Life in Dubai

See you in Oz?

2011-08-12T14:12:00.004+04:00

Just about the final piece of the moving back jigsaw has fallen into place.

The shipper has e-mailed to confirm that our stuff will be delivered the day after we arrive. That couldn't be better timing, just one night camping and then we'll have the furniture and the rest of our belongings.

So after nearly six years this will be the last post on Life in Dubai.

The first post was January 20, 2006 and I've rabbited on in 1264 posts in total. I'm amazed, I had no idea when I started that it would go on and add up like that.

A sincere thanks for stopping by, for taking the time to read the posts and for the comments, I really appreciate it.

I'll leave this blog as it is because it's a report of daily life as one person saw it through a unique period of time in the development of Dubai. I won't post here any more but I'll check back every so often to see if there are any new comments; I still get comments on posts from years back.

As in future I'll be in Australia that's where I'll move my blogging to. But I'll be visiting Dubai regularly, at least for a while, and I'm sure I'll have things to say about it. You'll find me at Life in Oz...& Dubai.

If you'd like to keep in touch, as I would with you, just click on this link: Life in Oz...& Dubai..

Last lap

2011-08-08T18:11:00.000+04:00

Less than a week before we fly back to Oz, Saturday morning in fact, so this really is the last lap.

Everything's done, except packing the bags and we always leave that to the last minute.

The online tracking system shows that the ship with our container of belongings arrived in Sydney on schedule last week. It does say that customs clearance was completed today but as I expect a bill from customs I don't believe that.

It also says Quarantine Date was August 5, but I'm not sure what that actually means. The Quarantine Service in Australia is very tough and I fully expect them to demand that at least some of the furniture is fumigated but I've heard nothing about that so far. Usually they send a Quarantine Notice saying why fumigation (or destruction) is required and the cost of doing whichever one you choose.

Anyway, it seems to indicate that our belongings should be delivered not too far from when we arrive ourselves.

The shuttle is booked to get us from Sydney International early on Sunday morning and I'm hoping we'll be home by about 10am. The forecast is sunny with a possible shower and a max of 18C - that's very different from the horribly humid day we're having in Dubai. The worst humidity of the summer I reckon.

Solutions drivel

2011-08-04T14:25:00.000+04:00

I've been letting a few examples of ridiculous corporate gobbledegook pass without comment, plus a few with the use of my hate word 'solutions'.

But there's such a classic combination of the two in a Gulf News report this morning that I have to share the gibberish with you.

They've even managed to get three 'solutions' into one sentence.

It's a short report about the link between Mubadala and Virgin Australia and includes this company statement:

"Leveraging the full scope of Mubadala Aerospace's global MRO [maintenance, repair and overhaul] capabilities, some services will also be completed out of Abu Dhabi Aircraft Technologies, SR Technics' sister company. These agreements will cover full nose-to-tail integrated component solutions and are complemented with a component financing solution from Sanad Aero Solutions"

The report is here.

Paperwork done

2011-08-01T15:04:00.000+04:00

The last items of paperwork for the move back to Oz are done now, cancelling the residence visas.

My cancellation was easy - my sponsor did it. A bit more involved for Mrs Seabee's though, because I was her sponsor. And I'd had to pay a deposit of Dh10,000 when I arranged it, which I was keen to get back.

I actually started the process a few days ago when I went to the DNRD office in Bur Dubai, on Trade Centre Road. That's where I arranged it all in the beginning so I thought I'd go back there.

It was absolutely packed with people though, although much more orderly than the first visit because now they have the numbered ticket system. It's hardly rocket science, and it's existed in other countries for many years, but it's new here.

And what a huge improvement it is in government departments (and banks and other organisations). It replaces the chaos we always had of everyone pushing and shoving, waving papers and shouting to get the attention of someone behind the counter. Now you tell the ticket dispenser person what you're there for, he gives you a numbered ticket and tells you the counter number(s) to go to. You sit and wait for the machine to bleep and display your number, telling you which counter to go to.

Anyway, even with a more orderly crowd the size of it made me think I'd be there for most of the day. So I decided to drive down SZR and go to the smaller, less popular Jebel Ali DNRD office. It was as I'd expected, very unbusy.

Now anything you do at DNRD requires 'typing'. Generally you have no idea what's being typed, and it's in Arabic of course. But you have to have 'typing'.

I told the Information person I was there to cancel a visa. "First typing. Then any desk".

I told the typing department ticket issuer what I was there for, got my ticket and sat down. For an hour. The 'typing' took twenty minutes. Another fifteen minutes waiting at a DNRD desk until I was first in the queue (no ticket numbers for this bit, just sitting in order on the bench seat and shuffling along as the people ahead of me were dealt with).

The actual cancellation took about two minutes.

Then I took my Dh10,000 deposit receipt to the cashier desk.

I was told that as it was issued in Bur Dubai I had to get the refund from Bur Dubai.

Another of those inexplicable obstacles you run into here. It's all the same DNRD, one large government department, but you have to get the deposit refund from where you lodged it.

Back up SZR to Bur Dubai DNRD.

There seem to be just three desks for deposit refund paperwork and I was their only customer.

That's when I hit the next obstacle. As with just about anything official you have to do here, you don't know what you're supposed to do, you don't know what you have to bring with you and there's no way of finding out in advance. It's only when you try to do whatever it is that you're told what you should have brought with you and what the process is.

I didn't have all the bits of paper I needed, so I gave up and went to get some coffee.

I haven't been able to get there again until today and as it's the first day of Ramadan I wasn't too confident about it all.

In fact the office was almost deserted. Plenty of people behind desks but with no-one waiting to be served. No big queues at the ticket dispenser. I got my ticket, only waited about five minutes and then it was my turn.

"Go to typing to get letter, then come back".

Out to the Dickensian typing office.

Tiny, hot, crowded both sides of the counter. No numbered tickets here, and it's the east-west queue rather than the north-south queue. That is, a double line of people the length of the counter, pushing and shoving, waving papers, yelling in a variety of languages.

I joined in, told them I wanted a deposit refund letter, paid the oddly precise amount of Dh19 and waited while they photocopied everything and printed out an Arabic letter.

Back to the DNRD counter and five minutes later I had the authorised deposit receipt.

I asked where I had to take it and was told, "Outside bank".

I wandered outside and found a Commercial Bank of Dubai branch. Got my ticket, waited five minutes, signed and had to write my mobile phone number on various bits of paper, and had to pay Dh20 for something or other. I was eventually given ten crisp new Dh1,000 notes.

So it's done. All the paperwork's completed, the deposit's back where it belongs in my wallet.

We're booked to leave in a couple of weeks.

Traffic fines discount

2011-07-31T11:31:00.000+04:00

It seems that Dubai police are about to follow some other emirates and offer discounts on traffic offence fines.

I'm struggling to understand how that will help to improve the standard of driving.

Gulf News has the report here.

Silence on property 'residence visa'

2011-07-25T17:01:00.000+04:00

At the end of last month I was talking here about the new so-called 'residence visa' for property owners, which the media and real estate spokespeople were lauding as a great move forward.

It was nothing of the sort of course, and not even a residence visa. It was a three year multi-entry visit visa for which, in spite of all the applause, we were given no details.

We were told that holders would have to leave the country every six months...which was 'clarified' a few days later by a statement that holders would not have to leave every six months.

The only other information was that holders would need proof of a bank account either here or overseas and a salary of Dh10,000 a month, and the visa would only apply to property 'worth Dh1 million'. They would also have to have medical insurance renewable every six months (strange) and take a medical here every two years.

But the real detail that property owners, and potential buyers, need wasn't, and still hasn't, been given. The announcement was made, then nothing.

Value of property for example. Based on what? The original price paid? Even with the burst bubble, apartments in my building that were originally bought for Dh450,000 are currently over Dh1 million - and they've been much higher than that of course. But if the original purchase price is the yardstick, none of the owners qualify for the visa.

Or is it based on current value? Two problems with that. One, who decides what current value is? Two, value fluctuates all the time depending on many factors. Something that's worth a million today may be worth less than a million in a month's time if interests rates go up, mortgages become even more difficult to find, a large supply of similar apartments is released.

Then as it isn't a residence visa, can holders apply for all the things that require a res. visa, such as a driving licence, DEWA connections and so on? Or are they treated the same as other visit visa holders?

And what's the cost? The original plan for a six month visa required the holder to exit the country and apply for a new visa to come back in...at Dh2,000 a time. That soon adds up if it's a family on the visa. We had no indication of the cost of the latest version.

Far from helping the real estate sector, this kind of part announcement leaving vital questions unanswered damages it even more.

Johann Hari exposed

2011-07-22T15:59:00.002+04:00

The story broke in the UK press a couple of weeks ago and I've been meaning to post this for a while, but being busy with the imminent move back to Oz I didn't get around to it.

It's been somewhat swamped by the Murdoch News of the World saga but it involves much the same thing, appalling standards of 'journalism'.

I'm prompted to devote time to it today by an article in this morning's The National.

It concerns Johann Hari, a columnist I've disliked for a long time and who I've slated here before, and his standards of 'journalism'. You'll remember Mr Hari for his infamous article 'The Dark Side of Dubai' written over two years ago now.

He's at last been publicly exposed for something that was apparent from that and other articles; misrepresention, misquoting and making up 'facts' to make a point.

Hari admitted exactly that when in response to the criticisms he said he had opted for "intellectual accuracy" over "reportorial accuracy".

He has quite rightly been suspended by his newspaper, The Independent, and calls are being made for his various awards for journalism to be taken back. One committee is said to be actively investigating their award to him.

The National quotes Bitish author and columnist Guy Walters as saying Hari has committed three journalistic crimes: "First, he has pretended that words spoken to other journalists were in fact said to him. That is plagiarism, pure and simple. Secondly, he makes things up. There is no doubt in my mind that many of the people he supposedly encounters - such as the girl in hot pants in Dubai - are figments of his imagination. Thirdly, he distorts the words of the real people he does manage to interview."

Certainly the second and third apply to his Dubai article, as I pointed out in my detailed response to it.

That was back in April 2009 and it's interesting that I still regularly get visitors landing on that page.

The times when news went into the bin at the end of the day have disappeared, now it stays here on the www for people to read forever. This is an example - various commentators reporting Hari's attack on Dubai linked to it and to my response, and now more than two years later people are still reading both.

Now that he's been exposed I think there's a good argument for The Independent to remove the links to any of his articles which have been called into question for containing plagiarism, lies, distortions.

I would also suggest that those of us who took him to task over his Dubai article and follow-up, and who took a lot of stick at the time from his supporters, have been exonerated.

The Dark Side of Dubai.
My post disecting it
More lies from Johann Hari.
The National.

Pssst. Wanna buy a suit?

2011-07-20T15:02:00.000+04:00

I'm sure it must be a scam, although I don't know exactly what it is because I always cut it short.

Walking in Dubai Marina I've been stopped now about ten times by a car pulling up alongside.

"Scusi. Can you please tell me the way to Sheikh Zayed Road, there are no signs"

The passenger is always Italian, presentable, friendly.

I tell him how to get to SZR.

Profuse thanks, then "Where are you from?"

"Ah, Australia. Melbourne or Sydney? I have a brother in Melbourne".

When I say Sydney they usually ask whether I know Machiavalli restaurant - one of my favourites as it happens.

They go on to say they've been working in Oz, more often than not as interior designer at the Versace hotel on the Gold Coast. But...they've changed occupations and now are in Italian fashion and can make me an offer which presumably is too good not to accept.

That's when I tell them I'm not buying and say ciao.

I wonder how the scam plays out. Anyone know?

They don't get it.

2011-07-18T15:32:00.002+04:00

The News Corp phone hacking saga continues like a runaway train.

Actually, to my mind it's not about phone hacking, although it did start when the public discovered that the News of the World hacked into the phones of people other than celebrities. That meant the illegality which had been accepted for years was suddenly an outrage.

And although it's called the phone hacking scandal, the real story is corruption.

The UK has long prided itself on being corruption free. It can't any more. Media, politicians, police all scratching each others' backs with secret deals, payoffs, freebies, exchanges of confidential information.

Politicians playing for Murdoch's media support. And in return he expected...?

A relationship between police and Murdoch's empire that included police being paid for information.

Former executives from the NoW being given well- paid jobs with the police and government.

The original enquiry finding no problem other than a couple of minor underlings, who went to jail, and the enquiry being closed with unseemly haste.

And so it was back to business as usual.

But every day sees more sensational developments. It's not just underlings taking the rap any more, big names are beginning to fall.

The latest is the top cop, Sir Paul Stephenson, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, who resigned yesterday.

There were a number of pressures on him but the one that to me is the biggest is that he accepted a gift of thousands of pounds of free health spa accommodation.

It doesn't matter who the owners were, who arranged it, whether it had anything to do with Murdoch.

The problem is the nation's top policeman accepted a valuable gift from someone.

At the very best it shows appalling judgement and naivete.

And like others being outed in this drama, he just doesn't get it.

Here's what he said:

Sir Paul insisted there was "no impropriety" in relation to his use of the spa. He said: "I am extremely happy with what I did and the reasons for it — to do everything possible to return to running the Met full time, significantly ahead of medical, family and friends’ advice. The attempt to represent this in a negative way is both cynical and disappointing."

See, accepting gifts is perfectly OK for senior police officers. There is such a thing as free lunch. People will give them gifts worth thousands of pounds and never even think of wanting a favour in return.

Just watch it, this story will grow like a snowball because it's becoming a really dirty fight. People involved are looking to deflect dirt from themselves by naming others, people are settling old scores, good friends are hurriedly being dropped, there's a mad a scramble as people scurry to put distance between themselves and News Corp. And of course, anti-News Corp forces, including media rivals, are throwing fuel on the fire.

There are widespread reports of Sir Paul's dig at the Prime Minister who he said risked being compromised by his closeness to former News of the World editor Andy Coulson.

And, naturally, not for himself did Sir Paul kept secret his relationship with and employment of Caulson's former deputy Neil Wallis as a 'strategic adviser'. No, that was to protect others: "I did not want to compromise the prime minister in any way by revealing or discussing a potential suspect who clearly had a close relationship with Mr Coulson."

Very senior people, including long-standing friends of Rupert Murdoch, have gone and are among those arrested. The top cop has gone and his deputy should be next.* The opposition is baying for government blood.

They'll make a movie of it one day.

Quotes are from:
Sir Paul turns on PM. The Guardian.
Daily Telegraph.

* Breaking News

It's ninety minutes after I posted this and the Assistant Commissioner has just resigned. Things are moving faster than we can keep up with.

Power tends to corrupt...

2011-07-16T16:45:00.002+04:00

So said Lord Acton back in the eighteen eighties.

Very relevant to the momentous events going on in the UK surrounding Rupert Murdoch's brand of 'journalism' I would say.

Another saying that springs to mind is 'one law for the rich, one for the poor', but this one is happening in reverse from the usual meaning.

The hypocrisy of the general public is never more evident than in the Murdoch saga.

He's made his squillons and gained his power & influence by feeding the public obsession with gossip and personal details about people's private lives, the more dirt-raking the better. His papers are as downmarket as you can get, with even the once internationally respected The Times and Sunday Times going on a rapid downward spiral when he took them over.

The public's insatiable appetite for dross gave tabloid rags like The Sun and the News of the World the highest readership in the UK. In Australia it's the same with his tabloids versus the broadsheets.

Then the hypocrisy. As long as the gossip and lurid details were about royalty, footballers, politicians and 'celebrities' the illegal means of obtaining the information were not questioned.

But when exactly the same methods were used against ordinary people - an uprising.

It's not the unprofessional, immoral, illegal actions which have caused such outrage. It's who the victims are this time.

They won't of course, but people should take a long hard look at themselves for accepting illegal practices when they were used against well-known people. That's encouraged the practitioners to see their illegal, immoral actions as normal practice, happily accepted by the public.

Then there's the side to this saga that will be society changing.

When the Dirty Digger, as Private Eye* famously dubbed him, bought into the UK's newspaper world he was a breath of fresh air. He challenged the establishment, as very few did in those days, and broke the print unions which were killing the hand that fed them. (I had personal experience of them when I worked in London ad agencies).

But as his influence with the public - read voters - increased so did his interference in politics. Now there is evidence not only of his power to influence the highest levels of government but of his organisation's illegal activity in phone hacking, fraudulently obtaining personal information ('blagging') and bribery of police.

The mutual back-scratching of News Corp., politicians and the police isn't new but it's reached new depths.

No-one knows how much more there is to discover. Was it confined to the now thankfully defunct News of the World? (Always a dreadful example of tabloid 'journalism'). Was it even confined to the UK? The FBI in the US is looking into alleged breaches of US law. In Australia, where his empire began and where he owns nearly two thirds of big city newspapers, MPs are calling for an inquiry into media regulation.

This time News Corp won't be able to sweep it under the carpet as they did earlier, sacrificing a couple of, albiet guilty, fall guys. I've always maintained that the culture of an organisation is set at the very top. Underlings do what they believe the boss will be happy with, often what the boss indicates he'll be happy with.

