Dubai Is Bouncing Back

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Chatting with pal +Ashish Panjabi on Twitter... hang on a second. I just typed Ashish's twitter handle - @apanjabi - into the blogger CMS and it suggested his Google+ handle instead and replaced the text for me. That's getting way too spooky, Google - and surely in your bid to MAKE us love Google+ and adopt it over all other religions you're now crossing the 'do no evil' rubicon. When you use Gmail and write 'I've attached a photo of your bottom' and forget to attach anything, Goog comes back and asks you if you're sure you want to do that. It's part cutesy, part useful and part scary. But linking everyone I know's social profiles to Google+? That's just plain scary.

Anyway, back to the point. Ashish was complaining about the traffic on floating bridge on Twitter this morning and used a memorable phrase as we chatted about the situation: 'Dubai is bouncing back'. It's not really news as such, the signs are there for all to see. But in black and white, the text sort of hit me.

On the one hand, bouncing back is no bad thing. There's little doubt the UAE has been the best place in the world to be over the past few years - sure, it's been quieter around here, but there has still been opportunity and trade goes on. Modern Dubai was founded on trade and once we'd got rid of the estate agents, it was trade that saw the city through. You forget these things, but compiling blog posts for Fake Plastic Souks The Glory Years took me right back there to 2008 and the overheated Dubai that preceded the GFC.

You couldn't get a school for your kids. You couldn't move in the city, the roads were a constant jam of snarling, honking traffic. The sewage plants were so over-capacity they were digging holes in the desert to store the stuff and tanker drivers were pumping it into storm drains so the sea off Jumeirah was fouled with human sewage and people were getting sick. The power network was straining. You couldn't get into a hospital and the machine that goes ping had a waiting list. Rents were sky-high, Gulf News weighed 1.4Kg - most of which was adverts charging us to dare to dream and live to love - and the city was filled with pop-eyed yahoos getting drunk and boasting how much money they had. Anything that didn't move had a billboard tacked on it. Hotels made up insane lists of demands before taking a booking - including minimum stays and cash up front for event facilities - if you could get one beyond six months in advance. Taxis wouldn't stop for you or wouldn't take the fare if it didn't suit them. If you could find one. There was a constant miasma over the city, a yellow, sulphurous dust cloud you could see as you approached from inland, a great smudge across the horizon. This had become a really unpleasant place to live.

Now there's no doubt that Dubai's in better shape today, having continued to invest in infrastructure during the lean years. The Al Khail Road's been quietly finished, the new road network around Trade Centre Roundabout's well on the way, Defence Roundabout is an interchange, the metro's up and running and so on. Presumably (hopefully) similar investments in other key infrastructure have been taking place, allowing the city to expand once again but do so in a more prepared and planned way - a more sustainable, manageable growth. Because we've learned the lessons from the boom and bust - particularly from the bust - haven't we? If so, then all well and good. We can Bounce Back all we like.

But if we're talking a return to the excess and insanity of 2008, I fear. I fear for this little city I have come to call home - although it's not home and doesn't mind reminding me of the fact now and then. And the reappearance of daft real estate ads, the talk of 22% price rises and jams on Floating Bridge make me very skittish indeed.

Of course, Gulf News will never be 1.4Kg again. The Internet's seeing to that. So there's no point in using its weight to chart the economy's rise as was possible to chart its fall...

Nutter

There's little doubt that Gerald Donovan (@gerald_d to many) is special - whether that's not quite right in the  head special or another kind of special is something the jury's out on. If you want proof in the pudding, the above video was taken on an abortive trip to the top of the Burj Khalifa to get the shots he needed for the Burj Dubai Pinnacle Panorama wot I have previously posted about.

Finding himself at the top of the world's tallest tower, some 860 metres up at the end of an 60-metre tube that's 1.5 metres in diameter when a sandstorm blows in, he of course straps on a helmet camera and proceeds to hoon about poking his head around the place as the wind buffets the whole structure.

Anybody normal wouldn't have been up there at all, but I would submit if a reasonable man had succumbed to a head-fit and gone up to find those conditions, he would have nipped down for a coffee and almond croissant at the Armani or something.

