Returning from the A&E (the alcohol store) and having trekked 6 km in the hot sun (it's over 100 degrees), I walked up to the elevators in the intercon behind an emirati and his three wives. I had 2 bottles of wine in my beach bag covered up with my dry cleaning, and I was wearing a sleeveless shirt because I'm kind of over the whole cover the shoulders thing in this heat (never would have dared to go out like that 3 months ago). I was feeling a bit uncomfortable.
Emiratis don't mingle with us westerners really. Most of the time I get dirty looks in the intercon because I'm not wearing designer clothes and my hair is a mess. Most of the emirati women here are so contemptuous of me that they won't ride in the same elevator (don't blame them really, I'm normally sweating from the gym or from walking around here in the heat).
But this guy invited me into the elevator with him and his three wives. He held the elevator door until I got in. I was holding my bag really tight trying to keep the bottles from clinking too much.
It turns out they are staying on the same floor as me. As we rode up I stared at the floor and hoped they wouldn't notice the shape of the bottles through the canvas of my beach bag. I tried not to move so they wouldn't clink around, but accidentally when the elevator stopped on the floor they clinked. The emirati man was not talking to me, but he was talking to his wives in english giving them their keys (adjoining rooms, the young skinny one with him the two older ones next door). They normally don't speak english so I felt, in a way, that he was somehow, I don't know, trying to make me feel comfortable around them.
As we walked out of the elevator he saw the view of the marina from our floor, which is spectacular. He got so excited he pointed out the window and then said to me "Look! Ships!" I smiled and said "It's pretty amazing". Then he said "sandbar!" pointing to a small sandy island. "You like view? It's a very good view! With many ships in this view!"
I concurred on the view and walked to my room. The emiratis followed me and stood in the hallway outside my door looking uncertainly down the hallway. I told them that their rooms were on the other side of the elevator banks, and then walked them there. The guy asked how I knew where they were (admittedly, the room numbering scheme here is confusing) and I said "because I live here". Then he said "It's very nice for you. Very nice indeed!"
I don't know why but I was flattered he talked to me. I've only spoken with one other emirati outside of work. It made me feel good that I wasn't even following the dress code and this guy obviously wanted me to feel comfortable (not realizing, I hope, that the main source of my discomfort was the alcohol I was carrying) around him and his wives. It was nice to share the great view from our floor with them because they felt the same way I did when I first got to the hotel and came up to my floor and saw the marina at night with all the lights on the boats.
It's the little connections in life that make life bearable and even joyful.
Thursday, May 27, 2010
Monday, May 24, 2010
bloody sunday
Sunday I got to my customer site at 730 and spent 1 1/2 hours arguing with the system administrator trying to get a log on to a server I need for my project. Then I sat in my "office", which is just a desk shoved in a stairwell outside my customer's door.
It's a bad location because everyone walks by. Worse some of them want to talk to me. I normally just say good morning and avoid turning around, but some guys are quite persistent, including this little indian guy who had the cheek to ask me yesterday if it's true that blond women have different pubic hair than women with black hair.
Not knowing how or wanting to respond, I went downstairs to get some tea. When I got back to my desk I discovered the office boy had stacked what is possibly all of the paper in Abu Dhabi on my desk. Which, I should mention, besides being next to the printer, is next to the shredder.
Are you goddamn kidding me I thought to myself as I tried to work through the noise and vibration of the shredder. I can't yell at the office boy though. He's very nice. Last week I bought him a pot holder because he's always carrying this metal coffee pot around and it's really hot. But, instead of using it to protect his hands, he hangs it around his neck like it's the biggest employee badge ever.
Also, I got sunglasses for the guys who clean and do work outside because they don't have any and they'll end up with cataracts and not able to work. I thought, when I gave them the glasses, I had explained that to them very clearly. But, every time I see them outside, they don't have them over their eyes. They wear them on top of their heads, like I do when I'm in the office (that's how I, um, fix my hair - wake up and pull it off my face with my shades). When I say "No, put your sunglasses on your face" they say "yes madam we wear sunglasses" and point to their heads like I'm the one who potentially has problems seeing.
There is a door out to a patio near my desk, which I was quite chuffed about since that meant I wouldn't have to walk down 3 flights of stairs and then go out a locked door to smoke (there isn't usually anyone to open the locked door so you risk a long wait in the hot sun if you go out it). But the door is broken and won't close. It's very, very hot at my desk. And I'm surrounded by 5 offices belonging to the loudest screaming arabs on the planet.