To make matter worse, far from making a couple of minor mistakes in handling the crisis, as Murdoch told the (his) Wall Street Journal they'd done, he's made uncharacteristically massive errors. Maybe he's simply lost the plot. But I suspect it's more that the years of increasing power and influence have made him overconfident about what he can get away with. Arrogance and treating people with disdain aren't cutting it any more.
It needed an immediate admission that the practices were totally unacceptable. An immediate apology and promise that he was on his way to sort it out and hold those responsible, right to the top, to account. An urgent personal apology to the family of the murdered teenager Milly Dowler, the hacking of whose phone started the public outrage.

He should not have refused to attend the parliamentary hearing - a bad decision since reversed only as he realised the severity of the storm and threats of a summons to appear were made.

He should have immediately dropped his bid to buy the whole of BSkyB, 'pending the outcome of the current investigations'. Instead he tried to remove it from the political arena by having it referred to the competion watchdog, then had to withdraw the bid anyway. Calls are now being made to consider whether News should be allowed to retain its existing 39% holding.

All in all, mistake piled on mistake. As I said, out of character and massively damaging to the empire. Perhaps even fatal to it in its present form.

It will certainly lead in the UK to a formal distancing between media proprietors and politicians and between the media and police. Perhaps a new media regulator, maybe no more self regulation. More attention will be paid to the meaning of a 'fit and proper' person in relation to media owners. Quite possibly stronger regulations about the percentage of media one person can control.

Very senior people are going to be held responsible for their actions and lose their jobs - instead of the usual platitude of 'I take full responsibility' with absolutely nothing happening thereafter.

And much more transparency all round.

It's a big, big story and, as they say, it has legs. And there'll be more sensational revelations as it evolves.

* Private Eye covers are consistently brilliant. Do have a look at their website, click on 'Covers Library' and search Rupert Murdoch for example.

"Temperatures up to 45 celcius...

2011-07-13T12:53:00.000+04:00

...but skies beginning to clear"

That was the weather report on radio this morning and I was relieved to hear the second part.

It's the very worst weather in my opinion, air you have to eat rather than breathe.

Photo. Karen Dias Gulf News

The heat I can take, in fact I'm only happy in hot sunny weather. Humidity I hate but in fact that hasn't been bad at all recently, quite comfortable really.

But the dust. I can't think of anything worse and it's been like it for the past couple of weeks.

In New Dubai we have more than just the sand, we have cement dust from the construction. It gets everywhere, inside the car inside the apartment, onto and into everything.

Including us.

A few years down the track I suspect that there'll be an epidemic of bad health caused by it among all of us who've lived here during the construction boom.

STOP THIEF!

2011-07-12T16:58:00.001+04:00

Back in Oz we have a nice orange tree which when I left had thirty or so oranges ripening nicely. I've been hoping they'd be perfect for eating when we get back.

We also have plenty of sulphur crested cockatoos flying about:

Photo. www.australiazoo.com.au

The connection is this e-mail our good friend and neighbour sent this morning:

Today, I have been watching from our patio a white cockatoo picking your oranges and flying away with them. As you won't be back at Terrigal for a few weeks, is it OK if I pick them? ( instead of the cockatoo)

Whichever way, I'm not going to enjoy them.

Not happy

2011-07-10T16:54:00.000+04:00

I've had a few dealings recently with the unbelievable red tape in the UK and the laughable customer service there and I'm in the middle of another major problem caused by it right now.

A few months ago we sold a house we owned in England. You wouldn't believe what we had to do to prove we were who we said we were - it was all to do with money laundering legislation the solicitor said.

In reality most the frustration is caused by 'jobsworths'; defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as "a person in authority (esp. a minor official) who insists on adhering to rules and regulations or bureaucratic procedures even at the expense of common sense." They've also been defined as "a minor factotum whose only status comes from enforcing otherwise petty regulations".

In my experience it's more than that. It's people misinterpreting, misunderstanding or simply not knowing enough about the rules but insisting on enforcing their version of them.

To complete the house sale we had to produce passports, other photo ID, signed statements from people that we were indeed us, copies of credit cards to prove our signatures were our signatures. We had to prove our bank account was our bank account. Each new piece of evidence we supplied was followed by another demand for something additional. It went on for days.

My latest run in is with Emirates and my UK bank.

I made bookings online for two family members to travel from the UK to Australia. I've booked online with Emirates many times and it's quick and easy with their excellent website.

But not if you're flying from the UK. If the person paying is not one of the passengers they won't accept credit card payments.

So I had to do a bank transfer, not to Emirates but to their nominated Global Collect BV. Did that, got a receipt from my bank. Waited for the e-tickets.

Nothing. No confirmation, no acknowledgement, no tickets.

I e-mailed Emirates to ask why and discovered that queries are forwarded to the country of departure. That means it went to the UK, so naturally my e-mail was ignored.

I sent another one.

This time I got a reply saying it must be a payment problem and asking for details of the payment. I gave them the information and they replied that my query had been passed to the relevant department and I would be informed as soon as they had an update.

The bank, the now government owned Royal Bank of Scotland, had sent me a note that the money had been transferred but I wanted to double-check that it had indeed gone from our bank account.

The website won't let me log in. It suggests you re-activate your online banking if that happens. It won't let me reactivate.

You can send them an e-mail, which they promise to respond to in typical UK customer service style...within ten working days.

Now there's an e-mail from Emirates that as payment was not made by the due date the reservations have been cancelled and I have to rebook. But I pay again of course if I do that.

You might guess that I'm not best pleased at the moment.

Vehicle transfer

2011-07-06T15:25:00.000+04:00

I approach dealings with government departments, anywhere, with a sinking feeling.

I expect to sit and wait for hours before I'm called to a counter.

I fully expect to not be on the same wavelength as the people I have to deal with (I've posted about this before and readers have left comments about their attempts to hold a meaningful conversation with bureaucrats).

I expect to be directed from counter to counter, department to department.

I expect it, whatever it is, to take at least half a day.

So yesterday was the day to do the car transfer of ownership and I approached it with the usual dread.

It was a doddle.

I can't believe it. Twenty minutes from start to finish. Friendly, efficient people. A simple process.

For when you have to go through it, here's the story.

I went to the Al Barsha Traffic Department, next to the Mall of the Emirates interchange on Sheikh Zayed Road.

You go not to the traffic department building itself but to the adjacent Tasjeel facility next to the EPPCO petrol station.

You need both seller and buyer to be there, they each need a passport copy (main page and residency visa page) and the buyer has to have an insurance policy on the vehicle. You need both driving licences and the current registration card. And some cash.

Regardless of when the vehicle was tested and registered it has to be done again.

I highly recommend you pay Dh150 for Express Service. If you do, you just park your vehicle and wait in the air-condirtioned office. Someone takes the vehicle, jumps the queue, tests the vehicle, issues the test certificate, brings it all to the office. Ten minutes.

You fill in a simple one sheet form - name of seller, name of buyer, vehicle details/numbers, that sort of thing.

You're asked if you have any outstanding fines, money owing on the vehicle, has the buyer paid you, whether the buyer wants a new registration number.

You hand over the money and in return get a wad of paper, the new registration card in the new owner's name.

That's it. Done. Twenty minutes.

But a heads up if you're served by Faisal Al Hamadi.

"Any fines" he asked.

"No, I'm a law-abiding sort of a person" I said.

He checked the computer. "Ah. One big fine. The police will confiscate your car for one month"

WHAT!

I dash round to look at the computer. He enjoys that. "Just joking"

A bit later he looks at the test certificate - which I haven't seen. "Any accident?"

"A car drove in the back of me two years ago, minor damage and it was an official dealer repair"

"Chassis damage" he says.

WHAT!

Dash for the computer again.

He enjoyed that too. "Just joking"

I don't mind. A government employee with a sense of humour, appearing to enjoy his work. He's also pleasant, friendly, efficient. Much better than the usual surly, unhelpful 'don't want to be here' attitude of so many bureacrats.

So a process I was dreading was actually very simple and efficient and not at all unpleasant.

Oh good, clarification.

2011-07-05T17:30:00.001+04:00

Gulf News is pressing on with reports about what they present as the great new residence visa for foreign property owners.

As I pointed out last Wednesday, it ain't a residence visa, it's a multi-entry visit visa available to some property owners. With lots of conditions - many of them not announced yet.

Today GN has a story headed 'New residence visa will increase flexibility for real estate investors'.

Oh yeah?

The story includes some of the usual 'clarification' that we're so used to.

Last Wednesday Gulf News quoted Maj. Gen. Nasser Bin Al Awadi Al Menhali, Assistant Undersecretary for Naturalisation, Residence & Port Affairs, as saying: "Investors who own property worth Dh1 million can get three year mutiple-entry visit visas. However, they have to exit the country every six months".

Today they quote 'senior government officials' as saying: "The visa...will allow property investors to sponsor their families and stay in the UAE for three years without leaving."

So they either have to exit the country every six months or they don't. Wait for more 'clarification'.

As for the unannounced conditions, Major General Nasser Bin Al Awadi Al Menhali has told Gulf News that the full details of the law would be made public soon.

The report goes on to point out that: "It is still unclear if the visa provides investors all the usual benefits of a residence visa, such as enabling them to open bank accounts and apply for local driving licences."

Another thing that's unclear is the Dh1 million 'value' of the property. Is that the price paid or the value now? And if it's the value now, who fixes the value?

Deja vu. It's exactly as happened with the original six month visit visa, exitedly welcomed but misrepresented by the media and the real estate industry as a residence visa that would restore confidence and increase sales. They're again wildly enthusiastic, presenting the latest incarnation as the answer to many of the problems of the real estate sector and investors.

Take a deep breath fellas. We have conflicting information, the law isn't issued yet, the details haven't been announced, we don't know how it's going to work.

The Gulf News report here.

The countdown begins

2011-07-04T14:46:00.002+04:00

It's time to move back to Oz and so the countdown to leaving Dubai has begun.

Like so many people we decided to come for two or three years but stayed longer. Six years in our case.

To be honest, I was ready to move back at least three years ago but Mrs Seabee got totally involved in her work and didn't want to leave. I wanted to go, she wanted to stay - so we made the compromise that so many couples make, we did what the female said.

If I remember correctly my first posts on Life in Dubai were about the fun and games we had with bureaucracy and I'll round things off with what we have to go through to close the chapter.

The first task is to transfer the car ownership and I'll let you know what's involved in that when I find out.

So far I've been told by my insurance company that the new owner of my personal mobility solution has to have insurance in place before we can do the transfer. I'll do a post with the full story when it's all done.

Flight's booked for mid-August and the container with our belongings has just left Jebel Ali. You have to allow for Customs and, particularly, Quarantine (Australian Quarantine & Inspection Service) to take at least three weeks to check and clear stuff coming into Australia and we've tried to time our arrival as close as we can guess delivery of our belongings will be.

As for blogging, I'll simply stop posting here - as I won't be commenting on a Life in Dubai any more - and I'll move to a new blog. I'll give you the details when I finish up here in about six weeks.

Property visa changes - again

2011-06-29T13:45:00.000+04:00

When foreigners were told they could buy property in designated areas of Dubai, a residence visa - subject to the usual DNRD requirements - was included as an added inducement to invest in the emirate.

But the goalposts were moved after the game was well under way.

The standard three year residence visa suddenly was no longer available. It was replaced by a six month visit visa - hardly fair to those who'd invested their money on the original basis. It was also a bad decision in relation to both confidence in Dubai being a good place to do business and in supporting the by-then crashed real estate sector.

Now that bad decision has been reversed, partially at least.

A three year visa is again offered, but it's still only a visit visa not a residence visa.

Gulf News quotes Maj. Gen. Nasser Bin Al Awadi Al Menhali, Assistant Undersecretary for Naturalisation, Residence & Port Affairs, as saying: "Investors who own property worth Dh1 million can get three year mutiple-entry visit visas. However, they have to exit the country every six months".

The Khaleej Times report adds that a property owner applying for the visa: "...also needs to open a bank account locally or aboard and is required to provide proof of a minimum monthly income of Dh10,000. The investor shall also get a medical insurance renewable every six months, apart from a valid medical fitness test every two years."

It's a step in the right direction but it still misses the target. It needs to be a true residence visa. And it needs to be simple.

Back again

2011-06-27T15:33:00.000+04:00

Sydney was 21C, sunny, with crystal clear air when I left.

Dubai today will reach 44C the weather forecast said, and even with only 24% humidity the air is thick with 'haze' - cement dust and sand.

Some difference.

The fun story while I've been away was, I thought, the ENOC/EPPCO no petrol saga. It's just such a typical story from this part of the world.

No petrol available from two of the largest petrol station operators in one of the world's largest oil producing countries.

The demonstrably ridiculous 'reason' given by the companies - upgrades of the outlets which everyone could see wasn't actually happening.

Followed by the usual 'disappear and say nothing' PR strategy.

Under that policy, the Sharjah government deadline to explain the situation was ignored.

The Sharjah government shuts down the outlets.

Still no comment.

So what happens next?

Let me guess. ADNOC replaces them as the supplier in the northern emirates.

Being an Abu Dhabi outfit they have government oil revenues behind them - unlike ENOC/EPPCO which have the Dubai government behind them - so the payment of the subsidies shouldn't be a problem. And EPPCO/ENOC get rid of the losses that were being racked up on every litre of petrol they sold in the northern emirates.

A conspiracy theorist would say that was the plan all along.

Christmas lunch flew in...

2011-06-21T09:35:00.000+04:00

A wild turkey on my back fence this morning.

I'm getting ready to come back to Dubai, flying out of Sydney on Friday afternoon and due in at the usual unearthly hour of the morning.

We've got a lot of flight cancellations because of volcanic ash in the air, mostly domestic but some international flights have been diverted or delayed apparently. They're saying it will clear within 48 hours so hopefully I'll get away on time.

Then and now

2011-06-17T11:50:00.000+04:00

Yesterday...

Today...

That's better!

2011-06-05T11:01:00.000+04:00

I can't believe the weather we've been having. It's so un-Australian.

We're coming into winter so cooler temperatures are normal, but the wet certainly isn't par for the course.

The last time I remember a period like this was way back in the mid-eighties.

But...today was sunny so I went for a walk. Blue sky. Crystal clear air. Sunshine.

I walked around the next bay to the one I live on...

That's how it should look, not wet and gray.

The forecast for tomorrow is sunshine all day. But then the clouds and showers are forecast for the rest of the week.

Bummer.

We have weather

2011-05-30T07:42:00.002+04:00

Australia's the world's driest inhabited continent, and the drought over the plast decade is testament to that.

Not this year though.

We've just had the coldest May since 1970 and we have plenty of rain, 100mm since yesterday morning.

We're also getting things I haven't seen before. This morning I looked out of the lounge window to see this:

Judges and bloggers of one mind

2011-05-27T10:36:00.000+04:00

Many of us have discussed on our blogs for years the sentences handed down for public indecency offences. While we accept that different cultures have different sensibilities it's hard to understand how an offence such as an alleged rude hand gesture can result in far more severe punishment than a real crime such as robbery.

A very interesting report appeared in The National yesterday including comments from several judges about the sentences they often hand down for people found guilty of indecency.

"Public decency laws need to be reformed so that punishments can more accurately reflect the severity of the offence, several judges have said."

I've questioned in various posts on the subject whether the courts had any discretion in the sentences they hand down, or whether they are mandatory. The judges quoted in the report have answered that.

"While sentencing guidelines for more serious crimes allow judges discretion in weighing the facts of a particular case, guidelines for minor crimes concerning public decency often force them into overly harsh sentences."

"An expatriate who has committed an offence such as raising his hand in a bad gesture should be punished, but not by destroying his chances of returning to this country to make a living," one lower court judge said. More serious crimes such as theft were not punished by deportation, he pointed out."

The courts have taken some stick, especially in the overseas press, over their draconian sentencing but it seems they have little room for discretion.

In fact judges, or at least some of them, seem to be of the same opinion as us.

It's a fascinating insight into the legal system here in The National.

Two lost weeks

2011-05-26T08:47:00.000+04:00

There hasn't been anything to report because I seem to have lost the last couple of weeks.
Dubai to Sydney door-to-door is a long and tiring journey so that takes some recovery time.

Then there's the six hour time difference that confuses the body clock for a good while.

Added to that a virus has had me flat on my back feeling awful for a few days.

But at least I was indoors in the warm.

We've had the wettest, windiest, coldest May days for a long time, so indoors was the place to be.

Tuesday we had severe weather warnings for the Sydney area and got winds of up to 110kph overnight.

They were southerlies - that's the cold ones down in this part of the globe. The weather bureau said it would reach a maximum of 14C but the winds would make it feel ten degrees colder.

I poked my nose out and it sure did feel like about four or five.

The coldest May day for eleven years they said.

The battered body is adjusting to that too, having just come from 42C in Dubai.

I'll just about get on top of it all when it'll be time to come back.

Don't call us...

2011-05-15T12:28:00.000+04:00

"Gulf News was unable to get a response..."

Absolutely typical of all-too many companies here.

This time it's from Sharjah, where according to the Gulf News report, expat residents have found notices from SEWA (Sharjah Electricity and Water Authority) on their doorsteps demanding payment of additional deposits of at least Dh3,000...to be paid within seven days or the services will be disconnected.

