Dubai: Old Culture Meets New City

As I was flying around the world with Qantas, and they have recently changed their route, I missed out on returning to Singapore for a homeward stopover, and instead had the option to break my journey in Dubai. Something new? Why not! Plus, I loved the time I spent in the Middle East travelling through Egypt, and then overland from Cairo to Istanbul (a journey you would not now be able to do easily through some parts of Jordan or through Syria at all, sadly).

Ah - but there's the rub - for Dubai is nothing like the Middle East! Or perhaps that was the jetlag? It was an "overnight" 6 hour flight, where I think I managed only 30 minutes of sleep. So it's just as well that the magnificent temple that is Dubai International Airport (by the way - is this airport not air-conditioned? It was extremely hot and stuffy in there... or was that the jetlag?) had friendly staff and a very easy entry process (although confusing, as the need to purchase a visa on entry turned out to be a "free" visa, and is essentially just a matter of standing in any line - not necessarily the one that says "post-arrival visa" - and getting your passport stamped!).

Or was that just the jetlag confusing me?

Anyway, all this efficiency meant I arrived via taxi at my hotel around 9am - far too early to check in. So I sat in the lobby trying to work out what time my body thought it was (middle of the night!) and trying to stay awake with expensive coffee (around the equivalent of AUD $7.50!). Two hours later when the room was ready, I was ready to crash. I slept most of the afternoon (I know, always a bad way to handle jetlag - you should try and stay awake and go to bed early instead) and only surfaced long enough to have dinner in the hotel before going back to bed again, where I slept through the night also. So much for day one in Dubai. I only took two photos on my first day - the delightful stained glass windows in the lobby - as taken from the elevator a few floors up, and the magnificent and luxurious corner suite they gave me - part of the reason it was so easy to stay in the room... plus I was paying for internet access (only complementary in the lobby for 2 hours, and I'd used that up!).

At least I woke up on day two ready to squeeze in as much as I could in a day. Given that Dubai is a city of large building complexes set apart by freeways and temperatures too hot for pedestrians to do any significant walking out in the open, I thought I would try one of the hop-on-hop-off bus tours. My concierge directed me to the subway (love a city subway - these are so new and clean, and such fancy leather seats... oops! I seem to be in a "Gold Class" carriage... just as well it was only for one stop. After that, I took the "Ladies only" carriage. Just because I could!) and the nearest mall to buy tickets.

I booked on a combo night and day tour. But I wouldn't recommend it. I think if you can manage a hire car, then that is how the city has been designed to be viewed. The best part of the day tour was timing my visit to the Dubai Museum (in the Old Fort, which is the oldest building in the city - dating to around the 1790s) with a complementary one-hour walking tour of the souks.

Check out the Blog Gallery for a picture of the museum. It's quite extensive in that old-fashioned "we have lots of creepy posed mannequins dressed in traditional clothing" way - plus a stuffed camel (very popular photo point) and a stuffed goat (not so popular)! But I did learn a little about the seven emirate states that make up the UAE, and it was interesting to plot the development and progress of Dubai since the second world war.

I also love the photo of one of the nearby city's Mosques (sadly we did not visit it on the tour...) - and strangely I only heard the call to prayer once while I was in Dubai.

But back to the tour - I was quite excited by its itinerary- we were promised mosques, the Old Souk, plus the spice souk and the gold souk, as well as a river crossing in a traditional abra.

OLD souk? I think it dates from the 1970s! Of course I've been spoiled by Khan el-Khalili (Cairo), as well as the souks in Damascus, Aleppo, and Istanbul. As a cultural experience I'm afraid this just didn't compare (my photo shows the WHOLE length of the souk, by the way!).

We did pass, however, by a really ornate and lovely Mosque. Apparently the real mosque was the plain one opposite it (which I didn't even bother to photograph, it was so uninteresting!), and this is only used on special occasions! Gorgeous tiles, though!

