In Dubai: Episode 6 - On the trail of a Tangierine

Ibn Battuta Mall

Some imagined impulse born out of a love for travel, travelers and travel writing in general had led me to blurt out Ibn Battuta Mall when SM had queried me as to where I wished to go after the planned itineraries came to an end. Before departure that noon, we had walked to nearby Ansar Gallery, a two-floor convenience mart stocked with everything imaginable that had us singing to the tune of ‘ah, life abroad’. Given this and the general overabundance of malls in our trip (I’m not sure as to how this can be avoided in Dubai), I fear this could turn out to be yet another one. To top it all, it is a long way between the respective metro stations – 33 kms. As such, it isn’t so much with expectation as with uncertainty that I venture Ibn Battuta Mall.

Outside the bus station next to the mall, we are joined by the hot sun afternoon sun that is a harbinger of things to come in summer, and Pushpa, whose school happens to be nearby. From here, buses depart for Abu Dhabi (100 km) where the Al Nahyan family reigns. Cousins in the larger sense, these two families constitute the most powerful of the six families of the UAE, perhaps even the ten families of the Persian Gulf. That sentence reads like it should be in The Godfather. Nearing the outskirts of Dubai with only Jebel Ali ahead, the Battuta Mall feels like a link between the two Emirates and that is just the kind of arrangement the Moroccan traveler wouldn’t have minded as part of his considerable legacy.

At first, the mall seems to be a strange way to pay tribute to a traveller of legions. Custom dictates that a monument should be its own justification, and the subject it commemorates, the sole draw. A shopping mall will inevitable reduce a towering subject like Battuta to the side-lines. In the few hours we are inside the mall, it does seem so. Nearly everyone seems to walk on without casting the slightest glance at the considerable interior décor. Pa and I do the opposite, wilfully ignoring the stores, going over every piece of work with deliberation. The layout of the mall is divided into sections that feature the various courts – India during the Sultanate, China under the Mongols to name two – which Battuta visited. The motifs are broad though, only loosely evoking the region. For instance, the Egypt court has the insignia and relief art associated with Pharaonic Egypt – jars, implements, animals, and human figures standing sideways in hierarchical proportion.

Walking through Tunisia Court could well be like strolling through the streets of a Maghreb town. The ceiling has been plastered with sky wallpaper, palm trees and street lamps have been installed at corners that have been recreated in the manner of the narrow, winding streets of a trading outpost. Only instead of a bedlam of fish vendors and boulangeries, we have all the attributes of the modern mall. Ma is especially enthralled by the evening bazaar-like scene that is created. Here, even brand names and store facades lose the banal, whitewashed and antiseptic look that is their characteristic, acquiring something of the quality of a little mama store. What is more, brands don’t dominate here either. Petit stalls chaperoned by women are full of curios, knickknacks and the like. Some of the better souvenirs I have seen on the trip are to be found here, atleast as far as malls are concerned.

We pass through other galleries – the Andalusia Court is replete with astronomic and scientific exhibits that speak of a more enlightened state of affairs in that part of the world before the Reconquista – the India Court is dispiritingly unoriginal with the obligatory elephant, craftsmen and palanquins – before arriving at the Persia Court. Its centrepiece, under an ornate dome with a geometrically patterned decoration that is early Islam’s signature, happens to be where Starbucks has put up shop. Around the coffee shop are exhibits displayed in the form of a miniature gallery. Thoughtfully assembled, they offer much to muse about the world at large during Battuta’s time and now. Ma and Pushpa, spent from a lot of walking, have found chairs. Pa is nowhere to be found for a few fleeting moments. Head still reeling from the sheer brilliance of the Moroccan’s exploits, I am nevertheless struck yet again by how the old is evoked through the new in Dubai. When a young Lebanese couple ask for directions to the Tunisia Court, all I can muster is a dazed smile. 