"We tried to contact Sewa to inquire through their phone number attached with the notice but in vain as no one ever responds," said one resident.

High-handed or incompetent? Both, probably. And just so typical. Make a statement, say something controversial, change the rules overnight, go into hiding.

You can read the full story here.

And on that note I'm getting away from it for a few weeks, back to Oz. I'll be back towards the end of June, although I'll probably post the odd piece on Life in Dubai while I'm away.

The suitcase is packed with sweaters; Sydney will be sunny but with a max of 20C and a minimum of only 8C tomorrow when I arrive according to the forecast. But cool as it is at least I'll be able to breathe the air, it won't be full of dust as it is today in Dubai.

Give and take

2011-05-11T12:28:00.001+04:00

I found a couple of news stories about money interesting, coming as they did at the same time.

In Oz the federal Treasurer Wayne Swan delivered the budget which included an increase in overseas aid to $4.8 billion.

At the same time Abu Dhabi announced that it was donating $30 million to our northern state of Queensland to build cyclone shelters, after the devastation caused by Cyclone Yasi.

`

More old photos

2011-05-08T11:56:00.001+04:00

Here are more of the old photos I rediscovered recently.

These I took in the fish market and the fruit/vegetable market in Deira in 1980.

Back in the day...

2011-05-06T13:50:00.000+04:00

I've been through that forgotten bag of old Dubai photos I mentioned the other day and scanned some of them, so it's time to share them with you.

What's interesting is not so much the buildings themselves in these photos but what's around them. Or, compared with today, what's not around them.

My first apartment was in a brand new building and I was one of the first to move in.

It was in Deira just behind Al Ghurair City. Although back in 1977 when I moved in construction of Al Ghurair Centre, as it was originally called, hadn't been started.

Mine was the top floor apartment on the right of the building. From it, three or four years later, I had a good view of Al Ghurair Centre.

You can see that it was still far from the built-up area that it is today - in fact it was almost rural:

Over the other side of the Creek, behind the newly-opened Trade Centre was the Hilton hotel. This photo has a note on the back that it was taken in 1979.

The Hilton was demolished a few years ago but the Clock Tower is still very much in place, although not the prominent landmark that it was back then:

The Dubai Municipality building in Deira is still there, but the surrounds are very different now.

This one was also taken in 1979, from Deira looking across the Creek to Bur Dubai:

No concrete banks you'll notice, just the natural sand and plenty of dhows and fishing boats.

There were a lot of original buildings in Bur Dubai too, complete with original, working wind towers.

Signs of the times

2011-05-01T12:23:00.003+04:00

Here's some signage I stumbled across in the UK which caught my attention.

The first isn't unique to the UK of course, the stupidity is world-wide.

A packet of peanuts...with an allergy warning to buyers that it contains nuts and may contain traces of nuts.

You'd hope a packet of peanuts would have at least traces of nuts, wouldn't you.

Then a couple of local signs.

An obviously dissastisfied customer of the enclosure solutions operative wanted the passing world to know of his frustration.

A reply was added by said fencing contractor:

And another, this one a classic of the way the bureaucratic mind thinks so differently from the rest of us.

From their parallel world you get this:

A bureaucrat sees the overgrown shrub, goes back to the office, writes a notice, gets it printed and laminated, goes back to the site and pins the notice in place. Then presumably puts in a requisition to the environmental solutions department to carry out the necessary landscaping.

A non- bureaucrat would simply have gone back with a pair of shears and trimmed the offending leaves.

Treasure Chest

2011-04-28T17:37:00.000+04:00

I've discovered a treasure chest. Or to be accurate, a treasure plastic bag.

Full of stuff I didn't know I had, it was hidden way back behind stacks of other stuff in the dark depths of a large cupboard.

A bag full of stuff from Dubai from 1977 up to about 1982.

I've been sorting through it and I've come up with a selection of photos and some other bits that I'll share with you over a few posts.

A real find was an old vinyl 45rpm record, one that we played at every gig we had with our mobile DuneBeat Disco.

The cover is the fabulous 'Life in the Emirates', but inside it the disc was 'Back in Dubai'...

But I did find a copy of 'Life in the Emirates', on an old cassette tape:

And there was another home-made tape, featuring 'Alex & The KayGee's, Live at the Cafe Royal, Dubai International Hotel'.

Dubai International was one of Dubai's earliest five-star hotels - it's still there opposite the airport but now changed to Le Meridien Dubai.

Back in the day it was the place to go. It had one of the city's first discos, Studio 7, and Cafe Royal, the fine dining restaurant. And it really was the best fine dining, with superb food and service and a big showband, which was Alex & The KayGees.

They started the evening with just the piano player, who was gradually joined by other musicians as the evening progressed. They ramped the sound up until eventually about fifteen musicians made up the big band, then the girl singers came on and finally Alex, the lead singer, with his big voice, big hair, big personality.

It was some show.

Here they are, with some of the Cafe Royal waiters. From memory, they were the first Filipinos to come to Dubai so they were real trail-blazers:

Cafe Royal was so popular that they couldn't fit in all the people who wanted to dine there, so on Thursdays they took the restaurant outdoors.

If you've been to the hotel you'll know it has nearly forty acres of landscaped gardens, and that's where they built a series of food stations, put down a dance floor and bandstand and had many more tables than they could have indoors.

Not a good photo but you'll get the idea. Dancers over on the top right, the bandstand just to the left of them:

Those were the days.

The Brits & weather

2011-04-27T13:50:00.000+04:00

Three weeks in the UK and I've fallen into the habit of the weather being the first topic of conversation.

Our first week was warm and sunny, so was the third - in fact the Daily Telegraph ran a story last week headed "Heatwave to stay...with chance of 25C today"

But the week between was wet, cloudy and the temperature struggled to a peak of thirteen or fourteen celcius. But that doesn't stop the Brits stripping off if the sun comes out.

We were huddled in a coffee shop, hiding from the eleven degrees and howling wind that took it much lower, when several women walked by enjoying the sunshine dressed like this:

Later in the week in Devon the temp dropped even more. The car told us that in the afternoon it was eight degrees:

And a few minutes later, even though there was no sunshine, they were in T-shirts, shorts, thin blouses to enjoy the balmy weather:

Last week someone said to me that people had been complaining about the cold since about November but a day of warm sunshine and they were already moaning about the unbearable heat.

I have hundreds of photos of our trip to sort out of course and I might post a few soon. More importantly, I found a bag of forgotten photos of Dubai back in the seventies so I'll be able to do a new 'Old Dubai' post when I've sorted them and enhanced the faded ones.

The fog did NOT do it!

2011-04-09T21:17:00.000+04:00

Sitting here in the UK on a crystal clear early evening I thought I'd have a quick look at Gulf News before we find a nice village pub for dinner.

The morning we left Dubai was when the latest multi-vehicle pile up was reported, a story that has legs, as they say. I found it still being talked about in today's online GN, proof yet again that criminally moronic drivers are not being blamed for our too-frequent road carnage in bad weather.

There's an article headlined "Timeline: crashes caused by poor visibility"

The latest big crash was "caused by heavy morning fog" we're assured.

The other eight crashes listed were also caused by the "foggy weather conditions and poor visibility"

Not, you note, by terminally stupid drivers travelling at 140kph in 50 metre visibility.

I know I've gone on about this several times in the past but I really do need to keep repeating myself. What chance is there of ever changing these driving habits when those responsible for the carnage are excused because it wasn't their fault, it was the fog's.

Note to Gulf News - the fog wasn't driving the vehicles at insane speeds. The fog wasn't driving too close to the vehicle in front. The fog did not cause the crashes.

The crash, the death, the injuries were all caused by the drivers.

The drivers, not the weather.

Weather drives cars says Gulf News.

And now for something completely different.

2011-04-02T15:34:00.002+04:00

Something that's intrigued me for a long time has to do with racing camels here in the UAE.

Very big, camels.

Big, clumsy and weighing over half a tonne.

So why were the jockeys very small young boys, replaced when it was acknowledged that was an unacceptable practice by even smaller robot jockeys?

Photo life.com

This makes much more sense to me, as we do it in Australia, where we have huge herds of wild camels by the way, with a proper grown-up human jockey:

Photo Greg White

It's a rhetorical question, I'm sure there's no logical answer.

BTW, the pic is from Australia's richest camel race with A$30,000 in prize money (Dh110,000), held every July way, way, way out in the bush in far western Queensland. It's about 2,000 kilometres from the state capital Brisbane.

Just a bit of background, that gives an idea of the vastness and sparse population we enjoy in Oz. Boulia Shire covers a land area of 61,176sq kilometres and has a total Shire population of just 600 people. That's four times larger than Greater London, which has eight million people.

The town of Boulia has a population of 300 people and the other town in the Shire, Urandangie, has a population of 35.

So there's a lot of empty space.

It fills up a bit for the camel races, when about 2,000 people turn up.

And of course, it's empty apart from the 250,000 sheep and 75,000-plus cattle that are usually around the shire. The wool clip is approximately one million kilograms weight. Yep, a million kilograms.

They say the largest employer in Boulia is the Shire Council, the main role of which is the maintenance of the roads within the Shire.

I'd say there's not a lot else to look after really.

And on that camelian note I'm disappearing for a while. We're off to the UK in the morning for three weeks. Not sure whether I'll be posting much for the duration.

Boulia Shire Council has a website - a very good one actually - that you might be interested to look at to get a glimpse of a very different lifestyle. It's here. Info on the camel races is under 'Events'.

More on the law

2011-04-01T18:38:00.000+04:00

I was going to post about this earlier in the week but decided to wait for more information and for the muddy waters to clear. It's still all very murky but we know a bit more now.

Sadly it's another in a long line of victim jailed cases such as I posted about a few days ago.

Back in Australia there was a hearing in Brisbane Supreme Court on Friday of last week when lawyers acting for a young Queensland woman, Alicia Gali, were given leave to sue Fujeirah's Le Meridien Al Aqah Beach Resort for breaching its workplace obligations and failing to have systems in place to protect their workers against assault.

That opened a can of worms.

On Monday it was in the news, with headlines like:

Drugged, raped, then jailed for 'adultery'
and
Queensland woman tells of her jail hell in United Arab Emirates

The details are murky but it goes back to 2008, when Alicia reported to police that she had been raped by three co-workers at the hotel after they spiked her drink in the hotel staff bar.

It seems the three men were not charged with rape but they and Alicia were found guilty of illicit sex, and presumably consuming alcohol.

Alicia got a year in Al Slammer and served eight months before being pardoned.

She claimed she had no assistance from her employer or the embassy, which the hotel immediately denied. They issued a statement that they had helped 'including assisting with medical support, arranging for financial support, assistance with the investigation, liaising with her representative embassy and arranging for her family to come to the UAE from Australia'.

The following day her lawyers refuted those claims.

I told you it was all very murky. It'll get worse as the case progresses too with the international spotlight firmly on the laws here and the way they're administered. Let's hope it brings about some changes.

BTW, if you read the stories I've linked to below you'll see they contain warnings against travelling to the UAE. The only news outlet here I've seen the story in is Arabian Business, who simultaneously reported a UK survey in which Dubai came fifth in a survey which asked travellers which destinations they felt most at risk in.

That's strange about a country that's one of the world's safest, but it's not safety in relation to muggings or violence against them they're concerned about. It has to be the regular reports of people being jailed for consuing alcohol, for verbal insults, for giving the finger and of victims being jailed that cause the concern.

Here's the first story and also
here.
Hotel defends itself.
Not true say lawyers.

Dubai not safe survey.

I don't get this either...

2011-03-29T11:33:00.001+04:00

I'm still trying to understand Citibank's 'marketing initiative' I posted about yesterday...and here's another in my 'I don't get it' file:

People are paying a lot of money to eat dinner while dangling from a crane fifty metres in the air.

If anyone who's done it reads this...why?

They're kidding, right?

2011-03-28T13:45:00.000+04:00

It's in Arabian Business, not some sensationalist tabloid, so I tend to believe it.

I've checked the date and it isn't April 1st.

The report says:

Citibank’s UAE subsidiary has launched a marketing campaign offering residents a free one-way flight out of the country if they sign on for a personal bank loan.

Borrow up to Dh64,000 and they'll give you a one-way ticket out of here.

I need to go away and think about this one...

See what you think of the story, which is here.

Dubai 1977

2011-03-27T14:29:00.006+04:00

I've been fossicking around at the bottom of boxes and the back of drawers looking for more photos that I took in Dubai when I arrived the first time in 1977.

I found some 35mm slides, processed by a lab I'd completely forgotten about, United Colour Film Co of Ajman.

My first apartment was in a new building in Deira, just behind what is now Al Ghurair City (which hadn't been started when I moved here). There's a photo of it on an earlier 'old Dubai' post, here.

Anyway, in the heart of Deira I took this shot from my sixth-floor apartment:

Plenty of people still kept their livestock like this, a few hundred metres from the Inter.Continental hotel on the Creek.

Across in Bur Dubai, there wasn't a lot of development around Dubai Museum either:

We had some interesting retail options in those days ( I love the brand name on the box by the way, click on the pic to enlarge it):

And last but not least, my very favourite of all my old Dubai photographs:

Yes, it's the Imperil Restaurant.

Why, du? Why?

2011-03-23T11:12:00.002+04:00

In my post of yesterday, which included some photographs I took in Dubai back in the early eighties, I finished with this:

(You'll find many more shots of Dubai back in the seventies and eighties if you hit my 'Old Dubai' label).

Then readers told me this:

Post a Comment On: Life in Dubai

Shalini said...

Great photos and so interesting to see the changes.
By the way, your "old Dubai" label comes up as a blocked page by Du.

March 22, 2011 6:16 PM

Dubai Photo Story said...

The old Dubai label is indeed blocked by du!!!!!

March 22, 2011 9:08 PM

They don't want you to see photos of Dubai in the old days? Why not?

Times they are a'changin'

2011-03-22T16:01:00.003+04:00

Rostamani Tower, that's the one at the far left which I've arrowed, on Sheikh Zayed Road:

From my apartment at the back of the building I took this photograph:

Of course, that was back in 1981 when it was Abu Dhabi Road and it looked like this:

Photo: Torri Higgins

That's Rostamani Tower in the far top left, and that's how it was when I took the photo.

To get across the road to drive into Dubai we simply bumped across the sand between the two lanes and off we went. There were crashes of course but not like the ones we get now, by far the biggest problem then was speeding cars hitting wandering camels.

In the foreground is the Trade Centre, then Dubai's tallest building and I took a series of shots at a royal wedding celebrated in its shadow:

I found these photos when I was rummaging around in a cupboard back home in Oz last month. When I've posted old photos in the past they've been received well so I thought I'd share these with you too.

I came across some more of the Dubai Highland Games from the same early-eighties period too. Here's one of them, one of the several Arab Scottish Bagpipe Bands which performed at the Games.

The black & white photo by Torri Higgins I found on Len Chapman's wonderful website Dubai As It Used To Be.

(You'll find many more shots of Dubai back in the seventies and eighties if you hit my 'Old Dubai' label).

More on the law

2011-03-21T16:30:00.000+04:00

If you haven't read yesterday's post, please do so before reading this one.

I think that sometimes the problem is the way the law is administered rather than the law itself.

In his comment on my last posting, Alexander called it 'a system that runs on rails to an insane degree', which pretty well sums it up.

But there are other examples where it is the law itself that's the problem and there's an example of what I consider to be a bad law reported in this morning's Gulf News.

A tragedy that happens world-wide is that little children are run down in their own driveways by their parents, especially when they're reversing large 4x4s.

I can't even begin to imagine the sickening horror the parents experience.

In the UAE, more horror is piled on top of that horror.

An Australian father has been charged with accidentally and unintentionally causing the death of his son after reversing his car and running over the toddler at the entrance to his house in Umm Suqeim.

The prosecutors are all showing sympathy and asking that he should be dealt with leniently.

...the law must be applied with a humane touch," said Salah Bu Farousha, Chief Traffic Prosecutor, while arguing for a compassionate and sympathetic view of the case, and asked the court to consider the emotional state of the father and the exceptional circumstances of the case to pass a light punishment...Upon the directives of Dubai's Attorney General Essam Eisa Al Humaidan, prosecutors ask a judge to be sympathetic...In such cases, we frequently ask the court to implement Articles 83 and 84 of the law, which stipulate that a fine or an imprisonment against suspects convicted in such cases could be suspended for three years.

There's been a death in a traffic accident so it's fair enough that there's a police investigation. If dangerous or reckless driving is involved then a case should be brought against the driver.

But to have 'accidentally and unintentionally' as a crime is another thing all together. And in this instance there is no suggestion that it was anything other than a tragic accident.

Prosecutor Salah Bu Farousha said the law must be applied with a humane touch. But they shouldn't have to ask the court for leniency, it should never reach court. A true humane touch would be for such a terrible accident not to be treated as a criminal act.

The story is in Gulf News here.

Report a crime, go to jail

2011-03-20T14:02:00.000+04:00

There's a disturbing example of the way the legal system can be administered, reported by Gulf News yesterday.

If the story is correct, not for the first time the victim reporting a crime has spent time in Al Slammer.