Our guide also took us through little India (it seemed to me that the workforce in Dubai was either Indian or Filippino - our tour guides being the latter!), but it was shut for siesta... as was the textiles market. :-( Where have I heard that before? The boat trip, along part of the Dubai creek was great though, revealing many old dhows that had come all the way (as they have for centuries) from India and Africa to trade, and it was quite refreshing to be on the water.

And we got free samples at the spice market - I tried (and bought) some camel milk chocolate (looks like coloured pebbles for a fishtank!). The family has been nibbling away at it since my return. The spices always make for interesting pictures. They did tell us what all of these were - but I can't for the life of me remember any other than the dried limes, and dried smoked limes at the left - and cinnamon at the back... there might have been some myrrh or frankincense too?

The obligatory dates were handed around to try, although I was only one of two people willing to try a saffron and cinnamon tea (anything with cinnamon and I'm in!). There is a sugar cube at the bottom, and you use your cinnamon stick to mush it up into the saffron. I thought it tasted fine. Kind of like saffron and cinnamon and sugar... I was told it was a calming and relaxing tea. I was too hot to disagree - or was that the tea at work? Perhaps it was the jetlag...

Our last stop was the gold souk, which is very sparkly (and very quickly snapped - there wasn't much time to stop on the tour - strictly no shopping allowed!). Although we did pause to see the Guinness Book's largest ring (around 5kg from memory). It's not a real diamond, by the way! ;-)

But clearly, this is a bygone era in shopping and not how most people shop these days in Dubai. No, Dubai is all about the malls, and there are plenty of them.

Although I could not get the day and night tour itineraries to combine the old city tour and a trip out to the couple of malls and the beach and ensure I was back in time to catch the night bus from the city again (the route kind of went backwards for my needs... always the left-hander, hey?). So I ended up using my public transport card to take the more direct subway route out to see at least one of the malls and back again in time for the night tour.

I picked the Mall of the Emirates, although older and not as trendy as the Mall of Dubai, I was intrigued to see its ski slope inside! Who says a desert environment should cramp your winter style? ;-) And on the way, I actually got better views of the surrounds from the Subway (which becomes elevated outside of the CBD).

But all in all, the bus tour was disappointing, really. I was tired and hot (after Europe's cold weather) and wanted to mostly sit down in air conditioning for the day. That was really why I picked this option. The commentary recording was okay and informative, but it's impossible to take even half way reasonable photos on these things. I liked the architectural contrast of the one accompanying this blog entry (no idea where I was!).

And so, the night tour. Oh dear. The night tour...

It was freezing even when the wind wasn't blowing. Many people left the top deck and went downstairs to try and stay warm. The microphone stopped working half way through the trip, which frankly was a blessing, as I was getting tired of the "I am only kidding" punch lines of our guide... The commentary mostly consisted of... here's a five star hotel, and here's another five star hotel! On that vacant lot... they will build a five star hotel!

For 90 minutes of this torture, I have barely two photos to show.

The first is of Burj al-Arab - the world's tallest building. This was extremely difficult to photograph from a moving bus at night while shivering (difficulty level 11!). Whenever the bus actually stopped, there was always a street light in the way! My camera roll has many, many blurry or over-exposed shots of this iconic building.

The second is of the night skyline - not as good an opportunity as the photo crossing back from the palm islands... but I was on the wrong side of the bus and rather over it all by then. So, I am afraid the one I've included in the Blog Gallery will have to suffice (note the pesky lamps that interfere with bus-top viewing!).

I think Dubai is a lie-by-the-pool-go-buy-more-designer-bathers sort of place. I kind of expected this, but was hoping the old town would provide some alternative, but it just wasn't old enough for me. The food was great, though, in the restaurants I tried (Indian and Japanese). But I was seriously travel weary, and about to come down with a terrible head cold that awaited my return to Melbourne. The irony is I was trying to use this stop to help me overcome the time differences between Europe and Australia.

So in the end, it was all about the jetlag...

I will do a wrap up post to finish my very lengthy travel tales. Thank you to all those who have given me feedback about the blog. Glad you could share the journey with me!

One more to go... Aveline. xxx