I swear it's finally happened: someone's dumped kilos of high quality acid in the water. It was only a matter of time before some wag thought of it. And the drugs have started to bite deep and hard just in time for Dubai's 'CityScape' real estate exhibition - 45,000 people are expected to wander around the sprawling ten-hall World Trade Center and visit this megalopolis of megalopolises.
The advertising around the event is proof positive that there is a twisted dose of California Sunshine in the public supplies: 'Find your home in a cultural palette' screams the wraparound to the Gulf News business section today from developers Dheeraj & East Coast. No thank you. I have no desire to live in a cultural palette. Whatever a cultural palette is. The ad goes on to gush 'Discover the roots of civilisation that flourished by the creek/Find contentment where life moves according to your own beat.'
Complete tosh.
But it gets worse. A lot worse. How about developer Iris Amber, which is offering 'A premium investment for those wishing to experience the warm tones of a cultivated life'?
The warm tones of a cultivated life? Really?
Or perhaps Qatari developer Qatari Diar (they must have hit the Qatari supply, too), which informs us: 'After all, there is only one Earth and there is only one you. It is our privilege to serve both.' An earnest promise, surely, and one to take seriously.
But this is my favourite from the rich crop of insane babble that is splashed across the double page spreads, four-page pullouts and wrap-arounds festooning today's UAE newspapers. How's this for acid-fuelled copywriting? "...a new kind of community, it provides all the comforts of upscale community living with one exception; smart value that does not come at the expense of ideal location, extensive community amenities, lush landscaping, spacious garden apartments, Moorish architecture and an uncompromising build quality"
Errr... wasn't that one exception?
Lush icons, peerless landscapes, unctuous vistas and scatological effulgence abound. A declamatory jumble of insanely positive assertion, semi-English verbiage and gushing torrents of epithet, plastered across the facade of an industry that only appears to understand facade.
5 comments:
Thanks, Alexander. I have since been thinking I should change jobs and build a thriving business based on my expertise in the English language. I could really make a difference!
Please tell me what you think of some ideas I have come up with:
"The idea to think differently"
"We build the solutions of yesterday to create a stable future"
"Investment opportunities to grow and strategic implementation of finance options - your future in our hands"
RAK Properties could use a better slogan than "We build in the heart of nature" - in Arabic, it sounds even more unPC, btw.
A colleague found 'Beliefs as strong as the foundations we lay' but sadly only after I'd finished the post.
We build in the heart of nature. Lovely.
Missing it already.
The Burj Dubai website still takes a lot of beating: http://www.burjdubai.com/
My favourite lines on the website - found under the heading of "Sky Living" - are:
"Go to the world's finest restaurants. By elevator.
Discover the quietest corner of downtown. Inside your living room.
Photograph the breathtaking migration of peregrine falcons."
How splendid!
"Photograph the breathtaking migration of peregrine falcons"
OMG! WTF! LOL! FTFO!
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