DUBAI Mon, June 10, 2013

            Did you see “Lawrence of Arabia” years ago? In your mind call up miles of yellow sand, men in flowing white robes, Arab tents and lots of camels.

            Fifty years ago this is what the modern state of Dubai was like. Not anymore though. Dubai is probably the most modern city in the world. Lots of skyscrapers – including the tallest building in the world. That is, at the moment. Other places a planning to overtake it in the near future.  But now the needle top of the current Baj  ?  stands above the crenulated  peaks of the other towers of the new city.

            What made the sudden difference? OIL! Oil was discovered in the Emirate of Dubai in the early 1960s. Previous to this there was a local fishing village with an old local market place, so the local industries were fishing and trade.

            When we docked at the wharf in Port Rahid the sight of the tall skyscrapers was overwhelming, and I no longer thought of the sand that had piled along the approaches. Here everything was modern. Eight lane highways, shiney modern cars. Plenty of trees and grassy green verges everywhere. Flowers on the sidewalks and vivid flowers on the flame trees along roads. Not a camel in sight. Where had the ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ landscape gone?

            Sheik Said bin Maktroum, his son and grandsons were far-seeing about the oil. They invited in the wisest economists, architects, engineers and planners of the world to use their oil money to build a new Dubai. They established a sound economy with international trade and local manufacture based on oil products and by-products.  Oil, they knew, would run out. So they planned and used the money for the future.

            They shared the oil-money with their people with free health schemes, free education –even free housing for locals. “Locals” meaning original Dubai citizens who make up only 20% of the population today. The other 80% are ‘foreigners’ who supply the bulk of the workforce. While you work you are welcome in Dubai. There is no taxation. You rent your home. Foreigners could technically buy a home but few could afford the upwards of A$1 million. Foreign companies are welcome to invest in buildings and projects.

            There are beautifully designed golden stone mosques everywhere with their mesuin towers reaching up to the sky. Our guide said it was the idea to have two mosques to each suburban area so people could walk easily to pray five times a day at the mosque if they chose to.

            We visited the ‘gold souk’ – a street and area of small old shops famous for the trade in gold and precious metals/jewellery. The ‘souk’ is a market place or area where similar goods are traded. Most are still the old fashioned ‘local’ small shops – not modern market places.  Though there are several of these with thousands of shops under the one roof, so to speak. We did think of taking a local shuttle to one of these when we got back to the ship from our local tour, but by then we were too worn out by the heat (40degrees and dry) and the extent and variety of modern Dubai.

            Other interesting things we learnt from Ahmad, our guide, who had moved to Dubai from Morocco seventeen years ago with wife and family:

·      Women have equal rights with the men – except a woman can never inherit being sheik.

·      Women drive cars and move around freely

·      'Local’ men are easily identified by their white flowing robes and head turbans – a cool form of dress from their desert dwelling forebears.    Think ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ here

·      ‘Local’ women wear black (must be very hot!)

·      The other 80% choose their own form of dress.  There’s a special ‘souk’ of shops with lots of brightly coloured fabrics on show. The men planting flowers along the footpaths wore green uniforms and must have been hot. They looked as if they were Indian or Pakistani, so may have been used to the heat.

·      The beach area we visited looked like a normal beach with people ‘sunbaking’ and swimming. Maybe tourists? Or local ‘foreigners’ ? There is a special beach for ‘women only’ where they can swim in privacy.

·      In one of the big ‘malls’ there is a ‘ski’ area complete with snow. You can burn to a crisp on a beach in 40degrees in the morning and visit the snow in the afternoon.

·      Our guide told us there was complete freedom of religion with other churches scattered around Dubai. I guess this was as long as you didn’t try to convert any of the Muslim population to your religion

·      Everywhere was immaculately clean. Men in orange uniforms picked up any rubbish around, and swept up the sand in gutters.

·      Our guide said there were penalties for littering, and crime of any kind was viewed very seriously. Death penalties applied for things like drugs.

·      We saw no police anywhere, in spite of this. Though all the buses and taxis had signs which said “Am I driving safely? If not please ring . . . .’  or ‘email . . .’

·      It may rain twice a year, with no more than 10cms a year. All the water for drinking and watering all the greenery is from the sea, through several large desalination plants.  The seasons are ‘hot dry summer’ and ‘hot dry winter’.

Dubai is one of seven Emirates who have joined together to form one nation of the United Arab Emirates, of which the capital is Abu Dhabi. Each is governed by a Sheik with inherited power, and States differ in their approach to modern development. The total population of the U.A.E.  is about four and a half million people – less than Sydney.