In summary, when meeting friends at a hotel a young German woman was offered sweets. She felt dizzy and uncomfortable immediately after she ate a sweet and blood tests confirmed she'd been given a drug.

She reported the incident to police, who set up a sting operation which resulted in a man being punished and deported.

All witnesses and law enforcement officers confirmed that she was the one who reported the matter to the police. Forensic doctors confirmed that the drugs which appeared in her blood could have resulted from the sweet she ate.

On Thursday she appeared in court after five months in jail.

After five months in jail.

You have to ask why she was in jail in the first place and why it took five months to get the case to court.

There've been similar cases in the past which have attracted scathing criticism in international media, and rightly so.

On every level it's absolutely the wrong thing to do.

On a moral level it's indefensible to lock up a victim.

It can't be right to keep someone in jail for five months before bringing them to court.

It's counter-productive in the fight against crime. People won't report crime for fear they'll be jailed themselves.

It further harms Dubai's reputation, already under sustained attack by sections of the western media.

And still she's not free. The woman was released on bail, had to surrender her passport and, as the report says, the trial continues.

Gulf News has the full court report here.

Helping a friend

2011-03-18T12:33:00.003+04:00

I've noted many times how all living creatures are equally affected by natural disasters. Bush fires, floods, eathquakes - we're all in it together.

Here's another example.

Days after the Japanese earthquake a dog was still watching over an injured dog. When it saw an approaching TV crew it went to them and led them to its injured friend.

I found it in the UK Daily Telegraph, and the story's here.

Bahrain escalation

2011-03-16T16:05:00.000+04:00

Over the past couple of months there seems to have been a see-sawing power struggle going on at the top in Bahrain.

The hard liners were obviously in control at the beginning of the current protests, when security forces attacked the protestors, killing several and injuring many more.

Then the moderates, led by the crown prince, seemed to take control, riot police were withdrawn and dialogue was discussed.

Tragically the dialogue didn't happen, I suspect in large part because the first attack had hardened opinion and increased the protestors' demands. How different it would have been had dialogue started with the protestors at the beginning instead of the violence against them.

No dialogue led to a stand off. For weeks. That simply couldn't continue and it seems certain it led to the hard liners taking back control. Then it was inevitable that it would end up where it has today.

The inevitability of a spiral of increasing violence following the first use of violence. As sure as night follows day.

Today reports are building of a major assault on the protestors by troops with armour and helicopters. Currently the reports are saying at least three and possibly five dead and hundreds injured.

A huge leap in the escalation was the introduction of foreign troops, 1,000 from Saudi Arabia. The UAE says it has not sent troops but has sent 500 police. Whatever they are they'll be seen by the protestors as invading forces, even though the Bahraini government invited them in. Who knows what pressure they were under from the Saudis in that decision, incidentally.

Not only the protestors will see them as invaders, that's the view from the bogeyman of the region Iran and probably most Shias.

They have gone in under the GCC alliance clause which says, as do most similar alliances, that an attack on one member state is considered as an attack on all.

It's an interesting question whether the original intention was for that clause to interpret an internal uprising as an attack on the state. The writers had Iran and Iraq in mind I would suggest.

But it's a rhetorical question because of the facts on the ground. They're there.

As result of the hard line approach I can't see anything other than more violence, more crackdowns, more deaths and injuries, more bitterness, a thicker wedge driven between Shia and Sunni. And the distinct possibility that it will spread geographically.

And if only they'd talked to each other it could have been avoided. What a disaster.

Bank vs Seabee

2011-03-14T15:28:00.001+04:00

Continuing with the bank story, this morning I decided to see whether the PIN given to me by the bank which said it was for the new ATM card was actually for the new credit card.

Following instructions from the machine I put the credit card in, pressed 'Other Services', pressed 'Change PIN', keyed in the PIN they'd given me, keyed in the new one I wanted.

Did as I was told and keyed it in again, then again keyed in the one they'd given me.

Waited.

'Transaction complete'.

Waited a bit longer to see if it contradicted itself as it had yesterday.

Nothing.

Bloody hell, I'd done it!

I now had a PIN I wanted on my credit card.

Mind you, I don't trust the machine so I won't bother to try to use it. I'll just do the old signature thing.

I thought maybe I was on a winning streak so I decided to give the ATM card a go, just to see if it was working and if I could withdraw cash.

Not sure about the PIN though. Would it be the one I had on my previous card or would it be the new one they'd sent me?

I keyed in my original number.

'The number is incorrect please try again.'

I tried the new number they'd sent me.

'The number is incorrect please try again'

Aha. They were getting their own back because I'd just managed a hassle-free successful transaction.

I suspect that if you beat the system by managing that, the system goes to Red Alert mode and you go on a watch list. 'A customer has made a successful transaction without any aggravation. Flag him'.

I pulled my card out of the machine and the retribution started. 'This machine is temporarily out of order'.

So it wasn't going to let me try again. (My apologies to any other HSBC customers who now can't use the ATM near Spinneys in Dubai Marina)

A bit later I was up in Jumeirah 1 and I remembered there's an ATM in Spinneys' entrance.

I put my card in and the screen welcomed me by name.

I keyed in my original PIN, pressed the appropriate links.

'Card retained. Please contact the Bank' (Their capital B, not mine)

Yep, it identified me, snatched my card from me and wouldn't give it back.

I called the Bank. Naturally the machine at the other end started asking for things: 'Key in your ten digit personal banking number'.

Yeah right, I always make sure before I leave home that I have all my ten digit, twelve digit and sixteen digit bank and card numbers with me.

Went home, spread all the papers with numbers on them (do you know how many different numbers a bank gives you?) over the desk and called the Bank again.

The machine made the usual demands for ten, twelve, sixteen digit numbers relating to accounts, cards, personal banking, phone banking.

Somewhere in the middle of it all I thought I heard something about 'alternative'. I hit the star key, then whatever numbers it told me to hit and I was in a queue to talk to...wait for it.....a person.

I got the inevitable stuff about 'all our customer service (sic) officers are busy' and I was even told I'd been put in the priority queue (hollow laugh from me of course).

Then the machine told me that 'Our Customer Service (sic) Centre is available 24 hours a day. You can continue to hold or please call us later'

I held and not too many minutes later a human being spoke to me.

I'm sorry I didn't note her name because she was actually lucid and helpful. I explained the situation and that I wanted a new card issued. She said she would arrange it and that she had cancelled the card the machine had snatched from me.

So today has confirmed the cause of the problem, vague and incorrect information in the material sent by the bank, and what actually needs to be done.

The PIN they sent which says in three places that it's for the ATM card is actually for the credit card.

The statement on the instructions with the ATM card that you can only change the PIN at any HSBC ATM is incorrect.

The sticker that says 'Please call 800 etc to select your PIN' actually means you must call that number, there is no other way.

Smack into the wall

2011-03-12T14:52:00.009+04:00

Back in Dubai and I inevitably smashed straight into the wall of frustration.

Sorry but I need to get it off my chest. After all, what's a blog for if it isn't to let off steam. (Feel free to leave at this point before I start).

The first and worst frustration is the bank. No surprise there then for anyone living in the UAE.

Two days of incompetence, of stupidity, of false information, of bank-built barriers to prevent the customer doing the simplest thing. I swear they do it deliberately to make us go away, to stop us asking them for anything.

And I'm still only at the begining of trying to do one very simple thing with them.

Here's the story so far:

I arrived back in Dubai to find a new credit card and new Debit/ATM card waiting for me.

With the Debit/ATM card is a sealed envelope containing a PIN. On the outside it says "Debit/ATM Card PIN."

Inside it says "...PIN to access Debit Card/ATM services..."

Next to the PIN it says "...PIN for Debit Card/ATM Services."

I assumed that means the PIN relates to the Debit/ATM card.

Foolish of me of course, that's apparently not what it means at all.

It tells me to change the PIN, "which can only be done at all HSBC ATM's in the UAE."

There's a sticker on the card itself that tells me to call an 800 number "to select your PIN." Not a good sign, starting with a contradiction. Only at an ATM...or alternatively by phoning.

I'll be passing an HSBC ATM so I decide to do it there.

Following the prompts I put my Debit/ATM card into the slot, then key in the PIN they've given me. Then I key in the PIN I want to change to.

As requested, I re-key in the PIN I want to change to and I re-key in the PIN they've given me. It tells me the transaction has been successful.

Then it changes its mind and tells me the transaction has failed and I should go to a counter.

I go to a counter.

The cashier tells me I'm using the wrong card, I should have put in my credit card.

I point out that all this PIN stuff came with the Debit/ATM card and that's what it says all over the envelope.

He shrugs and gets on with some important paperwork.

HSBC customer service personified.

I ~~walk~~ steam away, fuming.

I come back and recheck all the paperwork. No, nothing about PINs on the credit card paperwork, the PIN all relates to the Debit/ATM card.

Today I think I'll give the 800 number a try.

Unbelieveable.

You're being talked to by a computer of course, so you have to wait for it to tell you what to do, key in whatever it demands before it moves on to its next demand.

What they haven't bothered to tell me in advance is that I'll need lots of information at my fingertips to be able to advance through the phone call.

How hard is that? While telling me to call the number to select my PIN they could so very easily have said "you will need the following information".

Here's how the one-way 'conversation' goes:

Please wait while we identify your contact number.

I wait.

To continue in English press 1.

I press 1.

Please key in the last six digits of your primary bank account number or primary card number.

(Dash away to find the numbers, come back and redial. Start all over again).

Please wait while we identify your contact number.

I wait.

To continue in English press 1.

I press 1.

Please key in the last six digits of your primary bank account number or primary card number followed by the hash key.

I obey.

Please key in your full ten digit personal banking number or your full twelve digit bank account number or your full sixteen digit primary card number followed by the hash key.

Scramble for bits of paper trying to find numbers, count the digits to see if I've got the right one. Too late, the computer has lost patience with me and cancelled the call.

Redial and start again.

Please wait while we identify your contact number.

I wait.

To continue in English press 1.

I press 1.

Please key in the last six digits of your primary bank account number or primary card number followed by the hash key.

I comply.

Please key in your full ten digit personal banking umber or your full twelve digit bank account number or your full sixteen digit primary card number followed by the hash key.

I obey.

We're sorry, the number you've entered doesn't match our records. Please try again.

I do. Very carefully. Digit by digit.

We're sorry, the number you've entered doesn't match our records.

You probably heard the phone slamming down over in Sharjah.

So HSBC wins again. I've done what they always intended me to do, give up, go away and leave them alone.

Now for something completely different, let me tell you about the customer service we enjoyed in one of our ubiquitous franchise ~~restaurants~~ food factories last evening.

The waiter was friendly, pleasant, doing his job to the best of his ability and let me say that I don't for one second criticise him for his lack of English. That's the fault of his employer. People employed in customer service here need to speak English because of our diverse population. But that's not something that concerns the people who employ them, they just bring in job-lots of bodies. Why would it matter if they can't actually give the service customers expect.

We'd been shopping and stopped at Noodle Factory in Dubai Marina Mall for a quick meal.

One of the dishes includes mixed peppers, which we don't like. Mrs Seabee asks the waiter to get the chef to change the peppers for a different vegetable.

Blank look.

Repeat the request worded slightly differently.

Still a blank look.

Try again, in pidgin English.

He sort of gets part of it because he carefully explains that, yes, the mixed peppers come with the chicken.

We try again. Yes we understand that but maybe the chef could replace the peppers with broccoli?

He tells us if we want extra broccoli we have to pay extra.

It's soon after my HSBC run-in and I get very close to losing my temper.

Through gritted teeth and perhaps a little louder than I would normally speak I suggest he just brings whatever he wants to bring.

We push the mixed peppers to one side and eat the meat, vegetable-less.

It's all so unnecessary. Doing the right thing, running a business competently, making it easy for customers to do business with you isn't actually very difficult.

But here there's a universal wilful insistance on doing it the wrong way, running businesses incompetently, making it hard for customers to do business with them.

And I haven't even mentioned their websites.

There, I feel a bit better now. I knew I would.

Back to Dubai

2011-03-07T09:21:00.000+04:00

I'm flying back to Dubai tomorrow, arriving, as always, at some unearthly time on Wednesday morning.

It'll take a couple of days to recover and to get back into what's going on in the dusty city but I expect I'll soon be posting again.

Pots & kettles

2011-03-04T10:44:00.001+04:00

Just about all of the news outlets I use are suggesting the 'international community' needs to step in to stop more bloodshed in Libya. By 'international community' they mean, and usually name, the USA, the EU and NATO.

The West in other words.

But what about the Arab League and the African Union?

Libya is a member of both organisations so surely they should have been taking the lead in this crisis.

Nothing from them for weeks but now, according to AP, the Arab League have at last spoken out about the situation.

The foreign ministers meeting in Cairo have: ...condemned Gaddafi's crackdown on the Libyan people and said they would consider imposing a no-fly zone over the country if the turmoil continues...The Arab ministers said they will coordinate their discussions about a no-fly zone with the African Union and consult 'about the best ways to protect and ensure the safety and security of Libyan citizens'.

So the two organisations which should have been active from the beginning are gently dipping their toes to test the water.

It must be difficult for the Arab League though, given that some of the member governments condemning Gaddafi's actions are guilty of doing exactly the same.

As for the African Union, they've been conspicuous by their silence. A few gentle comments about governments needing to listen to and negotiate with their people is as critical as they've been.

But then it's difficult for them too isn't it. More than a few of the member countries have governments not dissimilar to the colonel's of course, and it's long been assumed that the colonel bankrolled the AU and paid smaller countries' fees.

The old cliche 'the pot calling the kettle black' comes to mind.

The AP report is here.

Libya end game

2011-02-27T08:00:00.001+04:00

Seemingly, to me, the Libyan revolution came out of nowhere. I really expected other places such as Yemen to dominate the headlines about people power.

It looks as though I wasn't alone in that thinking, the 'international community' very obviously didn't think the mad colonel was in any danger because they had no contingency plans in place.

Only after the country imploded and they realised their citizens in Libya were in grave danger did they start to work out evacuation plans.

Those plans have gone wrong very often too, for example with the British PM having to apologise for the stuff-up, and reportedly carpeting his ministers.

At this late stage the Aussies are being told to head to the airport where arrangements have been made with allies to evacuate them. I can't even begin to imagine the chaos and confusion there is and will continue to be.

Out of the blue Libya started to dominate the news. The speed of the changes and the success of the revolutionaries is astonishing.

What hasn't surprised me is the crazed raving of the colonel. Dressed just like Michael Jackson on tour he's been ranting almost incoherently - but behind the pantomime has been the very real threat of the massacre of demonstrators.

At long long last the 'international community' has started to speak out against the regime and it looks as though sanctions, even perhaps some sort of military action, are imminent.

Having supplied the weapons he's been using against the demonstrators it now seems that the west won't replace the spent arms. Assets squirreled away by the ruling family are being frozen. Diplomats and members of his government are defecting.

The regime is increasingly isolated and has all-but gone.

I'm afraid there's going to be terrible bloodshed though before they're finally driven out.

The colonel's son Saif al-Islam has been on tv telling the world they have Plan A, Plan B and Plan C. They are identical, to live and die in Libya.

Like a cornered wounded animal they will fight to the death and take as many of their opponents with them as they can.

I sincerely hope the 'international community' summons up the political will to step in and prevent that happening.

Amazing photo

2011-02-24T12:14:00.000+04:00

Well I think it's amazing.

The earthquake in Christchurch dislodged a car-sized boulder near Lyttleton. You can follow its path as it rolled across the lawn and then smashed straight through the house.

Photo: AAP ninemsn.com.au

And here it is, the other side of the house it destroyed.

Photo: AAP ninemsn.com.au

Her fate?

2011-02-24T11:22:00.000+04:00

Yesterday I posted a link to a mobile phone conversation between a woman trapped under her desk in a collapsed office building in Christchurch and a tv station.

She said she had not had contact with rescuers.

What happened?

Late yesterday rescuers pulled her out alive with broken ribs and cuts. She is recovering in hospital.

Ms Vos said she had plenty of time trapped under four-storeys of rubble to reassess her priorities in life - if she made it out alive.

''Like not worrying about stupid things like: 'Oh my god, where's my bag?','' she said. ''What does that matter? They are things you can replace later. You can't replace people.''

The randomness of death, injury, escape in disasters always intrigues me.

There are amazing stories of missing death by seconds or centimetres and while some people are being rescued the death toll now stands at a confirmed ninety eight. Very sadly babies are amongst the dead, which I always think is somehow the saddest thing. One of just five months old and another nine months old are amongst the confirmed dead.

Over two hundred people are still missing and the rescue services say hope of finding any more survivors is almost zero. They've had no sounds or signs of life in over twenty-four hours.

The report is here.

Listen to this

2011-02-22T16:06:00.003+04:00

TV Channel 9 here in Oz has broadcast an amazing interview over her mobile phone with an Aussie woman trapped in her Christchurch office building after today's earthquake.

I've said many times before during major disasters that they're actually not one event but a jigsaw of individual, very personal stories.

This is another example of that.

She sounds calm but she must be terrified.

Listen here: "I'm trapped under a desk, I can't get out, it's dark, I'm bleeding, and I just don't what's going on out there".