Anyway, you can read more about the whole thing over at The Daily Mail, which leapt at the chance to play with the pano again. By the way, in case you're wondering what a piece of coverage on the Mail Online website is worth, you can start at 100,000 views in 24 hours.

I'm thinking of doing a stunt competition for a client whereby people have to devise ways to scare our Gerald. I mean, I'd hate to have to cure his hiccups...

Let The Chaos Begin!

Hornjoserbsce: A sim card (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Gulf News today carries a Great Pronouncement Of Doom from UAE telecom provider Etisalat. If you don't register your SIM card on time, you're going to have your line cancelled, they tell us. It's all part of the UAE's Telecom Regulatory Authority slightly obtuse campaign,  'My number, my identity'.

As I predicted earlier, this one has all the usual Ealing Comedy attributes. We are all to trot off to a telephone company office with a passport copy (and original it seems) or a national ID card (copy and original we assume) and re-register our mobile lines by filling a form. The 'campaign' started on the 17th June - now Etisalat has given 1.5 million of its 8.6mn subscribers just three months to register their lines, failing which they will suspend the line. Three months after that, it's cancellation. They've sent out texts to the lucky 1.5 million hapless victims telling them to register or lose all within 90 days.

As I pointed out before, it took five years to issue everyone National ID Cards here - and that's still not a 'done deal'. The constant slew of frequently clashing announcements, pronouncements, threats and exhortations have provided endless amusement. Now we're going there all over again.

Does Etisalat really think they can get 1.5 million lines re-registered in 90 days? Even allowing for a constant and equal throughput across all their 104 offices, that means 160 applicants re-registered per office per day, or (with an eight hour day) 20 per hour. Or a constant rate of one registration every three minutes in each and every office.

Don't make me laugh. Etisalat doesn't process bill payments that fast, let alone re-registering lines (including, presumably, verifying and inputting the registration information as well as scanning documents etc). Can you imagine the long, hopeless, shuffling queues? I can and I'm in no hurry to play, thank you.

In fact, Etisalat's spokesperson told GN "It won't take more than ten minutes to fill the form... everyday we have an average of 10,000 subscribers who approach Etisalat offices to update their personal information.". At that, frankly unbelievable, number, we're still talking only 900,000 registrations in 90 days.

And then they're proposing to text another 1.5 million customers, just to add to the chaos from the preceding 90 days.

Words fail me.

Sharjah Goes Mad (der)

Image via Wikipedia

Sharjah, the place where all roundabouts are called squares, has decided to shut all of its public parks until 4pm each day in order that the general public can avoid being stared at by gardeners.

Seriously.

The Emirate's public parks, all of 'em, will now open only from 4pm until 10pm.


According to a report in Gulf News, Sharjah Municipality official Yaseen Mohammad said: "The municipality cannot accept the responsibility of having its employees staring at women and making them feel uncomfortable."

The closures "combat this threat", according to the official, ensuring that gardeners will be able to 'tend the greenery' in the morning without having their eyeballs falling anywhere inappropriate.

Now gardeners will have to leave the parks to stare at women, a considerable inconvenience for them, I am sure.


The story's here, Gulf News having decided to take the angle of 'furious joggers' in its reporting of the move.

I'm still giggling...

Catch 22

Gulf News today has a one page feature titled ‘All you need to know about your ID card’ which doesn’t quite tell me all I need to know, because what I, personally, really, really need to know is why the website has been such a spectacular failure and why it hasn’t been fixed so that we’re all not involved in daily pointless three hour queues. Or why the application application doesn’t actually let me make an application or help me apply for an application. I’ll stop there. We got confused enough last time.

But, ignore my cavilling. Gulf News put its readers FAQ to two officials from EIDA, the Emirates Identity Authority, about the new ID.

One question was ‘It has become impossible to find registration forms or register on the website. Will I be penalised?’ The response? ‘It is your responsibility to register.’

Good. Well that's clear, then.

I also liked the response that said, of the Jan 1, 2009 'deadline' that ‘EIDA obeys government regulations and will demand the ID card from its employees and customers to provide services.’

Great. I can see it now...

