The day awoke with the sound of prayers. Slowly, the individual voices from each of the mosques of Al-Karama began to sing the first call to prayer, the Adhan. The faithful are stirred from their dreams and are reminded in verse sung from minarets that ‘prayer is better than sleep…[and]… to hasten to the best of deeds.’ I had arrived here in Dubai about this time yesterday, walking through the airport’s baggage reclaim after a twelve-hour flight en-route to elsewhere. This same call to prayer permeated the Al Maktoum International airport. It is amazing how you can even feel a sense of familiarity with an airport that size. But this one does feel familiar now (it is my fifth visit). I know my way around. Knew my bearings: the routine, the lifts, the escalators, the way of direction through the chaos of flow. Occasionally glimpsing faces from the flight I’d just disembarked, I watched for a moment as we all stood in queues, before disappearing into the rest of our lives. My taxi was waiting for me. The driver was from Pakistan. He gave a genuine warmth of generosity at such an early hour. He told me how happy he was working in Dubai but missed his family and his home. The journey to my hotel took about a quarter of an hour, roads were quiet and we arrived at the hotel at around sunrise. Despite the early hour, the working day was already walking about and moving.
Yesterday was much of a blur after that; of sleeping, of eating, of feeling fatigued. I didn’t travel far or do very much (not that I can remember). After check-in, I was taken from the hotel foyer to my room. Fifth floor, room 541. Six lifts from the lobby all going upwards. Unpacked a bit, showered, sat on the bed, listened to the silence. I went back downstairs, through the lobby, to a shining dinning room and ate for breakfast. In a different time zone watches and clocks matter very little. But I ate and drank hot, black coffee. After breakfast, I crossed a busy road and went to a Carrefour supermarket and bought fruit and water. I got chatting to a happy cashier from Uganda and then was helped packing my things into a bag by a man from Egypt. He told me he loved the English language and its literature – that he enjoyed reading Virginia Woolf and Shakespeare. He told me that he was pleased to have met me and hoped I enjoyed my stay in Dubai. Back at my hotel, I fell asleep and slept solidly face down on the bed. To salvage the day, I had tried to walk down to the Creek at around sunset, but was still tired, disorientated and eventually lost my way. In the end, I came back to the hotel. The rooftop pool was closing, but the young pool guard from Kenya allowed me a few minutes to look at the glittering night-time skyline of the city in the distance.
So, I am here now, in Dubai (in transit – a stopover), for another 24hours. This time tomorrow I will be back at the airport, with my bags, moving on elsewhere, completing the rest of my journey. Before that, because of yesterday, I am determined to enjoy something of today, to see something today (something I have not seen before). So, just before first light, I showered, made coffee and opened the windows of my room and heard the first call to prayer. I took photos of the day as it rose before me. I sat looking at this incredible city moving from dawn into day. I re-read a quote I had written down during the flight from His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum about the importance of transforming ‘a dream or an idea into reality and vision into action… History has no place for dreamers.’ I drank my coffee; hot, black, and watched the cooling, curling twisting, white whisps of vapour steam out from the darkness of my cup into the new light of day.
On leaving the hotel I decided to walk back to the Creek. This time I had a map, I’d marked streets and a clear route there. I wanted to see the Al Fahidi district – there was a souk and a historical area, with older buildings now converted to museums and art galleries. It was still only mid-morning and some shops had opened, others were opening. Streets were perfumed with incense. The day had yet to heat up. People seemed at peace with each other. There was no hurrying. Shopping was actually quite pleasurable. People smiling, wishing you ‘assalam mualikum’. Nothing hurried. It took a while but I got there.
Wandering around at first, looking at postcards, looking at pottery, I eventually found a Coffee Museum. It was a two-storied building which told the story of the region’s relationship with coffee. You could buy, you could try. There were so many different types of coffee available, so many different colours, so many different varieties existing. My choice had been to try local Gulf coffee. It came served from a tall, metallic dallah pot, poured from a thin neck into a small, white cup and given to me to drink. There a golden coloured coffee cooled, flavoured with cardamom and cloves (no sugar needed). I bought Medjool dates and almonds to eat with it.
Afterwards, I walked around the souk and the historical buildings. The heat of the day was beginning to bite; in full sunshine it was intense. The blue sky was now smudged with humidity. White buildings reflected glare. Palm trees rose up out of the ground, into the day, housing small birds which chirped and swooped, flitting between the sunshine there before sheltering in the coolness and serenity of surrounding eves and ceilings – flying through the eternal peace of the spaces found in a mosque nearby. Climbing stairs, I discovered a rooftop terrace which faced the Gold and Spice Souks across the water near Deira. For a while, I sat watching the river flow down the Creek and out into Port Rashid. Dhows and water taxis flowed past. I drank my water. I ate some fruit. As the heat increased the small birds sang more softly in their echoes and chirps. At around midday, the streets rose up once more in song – the second call to prayer sang out across the Creek; it called from everywhere, all at once, reverberating around this city.
The heat was beginning to weigh me down. The fatigue of my flight had not quite left my body. I spent what cash I had left on me buying souvenirs and gifts and hurried to return to my room. During my attempt back to the hotel, I still had to navigate my way out of the little streets and alleyways. A few times I got lost. On another turn I found the Centre for Cultural Understanding; they were busy preparing a meal for lunchtime – served in an hour. I was invited to stay, to join them, but had already arranged to meet a friend back at the hotel (he lived here, had moved here, had also arranged lunch). I promised to return next time, to join them, to share a meal. Then, the last discovery, entirely by accident: an art shop selling watercolours, an art shop creating watercolours entirely from coffee. On entering, the first thing I smelt was the familiar warm perfume of coffee – yet this was from the artwork. Paintings hung from the walls ready for sale; paintings of dhows, calligraphy, sunflowers, paintings in differing shades of gold, tan and black; paintings of coffee. The artist told me how he used coffee as his medium to paint and how he enjoyed his craft. It was spellbinding as he explained and demonstrated what he did. I wanted so much to buy a picture, to support this creativity, yet my cash had already been spent elsewhere. I wished so much that I had found this place first and had bought a picture from coffee before anything else. I vowed to return to Dubai again, and find this shop and to buy a picture. To date I haven’t been back. At present, I’m not sure when I’ll have the chance again.
On the rooftop of my hotel in the late afternoon sun, I am sitting by a pool. I am still full from lunch – having met my friend from London at an Ethiopian restaurant called Zagol in a street behind this hotel, in a street in the shade. The food was incredible, utterly amazing, we ate it all and enjoyed the hour together before his return to work. I came here and have spent the afternoon enjoying the sunshine. Ahead of me now is the silhouette of Dubai’s skyline. The Burj Khalif stands tall. It is tall, it is so tall. I look out over the dreams and ideas that have come into fruition here; that have been created here. It is an incredible city. As the sun now angles lower, and begins its descent into dusk, a breeze blows across my shoulders. The streets below in Al Karama sound to the clangs and bangs of new dreams being created through construction noises, busy cars toot their horns; here, umbrellas around the pool stretch and strain as the Emirati breeze picks up. In the distance I can see the sail of the Burj al Arab. Beyond that the smooth shining gold foil of the Indian Ocean. This time tomorrow I shall be elsewhere in the world. The Indian Ocean is like flat gold foil. And the big blue sky is endless. Is endless. Is endless.
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siesta del somewhere 