The Dubai Letters: 6. Driving
Dubai, Sharjah, & Ras Al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates -- March 2007

I've got two tickets to Iron Maiden, baby
Come with me Friday, don't say maybe

Wheatus, Teenage Dirtbag

Whack for my taxi-o
Whack for my taxi-o
There's whiskey in Pajero

Whiskey in pajero

I passed my U.K. driving test at the reasonably late age of 24. Aside from a careless accident in my early weeks, I consider myself a reasonably good driver. Not the best driver in the world, but good enough.

That said, the prospect of driving in Dubai terrified me.

You see, there is something you get warned about but never really believe until you witness it. People in Dubai cannot drive. I have a theory or two on this, but I will get to that later.

The traffic in Dubai is notoriously bad, and the United Arab Emirates has some of the highest (and scariest) accident and fatality rates in the world. When I arrived I was unlucky enough to witness a number of fender benders and one serious accident in my first week. This was perhaps unrepresentative, as since then I have only seen one crash, and a minor one at that. Perhaps more worrying, is the number of near misses I have both witnessed and, once I got my wheels, been involved in.

If I had my way, I would have remained a pedestrian until I returned to the U.K. However, the summer is coming and with it temperatures too hot to walk in. Couple this with the decreasing availability of taxis, and it was clear: I had to toughen up and get on the roads.

Trader Vic's is one of the Madinat's multitude of bar/restaurants. The bar side is infamous, belonging in the let's-see-what-nasty-thing-we-can-make-with-rum-tonight school of cocktail bars. The rum-biased cocktails are large, expensive, and very alcoholic. They are served in coconuts and dog water bowls and elaborate ceramic tankards. Getting served on the weekend -- Thursday or Friday -- can take upwards of half an hour, and you find yourself grateful that the drinks are so strong as you sober up between rounds.

Overlooked is the restaurant, which is Polynesian themed (which seems to be a blanket term for a wide selection of Asian dishes). The portions are expensive, but some of the best and most generous portions I have had in Dubai. I had the sweet and sour shrimp prawns, which were each larger than my thumb, and probably a good deal tastier as well.

Following my annual review in January, I decide that I needed to be more pro-active as far as my career development is concerned. I start going into the office on the weekends to work on the things I will need for my professional review. At the moment I go in weekly, but that is because of a backlog from my time in the Concrete Kingdom of Swindon.

One interesting side effect of forcing myself to get into the office is that I see a much earlier time of day on the weekend than I otherwise normally would. Given the opportunity I will stay in bed until lunchtime on the weekends in an attempt at catching up on my sleep, and then spend the rest of the day feeling guilty because I wasted most of the daylight. Now I am finding myself having actually accomplished things by midday on a Friday morning, which is unprecedented.

My company's main office -- and hence the centre of its administration -- is in the neighbouring emirate of Sharjah. When I finally get motivated get a license, I discover that I had to return to Sharjah. I quickly lose my earlier motivation.

You see, back in October, I had travelled to Sharjah for another administrative procedure, and had been subjected to a hellish morning of waiting, waiting, waiting and, at one point, being manhandled, half-naked into an x-ray machine. You can understand if I was somewhat reluctant to revisit the Emirate.

In the end it is not as bad as I had anticipated. I travel with one of the company drivers, and he leads me, from desk to office to desk around the police building, telling me what I would need and where to go next. I pass through the sequence -- information desk, typing room^[1], information desk, eye and blood test, typing room^[2], eye and blood test, information desk, licence desk, and print room -- in about an hour.

My licence looks like one of my old university IDs, when they had not quite mastered the art of printing onto plastic. My photo is so pale that I appear to be Scottish, and my hair looks painted on.

Like the subject of the weather in the U.K., the most popular subject of conversation in Dubai is the traffic^[3]. How bad it is, how unusual it is when you have a quick journey or a quiet road, what can be done to solve the problem, how many people have died so far this year, and so on.

Wherever you go the subject of conversation inevitably turns to the traffic, because wherever you are, you will have encountered the traffic in getting there. Like the weather in the U.K. everyone has an opinion, and sharing that opinion is free.

I sigh whenever the subject comes up, not least because some of my friends, as previously mentioned, are highways engineers or transport planners. They worry at the subject of the traffic, like a dog with a new set of stitches. And though I dread the hours that will follow, even I will occassionally succumb and offer into an awkward silence the fateful words:

'The traffic was a nightmare tonight . . .'

I visited the beach a few times when I first arrived in Dubai -- onto the quiet thirsty sands of Ramadan -- but for some reason, I stop during the winter. I blame the rain, because hardly a weekend went by when it did not rain at least once, but in the end that is just an excuse for laziness.