In Dubai: Episode 5 - In the company of Titans

Burj Khalifa and Dubai Mall

SM and Pushpa’s balcony looks out to a shimmer of skyscrapers that dot the business and financial district of Dubai. Among them is the incongruously tall Burj Khalifa (Tower of the Caliph). We have been looking at it on and off for three days now. It is the key fixture in our morning and nightly Darshans from the balcony, not entirely unlike a towering South India Gopuram (temple tower) whose glimpse is sought from the comfort of one’s home. During the many drives through the city, it is a constant feature of the Dubai skyline. My first impression is one of absurdity; it seems an impossibly high construction that makes a beeline for the heavens. In its ambition more than design, it reminds me of the Tower of Babel (Burj Babil in Arabic) of Biblical legend. The Book of Jubilees mentions the Tower as being 2.5 kilometres high making it thrice as tall as the 828 m high Burj. This is among the more conservative of the various estimates for the height of the ancient tower! The Burj is ambitious enough for our time; the world’s tallest man-made structure of any kind. 

Our plan is to ride the elevator to the top of the Burj and spend some time savouring the views. The tourist entry to the building is contiguous with the Dubai Mall, the world’s largest shopping mall. It seems uncanny that a horizontal behemoth should share a complex with a vertical titan, almost as if the Blue Whale were somehow conjoined with the Godzilla. Pushpa can’t accompany us to the top despite being with us at the Mall owing to cancellations in her teaching schedule. Tickets have to be reserved in advance for the trip to the top, quite amazing considering the holiday season is behind us and it is a Monday. We have 5 tickets, and are compelled to leave her at a coffee shop within the Mall.

The first part of our tour consists of navigating a series of numerical claims for the Burj, displayed in exhibits and virtual screens along the approach that is elaborate and serpentine enough to generate excitement without constituting too much of a wait. When we eventually reach the elevator, there is a short wait while we are told that the elevator to the observation deck is a novelty in itself, clocking a top speed of 36 kmph and speeding to the 124^th floor (~450 m) in less than a minute.

Inside the speeding elevator, ears pop as the pressure drops. We are a sensitive family when it comes to the ear; rapid aircraft descents usually mean conversations after landing are laboured with everyone having to repeat everything atleast twice. Here, Ma’s grimace suggests she feels the pinch more than the rest of us. Shortly, the doors open and we step out on to the observation deck. A 360 degree viewing space, the deck floor consists of wooden planks that make slight but rhythmic plonking sounds as people walk about. It is roomy enough for a 100 people or so without feeling crowded. The first few minutes are spent looking at the views and clicking photographs. There is much to take in for geography enthusiasts; the Creek in particular is revealed in all its complexity.

The euphoria of where we are and what lies outside lasts a while, perhaps twenty minutes. Strolling around and looking at the goings-on within the deck yields a mixed bag. Expensive souvenirs are being sold at a counter with few takers, unsurprisingly. At another corner, there is worrying evidence of Hollywood having colonized a landmark barely three years after its baptism. Tom Cruise’s jaw-dropping stunts in MI-4 find their touristy reinforcement here through posed photographs against a dark background in empty kiosks. They are later photoshopped to show the tourist in the act of climbing the Burj. While I am a fan of the movie and its innovative sequence centred on the Khalifa, I wish this sort of thing didn’t happen although it seems inevitable given Dubai’s tourist ambitions. In the end, it is only yet another in a series of activities created out of seemingly nothing. Perhaps a pokerfaced witticism is called for from Simon Pegg!

Ma prods me to look at two people seated on the floor next to each other, wearing cardigans with the hood over their heads, their backs against a support and their legs stretched out. One appears to be a Chinese man; the other seems vaguely like a Caucasian woman. Each is writing something; a closer glance reveals postcards. A few feet away is a little girl, probably Arabic, trying earnestly to capture some minutiae on the floor on her camera. There are others seemingly lost in thought, looking nowhere in particular. I don’t notice it at first but soon it seems more eyes and cameras are turning inwards. Perhaps, having tired of the views, they now feel drawn to the drawn-out countenances that faces are gradually acquiring. Could it be that taking in vast panoramic sweeps stretches the eyes in a way they are unaccustomed to! One camera hover inches from a face almost as if trying to record a specific glint in the eye. The whole thing has played out like a well-sequenced inversion of the tourist glance. Now people are both the focus and the backdrop; the view has been reduced to a prop.

                                                                                                                                            

Back on terra firma, the Dubai Mall beckons. There are a few things to this mall besides its size. For one, the promoters have deliberately shunned any attempt at ornate sobriquets for its various sights. The mall’s plainly definitive name is a clue as to what awaits one inside. A section recreating the Arabic Souq is called The Souq (market). A waterfall spanning three floors with male figurines in diving repose at various heights is simply titled The Waterfall.  The world’s largest choreographed fountain is within a lake (yes!) in the premises of the mall. There are no prizes for guessing the name. The definitives have a purpose – the powers that be would rather that we didn’t fuss about with qualifiers. Malls per se are monuments to consumerism; the Dubai Mall seems like a veritable temple-museum.

