Day Four - Ibn Battuta, Souk Madinat, a HUGE Traffic Jam and Sealand

After leaving the college, we ventured to Ibn Battuta which is an amazingly crafted up-scale mall that has four themed sections: China, India, Egypt and Tunisia. Each courtyard had been built to scale with towering columns and mosaic arches or Sphinxes and wood-carved junks. We walked the entire length and had a coffee at the Starbucks in the Tunisian court before feeling the call to lunch, meeting another friend at the Madinat.




The Souk Madinat is a nicely architected living, dining, shopping and leisure activity area for tourists and citizens alike. We had a nice lunch outside in the afternoon air and walked around to see Al Burj in the background, decorative wind towers atop the condominiums, condolas slipping through the waterways and many shops, bulging with goods for purchase.

We left Dubai at about 5 p.m. and spent the next three hours in bumper to bumper traffic. Between these sunlit photos of the Madinat and the darkened front of Sealand, we were stuck in a traffic jam. Dubai and its enlightened city planners will need to come up with a solution to the issue of too many cars traveling on roads not planned for so many. And yet the building of highrise living quarters continues...



Not to be too overwhelmed by the traffic, we had dinner upon arrival at a restaurant just down the Corniche from where I was staying. Sealand is an Indian restaurant designed to transport you either into a G.I. tract fiber optic exploration, Captain Nemo's voyage into the deep or just into someone's version of having fun with a lot of plaster and irridescent paints. The ceiling was sculpted and the boothes flanked by what looked like coral outcroppings. Truly a surreal dining experience - great food and as always, exceptional company and conversation.

Day Three - The Blue Souk, Sharjah Heritage Center and Creekside

Actually, on a map of Sharjah, this Souk or market, is called the Central Souk. I shopped for most of my souveniers here, since in Dubai, most items were marked up to cover the cost of the obese real estate, swallowing places like Jebel Ali Sailing Club. A sad cycle, but the Blue Souk was delightful to walk through a browse. Be ready with your negotiations, however, these people are masters at haggling!


The Sharjah Heritage Center had fabulous displays of life in the area before the United Arab Emirates become a country. Simple mats on the sand floors for comfort, brooms for sweeping off thresholds, pillow-lined walls and comfortable airflow through wind towers for natural air conditioning.





This is a wind tower, simple mud construction strengthened by poles acting like rebar.

In the evening, we drive down to an area called Creekside, which rims the central corniche in Sharjah. There is another heritage center here where spinning is demonstrated and the old ways of living in the United Arab Emirates. We go to the old market in the center and have a light dinner on the street: fresh fruit juices and roasted meat in pita with delicious sauces, all the while, the street is alive with the native dress of the surrounding regions. A feast for the eyes.

Day Two - Dinner with Friends in Sharjah

Canadian friends hosted a party for our homecoming (well, not mine, I'm the tag-along) and they live right across from a mosque.

At the call to prayer, the bull horns on the sides of the minarets broadcast varying degrees of singing prowess throughout the area to call the faithful (men - no comment).

I heard many calls that were lovely and poetic: a softly lyrical, coaxing summons to the mosque; while others are mumbling or raspy or otherwise indecipherable as a dialogue of prayer or beckoning. Maybe sound quality depends on how much shisha is being enjoyed during one's spiritual day...

We, during the course of our evening event, experienced a couple of these calls to prayer...and these friends suffer through one of the least pleasant applications of this broadcast medium, I'd have to say, and at 5 a.m. to start the day.

All with tolerant, good humor...

Day One - Jebel Ali Sailing Club

The Jebel Ali Sailing Club is/was on a little jetty of land on the Arabian Sea at the center of Dubai. Unfortunately, with all things that have real estate value beyond their ability to draw income, this place is being bulldozed for some big high rise right on the waterfront. I saw this a lot in the United Arab Emirates. Beach front real estate is something of which they do not have a shortage.

We were there, sleeping off jet-lag during some of the last hours of this quaint little club: bar, restaurant and sailing marina.

It's interesting and sad to say good bye to a nice memory when you've only just been acquainted with it...as I write this, Jebel Ali is already gone.