As it seems things can't get any worse about my work place, they do. Yesterday around 10 am the fire alarm went off for 5 minutes. One arab, E, started screaming "shut that fucking thing off!" as loud as the alarm. Finally I went to his door, said "as an engineer, you should know that yelling doesn't fix things" and then I slammed his door. Point taken. He later attempted to get back into my good graces by bringing me dried sugared pineapple (they taste like smarties, but better and after I eat two I feel like I'm going to vomit from the sugar overload).
The alarm went off intermittently for the rest of the day. I got back to my hotel around 7 feeling like I had a concussion, did my workout, and was getting ready to take a shower after eating the biggest pizza ever (I needed it, I've already lost 10 pounds from the heat). It was 915.
But no. I heard a muted boom, and then the power went out. I went down to the lobby in my workout clothes. They said that only a sector of the hotel lost power, and that they would send someone to my room to fix the problem. I went back and laid down on my bed, still in my work out clothes. And waited. And waited.
Soon I felt like I was going to suffocate from the heat. I wandered down to the lobby again, mostly to be in the air conditioning. It was 1130. They told me to go back to my room immediately and that someone would be coming soon. Yeah. That's middle eastern soon.
I drifted off into a light sleep around 130. At 330 all of the lights on my room came on and the air con kicked in. I was so happy suddenly that I started laughing out loud.
Or, perhaps, I was losing my mind.
In any case, 530 rolled around quickly and the day at the customer site could not have been any longer.
Tonight, inshallah, I will go to bed at 10 and the power will stay with us.
It's a bad location because everyone walks by. Worse some of them want to talk to me. I normally just say good morning and avoid turning around, but some guys are quite persistent, including this little indian guy who had the cheek to ask me yesterday if it's true that blond women have different pubic hair than women with black hair.
Not knowing how or wanting to respond, I went downstairs to get some tea. When I got back to my desk I discovered the office boy had stacked what is possibly all of the paper in Abu Dhabi on my desk. Which, I should mention, besides being next to the printer, is next to the shredder.
Are you goddamn kidding me I thought to myself as I tried to work through the noise and vibration of the shredder. I can't yell at the office boy though. He's very nice. Last week I bought him a pot holder because he's always carrying this metal coffee pot around and it's really hot. But, instead of using it to protect his hands, he hangs it around his neck like it's the biggest employee badge ever.
Also, I got sunglasses for the guys who clean and do work outside because they don't have any and they'll end up with cataracts and not able to work. I thought, when I gave them the glasses, I had explained that to them very clearly. But, every time I see them outside, they don't have them over their eyes. They wear them on top of their heads, like I do when I'm in the office (that's how I, um, fix my hair - wake up and pull it off my face with my shades). When I say "No, put your sunglasses on your face" they say "yes madam we wear sunglasses" and point to their heads like I'm the one who potentially has problems seeing.
There is a door out to a patio near my desk, which I was quite chuffed about since that meant I wouldn't have to walk down 3 flights of stairs and then go out a locked door to smoke (there isn't usually anyone to open the locked door so you risk a long wait in the hot sun if you go out it). But the door is broken and won't close. It's very, very hot at my desk. And I'm surrounded by 5 offices belonging to the loudest screaming arabs on the planet.
As it seems things can't get any worse about my work place, they do. Yesterday around 10 am the fire alarm went off for 5 minutes. One arab, E, started screaming "shut that fucking thing off!" as loud as the alarm. Finally I went to his door, said "as an engineer, you should know that yelling doesn't fix things" and then I slammed his door. Point taken. He later attempted to get back into my good graces by bringing me dried sugared pineapple (they taste like smarties, but better and after I eat two I feel like I'm going to vomit from the sugar overload).
The alarm went off intermittently for the rest of the day. I got back to my hotel around 7 feeling like I had a concussion, did my workout, and was getting ready to take a shower after eating the biggest pizza ever (I needed it, I've already lost 10 pounds from the heat). It was 915.
But no. I heard a muted boom, and then the power went out. I went down to the lobby in my workout clothes. They said that only a sector of the hotel lost power, and that they would send someone to my room to fix the problem. I went back and laid down on my bed, still in my work out clothes. And waited. And waited.
Soon I felt like I was going to suffocate from the heat. I wandered down to the lobby again, mostly to be in the air conditioning. It was 1130. They told me to go back to my room immediately and that someone would be coming soon. Yeah. That's middle eastern soon.
I drifted off into a light sleep around 130. At 330 all of the lights on my room came on and the air con kicked in. I was so happy suddenly that I started laughing out loud.
Or, perhaps, I was losing my mind.
In any case, 530 rolled around quickly and the day at the customer site could not have been any longer.
Tonight, inshallah, I will go to bed at 10 and the power will stay with us.
wazis, taxis
I've explained before how weird things are here with taxis. But, a refresher in case you forgot...
