Click on text all_dubai above to see more pictures
So here I am,
embarking on a two month adventure, spanning 3 continents, multiple cities, involving planes, trains, and automobiles, and I’m wondering to myself, Why am I going?
In short the answer to that question is; “Because I can”!
My flight to Dubai !
I never complain about flying since I have seen Louie CK`s little interview about flying and although hysterical, it has a true lesson as well http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r1CZTLk-Gk
So without complaining, I managed to make a 16 hour flight go by pretty fast and uneventful. There was a bit of awkwardness after I started making up stories and lying about who I am and what I do, when the passengers started meeting each other in the back of the plane. You see the two Iranian married women sitting next to me were under the impression that I was a fortune teller, mostly because that’s what I told them, and the flight attendants knew that I was a special interrogator for the Justice Department that is trained in identifying lying (ironically) in terrorist suspects. I can identify most of the ten thousand muscles in a person’s face that make up emotion and was flying to Dubai on a secret mission involving the rendition of suspects from South Africa, specifically Angola (bullshit is all in the details) The confusion happened when they all met in the back and the Iranians wanted more insight into their future, and I had to explain to the flight attendants that reading fortunes is part of basic training, and psychology, psychics, and lying, have been overlapping and going hand in hand for thousands of years. The Iranians were extremely excited when they found out that they will be having children this year, getting very rich, and will run into a person that was going to change their lives within the next fifteen days.
On the bright side, my flight did not include any racial profiling, or I would still be back in LA. Flying with a plane full of people that are ethically against deodorant, has its advantages. Mostly, by making you more of a patriot!
Every city has its energy, even in America the major cities have a feel of what people are looking for, and what they think will make them happy, and that energy is dominant. New York is all about the money, LA is all about the fame, Washington DC is all about the power, Miami is all about the sex, and Las Vegas is all about greed. Every other city has a mix of all of those things.
Dubai is unlike any other city in the world. It is a city of excess, and riches, but it has no energy and no soul. Twelve percent of this city is actually local, the rest are transplants. This city was built on the backs of foreign laborers and it is reminiscent of the Pyramids, built on the blood and sweat of slaves. The owners of this country are like absentee landlords, they built a country and city and they just stay hands off, you don’t see any Police or authority anywhere yet this has one of the lowest crime rates in the world. Say what you want about Authoritarian rule, but it works!
I was looking for a place to go out my first night and I spent hours being chauffeured around to different bars and clubs that were essentially brothels that serve alcohol and play music. Even the Hyatt club was a room full of working girls, with guys just walking around picking them out and acting, like a hungry person at a buffet line: trying to balance the need to get your money’s worth, get satisfied, try something new, not gain weight or make yourself sick, but you always walk away stuffed and full,
yet full of regret.
I will try to describe my days so far. Took a bus ride around the city stopping at the most amazing hotels and malls in the world, went to the beach, the man made islands called “the world” visited the Atlantis resort modeled after the actual island, rode the Metro, got drunk, stopped at five nightclubs, made friends with four different hookers, took on the role of their pimp, met people from almost everywhere in the world, ended up befriending the manager of one of the clubs and have plans to spend the day with her on Wednesday along with four different simultaneous plans for that day with four different people, while being booked on an all-day safari in the dessert.
Two notable things that stood out to me and you can see it in the videos attached; The first thing was the prayer over the loudspeaker in the Emirates mall. The contrast and the attempt at fusing the most luxurious brand name stores and insane opulent while maintaining a religious mandatory mosque like prayer was ridiculous. It was very necessary to interrupt the consumerism, the gluttony, the purchasing of designer clothing and Bentleys to pray. But in hindsight it may be the way to go since it looks like all their prayers are being answered.
The second thing was that they have the main beaches on Monday strictly for woman, separate beaches in a country is definitely different.
The head to toe Burkas or Hijabs is a spectacle in itself. You cannot tell their expressions at all, and since 90% of communication is facial expression, they are stuck in a self-imposed personal prison, locked away from the world in their own form of a costume.