A weekend in Dubai
Hi there!
Last weekend I headed to Dubai, UAE, where my coworker Arafat is working on his international rotation in our Nielsen office there.
I will preface this post by saying: there is only so much that can be captured about Dubai in words, but I will do my best. If you are not familiar with the United Arab Emirates, Dubai in particular, I would suggest reading a bit online. Dubai has been built literally from desert into a booming metropolis in the last few decades and there is no place quite like it!
As the plane was landing I noticed just how isolated Dubai really is. We flew over desert, more desert, and all of a sudden we landed in one of the most cosmopolitan places I have ever seen. The airport has projected hologram guides telling you where to proceed and everything inside was top of the line. When I arrived at the taxi station, I was directed to a pink cab, which is used for female travelers. In UAE they are very serious about keeping women safe. In fact, I think Dubai is the safest I have ever felt in a city. There is little to no crime, probably because the punishments are extremely severe. My lady cab driver and I drove to the Nielsen office in Sharjah, Dubai's next door neighbor. All of the cars on the road are either brand new or luxury cars and they travel at an insanely fast speed, unless there is traffic, of course! Even the cops drive Ferraris, Aston Martins, and Lamborghinis in Dubai. It's unreal.
Arafat met me and we worked from the office until the sunset and we walked around a beautiful lake to the hotel where he lives and where I booked a room. Another thing I learned about Sharjah is that it is technically illegal for a couple to stay in the same room/apartment if you're unmarried. Rather than risk being fined, I decided to book my own room just to be safe! We headed out for a night on the town in Dubai complete with the best shawarma I've ever had, hookah, and a glass of wine on the lake. Let me emphasize again that this shawarma (which I had twice by the end of the weekend) has forever ruined shawarma for me.
The fact that we found a place to have a glass of wine was a treat. Practicing Muslims do not drink and in Sharjah alcohol is banned altogether. Some nice restaurants and hotels in Dubai serve alcohol at a premium to cater to foreigners. What I noticed is that the ex-pat community in Dubai actually outnumbers the Emirati population. This is because many people flock to Dubai to work for a few years tax-free and then go home to their native country. There were people from all over the world wherever we went this weekend, and we had a fun guessing game of what country each person came from.
Friday is the weekend in Dubai, so we spent the morning visiting the biggest mall in the world. The Dubai mall has an aquarium, an ice skating rink, and a fountain that is four stories high. It also is home to any store or restaurant that you could dream of, including Chicago's own Garrett's Popcorn. There was more money in that mall than I can even fathom. Nearly everyone we saw was decked out in designer clothing with shopping bags from places like Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Cartier, and Rolex. Our morning of window shopping and people watching had us covering over five miles (thanks FitBit!) .
The mall is built around the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world. We went outside to snap some photos and stare in awe. I could barely fit the building in one photo even practically laying on the ground looking upwards! It is truly a marvelous sight.You'll notice in my photo below that there is a crane on the right side. I kept that in the frame because it is symbolic of all of the development going on in Dubai. Cranes dot the sky in Dubai next to almost every other skyscraper adding more floors, renovating, or building something new.
After the mall, we met a Nielsen colleague, Katia, and went to what's called "Global Village". It is a giant (noticing a trend here?) amusement park/fair that has markets for many countries around the world, bringing in vendors who sell goods. Dubai is one of the few places where this could be so authentic due to its large foreign communities. We visited, India, Turkey, Lebanon, Pakistan, Spain, Italy, France, Syria, China, Vietnam, Japan, Ghana, England, Germany, Thailand, and many more. Who knew that you could cover the entire world in just five hours? For dinner we dined on an old favorite of mine from Germany and a new cuisine to Arafat and Katia: Döner kebab! It's essentially shawarma with a Turkish/German twist and brought me back to time abroad there in high school. We headed home and were fast asleep well before midnight after our eventful day!
Saturday was my last day in Dubai and Arafat had planned something very special to close out my trip. We walked around the lake in the morning and visited a beautiful mosque, had lunch, and then embarked on a desert dune crashing safari. We were picked up and driven about an hour outside of Dubai into the Arabian Desert. Our guide reminded me of a character from The Hangover. Arafat had taken another female friend of his on this safari a few weeks ago, so the guide kept making reference to him being a ladies man. It was hilarious.
We went "dune crashing" in a huge Toyota SUV and our guide got a thrill every time I screamed bloody murder. If you don't know what dune crashing is please watch this video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeHdf42fnR0. It's terrifying, yet exhilarating and think I bruised Arafat's hand with my death grip. The guide stopped for us to watch camels and take photos before driving to our the final stop. We arrived at a camp site where we were greeted by camel rides, a belly dancer, and an Egyptian dance show. It was such a wonderful way to close my trip.
How many people are fortunate enough to experience a sunset camel ride in the Arabian Desert? I am so grateful to have had the chance to not only see Dubai, but to share the adventure with one of my closest colleagues.
I headed back to the hustle and bustle of Mumbai on Sunday and was delighted to find Shake Shack at my gate. I can neither confirm nor deny that I had cheese fries and a milkshake for breakfast before boarding. Check out some photos below!
Cheers,
B
View from my seat
At the Nielsen Dubai office
Life changing shawarma
Even the subway is impeccable
Fountain at the mall
Burj Khalifa
India in the Global Village
Mosque in Sharjah
Arabian Desert
Our guide
Camel ride into the sunset