The City of Gold

The revolving door between consciousness and unconsciousness seems to be spinning faster and faster, and by now we’re running on pure adrenalin and caffeine.

After what feels like 3½ minutes’ sleep, we’re up again to embark on our ‘Dubai – City of Gold’ half day tour. Shower and get ready in times that would have us drug tested at the Olympic Games, before heading downstairs to hoover up the buffet again. It’s rather bizarre to be eating Indian food for breakfast, but the vegetable curry was simply too good to pass up. On top of porridge and fruit, it certainly makes for diversity of gastronomic experience. Now that we’re au fait with the tea situation, I’ve remembered to bring down a few bags of Irish Breakfast.

Today I meet an Australian man who is now living in Qatar with his wife – they’re living there because he has a job with an American university. They come to Dubai for weekends fairly regularly. He was very impressed when I told him about our Collingwood trip, and sympathised with me that we’d gone down to the Crows on the day. The fabulous thing about meeting Australians overseas is that everyone has a story to tell – if you wait and listen long enough, people will say the most fascinating things. He gave me some tips about what to see and what not to bother with, which was great. Each day we’ve managed to collect an assortment of people to talk to, and that has been just incredible.

We race out the door and down to the lobby to discover that, yet again, we’re the last to arrive. We are greeted by applause from our fellow travellers, in response to which we curtsey daintily. Comedians, the lot of them. Hop on the bus and meet our tour guide, Dominique, and our driver, Ragu. Off we go to collect some more people and begin our tour of the city.

Ahlan Wa Sahlan – Welcome to Dubai!

The thing that first strikes one about the city of Dubai is the sheer number of towers clawing their way into the sky. They’re all slightly different, but it’s just like Manhattan on steroids, and I can honestly say that it’s not all that attractive. There’s simply loads of them, without any obvious evidence of planning involved. Dominique told us that she'd been going past the camel racing track for ages each day on her tours and pointing it out to the tourists - then, she goes on holidays for three weeks, and when she returned, poof! The camel track had disappeared and was now a construction site. When we went past the site, there was evidence of something going on, but nobody knows what. Buildings just seem to spring up out of the ground overnight. As the old camel racing track was across the road from the Nadd Al Shiba racing track (where the world's richest horse race is run), there could be something planned to do with that, but again, nobody really knows until the thing is built. Just watch this space for a couple of days and see what comes up.

A girl could easily be forgiven for thinking that she hasn’t seen such an odd assortment of erections since the Canterbury Bulldogs last buck’s night at the Catwalk Club. It’s as though all the architects in Dubai have been taking Viagra whilst on a sex-ban. In between all of these glass erections appear mosques, which are built in the traditional form, and it creates a culture-clash juxtaposition of the old and the new. Quite bizarre to say the least. There are virtually no old buildings now in Dubai, aside from the very few that are preserved for cultural posterity. Everything is new and each week it seems as though it has to be bigger and better than it was the week before.

Apart from the buildings, there’s loads to see and we discover that Dubai has a fascinating history. It’s almost impossible to believe now that only 40-odd years ago, the people of Dubai were living in huts made from palm fronds and they were very poor, with little resources. As we gaze into the distance at the Burj Dubai (the world’s tallest building, still under construction – approximately 600 metres high at present with at least 250 metres to go) and the Burj Al-Arab (the famous 7-star hotel shaped like a sail), I think to myself that oil really is black gold. I’m thinking of the Beverly Hillbillies on a national scale. It’s astonishing, although I have a small chuckle to myself as I imagine Jed Clampett and Miss Daisy in a dishdash and abaya.

Driving through Jumeirah is just extraordinary and we pass all of the palaces of the royal family. The beachfront of Jumeirah is completely reserved for their palaces and nobody else is permitted to build there. Wouldn’t you just love to have that kind of pull that you can do whatever you like?

We stop outside the Madinat Jumeirah, a stunning resort containing 2 hotels, over 40 restaurants, 29 individual ‘summer houses’ and over 850 rooms and suites, all connected via a canal system. It’s often called Venice in Dubai and has been designed to resemble an Arabian citadel. It’s so gorgeous it almost defies competent description.

