Other People's Stories

Normally, Harry and I have so many things to share with you we can't fit them into our time to blog. But recently we have heard a couple stories from other people we just have to share.

1. CSI Dobby

A lady Sadie knows from jazzercise class, Karen, had the following experience. She and her family were asleep one night on the second floor of their home when they were robbed. In the morning, once they realized the laptop, camera, and cell phones were gone, they called up the police. The policeman asked for their location, and Karen told him the neighborhood, compound name, and the landmarks (we don't have street addresses here). He said the cops were on the way.

Two hours later, Karen gets a call from said policeman. What neighborhood are you in? Where is your house? We can't find it. She gives him the same information again, hears a pause, and then, OK twenty minutes. An hour later she gets another call from the same guy. Where is your house? What neighborhood? She tells him again, and he says, why are you not outside looking for us? She informs him her husband has been waiting in the front yard for almost three hours. He says OK and finally the police team shows up half an hour later (this house is not in a remote area but in a well-known gated compound in the middle of the expat part of town).

Once the police finally arrived, after three hours of supposedly looking for the house, the investigation began in full force. As Karen put it, her house was swarmed by about fifteen men in their white Khandoras, looking for fingerprints, evidence, etc. Very CSI. None of them introduced themselves, so she and her husband just stood there until the guy in charge came up to ask them questions.

But this guy hardly spoke English. So he sent another guy off to find an English speaker. The "English" speaker arrived, listened to his boss, turned to Karen, opened his mouth to speak, and then said he could not translate and dashed off to get another "English" speaker. This process was repeated two more times until they got to the guy who could actually act as an interpreter for his boss.

So the questions begin, etc. And Karen is informed that the family all need to give samples of their fingerprints so the police can figure out who the thieves are. Karen says no problem, we will come to the station with you now. But no, this is not possible. Her husband and sons can go to the station. But for women, there is only one station in Dobby where women can give their fingerprints. It is on the other side of town in the middle of a major industrial area.

At this point, rather than losing her cool like I would, Karen calmly gets out her map and says, no problem, just show me where and I'll go this afternoon. The guy looks at the map, points to an area of about two square kilometers and says there. In Dobby, this is NOT specific enough. Karen could be lost for hours. So she politely asks, please, sir, what street? By what landmark? The guy looks at the map, calls a couple colleagues over, they look at the map, discuss, look at the map again. Then he turns to Karen and asks, how long have you been here? She is confused but replies, three years. And the fellow says, I have Italian friend. He has been here for one year and knows everywhere in Dobby. How can you not know where this police station is? And walks off.

If you are not already laughing, let me just point out, as Karen did to us: How audacious! This guy is a policeman, and he could not tell Karen how to get to the police station (this is after it took three hours for them to find her house)! Moreover, he had the balls to blame her for not learning where everything is in Dobby at the same time he could not point out where she needed to go. Poor chap--maybe he was just having a bad day.

2. Not Beautiful Enough for the Scarf

We had the pleasure of spending Christmas day with the friends of one of our friends (and Harry's colleague) having what I think was a "British" Christmas at a restaurant. The day was really nice, and we had the chance to get to know some people outside of the legal circles here in Dobby. One family spent six years living in Saudi Arabia--Riyadh--about ten years ago. And the wife/mother of this family had the following, hilarious, anecdote to share.

Mrs. P arrived in Saudi with her husband a couple years before the birth of their son. Saudi women are required to be completely covered, but Western women are required to wear the shayla, or black head-scarf only. Apparently there are morality police walking around everywhere enforcing these clothing requirements.

Now Mrs. P did not make a special effort to conform with the rules, carrying her scarf with her rather than wear it. This was common practice among her friends too. One day she was in a shop with her mates when a morality policeman came in, saw these ladies, and pointed at all of them except Mrs. P telling them to put on their scarves (which of course they did). Mrs. P was really excited that she "got away" with not having to put on her scarf. She continued to avoid wearing it and no one said anything to her for almot two years.

But during this time period, Mrs. P started to wonder, why are they not telling me to wear my scarf? After pondering this for some time, she came to the following conclusion: she was not beautiful enough to require covering. If the point of covering up is to prevent beautiful women from tempting men, then no one was asking her to cover up because she did not present any real threat of temptation. While we were all laughing at this somewhat rational but also completely ridiculous logical conclusion (Mrs. P is quite beautiful now, so she must have been a real babe then) Mrs. P pointed out that at the time she actually believed herself a bit.