Too late, I rediscover the beach and start going again with the posse. We go to the open beach with its cigarette ends and endless parade of labourers. We go to the beach parks -- Mamzar and Jumeirah -- where there is an admission fee. The admission fee guarantees a nicer sunbathing experience by excluding those members of society who cannot afford to pay to get in. Apparently.

Soon the weather will be too hot , but for now it is just about right.

One of the most populous cars in the United Arab Emirates is the Echo! Echo! Echo! Echo!, a small car made by Toyota that is cheap and easy to run. Being about the cheapest thing on most rental companies' books, it is usually what engineers end up first driving^[3.5]. I am told by my friends that the Echo! Echo! Echo! Echo! is a right of passage, and I must get one, even though they are not particularly good cars.

However, I am paying for it, not work, so I spend a little extra and get myself a Ford Focus.

Getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road is not too bad. Even now, I find myself walking to the wrong side of the car, and looking to the left for the rear view mirror. I have never tried to drive on the left side of the road though. Driving on the right comes naturally.

Harder still is getting used to driving an automatic. I should not liken it to driving a bumper car^[4], not on these roads, but that is exactly what I am reminded of. My left leg and arm get bored with no clutch or gearstick to operate. After a couple of weeks of sitting at traffic lights, however, I soon come to appreciate not having to change gear.

The language of the roads is spoken with the horn. Horns answer every hesitation and every dangerous move. The noise is repeated to the point where it loses its efficacy. Seasoned pedestrians and drivers learn to ignore most of the horns you hear, acknowledging only those that come from unexpected quarters as the unexpected is often serious.

A car with a broken horn is impotent, voiceless in a city that shouts everything.

The Dubai Desert Rock Festival is now in its fourth year. For the first time it is a two day event, and the list of bands is pretty impressive. In Flames, Stone Sour, The Prodigy, and Iron Maiden. The Bravery, Incubus, and Robert Plant. It looks to be an amazing weekend, least of all because the tickets cost around £40.

For me the big draw of the weekend is In Flames, a Swedish melodic death metal band, whom I have been into for several years now but never had the chance to see. They are one of the first bands on the first day, and they set the standard for the rest of the festival.

The Prodigy have been silent for the best part of the decade, but this music, perhaps more than any other act this weekend, is the music of my childhood. They get us bouncing around like no one else does.

Iron Maiden's appearance provides me with another perfect opportunity to tease my brother. The teasing follows a similar line to that during the Roger Waters gig; sending text messages of song titles and so on. I buy him a tour T-Shirt that shows Eddie, Maiden's mascot, riding a camel past the Burj Al Arab. Maiden's set is impressive -- pure spectacle.

On the second day we are tired and sunburnt, but we role down to the Country Club in time to catch the first of the day's big bands: The Bravery. Incubus follow, and the night closes with Robert Plant. The weekend ends with Whole Lotta Love, and a whole lotta fireworks.

We go off in search of the 'Auto Market', and second hand cars. My friend drives his Echo! Echo! Echo! Echo!. The journey is an adventure, and takes about eight times longer than it should due to Dubai's famously bad signage. I learn more about Dubai's roads in that two hours than I do in the previous five months.

The Auto Market is a collection of dealerships, all gathered in one lockable enclosure and centred around the government administration building. A single lane road weaves inside. The traffic crawls as the Arabs keep their eyes open for their next four-by-four. It being Friday, almost every dealer is closed. We browse.

We return for a car auction. About seventy-odd cars are on offer, a lot of them confiscated by the police. Each of the car has a safety check performed on it, and as we browse the lots we discover that most of the cars have something wrong with them. Some of the time it is something easily and cheaply fixable, but most of the time it is serious or expensive.

The auction is in Arabic, except for the numbers which are summarised in English. It makes the event both confusing and amusing, as the auctioneer speaks both languages fluently and rapidly. He gestures wildly, breaks his patter to put a strange gesticulating emphasis on particular syllables. 'Thirty fourrrr five hundred.'

We have heard there are bargains to be had, but expect the few good cars to go for a small fortune. One five-year-old Land Cruiser, practically mint, goes for 34000 dirhams, and my friend looks at me. 'That was in your price range, wasn't it?'

We have long been aware that the Jumeirah Tractor^[5] fulfills a greater role as a symobl of status than it does anything practical, but most of the people here are Arabs and none of them are looking for anything small^[6]. We watch several small cars go quite cheaply.

Ras Al Khaimah (or simply RAK) is the northernmost of the seven emirates, bordering the Musandam peninsular at the very tip of the country. The city is quiet, the roads civilized after the bustle of Dubai and Sharjah. One of the main projects I work on -- aside from the ones I manage in Doha and Sharjah -- is based in RAK. As a predominately landlocked maritime engineer, my career has included few opportunities to visit a project^[7], so when the opportunity for a day trip to RAK came up, I jump at it.