From the Madinat, there are excellent opportunities to take photos of the Burj Al-Arab, rising majestically in the background. Lots of snapping away happening, and we get a couple of great group photos taken as well. Unless one is staying at the Burj Al-Arab or has reservations for lunch, High Tea or dinner, one cannot simply roll up there and have a look around. I guess that’s the privilege of being a 7-star hotel.

We went to have an outside look at the Jumeirah Mosque, the only mosque in Dubai that is open to visitors, although at specific times on specific days. The mosque is an impressive looking building and it would have been lovely to see it inside, but it wasn’t to be for us.

We spent quite a lot of time in the Dubai Museum, which is really well worth a visit. So much to take in that you’d really need several hours there, but we whizzed through as quickly as we could. Just fascinating.

We also got to see the Bastakia, the old wind-towered houses which were the first solid houses to be constructed in Dubai. Only very few of the original houses remain, and they have been preserved for the purpose of cultural heritage. The wind towers were the predecessors to air-conditioning and the locals are obviously very proud of their achievements here.

We ended up taking an abra across Dubai Creek towards the souks. Travelling down the waterway was really interesting and reminded me in many ways of being in Hong Kong. We got to see all the old cargo boats unloading their wares – this is still done by hand, and amazingly, all the cargo sits on the docks (usually uncovered) for up to two or three weeks at a time, without anyone touching it. Crime in Dubai is almost non-existent, and one feels very safe there.

We arrive at the souk area and I can just feel my shopping genes literally jumping for joy at the anticipation of it all. I’m in the mood for some jewellery. First of all though we have to look at the spice souks, which are really colourful and exotic, but there’s not too much point in looking, as we can’t bring back any of the spices into Australia. It's a pity really, as we saw some large containers of saffron which would have been excellent to bring back and they were so cheap we could almost cry. Literally the tiniest fraction of the cost of saffron in Australia. If you've ever bought saffron, you'll know that you can only get it in containers the size of postage stamps and it costs about as much as a pair of shoes on sale.

We make our way into the gold souk as quickly as possible, and Dominique gives us some valuable tips about buying gold in Dubai. It’s almost like Race Around the World though, and as soon as she’s finished, we’re off and running up the street in search of some treasures. To do research here in the short time we have available would seriously send one mad, so we simply choose a shop that has attractive window displays of the kind of jewellery we’d like, and we go in. Very quickly find some things we’d like and start the negotiation process. Mary-Rita ends up being quite the haggler, and she gets a bracelet for a really good price. I’m after a bit more, and look at some diamonds and a couple of bracelets. As we’re short on time, I didn’t bargain as long and hard as I should have, but it’s all a bit late for that now. The shopkeeper tells me that it will only take 10-15 minutes to resize the ring I’ve bought. Of course he’s lying, the filthy swine and he keeps me waiting well past the time that we’re supposed to be back with the group. I jump up and down and get very cross until finally he says that they’ll bring the ring to the hotel later that afternoon. I’m flustered and cranky by the time we rejoin the group, but there wasn’t much to be done for it by then. I’ll tell you this though. I’m having all of the jewellery valued as soon as possible, and if it doesn’t come up to scratch, I’ll be plastering that swindling bastard’s name all over the internet. Of course if it does come up to par value, I’ll be just delighted and will recommend your man to all and sundry. Men really should learn that women are fickle creatures and you really don’t want to mess with us. We get ugly when provoked, particularly when jewellery and shoes are involved. Most women will happily commit murder for diamonds and shoes and not have a skerrick of a conscience about it - or is that just me? No, I'm sure my sisters will all agree that it's not.

Still fuming about that wretched jeweller, we make our way hastily back to the bus and trek back to the various hotels through Dubai’s appalling traffic, which seems to get thicker and slower by the minute. Just like men, actually when a girl stops to think about it. Arrive back at the hotel just in time to have a quick change of clothes and a spot to eat in our special private lounge.

Tonight, we’re off to the desert. Can’t wait for that one.