If you were to try to pick a place where I would spend much of my first day away, where would you guess? A museum? Some historic landmark? Passed out in the hostel?
You probably didn't pick a shopping centre, but so it came to be. And not just any shopping centre, but the imaginatively named Dubai Mall, the self-proclaimed biggest of its kind in the world. It probably was at the time it was built, but may have since lost the mantle; this might be what's motivating the big expansion project that's underway. It sits underneath the Burj Khalifa - an 800m, wax candle-shaped monstrosity that is by a considerable margin the world's tallest building and biggest over-compensation for [redacted on account of what are no doubt strict lèse-majesté laws in the UAE]. And the world's biggest building deserves to have the world's biggest shopping centre at its base. It's only fitting.
No, I didn't lose my mind in the course of 14 hours in Qantas custody. I passed much of the time watching season 4 of House of Cards. I'd pretty much given up on this show after the unwatchable and absurd third season. I could perhaps suspend disbelief that a serial killer became President, but the idea of a Democratic President running on a platform of dismantling entitlements and appointing his wife to a cabinet position despite losing a Senate vote was too much. That, of course, was before the age of keratin-enriched demagoguery in which we now live. Going along with surreal plots comes much more easily now.
Anyway. Dubai. I'd gone to the mall not to buy things but to see the Dubai Aquarium in the middle of the centre, which comes to the hyperbole party with what purports to be the world's biggest aquarium window (I'm pretty sure I've seen at least one, probably two bigger tanks at other aquaria, so no pressure Dubai but you're slipping). Zoos and aquaria will be a theme of this trip: they are the least public of my niche interests but I will be visiting a *lot* while I'm away. I won't write much about them on here, though.
The Dubai Mall and Burj Khalifa precinct comes with a sort of instant, pre-packaged faded glory, like a pair of unnecessarily expensive jeans (which can also be found here, if you're looking). Aside from the shops and the towers and the ice rink and the rest of it, the focal point is what amounts to a massive concrete swimming pool (two metres deep and complete with pool tiles) that features dancing fountains. There's a hotel across the water that's stylised as traditional Arabic architecture, but in the same way that Pixar stylises its human characters: they could easily have made it look more authentic, but they didn't lest they fall into the uncanny valley and tip off visitors that yes, they really are in the Middle East. It's not even an especially well-planned precinct: it's about a kilometre from the nearest train station, so the best fix they've come up with is for you walk down an immense long corridor equipped with travelators like the ones in airports.
Imagine that Southbank exchanged some DNA with Chadstone shopping centre, and then the resulting cells metastasised into something malignant. Las Vegas without the vice. Singapore without the good food. And yet, it seems to work for them. Most of the shoppers were tourists. I heard dozens of languages, from throughout Africa, Asia and Europe, and Dubai Mall genuinely felt like the gaudy, depressing successor to a Silk Road bazaar. I suspect, though, that it's less a global attraction than the only obvious thing to do in a stopover city. They'd best hope Emirates Airline doesn't have a couple of major crashes, or the caravanserai will move on to somewhere else that puts white water rafting or maybe gladiatorial combat in its malls instead.
I did find pockets of living, breathing culture to cluelessly insert myself into. On day two I headed inland to Al Ain, a city two hours south of Dubai from whence you can see Oman. Again, I was going to see a zoo but it was the bus ride there that's most memorable. Upon boarding the minibus and taking the first spare seat, I was greeted with intense stares from several of the men around me. At first I took them to be stunned by my presence as the only tourist on a service that clearly caters overwhelmingly to locals. Perhaps I was lost, but if so they certainly weren't going to tell me about it.
The stares were remarkably persistent, though, so eventually I looked up and saw a sign saying that I'd sat in a 'ladies only' seat. I hurriedly got up - there are also ladies only carriages on trains that carry hefty fines for men caught sitting in them, and for all I knew the bus was the same. Looking for somewhere else to sit, though, I found that the first spare seat also appeared to be the only spare seat.
Increasingly confused at what I was to do - I had a valid ticket, but was I going to have to get off the bus and wait an hour for the next one? - one of the men took pity on me. He folded out the armrest next to him, which wasn't an armrest at all but a seat that, once unfolded, took up the entire width of the aisle. The next man to board the bus then proceeded to unfold the seat in front of mine, and so the bus continued to fill up, leaving me progressively less capable of escape. Bad enough, but then the scheduled departure time came and went with no sign of the driver. Unable to go anywhere and seeking some reassurance that I wouldn't be stuck there indefinitely, I asked my kindly neighbour what was going on; the bus wouldn't be moving until every seat was taken, aisle and all.
