Dubai – a flying visit

Ah! I was wondering why the Oldies decided to have their Christmas dinner in Lisbon. A dinner of fish and chips, to be exact. On the beach. In November. As you do.

It appears that Himself is going back to Austria to his mammy, whilst Herself is off to Ireland with hers. I don’t get to choose where I want to go, of course. I’m simply stuffed into Her Ladyship’s rucksack and flown over to Dublin. A few days later, I spot the letters ‘D-u-b’ on yet another boarding pass. I’m confused. We’re already in Dub… Ai, would you credit it? We’re actually off to Dubai. Oooh, this sounds promising!

After the seven hour flight, Her Ladyship is seriously jet-lagged. She looks like she doesn’t know which end of her is up. Her elderly Mummykins, on the other hand, is in flying form and insists on booking us onto a city tour straight away.

Even through my bleary bird eyes – I have to admit to a touch of jetlag too – I could see that Dubai is quite amazing. It is an incredible city as it stands. And it’s incredible that it stands on a desert! Our guide was constantly trotting out superlatives. ‘The tallest building in the world…’, ‘the biggest theme park in the world …’, ‘the highest hotel in the world…’, ‘the longest this…’, ‘the most expensive that…’  And it’s all so new into the bargain. ‘That hotel opened last week.’ ‘That building opened yesterday.’ ‘That multi-storey car park isn’t quite finished yet.’

Whatever about the biggest, highest, longest, Dubai must have the largest number of cranes in the world. I haven’t seen this many cranes since the Celtic Tiger years in Ireland. I suppose one reason for the building craze here is that fact that EXPO 2020 is opening in Dubai next October. Judging by the feverish activity in the construction department, it promises to be a huge event. Indeed, our tour guide mentioned that they’re expecting about 25 million visitors to flock to Dubai in 2020. And I thought we seagulls went around in large flocks!

I was delighted that we were able to stop off at the seafront a couple of times along the way. I love the beaches here with their beautiful golden sands. Well of course, that’s one thing you can say about this part of the world. There is definitely no shortage of sand.

We had arrived in Dubai just after the United Arab Emirates National Day holiday. Many of the skyscrapers were still draped with gigantic UAE flags for the occasion, which added a nice bit of colour to all that steel and glass. And, boy, there sure is a lot of steel and glass. I couldn’t get over all the amazing shapes of the buildings either. Curved, rounded, twisted, oval… It seems that if you can imagine it, an architect has built it.

My favourite building though, predictably enough, is probably one of the best known buildings – and an old one by Dubai standards – the Burj Al Arab Hotel. Shaped like the spinnaker of a yacht, it really made me think I was sailing out to sea. It also reminds me of one of my favourite boat-shaped buildings in Lisbon, the good old Vasco da Gama Tower in Oriente.

It was hilarious to watch Her Ladyship executing all kinds of gymnastics as she desperately tried to fit all 828 m of the tallest building in the world into her camera frame. Which, to be fair, is no mean feat. The Burj Khalifa is truly phenomenal, especially when seen from ground level. 828 m for goodness sake! That’s approximately 350 m higher than my home town in Austria. And exactly 828 m higher than my home beach in Ireland!

I held my breath when the guide announced that we were outside the Dubai Mall, reputedly the largest shopping mall in the world. Luckily there was no time to go in. If shopaholic Mummykins had got her foot inside that door, I reckon we’d never have got her out again. She’d have been in seventh heaven with that choice of luxury designer stores. Though she might have found the indoor skiing slope rather exhausting…

When it comes to superlatives, there is no beating the Dubai royal residence. The glimpse I got of the life-sized golden horse statues in the driveway was enough to make me realise that this was no ordinary palace. I had plenty of time to gawk at the sumptuous buildings set in beautifully landscaped gardens as we trundled along its four kilometres of road frontage. Now there’s a family that isn’t short of a few bob.

For mere mortals – with a few bob – who might be on the lookout for a nice wee pad on the waterfront, they need look no further than The Palm Jumeirah. This is yet another example of human ingenuity and, although I found it hard to get my little gull head around the idea of a huge artificial island, I couldn’t help but be impressed by its luxurious hotels and residences. For goodness sake, even the bus stops here are air-conditioned. You can hardly get more luxurious than that!

Hah, I thought that road signs in Hungary were long. It looks like Dubai is in the running for yet another superlative – the longest street names in the world!