So one day, when coming up an escalator into a market (and pregnant), a morality policeman spotted her from the top, pointed at her and yelled "scarf" ("hijab"). And Mrs. P said Yes! Laughed out loud, pulled out her scarf, and did a little dance up the rest of the escalator. This freaked the policeman out of course, but Mrs. P was finally content--now she was a beautiful, threatening temptation too!

Car Chronicles

Now that we cruise around in relative safety, I have started noticing more and more about our new home. The following short "postettes" chronicle some anecdotes and observations:

1. Impromptu Drive-Thru. I wish I could clearly communicate what it is like driving around so many Land Rovers, massive Mercs, and Land Cruisers. They are EVERYWHERE. That said, one Land Rover in particular is the subject at hand.

Now that it has been three months, I must admit I have my favorite coffee shops. One of them is in the swanky, European part of town (in reality there are many Gulf Arabs here too). This coffee shop is on a corner of a small street and major street, with a wide sidewalk on both the front and side.

I am sitting inside enjoying my coffee when I hear a screech--a Land Rover has just pulled up to the door, via the curb and the sidewalk ! With a local woman inside. She beckons the coffee-counter person, who comes dutifully running out.

Now this is a coffee shop. Not a drivethru Starbucks like we have in the US. It has windows, a normal door, and people WALK there on the sidewalk. But not today. The coffee-person makes the drinks, runs them out to the woman in the car, takes the money, runs the change back out. And the woman screeches off the sidewalk, through the parallel parked cars on the street, and on her merry way.

2. Jamal al-Junera. This same neighborhood is known for its white ladies with rich husbands who spend their days shopping. These ladies are affectionately known as Junera Janes. ( We live in a less-swanky part of town but Harry calls me Bur Dobby Betty). But this area has another, less advertised feature. It is also the hangout of Gulf Arab men, driving really nice Mercedes and SUVs, and wearing their crisp white Kandhoras. There are so many of them here that it's hard to find parking. So Harry and I have affectionately named them Jamal al-Juneras (the Al prefix in Arabic functions as "the", which is then used to form an adjective).

3. Landing up in La-La-Land. A most unfortunate feature of driving in Dobby is the frequent risk of starting off with a destination in mind, missing the one turn for that destination because you are in the wrong lane (even if you thought otherwise), and finding yourself in another emirate or city before you can turn around. For example, the neighboring city (about 15 kms away) is Shanda. It is on the other side of "old" Dobby. Shanda is not a destination. It was big in the eighties, but due to conservative social and business practices, has fallen far behind Aboo and Dobby.

However, twice for Sadie and once for Harry, Shanda has become an accidental destination, replacing the original destination of our favorite, Ikea (although it is NOT on the way or even nearby). At first we felt really frustrated, and a little ashamed about these terrible mix-ups. Then in the course of chatting with others we discovered landing up in Shanda has happened to everyone. At least once if not more. And it could be worse--one poor chap was on his way to a mall right in the center of Dobby, but ended up in Al-Ein, a tiny city about 100 kms from here.

So now we have perspective (and a new threat)--at least we have not ended up in Al-Ein!

The Legal Page

Every day we have the local paper hurled at our apartment door. While in my book it is quite a luxury to have the paper at my door when I step out, this perk is a bit diminished since I have to scrape together the sections into some semblance of a pile in order to read it. But scrape I do and first thing I turn to the national section, home to my favorite: the "court" column.

Before giving you samples from this column, first I must remind everyone that Dobby is in a Muslim country. It can be easy to forget that here when surrounded by so many non-Muslims, most of the time. Many Muslim sensibilities and values are very similar to those in other parts of the world. It is important to remember this basic fact. And some Muslim sensibilities and values are a little different than what we are used to in the West (although not so different from the subcontinent). One such difference involves ideas about appropriate dress and personal presentation--for both men and women. Another involves the possession of alcohol.

That said, the following article caught my eye the other day:

"Secretary 'stripped' to defer paying loan": a Philipina woman is accused of allowing two men to have sex with her. The two men in turn are accused of having "forceful sex" with her and possessing alcohol. I don't know the outcome, but the basic facts involved this woman owing money to her boss and his brother, and supposedly she offered sex in lieu of immediate payment. How is that for a storyline daytime soaps!

