An account of my concert in Atlantis (The Palm - Dubai) followed by some musings on the subject of Luxury and Poverty
It started as all great adventures do - by getting lost, there were roadworks and suddenly the junction was there and I'd missed it. I know I know the palm is visible from space but you know it's actually not visible from Sheikh Zayed road (That's the main road between Abu Dhabi and Dubai).
But anyway I got there and got to the right place and had the valet park my car all without any problem.



The place is amazing - the carpets are full of designs of sea shells, fish, water etc, the ceilings are painted too - it's stunning!

The event was the Jebel Ali Racecourse end of season gala dinner. They had Jebel Ali Racecourse spelt out in ice letters - each letter was about 1 foot by 2 foot by 3 foot, also some horses head like chess knights the same size. Amazing!

The ballroom was laid out with tables, candles, so many glasses the whole place twinkled! There was quite a big stage with twinkly lights on a black fabric - the whole effect was magical!

Then reality set in - we had a quartet rehearsal then a full orchestra sound check - then we were still practising and some guests had arrived early and they wanted the quartet playing NOW - we weren't even changed! So anyway we rushed out and got ready and started playing, we'd barely finished that when we were led off to get ready to go onstage - we must have been waiting behind the stage 20 minutes! I think the speeches went on a bit! Anyway we played our pieces, Die Fledermaus, 3 songs with a lovely singer then Radetsky March (they all clapped along in the right places!) and off we went. Getting my car back one of the staff muddled up our valet tickets so I nearly could have left with a rather more expensive car than I arrived with but anyway got my car back and had to by a coke and listen to Bon Jovi on the way home (singing along) to keep me awake!

So whilst enjoying the luxury and opulence of the whole thing (seriously who hires a whole orchestra for their end of term party!) I couldn't forget about the people of Libya, about the people of Japan, about the 2.6 Billion people who don't have access to a toilet, over three billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day, do these things make this kind of event wholly wrong?
In fact the problem as I see it is injustice and inequality - which we need to do something about and yet the beautiful things, the creativity, the care taken over each desert, the enjoyment of food - these are all things given to us by God, he wants us to enjoy them - he wants us to be creative and make beautiful things. One day in the new heaven on earth when poverty is consigned history we shall be able to make ice sculptures and paint ceilings and use all the gifts he has given us, to hold lavish banquets and huge parties with orchestras to entertain us and we can truely enjoy it because the injustice of it just won't be there!

A typical day in work for me here in my new job.

I work right out in the desert. I was so excited to get an ID badge but actually they never ask for it or look at it because they know me now! Then I drive to our little compound and
the security guy at the gate lets me in. I park around the back and walk to the front
door - I have to sign in and write the time on a piece of paper with all our names on
at around 9am. I go upstairs. Now that's just a little sentence but they are
grand sweeping stairs in a large hallway and the banisters have ironwork pattern
things and everything. I get to my desk say good morning to anyone already there
(though some of them I see in the hotel at breakfast anyway - even my boss stays
there!).

In the mornings I do lots of working with my lines and boxes, flow charts and
all this nice complicated stuff. I review them with the operational advisor. I also have to update some documents, write some guidance documents about how to use the software. I often end up proof reading documents because I'm the native English speaker - even though I have terrible
English but they don't realise that! All external meetings are generally in the
mornings but I don't get involved in those.

Lunch time! We have a buffet provided (for free!) so we queue up and have soup,
salad, bread (3 or 4 types), hot dishes (there is generally rice, 2 kinds of
meat, one kind of pasta, one of vegetables) , fruit, desserts, cans of drink
etc.
The food is really nice! We have a ladies table - since we have recruited some
more ladies we had to steal one of the men's tables to add it to ours! We have
great chats in a mixture of English and Arabic, we have British, Austrian,
Dutch, Lebanese and Emiratis on our table! In fact we might need to steal
another table soon since if everyone is there we don't have enough space
already!


Afternoons - sometimes we have internal meetings, I'm the only woman in the
engineering department which I guess is usual but another one is coming soon. We
have locals, French, German, Polish and Brits in the team so meetings do end up
with conversations in various languages but we try to stick to English because
that's the common language. The team is pretty good - we are all going in the
same direction (which is unusual at this stage of a project!) and everyone is
willing to help everyone out. Often some of the men will arrive back in the
afternoon after spending the mornings doing site surveys - they are visiting
sites all over the UAE. They have these white polystyrene (styrofoam) pieces
which are the same size as the box they will need to put in each vehicle so they
take it with them to try to see where they could fit it rather than take the
real one which is rather heavy!

We finish around 5.30, if the sun has been shining on my car it can get pretty
hot but it has air conditioning so I turn that on for a couple of minutes, by
the time I leave the site it's quite comfortable. The guys on the gate wave as I
leave and another day is done!

The next episode will include tales of my debut with the UAE Philharmonic
Orchestra (in the Atlantis Hotel which is the big one on the
Dubai Palm!)

Remember how I asked you to say a prayer for my safety on the roads?

Today I somehow ended up in the wrong lane on my way home from work and ended up on the slip road to Marif (I have no idea where Marif is), I turned off that road New Shahama which I do know where it is, whilst driving around randomly I found a supermarket (not a western one - an Indian type one) where I found rambutans (I just ate one which was very exciting they taste so good!) but anyway back to the point, after that I couldn't find may way back to the right road except for going in the wrong direction so in then end I did that, went back to Old Shahama (near where I work) then went up the slip road, round the roundabout, and down onto the road the correct direct, managed to change lane to avoid going to Marif. A while after that I passed an accident where a car's tyre had blown and the car had hit another car.
So maybe all this being lost had a purpose (or infact two purposes): I avoided being in an accident and I got to eat rambutans. God is Great!

My train of thought during a typical journey in the UAE
Where did I leave my rather non descript white car? (more than half the cars are white to reflect the heat)


I'll just walk around a bit in the likely area and click the button and look for the car that flashes...
There it is!
Doh, I'm just going to but my bag on the (driver) passenger seat and then walk nonchalantly round to the (passenger) driver's side and get in.
Thankfully this car is automatic because I can change gears OR drive on the wrong side of the road but NOT BOTH.
Put the car into DRIVE.
We drive on the right here.
Turn on Abu Dhabi ClassicFM.
We go round roundabouts the wrong way.
Remember to drive on the right.
5 lane motorways yay!
1st lane is lorries (trucks) and work vehicles
5th lane is Emiratis in ridiculously big and fast cars. Some of the 4x4s are so big they remind me of being a child and playing with toy cars from different places and some of them being ridiculously out of proportion. Nissan does this huge 4x4 which looks like a Nissan Micra but out of proportion to all the other cars - they make me laugh!



2nd 3rd and 4th lanes are for normal driving.
Whoa looks like a nasty crash (most weeks I see some kind of crash on the side of the road) hopefully it's only the crazy drivers who crash into each other in the fast lane, I stay out of their way but say a prayer for my safety please!
Hmmm sign all in Arabic, hope there's an English one later....
When the roads change they tend to add more signs rather than change or remove any existing ones so it's quite interesting trying to find the most efficient route somewhere - although doing something the most efficient way isn't the most important thing for most people here!
Find wherever I'm going - not too easy as some places seem move...
Park the car (or let a valet park it depending where it is).
Lock the car.
Look around for land marks to help me find it again (last night - in front of the Carrefore English sign (where I bought marmite!), to the right of the palm trees).
Repeat from the top.