Cams’ trip has reached its end and she is to leave for Copenhagen that night. Outside Terminal 2 at the airport, we are in jest about how a three-day trip means she needn’t lose the jet lag acquired on the flight to Dubai. It is another ten hours for her with a stopover at Doha. We meanwhile, have a comparatively pedestrian three-hour flight back to Mumbai. Cams is warm and efficient with her byes, a quality only enhanced in recent years. We return home by the metro; the two remaining days in the trip appear laced with uncertainty. 

In Dubai: Episode 4 - What Maketh a Metropolis

Dubai Bus Tour and Dhow Cruise

The third day involves something I can’t recall having done in more than a decade – an arranged bus tour. We have steered clear of that sort of thing through my formative years, shaping my own ideas of what a trip should be. Oddly enough, when something is truly sparse, it becomes somewhat novel again and there is a palpable sense of excitement. When we leave, it dawns on me that we are already used to the convenience of being picked up outside the apartment in roomy taxis. It is no different this time with a minivan.

After being transferred to a bus, we learn that our tour guide is a fella going by the functional, diminutive name of Ali. Are all tour guides in this part of the world usually called Ali?! Granted that it lends itself with immediacy to convenience but wouldn’t it be wonderful for a guide to introduce himself with the full Islamic glory of a name such as Abu ʿAbdallah Muḥammad ibn ʿAbdallah Il-lawati ṭ-Ṭanǧi Ibn Battuta (more on him later) and then perhaps add, it is my very good honour to meet you and you may call me Abu?!

In his twenties, Ali is stocky with wry eyes and a sardonic smile that he uses to close out sentences. It is the kind which makes me feel that the tourist cliché has been reinforced multiple times back and forth, almost as if to suggest that he knows we know he knows that the bus tour is, all things said, only routine. Even his weariness seems practised; he seems capable of conveying its specific tonality on a different day to a different group. He might be the very embodiment of the bored tourist guide, with no hint of a flourish or a bravura touch to what is admittedly a difficult job to plough through day in and day out. It is one made more difficult by us tourists. During the tour, Ali keeps throwing questions offhand at us, albeit in a voice that suggests clinical boredom. More often than not, he gets no response. It is difficult to assign blame to a situation like this. Typically, an audience responds to its performer and a cheery one should get some response if not reciprocated cheeriness. It is also fair to say that even the most cheerful guides must come to feel dismayed by continual lack of reciprocation. Eventually, Ali, like all people who learn to perform such jobs with dutiful detachment, has pared the work down to its bare essentials. For our part, as tourists, we have rationed our gratitude to the minimal in that we thank a professional, not a performer, someone reeling off factoids and not a storyteller.

                                                                                                                              

Given the introductory function of the tour, we are given fairly strict time slices at most places. In this regard, Ali is good at conveying a sense of discipline and urgency. The Dubai Museum, meriting a couple of hours, is to be galloped through in 20 minutes and yet we aren’t left feeling morose at such a rushed pace for this is meant to be a sampling exercise. People respond, out of understanding or indifference I am unable to say, but with a delay of only 10 minutes, we are off for a drive through Jumeirah, an uptown district that is as elite as they come.

The bus is being driven andante in marked contrast to the Metro ride that zips past the towers of the business district. Neatly spaced plots housing identical residences line the sides of the arterial road. They bear the Islamic stamp of being miniature fortresses; no prying glance penetrates the facade. A sheet of haze that day clothes them in a layer of indistinctiveness, making one doubt their mooring in reality, enhancing the air of exclusivity of the place. When we halt briefly at Jumeirah Beach, the haze becomes strong enough to render a close view of the Burj Al Arab (The Arab Tower) rather like a ghost ship. Built to resemble the sail of a dhow, it appears as a giant white corsair from the Golden Age of Piracy, captured in the moment of gingerly absconding from shore.

In sum, it is an arrangement that I think works well for a bus tour – passing by to register impressions and never staying to cement them.

