Dubai and the Dubai Metro

After passing through customs we wanted to head down to the main parts of the city to look at Dubai. Most of all we wanted to see the Burj Al Arab, one of the most famous hotels in the world. It has a 7 star rating. Rooms start from 1000 USD a night and they won't let anyone walk in off the streets (which we personally found out). To get to this part of town we had to either take the bus or a taxi, but luckily the day that we arrived was the day that the new metro system was opened. Unluckily, we were not the only ones wanting to ride it on the first day and it was more congested than a rush hour train in Tokyo!

When buying tickets for the metro we saw a sign with the following rules. It was 3 times as long as this picture shows and the value on the left is the fine for breaking a certain rule. After seeing this sign we were very cautious about our water bottles that we carried since one of the rules was "no drinking allowed in prohibited places" but because we didn't know where a prohibited place was we just held onto the bottles.

100 United Arab Emirate dirhams is about 17 GBP.

This is the metro that is fully computer operated. At the time that we rode it, not all of the track was completed and only about 6 stations were open.

Dubai is HOT HOT HOT HOT!!!!!! Even though it was dark when we were there it was a good 40C with 80% + humidity and warm winds. 2 minutes of walking around and our shirts were drenched in sweat. To be honest I don't know how people can work outside at all in a place like that, let alone during the day carrying construction equipment etc. Grass won't grow at all so in Dubai they have water hoses laid out on the sand and plant grass to grow around the hoses.

The sand is always being blown in from the desert and it covers everything that stands still. When people park their cars they cover it with a big car shaped bag to protect it from the sand but also the sun I suppose. Wouldn't want the colour to fade now would you. Most of the cars in Dubai are white and have fully tinted windows to keep the sun away and try and cool the car. How they can see through the windows though is something I've been wondering. When we were aboard a bus with tinted windows all we could see was our own reflections.

This is what happens if you don't cover your car. This is what it looks like at home in Sweden with the snow is blowing around and lands on a car, but this is sand. It has to clog up the engine?

Have I forgotten to mention that in Dubai I'm a rich multimillionaire with my own business tower named after me? Nah, I'm sure I must have told you...

The best thing in Dubai is the AC bus stops. Open the door and step inside a fridge and cool down before walking again. However, it is not the best feeling stepping out of the bus stop into the street again =(Duncan "chillin" on the inside





The Burj Al Arab (the one that looks like a sail) and a neighbouring hotel.

It took us about 40 mins to walk here from the Hall of the Emirates, a large shopping mall. From here we felt that we didn't have time to walk back to the metro and catch it back to the airport so we tried to catch a hotel shuttle to the airport from the Burj Al Arab. To say the least, this didn't work and were stopped by security before getting anywhere close to the Burj Al Arab. Ooops. Hahaha.

Dubai is an amazing sight, but not much to do for those who don't have a lot of money. Food is cheap and so are the taxis. But if you are interested in finding local culture then that will be almost impossible. Everything that we saw is really western. In the shopping mall they have all the same chains that exist in the UK and USA and even Boots has a pharmacy located in the Hall of the Emirates.

Dubai Airport

I'm not sure if I can explain Dubai's Airport in words, it won't do it justice. It's humongous and exactly what you would expect of a country that has almost unlimited funds to build whatever may please them. After landing at 6pm I'm still unsure if we were the only passengers there or if the complex just swallowed everyone else up. I'll let the pictures do the explaining and will respond to any questions in the comments section.

Security by the way, is kind of a joke. After having heard stories of people being thoroughly searched and stopped for no reason at all we were surprised and relieved, I suppose, to just be able to walk through with hardly anyone giving us a second look. Or it could just have been stories to scare people. hmmm

We have no idea on what's awaiting us past customs.

Shiny!

Rows and rows of pillars. Are we back in Rome during the Roman Empire?

Palm trees indoors FTW! Oh, and long conveyor belts since its so far to walk.

Emirates!

Earlier I wrote about The Thistle hotel and that it wasn't worth staying in. However, the view across the runway to T5 was amazing. This was taken at about 2 am. Even though planes were landing a couple of 100 metres away it wasn't noisy, which was good.

Emirates is a great airline. One of the best that I have flown with actually. The seats have lots of leg room, the food is good and the staff are friendly and approachable. I was talking to a Russian flight attendant for about an hour. He told me that with Emirates he got an apartment in Dubai to use on his visits there, got to choose his own routes if he wanted to go somewhere in particular and that the pay was really good. However, being constantly jet-lagged was a killer. This is something I can relate to since I am now writing this at 4am and I'm fully awake after having passed out at 8pm and slept for 7 hours. =(

As I was talking to the this Russian, we flew over Baghdad and the Tigris River. I managed to take a few pictures. It was my first time flying over the Middle East.





One thing that I noticed was that it is very, very flat! No hills or anything until the dessert and the mountains meet, something that I didn't manage to get in the picture. Need a better camera I think.



















We were very lucky on the EK008 flight from London to Dubai. Duncan and I had chosen our seats before boarding, where he had a window seat and I had an isle seat. However, we looked around and realised that the plane wouldn't be completely full so we decided to move from our seats. In the end we managed to get a whole middle row of 4 seats to ourselves. EACH! Sleep lying down. Wooo hoo =P Much more comfortable than sitting and sleeping.
One more thing about Emirates is the amount of movies that you can watch. They had many new releases and old ones. All in all there were over 80 films and comedy shows and cartoons. The TV screens were massive (though not as big as the 15-17 inch monitors in business class) and by using the phone you could make a call to any other seat on the plane. Very convenient if you and your friends don't end up next to each other. Power sockets are available for charging your laptop.