Winding down Dubai (11.9.07)

View of The Palm Jumeirah from Adam Kaye's residence

R & R on beach

View of Jumeirah from the Palm at Jumeirah

Flags on road leaving the Palm at Jumeirah

Jumeirah Beach Hotel entrance

Sheikhs and their security inside Jumeirah Beach Hotel

Adam Kaye, my gracious host in Dubai

Khaleegi with the natives

Chef at Bab El Shams Desert Resort

See video below for more singing & dancing at Bab El Shams

Mohammed Shahin's friend, Hakam doing Tanoura dance

Lebanese dancer, "Salaam" and Adam Kaye

Sylvana & Adam

Lighted Wind-Towers at night

Burj al Arab at night

I originally intended to spend my last day almost exclusively at the beach for little hard-earned R & R after serious sightseeing and travelling over the last few days, but a combination of exhaustion from yesterday's to-do list and a little OCD in thinking of new things for today's list kept me in bed until 10 and at the computer until about noon. At that point I padded out to the living room to talkwith Adam about online trading (Dad-I think you should consider this for your retirement), smoking lawsuits, and the ever-popular topic of exorbitant real estate costs in
Dubai.
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I made it down to the beach at ~12:30 and finally saw a sampling of all those expat workers who are locked inside their offices at Knowledge Village or Media City during the week and are the ones keeping the Emirati economy booming. The beach was packed with people from all nationalities camped out on mats and under umbrellas. I saw a huge mix of people: there were vacationing French families, glamour & hip young Brit singles, Bangladeshi workers on break, Sikhs wading in the water wearing boxers, undershirts, and their characteristic turbans, and even a young Emirati couple in which the woman was swimming in her modest street clothes which included two layers of long-sleeved shorts on top, a pair of sweatpants, and a head scarf. It was nice to be out there but was far too abbreviated a rest, because the next thing I knw I had to come in to start getting ready for the big evening event - dinner and a show at the Bab El Shams Desert Resort where a friend of Mohammed Shahin, an egyptian named Hakam, performs Tanoura and Saidi regularly.
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Adam and I left the Jumeirah Beach Residences at around 4:30 for the Jumeirah Beach Hotel where we could catch a free shuttle out to Bab El Shams at 6:30 pm. On the way we asked the cab driver to take a detour into the trunk of the Palm Jumeirah. This is the first of three Palm developments in which giant islands in the shape of a palm tree have been built out into the Persian Gulf. The Palm Jumeirah touts itself as the 8th wonder of the world (obviously neglecting to mention the enviromental impact on the native aquatic ecosystem of the area) and already is home to about a dozen enormous identikit condo mid-rises and soon to be home to condos, villas, and an additional 25 5-star hotels. The thing that Adam astutely pointed out is that an enormous amount of land has been created with the potential to hold an enormous number of people. With 5 lanes going each way there is no traffic problem now, but it has the potential to be a disaster when people come in and need to commute 2x per day.
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MORE TO COME ABOUT BAB EL SHAMS

Traditional Dubai rhythms and song at Bab El Shams

Bellydancer "Salaam" at Bab El Shams


Kurdish/arabic music with Khaleegi dancers