This part of the tour culminates in a drive through the Palm Jumeirah, the only completed Palm project out of three planned ones. Going by Google Maps though, all three have a more completed look. That said, even the Jumeirah project has parts that are work in progress, an idea that is the city itself in a nutshell. Cams is quick to phrase it thus – “SM, how does it feel to live in a city that is always under construction?” By under construction, she is referring to the notion of being a work in progress perpetually. While this is true of any city in its growth phrase, Dubai and Abu Dhabi, to name but two, have captured the popular imagination in our time because they are current examples of a search that has been on ever since people began living in mass agglomerations – the search for the perfect metropolis.

Cities can be written about in the manner of a photograph; a certain place at a certain moment in time. Paul Theroux channels a related idea in The Great Railway Bazaar when he says some places have a specific orientation with time. I should like to add the qualifier that over specific time periods, they do. Wind Dubai’s clock seven years back and the snapshot would have been unambiguously oriented towards the future. Go back twenty years and it must have been the same. Since 2008 though, with the recession having taken its toll and the pace of progress having slowed, the time-capture today must reveal a dimmer sense of entitlement to the future. Evidence as to this can be seen in the Government’s response to the 2013 resurgence when real estate prices began picking up again. Property Transfer fees have been increased and regulatory tightening done to prevent a speculation-driven bubble. From this cautionary tale emerges the sense of a city as a living thing, suffering a setback, learning and recalibrating its brand of ambition.

An enduring fascination with cities is to do with the tussle between old and the new, the latter always winning by relentless attrition over time. The specificity of the bout often decides the nature of the arrangement between the two. In mainland Europe, having come so close to losing it all, preservation takes priority. The newly arrived must always tiptoe around the recognized elders. In populous South Asia, by and large the new takes root with a matter-of-fact credo – a space in the city is my birth right and I shall have it – driven by plain economic bullying. Rearrangement of furniture is only post-facto.

In Dubai, I sense a more curious relationship. Here the new is designed in ways that atleast perfunctorily evoke the old. The Desert Safari is essentially the power of the motor vehicle coupled with the idea that sand dunes are nature’s roller coasters. The design of the Burj Khalifa and the Burj Al Arab reflect traditional Arab themes, the spiral minaret and the sail of the dhow respectively. The Dhow cruise is one more addition to this theme. It is essentially, as SM puts it, dinner aboard a cruise. I imagine there are versions of the same thing which appeal to varying tastes but the boats we find upon arrival at Dubai Creek are all made of wood with the overall design of the famed sailing vessels that plied the Arabian Sea. The whole affair seems decidedly less ostentatious, something that can only be the product of a conscious decision in this city.

Aboard the vessel, we are on the upper deck that is laid out like a dining area. Floating along in slow and stately fashion with the night breeze caressing the face, we are soon trading the vanilla how-nice-this-is look that families learn to give each other at the first opportunity. In a stolen moment, Cams and I exchange a sneaky glance of our own, one that feigns cocky derision at what a ‘family’ experience this is! The draft blowing across the creek has a tinge of cold that gets progressively colder as the night wears on. We are left to contemplate what might have been had we visited in December. 

In Dubai: Episode 3 - Sun, Sand and Sky

Dune Bashing, Belly Dancing

That afternoon the customary Dubai experience beckons – dune bashing.  When we leave the metropolis behind, the first rudiments of sand dunes are upon us. Stretching infinitely on both sides of the tarmac, the dunes represent the north-eastern fringes of the Rub’ al Khali. This is known more famously in the English speaking world as The Empty Quarter. The Arabic name and the English translation are both fine monikers, conveying a nihilistic desolation. The place is an immense nowhere, supposedly the largest contiguous sand desert in the world covering most of Southern Saudi Arabia, Yemen, the UAE and Oman.

With such credentials, it adds much to the Arabian mystique. Yore and fable have only enhanced its legend; there are tales of lost cities (Iram, Ubar) that have been swallowed by the sands around them, making them the desert equivalents of Atlantis. Yet this earthly black hole is also home to the Bedouin who have somehow been weaving their way through its dunes and wādis for longer than anyone can remember. Their nomadic life, though on the wane, continues today. No discussion of the Rub’ al Khali or the Bedouin is complete without mention of Wilfred Thesiger. An Englishman born in Ethiopia and a war veteran turned explorer, his fascination for places untouched by the motor vehicle led him to an epic journey across the Empty Quarter in the 40’s. He chronicled the dwindling ways of the Bedouin and his account, Arabian Sands, together with Eric Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, launched modern travel writing. It is one I am currently perusing.