Gold taxis are old taxis, and they are driven by people new to UAE. That is to say, crazy indian and pakistanis. They never know where anything is, and they don't speak english.
There are silver taxis, more expensive (color coding probably designed by the same idiot who put red before orange on the airport safety scale). The drivers, though they also don't know where anything is, speak moderately bad english and usually try to carry on a conversation, which is, most times, painful.
New taxis are available for ladies only, and they are called purple taxis, though the interior is more like lilac. They are driven by women, and usually the safest.
I always seem to end up with a gold taxi. The taxi drivers then proceed to drive me around to rack up the fare, and won't listen to my directions or look at my map. It's been frustrating dealing with that.
So today, I was standing outside the intercon at 730. The patio in front of the hotel is black marble, and was radiating heat. It was already over 100 degrees and humid. A half hour went by and I'd almost decided to take an intercon sedan (which is three times the price of a taxi) when a gold taxi pulled up.
My driver was a crazy guy with bad english. He wouldn't listen to my directions and kept trying to take me the wrong way. Normally I just give in but this morning I had to get to work. I ended up having to use my marine words on him. Blanking those out, the conversation went something like this:
me: Please....stop trying to....go the wrong way and....listen to...what I'm....saying before I...lose my mind.
driver: hurhefhor keblah blah kobloblablabla ec hallah hon haralla blah blech blah blah
me: I'm...late for work...so JUST DRIVE STRAIGHT or I will.................!
driver: en haffa blah blah (I'm not sure, but I think he was cursing me)
Later, as we were nearing my building, I decided to go for some positive reinforcement so I thanked him for listening to my directions. He told me he was from Waziristan, possibly the most lawless place in the world. He was having visa problems, and hiding in his cab. He asked me "do you like taliban?" and I felt he was baiting me so I said "Actually, I am taliban (the nickname, at work, has stuck)". Weirdly, he turned around to look at me, almost sending us into a palm tree.
"You taliban?" he asked. "Only when I am at work" I admitted. He suddenly grinned at me like he had finally gotten my joke.
I gave him a big tip because it sounded like he needed it. And as we were pulling up to my office he was pointing towards the other side of the street saying something that sounded like "sha sa san". It was only when I got to the door of the office that I realized he was pointing out the sand to me.
Yeah, I haven't seen any of that before.
Gold taxis are old taxis, and they are driven by people new to UAE. That is to say, crazy indian and pakistanis. They never know where anything is, and they don't speak english.
There are silver taxis, more expensive (color coding probably designed by the same idiot who put red before orange on the airport safety scale). The drivers, though they also don't know where anything is, speak moderately bad english and usually try to carry on a conversation, which is, most times, painful.
New taxis are available for ladies only, and they are called purple taxis, though the interior is more like lilac. They are driven by women, and usually the safest.
I always seem to end up with a gold taxi. The taxi drivers then proceed to drive me around to rack up the fare, and won't listen to my directions or look at my map. It's been frustrating dealing with that.
So today, I was standing outside the intercon at 730. The patio in front of the hotel is black marble, and was radiating heat. It was already over 100 degrees and humid. A half hour went by and I'd almost decided to take an intercon sedan (which is three times the price of a taxi) when a gold taxi pulled up.
My driver was a crazy guy with bad english. He wouldn't listen to my directions and kept trying to take me the wrong way. Normally I just give in but this morning I had to get to work. I ended up having to use my marine words on him. Blanking those out, the conversation went something like this:
me: Please....stop trying to....go the wrong way and....listen to...what I'm....saying before I...lose my mind.
driver: hurhefhor keblah blah kobloblablabla ec hallah hon haralla blah blech blah blah
me: I'm...late for work...so JUST DRIVE STRAIGHT or I will.................!
driver: en haffa blah blah (I'm not sure, but I think he was cursing me)
Later, as we were nearing my building, I decided to go for some positive reinforcement so I thanked him for listening to my directions. He told me he was from Waziristan, possibly the most lawless place in the world. He was having visa problems, and hiding in his cab. He asked me "do you like taliban?" and I felt he was baiting me so I said "Actually, I am taliban (the nickname, at work, has stuck)". Weirdly, he turned around to look at me, almost sending us into a palm tree.
"You taliban?" he asked. "Only when I am at work" I admitted. He suddenly grinned at me like he had finally gotten my joke.
I gave him a big tip because it sounded like he needed it. And as we were pulling up to my office he was pointing towards the other side of the street saying something that sounded like "sha sa san". It was only when I got to the door of the office that I realized he was pointing out the sand to me.
Yeah, I haven't seen any of that before.
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