My last rant on addresses

It is in my humble opinion, essential that a city, and the richest city in the world at that, have a proper mailing addressing system. Otherwise, it’s like trying to visit 2^nd Auntie, and having 3^rd Uncle shout from his house, “Turn right at the 4^th house from the 5^th corner, it is the 6^th house straight down!”

I know this place was a desert kampong 30 years ago, but didn’t most of Singapore start out as swamp kampong 40 years ago? Now, the typical post code is 6 digits long, and pinpoints the HDB block! This is a little island that doesn't exactly have a building fund in the form of petroleum underneath its weathered granite subsoil.

So where in the world, is one’s flat number decided by the watchman with his black (hopefully permanent) flat tip marker? Where in the world, do I have 2 streets with exactly the same name, one after another, right in front of my villa? Where in the world, does one need to triangulate one’s place of residence with positions of nearby school/malls just to apply for internet? (which they tell you takes 2 weeks, but I know people who have waited for 5 months..)

A place’s inertia to change is probably directly correlated to the relative abundance of its natural resources. I mean, mainstream Australia skipped the entire VCD phase of home entertainment, and went straight from video tapes (that’s right, video tapes were still prevalent in 1998!!) to DVDs. LDs were probably a rare sight there too.

And here, well, I’ll not be holding my breath. At least not whilst there’s still oil down there.

It's Raining

It’s raining.

And I thought the floods in Saudi Arabia were caused by global warming.

It’s raining.

There is a Creamfields concert tonight. Open Air. Great timing.

It’s raining.

The guys' been busy drying the pavement since.

It’s raining.

The drains are there, the water’s not going in.

It’s raining.

Are those bus stops designed only for 360 days of the year?

It’s raining.

Hope those poor bastards have an umbrella.

It’s raining.

It’s cold and windy, but I shouldn’t complain.

It’s raining.

It’s so Singapore, this wet and dreary day.

It’s raining.

Hope it doesn’t rain tomorrow. It’s the touch rugby finals.

Man, it’s raining.

I’ll miss this weather when it’s 48 degrees in summer!

Moonlight in Abu Dhabi

No, not some romantic moonlight dinner with W in the desert.

What happened is that I forced W to watch New Moon with me. Kinda my way of getting back at him for watching 2012 without me.

I must admit, I’d been drawn into the media hype over Twilight and had forgotten how the first installment nearly bored me to death in the cinema. I realize I am no fan of the teenage romance genre, with or without the vampire.

I much prefer blood and gore and plentiful special effects when I see a film with vampires and werewolves in them. Instead, the story here is about a girl suffering from depression, a boy growing into werewolf puberty, and a suicidal 130 year old vampire. Just in case the audience gets too bored, Victoria comes back to rustle things a bit, and the teenage werewolf gets to maul a vampire, which we the audience did not get to see.

However, if Twilight is like Underworld, it would have captured a lot less of the female audience, and the male audience - a sizable proportion of which were forced to watch it with their female partners. J

Nonetheless, the seat shifting, watch watching, back aching event in the cinema is mitigated by the experience of watching this teenage vampire flick in the midst of teenage Emirati girls.

I wonder if audience reaction to the topless male leads in the show is similar all over the world, but Taylors’new bod is very well received here. Every time he steps out with his 6 pack, screams are heard all over the cinema. Every time 2 characters kiss, screams are heard all over the cinema. The scene where Mr. Vampire Right decides to go topless as well, screams are heard all over the cinema. The 2 Emirati guys seated behind me shouted something in Arabic when the girls started screaming the nth time. I think it would be in the order of “Keep quiet!”

Rapturous applause and cheers emanated from the girls when Bella slaps one of the werewolf guys, and the 2 guys behind shouted something in Arabic again.

Should I be reading anything into this?

Arabian Nights

Arabian Nights must have been inspired by the nocturnal lifestyle of the region’s inhabitants. The Chinese medical advice of sleeping between 11pm and 1 am for good health definitely does not apply here. I think I’d fit right in, if only W is a nocturnal animal like myself, and if only his company allows for the split shift.

When we think of all night partying and siestas, we think of the Spanish. Well, apparently Arabs do the same thing here. I wonder if this has anything to do with the Moorish conquest of Spain, or just the unbearable summer heat.

Curfew hours for daughters here must be quite late, coz ladies all decked out in abayas are still sitting around in shopping malls at 2 am in the morning. And, imagine my surprise to see an Emirati couple pushing a stroller (in it, a fully awake toddler!!) enjoying a leisurely walk around the neighbourhood at 1 am in the morning!

12am, people are still sitting around the streets engrossed in conversation, 11 pm, just finished dinner and starting to enjoy some coffee. 10pm, restaurants are bustling with hungry diners. 9 pm, perhaps some quick shopping before getting a bite?

Just my kinda place.

Boxes

Go to the entry A Ramadan Moment for the prelude.

So, the aircon to the bedroom has hence expired and Massoud came again to fix it, and he did with a detailed verbal breakdown of the steps taken to fix the aircon. And as he headed towards the front door, he turned and asked if I will give him boxes if I am happy. I think I know what he wants, and I am sure I heard right this time.

"What is boxes? What language?" I asked as I gave him 10 dirhams.

"Arabic", he said, "You happy give boxes. I don't know English for this."

"Ah.. English is call Tips" I said.

Good Tidings

So the night before I am scheduled to fly back to Abu Dhabi, I decide to indulge in an all night internet rendezvous with er.. the high speed internet of my Singaporean nest. Kudos to the government for making Singapore broadband capital of Asia.

Anyways, deep into the latest Heroes episode online, I decide to surf around again and the latest Yahoo news buzzed up.. Dubai is not going to pay its debts!! Stock Markets are crashing!! Dubai is Broke!!

Ok, the construction industry guys in the UAE have known this all along, that contractors are not getting paid. Now its official.

I took a look at the Lian He Zao Bao (aka Chinese Straits Times of Singapore) the next morning and figures starting coming in... like Dubai World owes 50 odd billion dollars in debt, the whole of Dubai owes 80 billion, and Dubai was only able to secure a 5 billion loan from Abu Dhabi out of the 20 billion they wanted. And more about the lack of transparency of commerce in Dubai, and the fact that property prices fell by 50 % since last year..

Well with all this doom and gloom, I am glad W works in Abu Dhabi now..

So up I go onto my flight and arrived in Abu Dhabi in the evening. W and I went out for dinner at a nice Indian restaurant, we flipped though some newspapers and guess what the headlines of Gulf News were?

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It's been fun. Foreign news sources are readily available here, and a few days later, letters start streaming into the Financial Times (the writers with Arab sounding names) complaining about bias reporting from the western media on the state of Dubai's economy. And as stock markets recover, the local papers see a sign of renewed confidence in the potential of Dubai.

The UAE Minister of Economy is "surprised" at the global reaction to the re-structuring announcment, and debt restructuring (whatever that means) is absolutely normal in global business. The 5 billion bond was a great success and reflected the transparency of business transactions here. And indeed, the 4% interest is quite attractive.. (assuming that this is not going to get restructured as well)

Anyways, good news for the expat populations is that rent in Dubai is going down down down. Now if only I can talk W into driving 3 hours a day to live in Dubai and work in Abu Dhabi...