This project, is at an early concept stage so is not much to see beyond a flat land where the desert becomes the beach. We get chased by a camel who decides that we are drawing too close to its babies, and we discover an off licence in a shed at the very corner of the site.

My friend calls me to tell me he has bought a car. 'It's a jeep wrangler,' he says excitedly. 'I fell in love with it. I had to buy it.'

'How much did that set you back?'

'I'm not going to tell you until you see it.'

He is afraid that he is going to get told that he has been ripped off, which is fair, because he was. That said, when I see it for the first time I can understand why he fell in love with it. It possess a certain character and charm that is redundant from many of the newer Jumeirah Tractors. Sure, it is falling apart and will probably cost him the asking price again in repairs, but he does not seem to mind. As an off road vehicle it should perform adequately, but we turn down the offer of a trip down any of the busiest highways.

There is only one place to be on Saint Patrick's Day, and that is the Irish Village. Sure, there are other Irish bars, but this one is the biggest and you just know every friendly drunk Irish woman in Dubai one is going to be there.

We arrive at noon, when it is still very quiet. We sit on the grass by the duck pond^[8], and listen to two hours of sound checks. Around two o'clock the entertainment starts: a couple of Irish bands, one Scottish band, and a troupe of Irish-dancing Irish children.

This year, St Pat's falls on the last day of the Six Nations Rugby tournament, and towards the end of the afternoon we stand, brush the grass and dust off, and go to watch the rugby. The beer garden has filled up since we arrived, and it is standing room only. It is worse still inside the bar and, even though we manage to secure a corner to observe the rugby from, I have to keep ducking outside to placate my claustrophobia.

The first match goes well for Ireland, and being English we bear the brunt of their abuse celebrations^[9]. They are on course for the title, we are not. We take the abuse in good humour. When, two hours later, France steal the title from them, we return their abuse with gusto. Strangely enough every Irish person in the place pretends that there was not any rugby that weekend.

Outside the party goes strong. People dance on the tables and, to the last man, everyone is steaming drunk. We stay until late evening, only subconciously aware that we have to be in work the following morning.

I mentioned earlier that I had my own theory on why the driving here is so substandard. I do not think any one group here is to blame, but rather a product of putting the worst offending groups on the same roads. There are three offenders, probably equally culpable:

Firstly, the locals, who have been raised to believe that they are better than everyone else. The rules do not apply to them. They can go where they please and it is the responsibility of other, lesser, road users to get out of the way. The 50% tint on the windows is there to preserve the privacy of their families, and if they cannot happen to see out through them, well again, it is the responsibility of lesser road users to not be occupying any space that the local cannot see.

Secondly, the immigrant workers from the Indian sub-continent, who drive as if they were still on the cattle-clogged streets of Mumbai. Manners and common sense are for people who do not make their living on the roads, people who livelihoods do not depend on them being somewhere five minutes ago. You can squeeze through any gap, you can jump any queue. If you should happen to die on the roads, then you were destined to die on the roads and there is nothing you, nor your innocent victims, can do about it.

Thirdly, the westerners. People who generally have a higher driving ability, but for the first time in their lives, are able to drive on roads that are practically lawless. Here we can undertake, use our horns more frequently than we blink, queue jump, speed, and essentially do all of those things that we are forbidden from doing back in the civilised world. Put simply, the power goes to our heads, and we drive like arseholes.

Put these three together and you have an accident^[10].

The standard of driving in Dubai is pretty bad. The actual experience of driving however is not as traumatizing as I had originally imagined. At the end of the day you have to keep your wits about you, expect nothing from your fellow road users, and hope that somewhere down the line, something will change.

[1] Because I cannot speak Arabic, let alone type it. I did however, impress the typist by telling her my mobile phone number in Arabic rather than in English.
[2] This second visit was not scheduled, but I discovered that if I photocopied my blood donor card I could get a discount on the fee and avoid having to have another blood test.
[3] And if you do not believe me, take a look at the length of this travelog and compare it to the others I have written.
[3.5] Because usually your company would rather you were cheap than alive.
[4] Or dodgem, if you prefer.
[5] Four wheel drive monstrosity. Like a Chelsea Tractor, but with windows with a 50% tint.
[6] And by small I mean anything smaller than a Jeep Wrangler.
[7] The only structure of mine that I have actually seen completed was the landside structures for the two new ferry berths at the Port of Dover. And that was a jolly to France rather than a site visit.
[8] The ducks having once again been evicted to make way for a stage.
[9] I apologise for the use of that strikethrough joke twice in quick succession, but I only have so many ideas.
[10] I was going to add 'waiting to happen', but it seems redundant.