Arabian Tales - Initial Visit

Previous article written on first visiting Abu Dhabi in summer 2010

The first thing that hits you in Abu Dhabi is the heat. We work out in the desert where it’s often 50°C. The sky is always blue, and the sun sears you as if you were a steak, as if your skin would sizzle and peel right off. The heat of their summer is like the cold of our winter – humans avoid it. 

Car awnings at Abu Dhabi Hotel

No one eats out on the patio, no one rides a motorbike, and no one goes to the beach. When you step outside the heat literally takes your breath away. No plug-ins here, but awnings grace the parking spaces; people rush to their cars and stand in the shade as the air conditioning cools them down. You know it’s hot when cloth seats burn you through your clothes.

It’s a black and white world. At least if you are Arab, and about 50% of the people I saw were. Men, almost all of them, wear white robes and headdresses, and women wear black. Some men (about 10%) wear a light colour such as yellow, lime or beige. 

Some women (about 10%) wear their scarves so they completely cover their faces, but most wear scarves to just cover their hair. There are lots of western-dressed men and women, and they look much like a day at the mall.

We ate halal food (Muslim prepared meat) and it was very good. Having arrived straight from the UK, definitely a pork-based society, it was a complete change. Breakfast was veal bacon and eggs with chicken sausage.

And it’s a gold service society. There is lots of imported labour from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Lebanon, etc. working on the building sites, driving cabs, and serving in restaurants. I realize this on my first morning when I go to breakfast. I sit down and the server comes to ask what I’d like, sir.

‘Coffee and I’ll just take the buffet…’

‘What would you like from the buffet, sir?’

‘Oh, isn’t it serve yourself?’

‘Yes, but I can get it for you if you tell me what you’d like…’

And so it was everywhere – ridiculously good service.

A guy from the UK who’d just moved there told me, ‘I was washing my car on Sunday when my neighbour walked by. ’

He said, ‘ Why are you doing that? ’

‘ I’m a Brit; we always like to wash our cars on Sunday…’

‘Why don’t you get someone to do it for you – I’ll give you the number of the guy that does mine? ’

‘No, I like to do it…’ The neighbour just shook his head in disbelief.

‘Wait till I start planting my garden!’

It’s green everywhere around the city. Strips of grass with equally spaced trees border the highways; our work site in the desert, a fenced military school, is lined with lawns, trees and flowers made possible through the liberal use of sprinklers. There’s a lush lawn at our hotel, and as we leave one day I see a guy out there in the middle of active sprinklers with a hose, spraying for all he’s worth. 

At night, green light illuminates the prayer towers (minarets) on each mosque, and there are mosques everywhere. Just like Christian buildings in the West, there are small modest ones almost on every corner, each with its own minaret, set to one side, from which the call to the faithful is made several times during the day. But there are also magnificent cathedral-like mosques, with many minarets. The Grand Mosque of Sheik Zayed in the centre of Abu Dhabi is a huge structure with many white domes and four minarets. It sits, gleaming white, and must be one of the most beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen.

It was my first trip to the Middle East and I was keen to see a camel up close – but I got more than I bargained for. Driving into the desert I saw a group of camels beside the road, shepherded by an old man, who through a series of awkward laughs and gestures, invited us to go over to them. As I reached out to touch one on its flank, it turned around as if to kiss me (I think!) – I only just got out of the way. And I can’t help thinking they were laughing at me. 

Fresh from the heat of the day, all you want is a cold beer. It’s a ‘dry’ society, but alcohol is freely available in all of the hotels where Westerners hang out, and there’s no shortage of cold beer. The restaurants in the hotels are good too, so it’s tempting not to foray into the city. But we went to the Lebanese Flower restaurant downtown – it also does take out, with people ordering from their cars, with servers running around taking their orders on little pads as they jam the street. It’s a popular place and the food was great. The guy that served us joked that his lime and mint drinks were laced with vodka; they were very good – and no hangover!