Presently, atop a sand dune, I vacillate between two scenes. Behind me are groups of tourists, an armada of SUVs lined up in conquering poise, a bevy of cameras and the general chatter of tourism. We have arrived here thus: the customary halt at the shop of miscellanea before we leave conveniences behind for good and a brief showcase of four-wheel drive before we stop for the photo session. At a reunion, posed photos have more purpose for the act of herding together into a frame is the reunion itself in miniature form, people from disparate timelines sharing a moment in time. I can’t recall a more enjoyable one in a long time. The photos reflect the bonhomie to the extent that we purchase a couple from the tourist outfit, something we normally shun. We are firm in denial to other tourist claptrap though. For instance, a falconer approaching us with a blindfolded falcon is turned down without as much as a second glance.

The second scene, ahead of me, is the Empty Quarter. Try hard enough and one can always lose the rest in a flight of fancy. Synesthesites must do this all the time. A black-and-white chequered keffiyeh wrapped around my head, less a concession to the heat and more an accessory worn in tourist jest, helps me feel the part. For a few fleeting moments, I am alone with the Arabian triumvirate - sun, sand and sky. As gusts of wind blow sand all around me, I am momentarily unnerved by the depth of feeling the desert evokes. Love of the desert is irrational, as the adage goes. There are no logical pointers as to why some people are enthralled by these waterless seas. While this is only a moment stolen in a planned itinerary, I briefly flirt with the idea of being a Thesiger and embracing the desert, warts and all.

Minutes later, as the SUV is pounding its way up and down this Arabian roller-coaster, I am part of the shared experience again. I suppose journeys are thus; one moves between parallel worlds. Pushpa lets out peals of laughter that alternate between genuineness and mockery. Her general effect on the rest of the family is such that we are quickly galvanized into mirth and half-derision too. Eventually, the pounders make for tarmac again in a manner reminiscent of a meeting concluded between rival gangs. I am forced to delay ours a wee bit by a mounting sense of nausea. Nestled into the back seat of an SUV seat, a static trunk and haunches are prime fodder for food to be tossed around inside.

Our ride stops at a fenced camp where there is more bundling of touristy things. There are samosas on offer and Arabian dining seating recreated alfresco around a makeshift stage. Little stores offer alcohol (in Arabia it must be more apt to say alcohol instead of liquor) and souvenirs. Short camel saunters are made available. An enclosure tucked away from prying eyes has a group of twenty-something Tamils sampling the Hookah. In a truly bizarre addition to this motley set, there is a screen on to which is projected, without much notice, a video of us in the act of posing for photos amidst the dunes! It continues in the same vein, capturing all and sundry for everyone present to see. We are both amused and embarrassed by this. Dinner is a typically Indian affair (given the clientele) with two Levantine inclusions: Tabbouleh - a mishmash of Bulgur (Durum Wheat), Tomatoes and Parsley - that bears a resemblance to the Maharashtrian Poha, and Fattoush, a salad with Pita bread as its mainstay.   

After dinner, the stage is the cynosure of all eyes. The first performance is my introduction to the Tanoura, a variant of the whirling Sufi dance, the key difference being the multi-coloured skirt worn by the sole male dancer. The music is played at a rapid tempo to which the dancer whirls, causing the skirt to swirl, and the colours to blur and intermingle rapidly, creating an arresting spectacle. The second performance is the belly dance or more appropriately, the Raqs Sharqi. While the allure of the dancer is what holds my attention for the most part, I eventually start to notice the lightness of her feet and how they are often held in stiletto position. Like the Tanoura, this is another dance form that emphasizes circular and elliptical motion. There is very little by way of leg or arm movement, indeed they are held in light balance to facilitate torso and belly movements. Cams is rapt with academic attention; she later reveals that her Danish friends have pointed out similarities between Raqs Sharqi and Odissi (something she has pursued for five years now)! 