Ánd by the way, it's a side of mobile phones, often so annoying and cause for complaint, that we don't think about. Try to imagine the comfort of it to someone like this, trapped in the dark, not knowing what's out there, what's going on, what her situation really is. She at least has contact with a friendly voice, feels that she's not alone.

Another example of a very personal story that was part of a much larger jigsaw - and another showing the value and comfort of a mobile phone in these disastrous situations - that still raises the hair on the back of my neck whenever I listen to it was during the Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria. It was a real time audio of one person trapped right in the middle of it, facing a terrifying death.

Rhiannon, only twenty years old, called radio station 3AW as the fires raced towards the house where she and a group had taken shelter.

Happy news, but then...

2011-02-22T09:50:00.001+04:00

The day in this region started off on a happy note, with the simultaneous arrival in Sydney Harbour of the luxury ocean liners
Queen Mary 2 and the Queen Elizabeth.

It must have been some sight and I'd have liked to have seen it - too early for me to be there though, not being a morning person.

Photo: AP Sydney Morning Herald

The harbour was full of leisure boats to welcome the liners and the foreshores were full of people wanting to see and welcome the two monster ships.

A typical happy and pleasant morning in Sydney.

But then later in the morning we started getting news of a big earthquake in New Zealand, which hit Christchurch city centre at lunchtime. The worst possible time, the city centre full of workers, shoppers and sightseers.

It's still chaotic and news is being updated, and getting worse, by the minute. There are many dead, sixty-five so far confirmed, and inevitably there will be more casualties found as rescue teams search the rubble. Numerous people are reported trapped.

Photo: ninemsn.com.au

Buildings have collapsed, especially the historic old ones. The beautiful Christchurch Cathedral has been badly damaged, the spire has crashed into the street and there's rubble all around the building.

Two crowded buses have been crushed by falling buildings as have cars with people in them.

Photo: Getty Images ninemsn.com.au

The city doesn't have enough ambulances to cope and residents from the outer suburbs are driving into the centre to help rescue people and take them to triage centres in their private vehicles.

An eyewitness on radio as I'm typing is talking about being able to smell smoke from fires and having seen broken water mains flooding roads. He says the roads are corrugated and overall infrastructure damage is huge.

Going, going...

2011-02-19T09:55:00.002+04:00

I said on a blog somewhere that the Bahrain demonstrators were demanding change in government, they were not against the monarchy. (I think it must have been in a comment I left on another blog).

I also said in yesterday's post, about the violence against the protestors: ...in practical terms it's simply counter productive. The more you brutalise people the more they will rebel against you. By doing it you create more pressure for change. It's a mistake all authoritan regimes make and they never learn from past examples....Even (the promised enquiry) may not be enough to stem the predictable reaction by the people to the violence.

It certainly did produce the predictable reaction. More demonstrations, increased fury at the authorities and an expansion of the demands to include calls for the king to go.

Once again a government has made a disastrous decision. And it continues because there was more shooting on demonstrators by the army on Friday. Fifty injured, seven critically, according to reports.

It's an upward spiral, there's inevitably going to be much more violence and stronger demands in reaction to it.

"Our demands were peaceful and simple at first. We wanted the prime minister to step down,' Mohamed Ali, a 40-year-old civil servant, said as he choked back tears. "Now the demands are harsher and have reached the pinnacle of the pyramid. We want the whole government to fall."

In the short term a government may be able to control its people with raw power, but that isn't sustainable.

There's only one way this is going to end and that's with change. Only the government can control whether that change happens peacefully by negotiation or violently.

It will happen, one way or another. It's gone too far for it not to.

The quote is from here.

Bahrain a domino?

2011-02-18T06:45:00.001+04:00

While the scaremongers have in the past often warned of the domino theory it hasn't actually happened. But it does look as though it's happening this time.

And where it's happening has taken world leaders by surprise. Especially in the west, where successive governments have propped up, financially and otherwise, the regimes which have now gone or are under threat.

First we had Tunisia, then Egypt and there's increasing unrest in Jordan, Algeria, Morocco, Iran, Yemen, Bahrain...

In the west they're usually lumped together and believed to be the same. But while they have in common the fact that they don't have democratic political systems, they're actually quite different from each other. Absolute monarchies, life presidents, secular, Islamic republic...

They also have very different economies, very different wealth, very different societies.

Currently they do have in common the fact that large numbers of the people want change. And they want change because they want a better deal, a better life.

In the poorer countries the unrest is mostly about standards of living and jobs. In the wealthier such as Bahrain it's mostly about politics. Much as in Northern Ireland it's politics dominated by religion - Catholics vs Protestants, Shia vs Sunni. Although interestingly there are reports of Sunnis joining the Shias in the demonstrations demanding changes.

I'm hearing a lot of surprise that modern westernised Bahrain, with at least half the population being expatriate, is included in the current wave of unrest. But in fact there's long been unrest there, it's been a fact of life for many years.

I remember on my second visit back in the late seventies seeing huge piles of sandals and flip-flops in the streets. In answer to my question I was told that there had been large demonstrations the night before and the demonstrators can run faster from the security forces if they kick off their sandals. From the amount of footwear I could see it must have been a good-size demo.

Coming back to my hotel after dinner I saw Public Defence units on most street corners and intersections and plenty of street patrol vehicles.

But while protests in Bahrain are far from a new phenomenon they do seem to have intensified since the success of unrest elsewhere in the region. In that sense I guess they are part of the domino theory.

The response of the authorities has intensified too with, sadly, people being killed. Reports are saying seven so far, including tragically a two year old girl. Well over two hundred are said to be injured.

Apart from any moral rejection of that, in practical terms it's simply counter productive. The more you brutalise people the more they will rebel against you. By doing it you create more pressure for change. It's a mistake all authoritan regimes make and they never learn from past examples.

Protestors say that riot police stormed their encampment while they were sleeping, firing tear gas and birdshot and beating them with clubs.

The government has said there will be an investigation into the deaths. I'm sure I'm not the only person sceptical about how effective and transparent the investigation will be.

Nothing short of bringing to justice those responsible on the ground and those who gave the order will suffice.

Even that may not be enough to stem the predictable reaction by the people to the violence.

Benihana Kuwait's blogger attack

2011-02-14T11:03:00.001+04:00

Here's the review that resulted in a blogger being sued for damages:

My Benihana Experience

A few days back I posted about Benihana opening up at the Avenues and yesterday night I decided to pass by with Nat and try it out. The service wasn’t too bad for a restaurant that’s just been open for a few days and the staff were really friendly. The restaurant itself is made up of islands and bars with a grill in the middle of each one. You sit around the grill and the chef will come to your table and prepare the food right in front of you which makes things entertaining. It’s actually why I prefer sitting at the bar in Japanese restaurants in general, since you can talk to the chef and watch them put your dish together. The problem with my experience last night though was with the food, it was disappointing to say the least.

We ordered beef negimayaki for starters followed by an Orange Blossom maki and a Hibachi Chicken. The negimaki arrived looking good and was probably the best thing we had there even though I prefer Maki’s negimaki which has a richer teriyaki sauce. The Orange Blossom was very ordinary, wouldn’t order it again. Now the Hibachi chicken which is basically grilled chicken, that was the worst. The chicken was very chewy (I could swear it was undercooked if not raw) and tasted terrible. Even after I had the chef add some more teriyaki sauce in hopes of improving the taste it didn’t work. I tried to dip it into the sauces that came with the chicken but it was hard to figure out if they were actually making things worse or not. Nat only ate one piece of chicken and left the rest while I needed my protein since I’m on a strict diet and forced myself to eat my whole plate (I can do that) but the after taste was really bad. Even the rice and the veggies that came with it tasted bad AND were under cooked. Once we left I considered picking up a frozen yogurt from Pinkberry even though I hate frozen yogurts but I just needed something to get rid of the aftertaste. A few moments later we ended up at Chocolate Bar ordering the gooey chocolate cake (bye bye diet).

I shot the two videos above of the chef preparing our meal. Benihana are known for the live shows they perform when preparing your dish so I was expecting to see [This] but ended up with the above . Would I go back to Benihana? No I wouldn’t. Their sashimi and maki’s are pretty cheap (KD1.5 for 5 pieces of Salmon sashimi for example) but there are two other Japanese restaurants at the Avenues, Wasabi and Maki, and I would prefer either one of those to Benihana.

(You can read the original post here. )

There won't be many internet users who aren't aware that Kuwait-based blogger Mark is being sued by Benihana Kuwait for writing that review of his experience in their restaurant.

In spite of universal negative reaction, franchisee Benihana Kuwait is continuing with its legal attack. The franchiser Benihana of Tokyo has taken the decision to hide and pretend it isn't happening, isn't damaging their brand.

Benihana Inc, a separate company, has spoken out, issuing a press release distancing themselves from the debacle, saying they welcomed customer feedback and advising people to 'share your comments and opinions directly with Benihana of Tokyo, Inc'.

I originally posted about it here, under the heading 'Sued for saying he didn't like his meal'.

I also said in an update post that it was a balanced review and along with many other bloggers today, I'm reproducing it.

The reason this is being re-posted today by many people on various internet platforms is to continue to draw attention to the attack on freedom of speech.

There's nothing in the review to warrant such an attack.

Read the blogs, the tweets, the Facebook comments - the damage to Benihana is being done by the actions of the Kuwait franchisee and by Benihana of Tokyo themselves by their silence. Just google benihana kuwait or on Twitter look for #BenihanaKUW to see what's being said.

Benihana can begin to repair the damage they've created for themselves by announcing that they are dropping the legal action.

A historic day

2011-02-12T05:22:00.000+04:00

What an amazing couple of weeks in Egypt.

The seemingly unmoveable Mubarak regime has gone. A regime not only brutal in the way it usually treated dissent and which had all-but destroyed any organised opposition but which was, let's not forget, also supported and propped up by the West.

In spite of all that a largely peaceful mass uprising by the people has removed them.

Amazing.

While it is a people's revolution the critical part the military played in the revolution should be acknowledged. Surprisingly to me they stood by and let the revolution take its course.

It was a big dipper of a revolution and it was touch and go there for a while.

It looks to me as though the original thinking of the regime was that it would fizzle out afer a few days, so they did nothing.

Then they tried to show that chaos would be the result by loosing off some thuggish 'supporters' to create violence.

By and large, and to their credit, the crowd didn't resort to retaliation with violence and the chaos the regime wanted didn't really happen.

The numbers waxed and waned, but calls for 'million people' demonstrations boosted the numbers again.

It was touch and go on Thursday when Mubarak was expected to resign by just about everyone but didn't.

If there was going to be a violent reaction, the disappointment at that point was going to ignite it.

Again to their credit, the people were restrained but determined.

There are lessons in it too for American foreign policy makers and their western allies, not that they've ever learned from their mistakes in the past though.

Once again they've been supporting a brutal, undemocratic dictator hated by his people.

And think about Iraq & Afghanistan - you can't impose a political system on people, the people themselves have to do it.

As the Egyptians have so wonderfully shown.

E-mail bigotry

2011-02-09T09:48:00.003+04:00

Why is the world in a mess?

Here's a thought for a big part of it - far too many people are intolerant and bigoted. Adamant that only they are right, believing everyone else must agree one hundred percent with them and do as they do.

Different from me? Not acceptable.

Another example has just arrived in my e-mail box, and I get similar messages regularly. They come from 'Christians' whipping up anti-Muslim sentiment.

Let me declare my position. I have very little time for any religion.

I don't have a problem with religions per se, but with the fact that they're a rallying point for an awful lot of nastiness.

People whose beliefs and actions are actually far from that of the religion itself gather under its banner and effectively hijack it to push their own perverted version of it.

The e-mails I get originate in the US, as this latest does.

It says, and the highlighting is not mine, it's on the e-mail:

These pictures are worth more than a thousand words!! Please take note that police and fireman are onsite! It is sanctioned.

NYC on Madison Ave

A Christian Nation cannot put up a Christmas scene of the baby Jesus in a public place, but the Muslims can stop normal traffic every Friday afternoonby worshiping in the streets. Something is happening in America that is reminiscent of what is happening in Europe .. This is Political Correctness gone crazy. Scary! Isn't it?

This is an accurate picture of every Friday afternoon in several locations throughout NYC where there are mosques with a large number of Muslims that cannot fit into the mosque - They fill the surrounding streets, facing east for a couple of hours between about 2 & 4 p.m. - Besides this one at 42nd St & Madison Ave, there is another, even larger group, at 94th St & 3rd Ave, etc., etc. - Also, I presume, you are aware of the dispute over building another "high rise" Mosque a few blocks from "ground zero" - With regard to that one, the "Imam" refuses to disclose where the $110 million dollars to build it is coming from and there is a lawsuit filed to force disclosure of that information.

This is in New York City on Madison Avenue, not in France or the Middle East or Yemen or Kenya.

PLEASE SEND THIS TO EVERY CHRISTIAN YOU KNOW!!!!

"For evil to flourish, all that is needed is for good people to do nothing." - Edmund Burke

I hardly know where to start.

The First Amendment to the US Constitution guarantees freedom of religion.

The senders of the e-mail obviously disagree with that amendment, or at least the part that refers to religion. I wonder whether they think the other parts, freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, are wrong too. My guess is that it's just the religious freedom bit they don't like. Or at least, if it applies to any religion other than their own particular branch of Christianity.

(I wonder where they stand on the Second Amendment too...)

Scary! Isn't it? What's scary? People saying their prayers scares you?

"A Christian nation cannot put up a Christmas scene of the baby Jesus..." Who are they blaming? I've never heard people from other religions demanding such things.

There are examples of this kind of stupidity but it comes from 'Christian' councils, officials, individuals, usually on the ridiculous basis of 'we don't want to offend anyone' - forgetting that they are offending Christians.

...this is not in France, Middle East or Yemen or Kenya (you've spotted the Obama reference there of course, and the old France-bashing dig). It is indeed in New York City. But NYC is in the USA, which guarantees freedom of religion. So the problem is...?

"For evil to flourish etc". Evil? What evil is being shown?

The photo shows pious people, too many to fit into their place of worship, peacefully and legally observing their religious devotions.

No prizes for working out the agenda of the senders of these e-mails.

More information

Thanks to jadaoun for pointing out in his comment the Snopes page on this subject.

In fact the whole thing is based on a lie. It's a complete misrepresentation.

The photographs are of an annual event, like the St Patrick's Day Parade and others.

You can read the Snopes information here.

Me & Twitter

2011-02-07T11:04:00.000+04:00

In a post the other day about blogging I said I couldn't get my head around Twitter and I should do a post on it so that, maybe, you can tell me where I'm going wrong.

Today Sarah has an excellent post about Twitter at Dubai-ified, which prompted me to write my post on it.

I understand the concept of instant, brief messages. I understand, as Sarah says, that Twitter is connectivity to the rest of the world. But there's much I can't get my head around.

Blogging I understand, it makes sense, it doesn't need you on it 24/7, it's clear and concise, easy to read.

Twitter is the opposite.

The first bit I struggle with is knowing what to follow. How the hell do you decide when there's so much of interest going on. And new, unpredicted things of interest regularly popping up out of nowhere, such as the Benihana Kuwait blogger-bashing story. I'd end up following so many subjects that my computer would go into meltdown.

And that leads me on to the other thing I don't understand - the time you need.

Twitter by its very nature provides instant and constant updates on all sorts of stuff. But if you're not monitoring it all the time you miss huge wads of the stuff and when you get back to it it's like missing the middle section of a movie.

And if you have your own Twitter page, how do you find the time to keep posting (or is that tweeting?). With this blog I can post something every day, sometimes longer like this and sometimes just a photo. I can check back for comments, I can reply to them...but I don't need to be on it all the time.

Then there's the content.

For example, I followed the link from a visitor tracked by my Statcounter:

alimustafaok: Queensland baby born in cyclone Yasi shelter {exclusive video of baby...must watch} - http://tinyurl.com/69q54rr
KrystleJondahl1: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi TishaMcmain5429: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi rosethistleart: RT @CBSnews: End of Cyclone Yasi Brings Australia More Woes http://bit.ly/eZi18N
YuetteFinley968: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
CBS News: End of Cyclone Yasi Brings Australia More Woes http://feedzil.la/g8juoy
AdamColeman25: End of Cyclone Yasi Brings Australia More Woes (CBS News): Share With Friends: World news - Top Stories News, KiyokoWires3264: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
MonicaRingstaff: The energy from Cyclone Yasi could power the world for a year
LaurenLandolt74: The energy from Cyclone Yasi could power the world for a year
teetee65: RT @CBSnews: End of Cyclone Yasi Brings Australia More Woes http://bit.ly/eZi18N
AllineYerhot194: The energy from Cyclone Yasi could power the world for a year
ThomasGoracke92: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
WanitaRied3601: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
Levi_Fourie: @JackieEatsBabys search up cyclone yasi!! :D and be amazed we got lucky :L other owns didn't :(
MiriamMazzoni59: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
RT @CBSnews: End of Cyclone Yasi Brings Australia More Woes http://bit.ly/eZi18N
ElenoreBueche60: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi
KiaraCiarletta3: The energy from Cyclone Yasi could power the world for a year
Louth: Tail end of Cyclone Yasi in Werribee. Pictures: http://bit.ly/fh5ocd Video: http://youtu.be/IiHCvNmRE2w [Not mine!] - More rain to come too.
Louth: Tail end of Cyclone Yasi in Werribee. Pictures: http://bit.ly/fh5ocd Video: http://youtu.be/IiHCvNmRE2w [Not mine!] - More rain to come too.
AliseCumpston27: All our thoughts with Queensland as they brace themselves for Cyclone Yasi

It goes on ad nauseum like that. Page after page with messages being repeated by dozens of people. Most of it is just quotes from the mainstream media and people re-tweeting what others have already tweeted, so it's page after page endlessly repeating exactly the same thing. In reality there are only five or six things being said, which you read over and over again.

