Dubai tings

17/2/22

On my first night, I went to a bar with a guy from the hostel, Talha. When we got there, it was 80% men, which meant that women were in demand! As soon as Talha left (he had an early flight), another guy sat in his seat immediately! Half of the women here are prostitutes, one of which sat with me and was absolutely stunning. She even shared her chips with me! But what is this Islamic place, which has no bikini signs around the pool, but enables such prolific prostitution?!

Aside from the strangely high percentage of male punters, the bar was nice – to be honest, my long awaited margarita was terrible, but the band were incredible, a mix of people from around the world, singing a mix of pop, rock and Latin songs. What more could I want?!

18/2/22

On my first full day, I was itching to get to the markets! I found the metro, made it to the right stop after nearly an hour, and passed a pretty riverside, reminiscent of Venice. I asked about where the Spice Souk was since I have no data to check and was waved in the direction of a market by a helpful tourist.

The market was exceptionally clean, and while people were trying to get you into their shops, they were quiet and respectful. The usual bustle and dirt of markets was not there!! There were beautiful Moroccan/Turkish lanterns, Indian pashminas and silks, and hilariously there was UAE soap made with camel’s milk, sold at an extortionate price – the guy wanted £9 for a small bar!! Marketing is pretty tiring so at some point I escaped to a very touristy cafe for a drink. I got a karak chai and after paying in AED, I calculated how much I had spent. £4.50 for a cup of tea – really?!?! What is life 😂😂😂

After the markets, I wandered around a ‘historic’ town, though it looked like it was a set from a film – all a little too perfect, with no actual bustling life, only wandering tourists like myself!! I somehow ended up on a roof top over looking the mosque, having gone through a series of open doors and the view was pretty nice! Afterwards, I walked back past an Italian styled Arab cafe and got a boat to the real Spice Souk. The boat trip was short, sweet and exceptionally cold, and again reminiscent of Venice. I was lucky to be on my own as I got the last seat on the boat, after they’d turned a band of brothers away.

The Spice Souk and the Gold Souk were similar again. Bizarrely, they even had a mattress souk! By this time it was around 4pm and I was starving. People kept calling me, trying to get me to follow them to see some fancy designers bags. I was wearing one of my long Somali dresses with my elephant bag (my fave travel bag) my auntie made me and falling apart sandals from Morocco, so I found it fairly entertaining that so many people wanted to sell me a designer bag! I declined another of the many offers but asked where I could get food. The vendor pointed me in the right direction and I thankfully found food just before the hanger kicked in. I went to a Indian cafe, where a lot of the people eating there were speaking Hindi. I ordered a tandoori chicken paratha and a lemon and mint drink, both of which were divine!!! Then I headed on my way back to the hostel.

The metro takes a long time, but when I got in, I had my dinner of smoked salmon with cream cheese on sourdough and chatted with some of the other hostel peeps. It’s nice to be in a hostel vibe again, since it’s probably been three years since I have stayed in a hostel what with covid and all!

19/2/22

Had a breakfast similar to my dinner before heading out in search of my pre flight covid test. I managed to navigate to the private clinic without data which I was pretty pleased with! I registered, paid and sat down to wait for my test, before counting my remaining days and realising that my days and dates did not add up, and my flight was in fact on Tuesday, not Monday. I told the lady at the counter who was very nice and didn’t treat me like an idiot, and she said I can easily just come back tomorrow!

I continued on my way and headed to the metro to hit the Expo. After nearly an hour on the metro, I arrived and walked with the masses to the entrance, to find my ‘free’ ticket wasn’t valid. I paid an entrance fee and headed in. The entrance was very grand and I was given a VERY detailed map. I headed straight for the street food and ordered falafel bites and a fattoush salad. When it came, it turned out I had ordered two full meals AGAIN!! I always make this mistake with street food! I finished my food and headed in the direction of music. The Angola stand had two violinists who very playing Latin songs as well as the theme tune from Alice in Borderland. I went to the Peru pavilion which had a panoramic screen view of the jungle, before going in search of more live music and finding two Aussie bassoonists – what a novelty – who played Summertime. After that I wandered around lots of different stands with each country showcasing itself – ideally, each stand was meant to show their vision for the future, but some just showed the country and culture as it stands, which was also interesting.

Not quite sure where all the time went, but I grabbed a mid afternoon karak chai and then headed to more stands. I actually queued for New Zealand’s stall because one, its New Zealand, and two, Jacinda Ardern ❤️. Sadly, a Pakistani man followed me into the queue, starting talking to me, which was okay until he kept asking for my number or to take me somewhere in his car. I asked many times for him to leave me alone, which he did not do and when I reached the front of the queue, the security lady asked if we were together as she didn’t want to break up a group. I explained that he had been bothering me after he had gone in and she asked if I was okay, kept me back another group so I wouldn’t see him again and told me to always get any security/volunteer if I had any further issue. I thanked her and went in with the next group, only to find another guy pestering me for my number, who turned out to be the friend of the original guy. After threatening him with security, he left me alone and I could enjoy New Zealand’s pavilion in peace!! The place was epic, they had large screens of rain and wind and their whole concept was being at one with nature and using nature to be powerful. I loved it.

I went to the Spanish stand and then found a band outside the Italian stand. I ordered a macchiato and an biscotti and swayed to an Italian swing band. It was divine!! Then I headed back to the huge stage at the entrance for a mystery performance, which one of the stewards said was Coldplay and was most definitely not (lol), but was a very good dance squad. I headed home on the metro over 20,000 steps later.

Not sure how I managed it, but after returning to the hostel, I went out to a bar/club with one of the guys that works in the hostel and some of his mates. Nearly everyone was first language French, but they spoke English for me, which was kind (since I am an incompetent Brit)! The bar we went to was in a fancy hotel and had a mixture of Latin, RNB and pop songs. We danced, drank and played pool, which I started off as flukily good at and got progressively worse the more gins I had. We stayed out after the bar had closed since the people I was with knew the owner, which meant I didn’t crawl into bed until 05.30!!