Thankfully I was rescued by a burst of late passengers about 20 minutes later. Never have I been so grateful for an over-crowded bus. The ride itself could have been much worse, apart from a persistent groaning sound coming from the bus which was either caused by the driver constantly veering out of his lane onto those raised lane marking things, or by a problem with the brakes. Neither was overly reassuring but I chose to focus on what was going on out the window: it wasn't like I could do much about it without climbing over a couple of dozen men on a moving bus. And riding through the desert on a bus with no aisles was pleasant enough: half-finished high-rise towers were interspersed with sand dunes-turned-camel paddocks. George Miller could do worse for his next Mad Max filming location.
Questionable public transport options were something of a theme of the stay. I wanted an easy, light day three ahead of a stupidly early flight to Lisbon. So I spent the morning in the hostel pool (as one does on a typical Wednesday, no?) and ventured out in the afternoon. Plans went awry on the search for what is reputedly Dubai's best falafel. Dubai is... not the most walkable of places. It's all high rise buildings separated by ten lane freeways, so what I'd optimistically thought might be a 90 minute venture for lunch turned into about three hours by the time some dodgy train directions, a missed bus and incipient heat stroke worked their magic. I ultimately jumped on a bus back to the Dubai Mall, which was the complete opposite direction to what I needed, but was still worthwhile because at least I knew my way back into town, kilometre-long corridor and all.
It was past 5PM - only 12 hours before I had to be at the airport - before I made it to the Dubai Museum, one of three things I'd hoped to do that day (Jumeirah mosque didn't happen at all). The Museum is in an old fort, one of the oldest buildings in Dubai, and unfortunately the fort is itself the most interesting exhibit there. Leaving at about 6PM, I thought I'd probably run out of time to wander through the spice markets, which were just across on the wrong side of the river. But then I noticed that the map showed a 'ferry'.
I like ferries. I ride them whenever I get the chance in Sydney, just for the sake of riding ferries. But this was not a ferry. This was a wooden bench, maybe five metres long, with a hull and a tiller. You pay your dirham (about 40c) to the driver and walk along the edge of the boat to an empty spot on the bench, if you don't fall in first. And then you hold on while you get across the river. I'm glad I've made it out of Dubai because I'm not exactly which of these transport methods are covered by my insurance and which aren't.
The wooden bench with a hull attached put me back on dry land at what I took to be a cargo shipping terminal. That's fine, except it's pretty pointless to ask sailors from all over Asia for directions to somewhere they've never been. So I just wandered in what I thought might be the right direction. To be honest I'm not sure whether I found the 'spice souq' or not. I certainly passed a variety of spice shops, but also a lot of fabric, gold, electronics and other shops. It was the same sort of mid-20th century market I found in Singapore and Japan - all narrow lanes going in what must have been concentric circles for how long it took to find my way out. Even though I'm not sure where I was or why, it was perhaps the most satisfying hour I spent in Dubai, because at least it looked and felt like a real city.
Would I come back? Well, yes, I will be coming back because I have another 18 hour or so stopover here on my way home. But after that, probably not. Dubai is a city that wouldn't exist - at least not in its current form - without oil and a handy location in the middle of the world. That's not to say I didn't enjoy my three days: I actually did. But four, I suspect, will be enough.
Random observations:
- It killed me to be called 'boss' by some service workers or salespeople, when the only qualifier I have for the term is some disposable income to throw about. I'm not a guilt-ridden tourist but I do aspire to being a self-aware one. Money is power, and going to a place where you have a lot more of it than some of the people around you is the surest way to drive home that fact. It's an experience that should humble those of us fortunate enough to live in strong social democracies, but it could also go to the heads of some. Don't let it.
- Use of the 'ladies only' carriages varied greatly by ethnicity. I never saw an Arabic woman in a mixed-gender carriage without being accompanied my a man. South Asian women mostly used the segregated carriages as well. There were plenty of East Asian women using the mixed-gender carriages, but only a smattering of white women, and I guess many of the latter were using the ladies only part. The ethnic variations suggests that it's a mix of cultural conventions and safety concerns motivating their use. I'm interested to hear in comments, especially from my female friends and family, whether you'd welcome the same things in Australia.
- A bunch of train stations have been named after corporate sponsors. I recognised the names of the major bank, telco and currency exchange, among others. Nobody tell Matthew Guy or if he wins the next election he'll find a way to give away the Flinders Street naming rights to Lendlease.
No comments:
Post a Comment