I've just had a look at Alexander McNabb's Twitter page and that highlights another problem I have. Dozens of conversations are going on at the same time. It's like being in one of those business meetings where the chairman loses control and everyone starts talking amongst themselves. So much is going on at the same time you have no idea what's going on.

Here's part of Alex' page:

Now. THAT is awesome. #Jan25
.@bilalhouri I do not somehow feel a deep sense of loss.. @tfehh @jarofjuice @mark248am @MaliZomg
.@bilalhouri Now the only voice on Facebook is the boycott page... LOL indeed... @mark248am @MaliZomg @naseemfaqihi
.@bilalhouri Yes, I rather think they did! Yet more great 'how to' lessons in social media! :) @mark248am @MaliZomg #BenihanaKUW
.RT @allawati: People are now forming to make the word "Leave" for the helicopters to see http://twitpic.com/3wbys0
.RT @Andrew_Bone: Last call for Jeddah. Would all passengers board immediately. Come on, Mr Mubarak #Jan25
.Fast Company on BenihanaGate. Hey, Benihana Tokyo? WAKE UP! http://bit.ly/faxZE2 #BenihanaKUW (Via @okassim)
.@okassim Yes, it was a despicable swipe against an alienated sibling. And quite fun...
."Reporters Without Borders is horrified... an all-out witch-hunt against news media... in Egypt" http://bit.ly/gjBXy7
.@okassim Yeah, but search 'Benihana' and you catch the growing global outcry. And it's actually scary. #benihanakuw
.@Beirutspring @krmaher Well, some ISPs are capable of anythingng... ;)
.@Beirutspring @krmaher Saudi IPs - IP addresses. See the post on the host's site: http://bit.ly/hsKEnv
.Hmm. The Slashdot effect? #BenihanaKUW http://bit.ly/hodSAS
.@bilalhouri @noornet @Beirutspring @MaliZomg Post is mirrored here: http://bit.ly/hsKEnv
.@Beirutspring According to the hosting provider, traffic spike plus attacks from Saudi-based IPs!
.@money1963 Benihana Kuwait! You might find this informative: http://bit.ly/gr0414
.@noornet @Beirutspring Guys, the blog is offline temporarily as the host is having traffic issues. http://bit.ly/hsKEnv #jan25
.RT @GKnieschot: Vodaphone #Egypt statement on Government abusing phone networl: http://bit.ly/gnVesi #Jan25

And I have a problem with the way it's presented.

There's all the link stuff, more than half the message, to wade through:

pippalovespink: RT @smh_news: RT @smhenvironment: 41 degrees: Sydney's sixth day of sizzling: http://bit.ly/gjYhnN #weather #environment #sydneyheat

Ninety-four characters of links to wade through to read forty-one characters of message.

And making it even harder to read what's there, the platform can't accept apostrophies so you get:

marielviray: @meteoritecrater also, Sydney's in a heat wave and Melbourne's flooding. Australia's weather is so bipolar.

User friendly it ain't.

Assuming that with practice I could work out how to cut through the dozens of simultaneous conversations and how to read through all the 'ses I still have two problems.

How to follow all the many, many subjects I'd want to follow and how to find the time to do it.

How to find a way through the endlessly repeated clutter and just read a message once.

Cyclones, floods & fires

2011-02-06T11:57:00.001+04:00

Mother Nature is dominating the news here in Oz, showing that we're a real land of extremes.

As I said yesterday, in Sydney we've had a record hot spell.

Overnight was as uncomfortable as predicted, it was still 30C at midnight and humidity up in the ninety percent area.

Then a southerly buster came through with a thunderstorm at 3pm today and at 5pm we were at 20C.

Up in far North Queensland they're counting the $billions of damage after Cyclone Yasi.

Photo:Dave Hunt AAP

In Victoria they're battleing huge floods across a lot of the state, with extensive stock losses and damage.

Photo: Nadine Walker ninensm

And right now over in Western Australia out-of-control bushfires are raging through suburbs of Perth.

Photo: paulpichugin.com.au

The current situation is that 20 homes have been destroyed, mass evacuations are under way and firefighters are deperately trying to defend houses.

Monday Update

The Perth fires are still out of control, with 59 homes destroyed and 28 damaged.

Whingeing weather

2011-02-05T08:48:00.003+04:00

I see Dubai's weather is rain, low temperatures, a shamal and sand storms.

Sydney has whingeing weather too. We're in day six of a heat wave and the whingeing hasn't stopped.

'Can't sleep' is the most common complaint, as we're having record high minimum overnight temperatures and new records for the number of consecutive hot nights.

It'll be the same tonight. The weather report just said it reached 43C today and most of the night will be around 30C.

Temps are measured in the shade of course, so with the sun blazing from our clear, blue, cloudless sky it's very hot. And as February is our most humid month it's quite uncomfortable too.

Several severe fire warnings have been issued and a large area of the state, including Greater Sydney, has a total fire ban in place. The Rural Fire Service has dealt with over a hundred bush and grass fires this week. They're spread around, with currently new fires being fought in the Blue Mountains to the west and here on the Central Coast to the north.

A cool change is forecast for tomorrow and by Monday the Met Bureau says "the daytime temperatures will be close to the overnight temperatures Sydneysiders have been suffering this past week".

I have a lot of running around to do next week so I'm quite pleased to hear that.

Cyclone Yasi

2011-02-04T06:45:00.001+04:00

There are hundreds of photos in the media showing damage caused up in Far North Queensland by cyclone Yasi, but one in particular seems to me to sum up the power of the wind and rain.

Forty million dollars-worth of yachts and cruisers at Port Hinchinbrook piled up like a kid's toys.

Photo AFP

A-OK after Cyclone Yasi

2011-02-03T13:31:00.002+04:00

Well, it was a category five cyclone, the same as Katrina which devastated New Orleans, but current reports are no deaths or serious injuries.

Cyclone Yasi veered south just before making landfall and instead of slamming directly into Cairns hit much smaller towns.

People who've been to Far North Queensland, usually to visit the Great Barrier Reef, Daintree Rainforest or the small islands, will know the small coastal towns of Mission Beach, Tulley, Innisfail, Cardwell, Ingham...all were hit badly.

Tulley, a small town with a population of about 3,500, is one of the worst hit with one in three houses destroyed or damaged. The town centre looks like this:

Photo: John Wilson HeraldSun

There's a lot of damage and as flooding followed the winds it's not over yet.

Trees are down everywhere and one of the big industries up there, banana plantations, has lost 90% of the crop. Bananas are a $400 million industry and there's also been an estimated $500 million of sugar cane destroyed, so the damage bill is high.

Photo: Jamie Hanson HeraldSun

But so far there are no human casualties, although the emergency services still haven't been able to reach some smaller towns or isolated properties.

Even if they do find casualties it'll be a small toll compared to the size of the cyclone. Category Five is as bad as it gets.

The reason is that the Queensland government and emergency services did an excellent job of informing people what to expect, issuing evacuation orders, setting up evacuation centres, telling people what to do. Radio was used extensively - the ABC local radio network is used in emergencies like bushfires or cyclones as an information service.

Last evening I heard them telling anyone who hadn't yet evacuated that it was too late, they must not venture out but go to the safest room in their house etc etc.

Good stuff. I usually criticize governments and bureaucrats but this time they got it right.

Thousands did as they were told and went to evacuation centres such as shopping malls. When they see the damage outside they'll be glad they did.

I've also been impressed with the Queensland Premier Anna Bligh. She seems to have been everywhere, she's all over the media giving people hard, up-to-the-minute information, something that normally is the last thing we get.

There are plenty of interviews with people of course. I particularly liked the wry humour of the policeman asked before the cyclone hit by the Sydney Morning Herald how his family would be staying safe. "My wife must have got hold of a good long-range forecast - she cleared off with the kids two years ago" he said.

Benihana Kuwait update

2011-02-02T12:06:00.003+04:00

You surely must know that the big story in cyberspace is Benihana Kuwait, that's the Japanese-style restaurant franchise, suing a Kuwaiti blogger because, in what is a balanced review, he said he didn't like the food and wouldn't go back.

In my post on Monday I said the story needs to get as much exposure on the 'net as we can give it, and I urged other bloggers and social media users to expose these people.

You could hardly have done better!

It's all over cyberspace and now all sorts of media is picking up the story and joining in the universal condemnation of the crass stupidity.

There've been a couple of recent developments.

Michael Kata, COO and Executive Vice President of Benihana of Tokyo, who license the Kuwaiti franchise, told boingboing.net that the franchise agreement didn't allow them to order franchisees to sue or withdraw lawsuits, but that they were empowered to terminate the agreement should the franchisee bring the brand into disrepute.

As I said on Monday, that's exactly what they should have done. It'll be interesting to see what the franchiser does.

The other development is a press release from the other half of the company, Benihana Inc. in Miami.

Obviously concerned at the effect of the stupidity on investors in their company, they're distancing themselves as far as they can from it.

Absolutely nothing to do with us, they say. There are two totally separate companies and we have no control or authority over what the other company does.

They take a dig at the franchisee, saying their half of the company seriously consider all feedback an opportunity for improving operations and We encourage you to share your opinions and comments directly with Benihana of Tokyo, Inc. The company's contact information is available on www.BenihanaGroup.com.

They're well aware what a storm the stupidity has created and that there's universal condemnation, and they clearly want us to let the franchiser know our feelings directly. The full press release is here.

By the way, if you haven't started at the beginning of this story, the original post with the restaurant review is here.

Like me, I don't think you'll see anything in the review that relates to the claims made in the lawsuit. The words Mark uses have no connection with the claims made in the writ.

boingboing have a translation, which includes: "And so, we order the payment of KD5001 as a compensation for the damages caused to the restaurant management and for encouraging large number of customers not to try the restaurant by insulting, doubting the quality and food served by Benihana and using expressions that disgust people from trying the food. The person has caused huge material damages to the restaurant, ethic damage to the restaurant's reputation as an international brand that has chains all over the world as well as hurt the restaurant's potential to expand in Kuwait by influencing all kinds of nationalities not to try a restaurant that offers a specific type of food that is subject to taste preference.

If anyone should be sued for causing 'ethic damage to the restaurant's reputation' it's their own management.

Wild weather again

2011-02-02T06:06:00.000+04:00

A tiring journey, almost exactly 24 hours door-to-door when I arrived home at 11pm yesterday.

There's also a seven hour time difference to adjust to, so I'm all over the place at the moment. Can't sleep, can't do much else, so I thought I'd check in here for a few minutes.

I've just received an e-mail from a Dubai friend warning of storms on the way for the next couple of days. The weather's the main news here too.

Sydney is in the middle of a very warm spell, over 40C the last couple of days and today high thirties, and as February is our most humid month it's quite uncomfortable. We also had one of the highest-ever overnight low temps last night apparently, at 26.4C.

There are bushfires in a couple of Sydney suburbs, under control fortunately, and more than seventy though New South Wales.

The big news though is the massive Cyclone Yasi due to hit Far North Queensland in a few hours at 10pm. It's a catagory five cyclone, 500 kilometres wide and it's headed straight for the area where the two cities of Townsville and Cairns and several smaller population centres are located.

It's forecast that winds will be as high as 300kph and will last 24 hours. That's much worse than Cyclone Tracy which destroyed the Northern Territory capital of Darwin in 1974.

Murphy's Law comes into play yet again, because Cyclone Yasi's landfall will coincide with a high tide and a two metre storm surge is expected in Cairns city centre. This on top of Queensland's floods that made world-wide news a couple of weeks ago, which still haven't fully receded.

Thousand of people have moved inland. They say 30,000 have gone and the Queensland Premier is urging more people to flee in the next few hours' 'window of opportunity' as she calls it.

She said: "I don't think Australia has ever seen a storm of this size, this intensity in an area as popular as this stretch of our coast...this is 24 hours of some of the most frightening weather that most people will ever have experienced."

Many people are in evacuation centres in Cairns. In Townsville the winds are already severe and if people haven't left they're being told to secure their homes and stay put. To go out now is too dangerous, the emergency services say.

And a totally unconnected news story that's just hit the airwaves after a news conference a few minutes ago is that our most successful Olympian, swimmer Ian Thorpe, has announced that he's returning to swimming and plans to train in...Abu Dhabi.

Sued for saying he didn't like his meal.

2011-01-31T12:52:00.002+04:00

In case you've missed it I have to draw your attention to a post by Alexander on Fake Plastic Souks.

Briefly, a Kuwaiti blogger posted a restaurant review, in which he gave a couple of positive comments but said he was unimpressed with the food and wouldn't go back.

Fair enough, you'd think.

I'll quote a few lines from Alex's post:

And then there's the comment from a geezer called Mike Servo, who claimed to be the general manager of the Benihana management of Kuwait and who threatened to sue Mark.

"...our rights and name is being used in a wrong way and broadcasting the video without a proper consent from us is really annoying specially Benihana is just opened up its doors to the public. We are seeking and consulting our legal dept. on how we can form a type of law suit against your website to be brought up to the Kuwait authorities."

He goes on to trill: "We want you to give us your information, your name, your number and your address so our lawyer will take it from there and be sure that you in Kuwait were the jury is 100 % clean and fair."

Mark posted up on Twitter yesterday that he had received the lawsuit. Benihana Kuwait actually went ahead and sued a blogger for writing a bad review of their restaurant.

It's something that infuriates me. Justifiable criticism from a customer and a company rushes to the legal system.

Benihana HQ needs to look at this seriously and quickly because the action by their Kuwaiti franchisee is bringing their brand into disrepute.

In my opinion the unprofessional, unbusinesslike action needs to get as much exposure on the 'net as we can give it, which is why I've repeated the story here. I hope you other bloggers and social media users will expose these people too.

PS an hour later.

Just before shutting down and heading off to the airport I thought I'd see what cyberspace had on this. Bloggers, Twitter, Facebook - have a look folks. Benihana Kuwait have created a PR disaster for themselves. All their own work.

I wonder if they're beginning to understand how business works in the real world. You know, the place where customers have a say too. Where bullying and threatening creates a backlash.

If you are beginning to understand it, it's too late guys, you've damaged the brand already. You've poured ridicule on your own brand.

Off to Oz

2011-01-31T10:51:00.000+04:00

I'm heading back to Oz this afternoon for five weeks, due back in Dubai on March 9.

I'll keep in touch with what's going on by reading my usual list of blogs, and I'll try to post on here at least once in a while.

Weird wild weather

2011-01-29T18:11:00.001+04:00

I'd just about finished yesterday's post when Mrs Seabee called to say she'd finished in the office and was outside our building waiting to go to lunch.

I walked out into sunshine...but by the time I got to the car I was being buffeted by gale force winds and smothered in sand.

It came out of nowhere, instantly.

We drove through Dubai Marina and in front of us it looked like this:

But to the right it was like this:

It seemed to be in a narrow band that we were driving through because Al Sufouh Road was much the same - compare the blue sky to the left with what we were driving into:

After lunch it had disappeared as quickly as it had arrived but it left evidence that it had passed through:

We went out to Global Village later in the afternoon and it had blasted through there too. All the stallholders were sweeping sand away, clearing rubbish and dusting their stock. Not a lot of damage and, in the way of these mini-cyclones, it had been selective in what it destroyed:

Note the hand in the right of the photo - Dubai residents will be very familiar with it. The immediate reaction to any problem is:

On blogging

2011-01-28T15:37:00.000+04:00

A lazy weekend, Mrs Seabee's gone into the office and I have a couple of hours before we meet for lunch so I thought I'd just post a couple of thoughts that came up on the Dubai Eye Radio blogging programme I was delighted to be involved with on Tuesday, and in conversations since.

It's the business equivalent of talking shop so if you're not a blogger you'll probably want to leave now, but thanks for stopping by anyway. Bloggers, addicts as we are, might stay with me...

One of the things that was touched on during the programme was anonymity when Hussein/Who-sane was asked about it.

I don't think of it as 'anonymous' though. I, and many others, are doing nothing more than using the age-old tradition of a pen name, a nom de plume. Was Eric Blair 'anonymous', or is David Cornwell?*

I've been known in business for years as Seabee, my wife calls me Seabee (among other things that aren't suitable as a pen name) so I use it, my nickname. I've been interviewed on tv and appeared in several documentary films in which I'm not masked or disguised, so I don't think I'm anonymous.

Why not use the name on my birth certificate? I suppose the main reasons are that that I'm just more comfortable using Seabee (I can't explain that), I prefer people to have their own picture of me in their mind (like a radio play where you imagine what the characters look like) and to avoid being harassed at home.