"Three men charged with Attempted Murder": This story may be familiar and is quite sad. A French teenage boy was tricked by a local Arab into getting a ride from school, and ended up being raped in the desert. While this guy and his accomplices were finally convicted of rape, it turned out the rapist has AIDS. So the local prosecution have brought a murder case against him. This is an example of non-differing values: it is possible he will be convicted of murder or attempted murder because he knowingly passed on the AIDS virus.

"Girl claims forced to have sex in car": Two local youngsters-16 year-old girl and 20 year-old guy are caught in the car in compromising positions. Now she is claiming he forced her into it. Both are also charged with possession of alcohol.

"Visitor gets jail, fine for carrying fake currency": A guy from Africa is caught with about $ 35K of fake dollars. He claimed he thought they were drawing papers. He was also charged with possession of alcohol.

"Man charged with Grabbing Women's Breast": and possessing alcohol. Apparently some guy grabbed a woman's breast in a mall or something, although the details are vague and it sounds like it might have been consensual. . . . .

And the list goes on. Sometimes entertaining, sometimes very serious, and always educational.

Eid, Christmas, and .........the Shopping Festival!!

Earlier on this blog we described the Muslim holiday of Eid (Eid-al-Fitr) that marks the end of Ramadan. Now it is time for "the other Eid," or "the Big Eid," more properly known as Eid-al-Adha. This second festival shares a figure with Christianity and Judiasm, as it commemorates Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Ismael for Allah.

Eid-al-Adha falls on the tenth day of the Hajj in Mecca, which I just learned begins about two months after the end of Ramadan. Because these holidays are tracked on a lunar calendar, they rotate through the different seasons on the Western calendar. This year, the Hajj and the Big Eid happen to coincide with the other major holidays in December (i.e. Christmas).

This Eid is a four day holiday, which is why it considered bigger than the three-day-Eid after Ramadan. As with the other, going to Eid prayers involves wearing your best duds, and sacrificing your best animals (modern translation: giving to charity). As was pointed out in an article I read, Ramadan and the two Eids fall on the same days every year according to the Muslim calendar. It's just our 365 day calendar that makes it appear to change.

But Eid is actually a bit invisible here in Dubai—especially to us non-Muslims. Sure, we all know we get three whole days off in the private sector! And we know there is a holiday because there are more tourists from the GCC than usual. (Plus the night before Eid started was declared a “dry” night so no booze was available in the bars.) However, lacking the decorative impact of Christmas, Eid seems a bit swallowed, apart from a few “Muslim” decorations in some of the malls.

Not so for Christmas! Christmas decorations are everywhere, although it is unlikely more than 3 percent of the population is Christian. All the malls have Christmas decorations. All the stores have Christmas stuff, including the grocery stores. We can get Italian Panetone, German Stollen, British Mice Pies, South African Christmas pudding, American cakes, and chocolates from everywhere just across the street. A few of our Indian friends even have Christmas trees.

Some of this is charming. Especially when interacting with a Muslim person at the bank, etc. and they wish us “Merry Christmas” followed by a shy little grin for getting it right (must have been part of the English lessons at school….). But some of it is actually disturbing. After all, this is a Muslim country. Has commercialized-Christmas really spread out so far as to take over the U.A.E. as well?

Here is the case in point: Dobby is becoming famous for its annual shopping festival. Supposedly people come from all over the world in December and January to shop, shop, shop till you drop in all the malls and souks. The gorgeous weather this month also attracts the tourists, as does a huge market with stalls from 150 countries that remains open for six straight weeks. Naturally, there are advertisements up everywhere for this festival. There are also lots of decorations on the major roads and landmarks.

And herein lies my concern. These decorations just happen to be green, red, white, and gold. Granted, green, red, and white are the colors of the U.A.E. flag. And National Day was only two weeks ago. But the shapes of the decorations are the source of my suspicion. While not openly Christmas symbols such as bells, branches, bows, etc. the decorations are ALMOST bells, bows, and branches, with nice curves and lines creating patterns that look kinda like bells and bows, etc.

When I brought this point up to some new friends, I was basically dismissed with a “those are for the shopping festival” (silly). But come on. This place is covered in Christmas symbols and decorations! Even the major flagpole (supposedly the largest in the world)! People just seem not to realize it…….

Dear Readers:

We are so sorry! The last four weeks have been very challenging with many things happening at once (internet access problems, setting up house, Sadie finding employment). As a result, we have a great backlog of stories to share with you. Please don't leave us :-). Our holidays are here and we are ready to write!