Contrasts

Just had an eventful couple of days. My last post had me end up in Copenhagen and the tugging on my heart strings got stronger and the realisation of just how expensive it is to stay in Copenhagen so I bought a cheapie ticket to Gatwick and went to the house there. Got a delightful welcome there. The power had tripped off due to the cooker hood having a fault (it took me 2 days to discover that) so the few bits and pieces that we had left in the freezer had grown hair, long stinky hair. I nearly chundered when I opened the door it was so strong. Anyhow, got that cleared up and set to fault finding the electrics. It was only by chance that I found it but I got there only on the night before I was due to leave. Got back to Copenhagen and now I'm back in Sharjah after a nice short flight down here.

It's here where the title comes into play. I spent the day in the 'Disney' shopping centre that is Diera City Centre. I say 'Disney' because they do have shopping down to a fine art down here. There are shuttle busses from hotels all over the Emirates, people on hand to answer your questions at the waiting rooms for them and that sanitised and overly expensive atmosphere that Disney creates so well. Loads of people down there spending loads of money and wearing loads of bling. So that was in the centre for commercialised excesses and I then get on the hotel shuttle back to Dubai's little brother, Sharjah. Sharjah is much like Dubai was 10 years ago but without the booze and a noticeable lack of females. Everywhere you look there are hoards of South Asians, all men, hanging around, draped over each other, staring aimlessly into the middle distance and spitting. These are the guys that built the commercial epicentre that is Dubai. They work hard, very hard and have scant little time off. They normally work 12 hour shifts of hard labour on the building sites that litter the area and have 1 day off a week. These guys send every penny they can to their families in Pakistan, India and Bangladesh so much so that on the way back from my dinner round the corner at the BBQ and Curry shop I see someone going through the contents of a large bin into which someone had dumped a load of clothes. This guy looked quite well dressed, appeared to have fairly good hygene standards but was rummaging through a dumpster for the chance of a new shirt. This may not sound so bad but the smell was reminiscent of my little freezer adventure in UK. It was vile and there he was in amongst it all holding up a white shirt with a big dark stain on it. I didn't see if he took it as he was examining it for quite some time possibly pondering if it was worth his while. Of course my assumption may be totally off but that is certainly how it appeared.

To finish this observation off is one of my favorite statistics about the UAE. Less than 20% of the population are Nationals. The rest are foreigners here to make a buck. At least they work to make that buck unlike what is happpening in the UK at the moment with immigrants arriving and being housed and getting benefits from the start. Oops, I digress. My statistics turned into a mini rant.