The latter comes up because in the pre-blogging days when I got things off my chest by forever sending letters to newspapers, I got phone calls from people who'd looked me up in the telephone directory. Not all were abusive, in fact they were the minority. But even with people calling to say they agreed with me I didn't want to be disturbed at home by them any more than I want sales people calling to offer deals they insist I'd be stupid to refuse.

Then there was the reason we blog anyway. How we started and why.

There are probably as many different answers as there are bloggers, we're all individual personalities. Some started to keep in touch with family and friends. Some are simply daily diaries, replacing the old paper diary. Some are specialist blogs, promoting a favourite football team, talking fashion, some are travelogues. We have awful blogs to promote extremist and racist agendas. Political blogs, self-promoting blogs. The list is endless.

For me blogging is an extension of what I've always done, but expanded through the internet. I'm interested on what goes on around me and in the wider world, whether it's a major event or trivia, and I usually have an opinion about it.

I talk about those things with family and friends, and conversations, debates, arguments, ranting, complaining, praising are the result.

That's what I do through this blog too. To me when I post I'm starting a conversation, which you join when you read the blog. Some of you actively join in by leaving a comment, and I thank you for that. The conversation may well go on for a while through the comments section - that happens in particular when I get people foaming at the mouth, purple-faced, when I touch on a sensitive subject. (Passing thought: I haven't done that for ages, I must try to think of a provocative subject to post about).

Then there's the future of blogging, where we think it might it's going.

My thought is that in a very short space of time we've gone from being a new, breakthrough medium to being old hat. We're edging towards being mainstream (traditional even?) media. Hussein and I both recounted instances where our blog posts were picked up by the traditional print media and became big stories, joining us with the mainstream.

Other example of this merging are links to this blog from mainstream media, for example such as *horror* Fox in the US (my post on a Brit facing jail for giving the finger to another motorist) and the New York Times (my response to Johann Hari's infamous 'Dark Side of Dubai' story).

Many people have moved to Twitter - dare I say the less committed, less serious, bloggers? (I really don't understand Twitter and I must do a post on it one day). I suspect that there may well be fewer traditional (that word again) bloggers in the future but that it will be the more serious of us. Again I suppose that nudges blogging even closer to the mainstream.

Another thing that came up was earning money from blogging. I seem to be in the minority (of one?) in saying that I won't have any advertising, any paid-for content, on my blog. I want absolute freedom to say, with no pressure from anyone, exactly what I want to say. Agree with what I say or don't, but what you read are my observations, thoughts and opinions. There's no commercial influence anywhere in them.

But that's me. I respect the others' views that they'd like to earn some money from blogging, as both fellow-Aussie Sarah and Micheline said they would.

Fellow guest in the studio Bebhinn has a website dedicated to fashion, at Hellwa Fashion, but to me that's a different thing from blogging. It's a fully commercialised site, much like an online magazine (and very good it is too) designed to make money from a subject dear to the heart of the publisher.

I was asked by co-host of the show Alexander McNabb whether I ever worry about censorship. It's something that's come up in more than once in comments left on this blog over the years. Usually they're from 'anonymous' and are heated claims that we all write as we're told to and are terrified of being thrown in jail if we don't.

As I didn't expect the question I hadn't given it any previous thought, and it's not something I've ever given any concious thought to so I stuttered somewhat in my reply, trying to think it through as I answered. And I think that's the point - I haven't given it any thought.

I've always believed that the laws of libel apply to anyone saying anything on the internet and I bear that in mind. I try to be reasonably polite even when I'm critical. But beyond that I say what I want to say. I certainly don't sit here thinking that I must be careful what I say in case big men in dark glasses pound on my door at 2am.

And here's Mrs Seabee ready for lunch so I'm off.

Have a great weekend.

* To save you googling, that's George Orwell and John Le Carre.

Getting back to normal

2011-01-27T13:38:00.002+04:00

One of the largest development projects in town is the Al Sufouh tram system. When it began, several kilometres of the once-completed Al Sufouh Road from Knowledge Village into Dubai Marina were dug up and diversions were put in place.

Then the global financial crisis hit.

When it did, the general reaction in Dubai was the same as it was in much of the rest of the world. Hit the PANIC! button.

Construction in particular stopped overnight. Companies fired people who they'd need in the near future to maintain the business. Construction sites were abandoned and became derelict. Creditors whistled for their money.

Over the year or so since the panic set in, the city, especially New Dubai, has looked increasingly very much the worse for wear. Sand and rubbish gathered and weeds started growing on the abandoned sites, the fences and barriers deteriorated.

It looked unattractive when work was happening but since it stopped it's really been ugly.

But the panic subsided, then companies 'restructured and negotiated with creditors'. (That is, they re-arranged their gigantic loans and told creditors that if they wanted to get anything at all they had to take less than was due).

So work on various developments has been re-started, people are being re-hired, the sites are being cleaned up.

Probably because I pass it every day the tram project was in my eyes one of the worst, most untidy looking.

But it looks as though the negotiations with creditors have been successful because for the past few days the project is a hive of activity.

It's a big project, it'll be years before it's finished but it's a relief to see that work's under way once again.

So where's Studio City?

2011-01-25T14:27:00.004+04:00

Whiled away a couple of fun, interesting hours with fellow bloggers on a Dubai Eye Radio programme this morning.

Suzanne Radford and Alexander McNabb on Dubai Today's 'Techno Tuesday' decided they'd devote most of the programme to blogging and bloggers.

But that's not what this post is about. Far better, if you're interested, to go to the podcast, which Alex said should be up soon on their website. Instead of me telling you about it you can listen to the programme.

No, the post is another in my 'bloody useless signage' series.

Over the years of blogging I've complained many times about the road signage being confusing, inaccurate and dangerous. In this case it simply doesn't exist.

I've driven out to Global Village the past two weekends (I must post about that too), going from Al Sufouh along Umm Suqueim Road to Arabian Ranches.

I had no idea that Studio City, where Dubai Eye is located, is there, right across the road from Arabian Ranches.

Today I saw the reason. Following Suzanne's instructions on how to get there I found it was exactly the way I'd driven to Global Village. But I didn't see one single sign to Studio City. Nor when I got there did I see a sign identifying the place.

Millions spent on developing a new 'city', plenty of companies operating from it and not a sign anywhere.

You can get a temporary one run up for a few dirhams if the permanent one isn't ready.

Although why it wouldn't be I can't visualise. The time it took to build the impressive-ish entrance gate was plenty of time to get a sign made.

Come on guys, it isn't rocket science it's just road signage. How can you get it so wrong so consistently?

Back to the programme for a minute to guide you to the bloggers who participated in it. Reflecting the blogosphere, they're all very different. But as they were hand-picked by Alex they're all well worth a read.

Dubai-ified
Mich Cafe
Who-sane
Hellwa Fashion
A Nabulsi Story
andfaraway
And Alex' own blog is Fake Plastic Souks

You can listen to the podcast here, at DubaiEye103.8

Dontcha just love banks

2011-01-24T16:17:00.002+04:00

No, I'll be fair and not blame an inanimate object.

'A bank' doesn't get things wrong.

It's people. People stuff up.

People are the problem, and some of them are employed by banks.

I'll link two events, a couple of months and thousands of kilometres apart. A visit to our Aussie bank back in December and a visit to our snail-mail PO Box in Dubai this morning.

Back in Oz in December, Mrs Seabee went into our bank to ask for a new cheque book, which we'd pick up from them.

Apparently 'the system' says that you can't, they have to snail-mail it to you.

Resignedly, Mrs Seabee replied: "OK. Send the new chequebook to our Australian address".

The bank clerk somehow heard: "Send a new Deposit Book to our Dubai PO Box".

How?

This has to be a first

2011-01-23T15:07:00.001+04:00

When I was back in Oz a few weeks ago my little digital camera threw a wobbly, then died on me.

When I got back to Dubai I took it back to where I bought it, Compu-me, because...wait for it... it was still under warranty.

You know as well as I do that products have a self-destruct device timed to activate one week after the warranty expires. The one in my camera must have malfunctioned.

Not only was I within the warranty period, after a couple of weeks they told me it couldn't be repaired and they would replace it with a new one.

I picked it up today.

I'm stunned.

A day in the life...

2011-01-19T13:57:00.000+04:00

I thought I had a major problem with my personal mobility solution yesterday.

When I put it into gear there was a loud and expensive-sounding grinding and rattling.

Gearbox? I hoped not, that'd cost a bit and have me mobility challenged going forward.

Or more accurately, I wouldn't be going forward.

Anyway, I took it straight to the workshop and it turned out to be nothing more serious than damaged engine and transmission mountings.

Done in the day and now running smoothly and quietly again.

I had to fill up with petrol on the way back and overall the day highlighted how inexpensive many things in Dubai are.

Petrol is Dh1.92 a litre (about US52 cents), I took a Metro ride from Dubai Marina all the way to Deira City Centre for Dh6.50 (about US1.75) and a taxi from there to the workshop cost me the minimum charge of Dh10 (about US2.70). The same distance a couple of months ago back home in Oz cost me the equivalent of about Dh35.

Sadly not mine, but an example of the best looking
personal mobility solution ever designed.

Photo from coupers-cars.com

A dubious award

2011-01-17T12:36:00.006+04:00

A highly dubious 'award' sent to me by fellow Dubai blogger Alexander McNabb.

In fact it's really one of those chain letter things that we get regularly, designed to wheedle out some personal details.

Usually I ignore them, but as it's from such a noted local identity and celebrity blogger, here goes...

1. If you blog anonymously, are you happy with this? If you aren't anonymous, do you wish you started out anonymously so that you could be anonymous now?

Anonymous yes, but I think of it as simply using a traditional writers' device of a nom de plume. Of course I'm happy with it, otherwise I'd change it.

2. Describe an incident that describes your stubborn side.

Me stubborn? Never.

3. What do you see when you really look at yourself in the mirror?

Depends on time of day. First thing in the morning I see a very blurred, out of focus image of someone. Later in the day I simply see me.

4. What is your favourite summer cold drink?

Since I discovered it when we came back to Dubai I have a new one, fresh lemon with mint.

5. When you take time for yourself, what do you do?

Depends where I am. Back home in Oz I walk a lot and spend a lot of time in the garden. In Dubai I tend to spend time on the computer, writing or on forums.

6. Is there something that you still want to accomplish in your life?
Get better at anything I do.

7. When you attended school, were you the class clown, the class overachiever, the shy person or always ditching?

All of the above except overachieving. I hated school with a vengeance and my reports always complained 'he could do better if he put any effort in'. I left at the first possible moment.

8. If you close your eyes and want to visualize a very poignant moment in your life, what do you see.

My father's funeral, driving past his workplace and seeing all his colleagues lined up at the roadside for a final farewell.

9. Is it easy for you to share your true self in your blog, or are you more comfortable writing posts about other people and events?

My blog is about what I see and hear, what happens around me, or sometimes in the wider world. Things that interest, amuse, annoy, frustrate me. I tend to give my opinion on much of it, so in that sense I guess I do show some of my true self.

10. If you had the choice to sit down and read a book or talk on the phone, which would you do and why?

Phone. I like talking to people, finding out what they're up to, getting different views, debating, discussing.

And the rule of these chain letter things is that I now have to annoy three other people by sending it on to them.

So it's going to three familiar bloggers, ex-Dubai now Madrid-based Keefieboy, to ex-Dubai now Barcelona-based nzm and to Dubai-based Grumpy Goat.

Modernising the fleet

2011-01-15T15:07:00.002+04:00

The car wash people seem to have been issued with smart new streamlined trolleys.

"Save my brother first"

2011-01-13T15:13:00.009+04:00

I've said many times before when I've posted about major events that they're really a jigsaw of many small, individual, personal stories.

A tragic example is one such individual story that's part of the jigsaw of the Queensland floods event. The story of a true hero, only thirteen years old, and passers-by who risked their own lives trying to save strangers.

Warren McErlean watched the water on a street gauge in Toowoomba rise twenty centimetres in ten seconds as the inland 'tsunami' hit the town.

He saw a car with a family in it, thirteen year old Jordon Rice, his ten year old brother Blake and mother Donna, with water up to the number plate.

Warren tried to get to the car but by the time he'd walked twenty metres towards it the water was over its bonnet.

He roped himself to a pole and again tried to reach the car but was washed away. Another passer-by, known only as Chris, pulled him out, tied himself to the pole and managed to get to the car.

He grabbed Jordan, but the boy insisted that he save his younger brother first. Blake was carried to safety.

Chris went back to the car where he grabbed Jordan's hand but the rope snapped, the car flipped over and Jordan and Donna were swept away.

Jordan Rice. Hero.
Photo: Sydney Morning Herald

Warren was interviewed on Radio 2UE, and you can listen to his account of what happened here.

The spin on food hygiene

2011-01-13T14:13:00.004+04:00

It's all good news on the food outlet hygiene front if you look at the way the story today is presented.

Gulf News headlines the story: "Hygiene standards improve in food establishments".

The first para tells us that "food establishments in Dubai saw a qualitative improvement in their standards of hygiene last year".

Later it tells us that "the amount of fines fell by 50%" and that "the year 2010 saw saw a significant reduction in the number of violations".

All true according to the report issued by Dubai Municipality.

But if you look at the figures there's another way the story could have been slanted, equally accurate.

There were in 2010 a total of 7,778 violations. While that's better than the 14,188 the previous year it's still a long way from acceptable in my opinion.

Nearly 8,000 hygiene violations by food outlets detected...how many of us does that put at risk?

In fact it's about 20% of the inspections carried out, and that is surely far too high.

We're going in the right direction but there's still a huge amount to be done, not least of which is education in hygiene for those involved in handling our food.

The Gulf News story is here.

Land of extremes

2011-01-12T15:38:00.012+04:00

This time of year I'm usually posting about bushfires causing death and destruction in Australia.

We do indeed have fires, in the west. Not far from Perth a deliberately lit fire has destroyed a dozen homes:

Photo: Alf Sorbello perthnow.com.au

There's a large area burnt out but fortunately no casualties reported.

The animals won't be as lucky, although people do their best to rescue them:

Photo: Alf Sorbello perthnow.com.au

But this 'fire season' the big news is the flood disaster hitting Queensland.

The news an hour ago was that thirteen people are dead and another forty three are missing...and the worst of the flood is yet to come.

Towns have been destroyed by flash flooding, with 'tsunamis' of six to eight metres coming out of nowhere and catching people by surprise.

One third of Ipswich, a suburb of Brisbane, is under water. Brisbane itself, our third largest city, is on high alert with many suburbs already flooded and mass evacuations from the city centre. The river runs through the centre of the city and is due to peak at 4am Brisbane time. Fortunately the predicted 5.4 metre peak has been revised to 5.2 metres. It's still a hell of a lot of water - measure it!

5.4 metres down to 5.2 doesn't sound a big difference but it means thousands of properties won't be flooded. The current reports are that 20,000 properties will be.

The area under water is larger than France & Germany combined and the flood waters are headed south into New South Wales so the north east of my home state is threatened.

People are being rescued from cars which have been washed away and from the roof of their homes...

Photo: Sky News. Town of Lockyer

Photo: Courier Mail. The town of Toowoomba

This shot from a television camera in a chopper shows a family on their sinking 4X4. The mother and son were rescued but sadly the father, a well-known local personality James Perry, is missing.

Photo: The Australian

The animals are affected too and people are doing their best to help them:

Men jumped in and battled to rescue this trapped horse, which was disoriented and couldn't find its way to the nearby high ground:

Photo: Network 10

The wild animals are in trouble of course, finding any high ground or something, anything, to cling on to, like this goanna:

Photo treehugger.com

And animals help each other in times of danger too.

This is one of the most amazing photos to come out of it so far. Armin Gerlach was visiting friends in the flood-hit town of Dalby when he spotted a brown snake (the world's second most venomous) giving a green frog a ride through the flood waters:

Photo: Armin Gerlach

The fog dun some of it

2011-01-10T14:21:00.005+04:00

Fog can make for interesting photos, like this morning in Dubai Marina...

...but when it's combined with idiot drivers the picture is quite different:

Photo: Gulf News

Abu Dhabi once again had the worst of it. In this 18 vehicle crash two people were killed and eleven were injured, two seriously.

At least the fog wasn't blamed this time. This carnage was attributed to an idiot driver, who apparently "exited the highway without paying attention to traffic in the adjacent lane".

Nothing new there then.

The fog dunnit elsewhere in AD though. They weren't crashes, they were 'accidents'.

According to Gulf News ...multi-vehicle accidents...were due to poor visibility and heavy fog at dawn.

I'm concerned about some of the advice reportedly given to motorists by the Director of AD Police Traffic & Control Dept. 'Take simple precautions such as switching on hazard lights' was part of his advice according to Gulf News.

Gulf News has the story here.

A Saturday wander

2011-01-09T15:45:00.004+04:00

How was my second visit to the dentist?

I don't want to talk about it.

Rapidly changing the subject...we had a wander around Downtown Burj Khalifa, or whatever it's called, yesterday.