In Dubai: Episode 2 - All's well that Malls well

First Impressions

Waking up the next morning to a gentle sun and mild breeze, we set out for our first impression of the city’s true cultural artefact, the shopping mall. As we shall later find out, Dubai has every manner and size of it. Al-Ghurair Centre on the other side of the creek is where we are ushered to first in a bid to get some of the shopping out of the way as the next few days are to be planned affairs. If the mall is a tourist destination in itself, I am happy to see we have Al-Ghurair to ourselves on a quiet Friday morning. Some leisured buys later, we are sipping coffee at Starbucks and watching cars go by from a sidewalk. Pa draws our attention to the noiseless aspect of traffic; no one seems to honk. All one can hear is the whizzing of cars and the occasional chafing of wheels on tarmac. SM adds that a horn usually means there has been a hold-up for much longer than usual or there has been a flagrant violation on the part of a driver. Honking as a last recourse is a distinct pleasure, especially coming from a driving culture where honking is instinct.

We return home for a veritable sadya (banquet of vegetarian dishes in Malayalam) with everyone’s hand but mine. A slumber follows after which we get our first taste of the Dubai Metro. I am happy to note that the system has been imbibed with as much thoroughness as is possible in our own Delhi Metro. In comparison to Delhi, Dubai’s is also a remarkably uncomplicated rail network. The shorter green line forms an inverted V-shape around the creek while the longer red one runs predominantly parallel to UAE’s lifeline, the E11 that runs parallel to the coastline connecting all the Emirates. The red line also runs on an elevated platform (as is often the case) from Bur Juman onwards. The undulating nature of the rail track adds immensely to the experience, elevated track notwithstanding. Being in the unmanned metro’s first car is akin to riding through a steel and concrete landscape in a simulation. Towers we have seen from a distance earlier are now close at hand. The Metro is perhaps the best thing to do for anyone craving a quick glance at Dubai.

That night we dine at Little Italy, a place described with amusement by my uncle V as ‘possibly the only vegetarian Italian chain in the world’. A seemingly odd choice for dining in the Arabic world but we are here for different reasons; SM and I are patrons of different Little Italy’s (Dubai and Bangalore respectively) while a first visit has eluded Ma and Pa for years now.

Later that night (or early next morning), we are at the airport to receive my sister Kaamya (Cams). She is on a Qatar Airways flight from Copenhagen via Doha. It is her first journey outside the temperate zone since she left India for Denmark a year ago. Had Dubai or Doha been a shade below the Tropic of Cancer (as it is they are both a degree and a half north), she might have forayed into the tropics. This kind of rendezvous echoes Pa’s claim for Dubai as a sort of median point. Apparently this has long been the Al Maktoum (rulers of Dubai) patriarch’s envisagement for the Emirate too. If nothing else, it is not a stretch to look at a world map and conclude that it does constitute a central metropolis of sorts for the Old World. In a modern context, Australia needs to be included too, something that hasn’t escaped the attention of Australian airlines. Last year, Qantas made Dubai its secondary hub.

Meanwhile, SM has arranged for concierge services for Cams. Aptly titled Marhaba (Welcome), it is meant to weave the passenger through lines and waits. True enough, she emerges barely twenty minutes after landing with the concierge by her side, a Filipino woman looking tiny by comparison. Cams returns the profuse bodily thanking that they have made their own with her brand of acknowledgment, demure and pointed at once. Ma and SM are overjoyed to see her after nearly seven months while Cams and I trade half-enthused, half-ironic greetings. She regales us with the tidings of her flight on the way home. 

In Dubai: Episode 1 - A Whiff of Malayalam and a swirl of Coffee

To Dubai

Malayali Aano (Are you Malayali), queries the airport security guard after a glance at our passports for Ma’s plainly records her place of birth as Ernakulam. Pa and I can barely contain our amusement at how this is the apposite flag-off for a trip to the Arabian Gulf (or is that Gelf). The guard gives us a half-knowing smile, almost as if to acknowledge the cliché. Ma musters a sheepish grin in response to the looks being cast at her. It may be a case of making too much of a happenstance but this start revs us up for more. And how often it happens thus – we encounter precious little of Kerala during the following hour spent traipsing aimlessly around Mumbai’s International Terminal after the procedural rigmarole. Perhaps the opening gambit was a red herring.

