Yeah. Not stuck on traffic on the way to the airport, but actually stuck in traffic at the airport, in the shuttle bus to the plane.
I wish I took a video… people who would not let us in, drivers cursing at each other, you name it. Welcome to Doha.
So another great thing to do in Dubai is have friends who own a boat. Then you can bug them and somehow get them to get up at 5:30 in the morning for ‘fishing’. Of course they have fishing gear. Of course you will not catch anything. But if you’re lucky you see dolphins. Like quite a lot. And do fun stuff with the crazy 8.
So far my experience here with the police was good. Only the procedures are sometimes a little annoying (then again, I dont want to know how annoying they are in Germany…). But now I got surprised a little.
This morning when I was commuting, I had a chat with a colleague about the police, how friendly the Dubai police is as long as you stay calm and relaxed.
Then I got a text message from Dubai police saying I got fined on September 1st and need to pay 200 AED (50Euro). I didn’t really recall doing anything wrong (except for exceeding the speed limit by 20km/h probably…).
Then I checked it on the internet and found that:
And when paying it, another 10 AED ‘Knowledge Fee’ was added. Knowledge what? Are they teaching me a lesson?
“it’s how they recover their investment on IT”
Some funny ideas from our bill (numbers rounded for illustration purposes):
1 shawarma = 1 beer = 1 nuts
1 shisha = 3 beer = 3 nuts
1 nuts[!] = 12 AED = 3 EUR
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schafkopf
Another idea of life in Dubai.
On Thursday (which is the last working day in the week) you can first sip a Desert Donkey at Fume in Pier 7 (did you know that vodka, raspberry, coriander and chili make a grand cocktail?), then have dinner followed by a power nap before you cab to Media One Hotel to get into Level 41.
Of course there is someone who has a table behind the dj, so no admission and some drinks for (almost) free. Then again you get reminded that you’re in Dubai when you order 5 shots of tequila and are asked to pay 250 AED / 62,50 Euros. The music was cool but at some point the club seemed quite empty. As it turned out, all people went two levels up 41 levels down and then 43 levels up to get to Q43. When we wanted to follow them, we were not matching the entry criteria (couples / women). So we took some more free rides with the elevator. When leaving level 41 (it closes at 3pm), we had a really tasty hotdog (‘beef sausage, like in Germany!!’ ???) from an Irish guy. After that nothing much happened. Some rumors say a sort of parade on JBR happened but I didn’t get any confirmations for that.
On Friday you can do some shopping, cooking, eating before you invite way to many people to your apartment to eat & drink together. Who would have known that it would turn into a concert with a live acoustic guitar player (thanks!) using an some pill packing as improvised pick and a youtube dj showing that Bon Jovi actually had some really cool stuff. Ah and of course if you didn’t prepare enough food, your guests might end up ordering at burger fuel. The healthy burger of course – avocado, mango, no bun. However, avocado and mango could not be found and led to a huge investigation case.
On Saturday you can start cleaning your flat, do some cooking for everyone who couldn’t make it out of your apartment before you head off to a mixology session. So you learn how to mix cocktails and you can drink them – that’s what we expected. As it turns out, you are shown how to make 4 cocktails, before you can try to create one yourself (but they will pay a lot of attention that you really use that measuring glass!!). Since you could get 5 cocktails for 150 AED, it was a fair deal. And our group was really cool, thanks again for that. And I learned that every 5 star hotel actually has a wheelchair, in case someone gets sooooo tired that it’s easier to carry them out in a wheelchair. A wheelchair. Seriously?!?!? And no, just for the record: it wasn’t me.
So I invited some friends and went shopping for food. Took a cart because it was a little more than usual. I asked the packer guy whether I can take the cart.
‘No’.
‘Do you do delivery?’
‘Walking or car?’
‘Walking.’
‘Sure.’
‘How much is it?’
‘Nothing, I will come with you, no problem.’
It felt so wrong walking next to the guy pushing the cart. To my building. Into my building. Into the elevator. WTF?! Almost invited him to the party.
Aaah and for everyone asking ‘why can’t we have the same in our country?!’. Well it’s because of non-wage labour costs. This poor fellow earns probably nothing. Or a little more.