I'm not a fan of most of New Dubai but this area is an exception. Burj Khalifa itself in my opinion is a stunning building and it looked its best in the bright sunshine.

It's not just the height of the building that always hits me, but also its mass. It is a huge building. The bottom of it is like nine normal skyscrapers side-by-side.

There weren't all that many people about but the board for the viewing level tickets showed its popularity.

I particularly like Old Town and Old Town Island. Not the usual modern could-be-anywhere buildings that are all over the city but architecture that reflects something of the area it's in.

What a pity that more of New Dubai doesn't do the same.

So far so good

2011-01-03T13:09:00.003+04:00

About forty minutes or so in the dentist's chair yesterday.

No pain, well except for when he jabbed the needle straight into the nerve.

"Goodness me" I muttered under my breath "that was uncomfortable".

Or something along those lines.

After sitting for half an hour with a mouth full of the dentist's and his assistant's four hands, what felt like a cubic metre of cotton wool and lots of metal equipment, I'm surprisingly intact.

No swollen face, no bruises, no apparent damage and no pain, no toothache.

I have to go back for round two on Wednesday so I hope I come out of that equally well.

Grumpy? Me?

2011-01-02T16:07:00.004+04:00

Welcome back to Dubai, Seabee.

Got back at about 6am Friday.

Tired from the nearly twenty four hours journey and the seven hour time difference...and I was awake most of last night with toothache.

Sitting in a dentist's chair was not in my plans for the first couple of days back. The diagnosis was a hole in a tooth, an infection and the answer is root canal treatment.

Oh great.

The first session was at lunchtime, I have to go back on Wednesday for more, then a third visit apparently.

And no, I don't feel lke writing much of a post just now.

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible...

2010-12-29T09:51:00.003+04:00

We're flying back to Dubai tomorrow, arriving on Friday morning at some unearthly early hour as all flights into Dubai seem to do.

We're on a non-stop Emirates A380, nearly fifteen hours.

It takes an hour longer going back to Dubai, obviously because to get from down here in Australia to the Northern Hemisphere it's uphill all the way.

I'm not sure how long after I get back it'll be before I get 'Life in Dubai' back to a normal posting schedule.

It's not just the fifteen hour flight, you have to add to that the time it takes to get to-from airports, to check in hours before the flight then sit around the terminal, then wait at the baggage carousel...it'll add up to nearly 24 hours in all.

Then there's a seven hour time difference that throws the body clock into total confusion.

I'm thinking I'll be unjetlagged and untravel-tired around March some time.

As you know, I like to include photos in my posts where I can, but after a couple of weeks here when I was able to post a few photos my little digital camera decided to throw a tantrum. When I tried to fix it it got really annoyed shut down all together.

I have to take it back to the dealer in Dubai to get it repaired and I'm not holding my breath for that to happen in a hurry. Being photoless will affect the postings schedule too I'm sure.

Still, I'll try to get back into the routine as soon as I can.

King Parrot

2010-12-22T10:37:00.006+04:00

Unimportant in the grand scheme of things I know, just a close encounter with a parrot, but I enjoyed it.

I walked into the lounge and sitting on the rail of our balcony was a King Parrot. They're gorgeous birds and it's the first time one has visited us.

By the time I found the camera and got it ready to shoot he flew off, so here's a shot of one from www.wiresnr.org. photo by Serena Hershon.

Scammers using snail mail.

2010-12-15T11:53:00.017+04:00

E-mail is the way they arrive.

Offers to make me a squillionaire. They always come by e-mail.

I get plenty of them. I bet you do too.

Millions of dollars are sitting in a bank account and in return for helping liberate them you get to keep a large amount.

Today I had a very different and interesting approach.

By snail mail. Personalised.

A stamped envelope containing a typed letter on headed notepaper (remember them?) arrived in my mail box.

It's from a firm of lawyers in Madrid with an address, telephone number, fax number and two e-mail addresses.

The stamp says it's from Portugal (is that where Madrid is now?) and it cost 80 euro cents.

The writer identifies himself as a barrister, personal attorney to a deceased gentleman with the same surname as me.

The bank of the late gentleman has issued a notice to the barrister to contact next of kin, otherwise the the account will be declared unserviceable and the money diverted to the bank treasury.

That would be a shame because the sum involved is "Seven Million Five Hundred Thousand Euros Only".

Barrister Santino tells me that "so far all my efforts to get hold of someone related to my client has proved abortive."

His suggestion is that he presents me as the next of kin,'"...since you have the same last name...", so that the proceeds can be paid to my account. He will of course provide the bank with "all the legal documents to back up your claim as my client's Next of Kin..."

The deal?

A nice touch - 10% of the money is to be shared"amongst the charity Organisations". The remaining 90% is divided equally between myself and barrister Santino.

Another nice touch - ïf this business proposal offends your moral ethics, do accept my sincere apology."

It's a new one on me. A correctly addressed snail mail letter, personalised by surname, the cost of a stamp, the cost of the paper and envelope...

Hello, anybody there?

2010-12-09T11:08:00.002+04:00

Actually, it seems that many of you have been here more often than I have over the past couple of months.

I've been away much longer than planned, been TBTB, but I see from the tracking meters that people are still taking the trouble to visit Life in Dubai. Thank you.

I'd planned to be be back in Dubai November 23 but, without boring you with the details, I had to change the flight back three times. It's now booked for December 30, no more delays on the horizon so I'll be back in the City of Dust on New Year's Eve.

I've tried to keep at least a little up-to-date with what's going on in the UAE from reading my blogger colleagues' postings and from the online papers. It's very different from being on the ground though so I feel quite out of touch.

Clarification needed

2010-11-22T10:03:00.005+04:00

It's all too frequent that the papers report an extremely important subject with an utterly confusing article.

There's another one from what is no longer Emirates Business 24/7 but emirates247.com

It's about freehold property ownership in Dubai, a subject important to a lot of people.

Going back to the property boom beginnings, Sheikh Mohammed decreed that non-GCC foreigners could buy freehold property in special designated areas.

I think I'm right in saying that of the emirates offering property ownership to foreigners only Dubai declared it to be freehold. The others offered leasehold of 99 years.

In the Court of Cassation there was a case involving a property dispute between two expat owners of a villa.

According to emirates247, during the case the court ruled that ...in some areas such as freehold property, expatriates have the right of ownership limited with time...have the right to use property (rent or live in it) or alternatively possess right to rent for a period not exceeding 99 years.

Then an even more mystifying: The Ruler's decree is a command and ownership cases require immediate retroactive action, ruled the court.

What?

So freehold property was offered, many people bought on that basis, now the Court of Cassation seems to have declared that it's actually leasehold.

It's not the clearest article you'll ever read but I'm sure that's what it's saying.

I'm sure everyone who bought on the basis of their property being freehold would like some clarification.

The article is here.

Clarification tomorrow

2010-11-09T12:47:00.002+04:00

There are reports in the papers this morning that the UAE's Ottawa embassy has announced that Canadians will need a visa to enter the UAE, effective January 2.

No details, no requirements are given.

Stand by for a series of clarifications...

Climate change is here

2010-11-05T09:25:00.003+04:00

We've certainly got climate change this month.

My view in Spring is usually like this...

Blue sky, blue sea, sunshine, warmth.

Half of the time I've been back it's been like this...

Grey sky, grey sea, raining, cold.

We're into November and I have the heating on, something I can't remember doing in November before.

Cricket is on at the Sydney Cricket Ground - a one day international against Sri Lanka - but rain's just stopped play, the covers are on, it's only 4.30pm but they have the lights on.

Football weather, not cricket weather. It's not like any Spring I remember.

Qantas emergency

2010-11-04T10:52:00.002+04:00

About three hours ago a Qantas A380 had to turn back and make an emergency landing at Singapore's Changi Airport after what they said was "an issue with an engine"

Some issue:

Thankfully all 459 people on board are safe and uninjured.

I've just heard a telephone interview with a passenger who'd just arrived in the terminal at Changi. He said they heard two bangs and saw debris flying off.

But he also said there was no panic on board because the passengers were kept informed quickly and regularly. The information was also given in German because there were a lot of German passengers, according to a passenger I'm listening to as I type.

A Qantas spokeswoman was also quickly on radio reporting everything they knew at the time.

Full marks for that. Lack of communication is usually the main complaint of people, something Qantas used to be guilty of like so many other companies.

Very quickly, Qantas have announced that their entire A380 fleet is grounded until they know exactly what caused the engine to fail.

The superjumbo was climbing after taking off from Changi and it was fortunate that no-one was hurt on the Indonesian island of Batam, because this lot landed there:

Some of the debris apparently went through the roof of a school and although there were children inside no-one was hurt.

I found the photos here.

Visitors

2010-11-04T10:05:00.002+04:00

Not much time available to spend on the computer but I thought I'd stop by briefly to show you a couple of visitors.

This one is actually resident, a Blue Tongue lizard about 40cm long. They don't look particularly cuddly but we like to have them around in the garden because they eat slugs and snails...

Rainbow lorikeets, the most colourful, friendly birds. Although they all have the same mix of colours each one has a different pattern so you get to know them individually...

UAE in the news

2010-10-30T10:21:00.007+04:00

Dubai and Ras Al Khaimah are in the international news again I see.

The UK Daily Telegraph had a piece that tells us that in RAK a 'power struggle threatens stability in wake of monarch's death'.

Soldiers are on the street it said: Sheikh Khalid al-Qasimi, the elder son of the late ruler, Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammed al-Qasimi, was on Wednesday night holed up in his palace, claiming to be the rightful successor, while troops were marshalled outside to enforce the claim of his younger brother, the Crown Prince Sheikh Saud.

Some of you are closer to the action than me right now - what's happening?

Then Dubai is back in the news with a parcel bomb destined for the US found at the airport, although naturally the main focus of the UK press is the discovery of another parcel bomb on a cargo plane at their East Midlands airport.

It makes life down here on the other side of the world seem very normal and relaxed.

Parcel bombs.

RAK excitement.

Bin turkeys

2010-10-26T10:49:00.002+04:00

Dubai has bin cats...

As I've observed before, things are a little different in Australia...

A jargon classic

2010-10-24T11:46:00.005+04:00

I keep complaining about the ridiculous use of jargon, of companies using buzzwords which don't tell us what the company actually does.

A classic turned up in my paper this morning.

It's about the re-naming of Sydney's Star City Casino, as part of a major redevelopment.

The owners have employed a company in San Francisco, Tattoo Brand Strategy, to come up with the new name.

Tattoo describe themselves as an: "evolution strategy collective dedicated to helping clients decode the role their brand assets can play in driving their business forward".

Right.

Anyway, the word is that after a couple of trips to Sydney and several hundred thousands of dollars they're getting close to deciding the new name.

A 'well-placed source' told the paper what the name will be, which a spokesman for the casino would neither confirm nor deny.

The source said the name will change from Star City to....Star.

You need an evolution strategy collective, many months and plenty of dollars to come up with something as earth shatteringly creative as that.

The story is here.

The Australian way

2010-10-22T13:13:00.007+04:00

I've posted a few times about the different speed that construction moves at in Oz compared to Dubai. I used as an example the upgrading our council has done of the road we live in.

After about seven years they've finished the roughly one kilometre long road, putting in kerbs and gutters, drains, a footpath and resurfacing the road.

At our house the high bank between the street and our boundary meant they needed to put in retaining walls.

I was pleasantly surprised at how well they'd done it, and I posted this photo sent to me by a neighbour at the time, just before Christmas.

As soon as I got back I realised there was a problem. I should perhaps have spotted it in the photo.

If you drive in from the left side you have to bounce over the kerb/drain to get into the driveway. People who'd avoided damage to their tyres and used the ramp had left their paintwork on the right hand retaining wall.

From the amount of different coloured paint I found on it a good few had scraped the wall.

So I e-mailed the council roads department and explained the problem. The kerb ramp and the retaining walls were out of alignment. I suggested the retaining wall needed moving back about a metre.

Without telling me they were coming they apparently did an onsite inspection and called me afterwards to say they agreed with me.

A stuff up.

Moving the wall would 'cost thousands' so they proposed re-doing the kerb/ramp, which they 'hope will solve the problem'.

Sounds simple and inexpensive, I thought.

On Thursday there was some major activity:

Half the road closed, seven or eight vehicles, a digger, warning signs up all over the place, men with stop/slow signs controlling traffic. A major undertaking, it looked more like they were building a freeway than adjusting a metre of kerb.

It all got too much for some of them too...

Anyway, it took all day Thursday to break up, dig out and remove whatever it was they broke up, dug out and took away.

Today a smaller crew with only a couple of vehicles arrived and by lunchtime they'd finished.

It looks like a lot of effort for this:

When it's dried I'll give it a go and see if it's solved the problem.

Hello from Oz

2010-10-17T12:30:00.005+04:00

I'm just stopping by to say a quick hello from Oz and post a brief report.

To make you jealous, I took this photo this morning - it's the view from my bedroom that I wake up to...

I did the nonstop flight from Dubai to Sydney, which with the extra hour sitting in the aircraft at Dubai was a total of fifteen hours. I chose the flight that gave me the new A380 and it was just about tolerable - I wouldn't like to do it in the smaller aircraft.

The long flight and the seven hour time difference take a good few days to get over, in fact I'm not entirely sure I've adjusted completely even now.

The big and instantly obvious difference is the clean, clear, dust-free air. Unlike Dubai, the air's breatheable. Then there's the very big, very clear, very blue sky.

Second day here I happened to look out of the window and saw a pod of whales blowing. I counted six but the camera's very slow to react and of all the shots I ran off I only managed to get one whale in...

We also have a bush turkey in residence. Here s/he is on the nest-mound s/he's building.

So, yes, it's very different.

And I can't tell you how good it is to be back for the next couple of months.

Downtime

2010-10-02T11:37:00.005+04:00

It'll be quiet around here for a while - I'm off to Oz in the morning for a couple of months.

The first week or two in particular I have a lot of running around with very little time for sitting at a computer. Hopefully things will settle down after that and I'll be able to get back on here, check the UAE blogs to keep myself up-to-date and even post a few things myself.

Am I looking forward to the trip?

You betcha.

Stupid me!

2010-09-29T09:20:00.003+04:00

I really should have learnt by now...wait for the 'clarification'.

Before commenting, wait twenty-four hours after an official statement has been made and published because it's almost guaranteed that a 'clarification' is on the way.

Yesterday I posted about the lifting of the ban on fifty-seven job titles not being allowed to sponsor their families.

Within twenty-four hours a 'clarification' was issued which denied the ban had been lifted.

I quote from the 'clarification' in The National:

"UAE officials have denied a report that expatriates from 57 different work categories would now be allowed to get visas for their families to live here.

The ban on certain lower-income occupations being eligible for visa sponsorship has not been lifted they said."

The officals giving the clarification are anonymous, the original statement was from Major General Nasser Al Awadi Al Menhali, Assistant Undersecretary for Naturalisation, Residency and Ports Affairs at the Ministry of Interior.

An ongoing story perhaps, so let's wait for the 'clarification' of the 'clarification' which could well be being prepared as I write.

Here's the clarification.

Thanks for the comments on my previous post which alerted me to the 'clarification'.

Good & bad

2010-09-28T16:12:00.006+04:00

A couple of stories in today's Gulf News relate to subjects I posted about last year. One's good news, the other I don't understand.

The good news is that the strange list of fifty-seven occupations barred from sponsoring family members has at long last been changed.

It was always strange to me that sales people, mechanics, butchers, drivers, tailors, cooks and many more were discriminated against on the basis of their profession, regardless of how much money they earned. Putting a minimum wage requirement on sponsoring makes sense to me, to ensure that the family can be looked after, but to ban people from from having their family with them based on their occupation I don't understand.

Anyway, the ban is lifted provided that the would-be sponsor lodges a deposit of Dh5,000 per sponsored person. That's a lot of money to them but at least they now have the option.

The other story is about a Pakistani visitor who'll be spending ten years in Al Slammer, was fined Dh50,000 and will be deported after his jail term. He'll be pleased to be deported I should think, to get the hell out of here.

His dastardly crime? He was convicted of drug running. He brought in 123 grammes of...wait for it...poppy seeds.

Back in January last year I posted this pic...

Bagels sold in Spinneys smothered in grammes of...wait for it...poppy seeds.

I must have a look to see if they still have them on sale.

I haven't read about the Drug Squad raiding Spinneys. Or anybody from Spinneys heirachy languishing in Al Slammer. Why not?

Is it a law that needs changing? I think so.

My earlier posts are here and here. Today's stories in Gulf News are here and here.

Not tempted

2010-09-27T11:20:00.005+04:00

We usually find something new and interesting on menus when we're in Singapore, and the last trip was no exception.

Chicken feet is a standard item in Chinese restaurants but this was a new one on me:

I've eaten crocodile meat back in Oz, but I draw a line at eating the feet.

I gave these a miss too:

And much like Dubai, No Parking doesn't apply to you if you drive something like a Lambo:

Now back in Dubai and there's an interesting story in today's papers. Given our reputation for enjoying a beer or two I had to smile at reports that an Aussie's been fined for consuming alcohol.

Our football team's former captain Craig Moore pleaded guilty to consuming alcohol and was fined Dh1,000.