Stanley here. Two days into my employment with the good people at AUD and it's nice to be starting the weekend. My job is low stress and it involves dealing with money, for which I have a certain fondness. The people are uniformly friendly, taking pains to introduce me to everyone who works on the campus. There seem to be a lot of Lebanese people working there, one of whom is my boss, who all constantly amaze me with their ability to jump easily from speaking English to French to Arabic. Makes me want to check out Lebanon. The rest of the staff are a broad smattering of Filipino, Canadian, Indian, various middle eastern backgrounds, and even one or two Americans. The students there couldn't be more different then the lovely, but somewhat childlike (by Western standards) Emirati ladies who attend Dubai Women's College. They're much more like you'd expect college students studying abroad to be: Calculatedly casual fashion sense, smoking, horsing around, flirting with each other. It was kind of a shock to the system seeing women dressed in a manner that would have brought the police to campus in short order at Dubai Women's. I guess that's why it's called the American University in Dubai.
The commute is a bit of a chore, as expected. It's about an 45 minutes to an hour each way depending on how many accidents there have been on Sheikh Zayed Road (pictured right) that day. As mentioned before, the driving style is pleasantly aggressive. People will let you change lanes, you just have to make it clear that you're coming weather they let you or not. I've been using the time to delve into the many CDs on my iPod that I'v
e never listened to and I've found a few gems, including The Veils Nux Vomica , but I'm planning on getting some Arabic CDs on Sunday and try to use the time to better myself. I'm skeptical about learning that way, but it's worth a shot.
Today we spent the morning eating breakfast at "MORE" (our favorite, see previous post) then driving around the city to see if there's a quicker way to get to work for me (answer: maybe). On our way we dropped by The Mall of The Emirates and you know what? They actually have a freaking ski slope in there. I'd heard about it, but was down right amused to see it. 40 degrees outside (104F), and people are bundled up in their rented ski-wear. Women in abayas and shaylas are throwing snowballs at each other. And they're skiing down an actual ski slopes in 56 acre winter wonderland.
While I'm at is, a quick rant: When I was looking for photos I came across a post: "This is what 100.00 oil buys", with a picture of Ski Dubai. This is not the first time I'm seen someone
implying incorrectly that Dubai or the U.A.E is an oil economy, but I'm struck lately that it feels a little messed up on a couple of levels. One is that we just assume that it's in the Middle East so it's all about oil, without taking the time to just go to Wikipedia and see that only a small fraction of this nations wealth is oil based. The second is that there's background noise in part of a statement like that, below the surface but usually present, that whispers, "Isn't it scary that the Arabs are able to build the same kind of excessive, consumerist monstrosities that we have taken for granted all our lives as the birthright of Americans, and Americans alone? If they can build a giant ski slope in the desert, how long before they come and carry off our women? War must be made on the barbarians!" 
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6 comments:
Mmm... Ski slopes covering dessert... sounds tasty...
All jokes aside, this was a good post. I like that I'm able to picture your experience there, at least a little bit. If you like this job, I'd stay there. The other job may pay twice as much, but I'm sure there's ten times as much stress. You're already losing your hair fast enough, why accelerate that?
OK ok....spelling corrected. I usually get Alicia to proofread shortly after I post it so SHE can make fun of me.
Maybe some people, like myself, are a little disgusted by the excess and the impact of these buildings on the environment. To me it seems like they are constantly building bigger and grander things just so they can have bigger and grander things. The energy use, regardless of whether the energy is coming from, must be immense to keep the air conditioning running at all times so that the place will be cool enough to make and maintain snow. Then there are the Dubai Islands which are a huge disruption to the environment. So my point is it doesn’t matter where the money comes from, oil or elsewhere, some of the projects that Dubai is embarking on are disgusting for other reasons.
Yeah. Good thing America is never involved with anything that could be described as "excess"... That's probably why, for example, nobody owns an SUV. Oh, wait...
Industrialized nations in general are screwing up the environment. Let's not pretend America isn't among the biggest offenders...
I saw a thing on the Discovery Channel that said scientists are finding that the "disrupting the ecosystem" concerns raised about the islands were so far turning out to be unfounded. That's the extent of my knowledge on the subject. But I believed them.
My point is obviously not that they do a great job over here with the environment (uh, they don't). simply that America does just as much (Vegas anyone? I think all that light and A/C probably isn't solar generated, but I'll still be back....). There's a subtle tinge of something ugly when Americans point the conspicuous consumption label at a newly developing nation. Not that we're all not trying to do our part to make America a better place, but neither are we boycotting Vegas in its glorious excess.
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