Our ramble eventually leads us to a café with a Tamil theme and a decidedly unpretentious name – Vaango (Welcome). We ask for filter coffee, opiate supreme to South Indians. It is a debt we owe an Arabian immigrant by the name of Baba Budan. Having discovered the pleasures of the coffee grain in the medieval coffee trading outpost Mocha (which has lent its name to the brew), legend has it that he left with a few grains and found another peninsula along with its unsuspecting populace in South India. Given its Arabian origins, it is the fitting choice of beverage before we leave for the Gulf’s most potent concoction today – Dubai.

A whiff of Malayalam and a swirl of coffee; for me, our experience trail begins here.

Flying westward in the night, we are set to gain time and lose sleep. I flirt with half-sleep and Peter Roebuck’s Sometimes I Forgot to Laugh, finding neither fully compelling. Later, this general state of inertia is enlivened by a bumpy descent into the Gulf. Soon the Emirates emerge into view below and there are animated murmurs around. Pa is aghast at being the one stuck on the aisle seat while Ma and I corner the views. He makes it clear that he will be the one on the window seat during the return leg. At this point, the aircraft does something reminiscent of landings at Mumbai. It flies over the Emirates into the waters between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran before turning around for a landing at Dubai. Aircrafts from Gujarat and indeed from all parts of the world to the west of Mumbai do something similar. They go all the way into the Indian mainland before turning around for a landing at Santacruz.

Rather expectedly, Dubai International Airport (DXB) is a behemoth, especially to those uninitiated into the ways of the busy port destinations of the world. Taxiing after touchdown takes a full 15 minutes. Our exit via Terminal 1 is one moving walkway after another; its static essence captured succinctly in the landmark titular sequence of The Graduate. As such, I do feel that if this weren’t my first trip overseas, I should feel just as listless as Ben Braddock. This time though, I am bounding through each of these, eager to get ahead. Ma and Pa are caught between the urge to amble and the need to catch up. The vestiges of a shopping hub abound – photoshopped models adorn poster ads of Christian Dior, Versace and the like. It occurs to me that we might be in a moving gallery of sorts, albeit one where the viewer and the viewed pass by each other with clinical indifference.

When we finally reach Immigration, the scene is my initiation into the ways of the Emiratis. Passport Control counters are manned by young males sporting (‘wearing’ does their demeanour injustice) a flowing white robe, the Gandoorah and a white headscarf, the Ghutrah. This headscarf is held in place by a black circular hosepipe, the Agal. The overall appearance they exude is one of aloofness and arrogance lightly worn. It seems as if a general apathy for motion induced by the harsh Arabian sun has been suffused with pride derived from wealth and the knowledge that some of their clothing is now part of worldwide fashion (Keffiyeh). This combination of economy of movement and primness of attire is a philosophy that might apply, in large measure, to their facial furniture too. They give the impression of imperturbability; indeed some bear countenances that appear as though they would be little disturbed by the news of an impending apocalypse. In contrast, Indian countenances are imbued with dramatic flair. We always seem poised to spring into expressions that eschew economy and go for the jugular. Maximum effort for maximum effect might well be our maxim. 

When we exit eventually, I spot a waving hand on what looks like my uncle. Just as I make to follow him, my aunt’s gushing enthusiasm envelops us. Hugs and flowers follow. Sriram Mama (SM) provides quiet foil to Pushpa’s cheeriness, only occasionally breaking a self-imposed decibel barrier for a witty outburst. Dubai that night is balmy with just a hint of the tropics. A port city set against a predominantly desert landscape is beyond my immediate grasp having encountered nothing of the kind in India. In March, Dubai compounds the issue further by defying characterization. In a six-day window, we witness a sand swirl, a haze, a downpour, mild afternoons, hot evenings and cold nights. The downpour in particular has Ma sighing in resignation and channelling her favourite climate keywords, global warming as a response to any perceived anomaly in weather.

We take an MUV to SM and Pushpa’s home in Al Karama, literally The Dignity, a meaning that assumed deeper societal significance when nearby Yemen suffered a tragedy on its Juma’at El-Karama protest march (53 people were killed) as part of the Arab Spring of 2011. Dubai’s Karama however, is an unassuming residential area to the west of the city’s prime natural feature, the Dubai Creek. A host of low-rise buildings house Indians (primarily) in addition to Pakistanis, Omanis and Filipinos. As to whether it houses even the primitive wellsprings of a rebellious spirit, the answer is to be found in the form of graffiti on some of the walls. They feature the Emirati flag with slogans praising Allah and the incumbent Sheikh.