Jan 2, 2009
‘Hello, I’d like to apply for an ID card.’
‘You have ID card?’
‘No, I’d like to apply for one.’
‘No service without ID card.’
‘But I don’t have one!’
‘Then no service is possible.’
‘How can I get one if you won’t give me one unless I have one?’
‘This your responsibility.’

But my favourite, out of a wonderful and richly informative piece (thanks, GN!) was this one:

What happens to the ID card if one dies after obtaining it?
‘The card gets automatically deactivated once we receive an automatic update from the government entity that authorises and authenticates this event.’

Authorises? I have to get permission to croak now?

I bet they'll need the ID card before duly issuing said permission.

Sheer magic!

Bank

You’ve issued me with a new Visa card. Can I ask why? The old one doesn’t expire for two years.
You asked for it.

I didn’t.
It’s the new black card.

So’s the old one.
It’s because your wife’s card was taken by the ATM.

No it’s not. Her card’s been replaced, you agreed not to replace mine. And that was months ago.
Pause. It’s a process.

It’s a what?
A process. By the system. It’s the system.

The system?
Yes. That’s it. The System.

Is this because of the security issues you've been having?
No. No. Not possible. I don't know. Yes, it's not. I have to get someone to call you back. Overload. Overload. My mind is going. Dave? Dave? I don't believe you wanted to do that Daaave....

I followed the complaints procedure and faxed a complaint form to my bank after Dubai’s RTA took Dhs750 from me in error and refused to refund it. Over three months later, the bank hasn’t responded.

Almost a month ago, the same bank failed to make a transfer to the UK in good order. The consequence was a botched transfer and an exchange loss, charged for me for some reason, of some Dhs 1200.

Two weeks ago I was suddenly issued with a new visa card, although my old one hadn’t expired. It has a new security number. Concerned, as they have messed up standing payments on the card before and we have, after all, just been asked to change all our PINs because of a security issue, I called the bank to ask them to confirm why they had issued a new card. The conversation above (only the last line is makety-uppity, BTW), is just one of many that ended with me insisting that someone, anyone who could take responsibility and tell me why I had a new card that I didn’t want or need, call me back.

Silence.

For a month I have been leaving messages on the answering machine of my ‘Status’ account manager. For a month I have been leaving urgent messages with the call centre to have someone, anyone call me back to discuss the above. They won’t give me any other telephone number for the bank.

This Saturday I am going to go to HSBC in Bur Dubai in person. Expect to hear about the consequences in Gulf News and other leading daily newspapers. I'll be 'British expatriate A.M.' in case you want to be sure it's me. I’d appreciate if you could all start some sort of ‘Free McNabb’ campaign as soon as the stories break. Thanks.

*Update. We blew this Saturday, so it'll have to be next. The best laid plans of mice and men...

Sammy

Gulf News has really got the bit between its teeth.

Today's FREE SAMMY THE SHARK campaign kicks off with considerable style: readers are offered a free 'Free Sammy the Shark' badge inside. Amazed at this new munificence (it was only last week that our two Gulf News 'Save the Planet' Jute Bags arrived), I was delighted to see that said badge is indeed printed inside on the paper's Page 3, along with instructions to Make your own Free Sammy the Shark badge! All you have to do is cut out the badge from Gulf News, affix it to a piece of cardboard and then cut out the shape from the cardboard. Then carefully attach a safety pin to the back and hey presto! You too can then show your support for the campaign by emailing a picture of yourself wearing the badge to Gulf News! If you live overseas and don't have a GN on paper, never fear! You can download a badge to print here!

(Environmentalists have come out against The Atlantis Hotel in Dubai keeping a whale shark, which was found in distress off Jumeirah some time ago and added to the hotel's aquarium. It's the latest in a growing string of PR nightmares being experienced by the hotel and the GN campagin won't be helping. Right thing to do? Free the shark, fast.)

Real

Help! I'm drowning in iconic luxury living!

Dubai's CityScape exhibition starts today and the normal background levels of iconic luxury living that reflects who you truly wish to be are now escalating to a dangerous degree. Gulf News came with a foil bag that screamed REALITY INSIDE, containing a bunch of deeply surreal leaflets.

The mindless hyperbole is incredible. You want to stick your fingers in your ears and cry lalalala until it all goes away. The radio's stacked with end to end soapy voices (why do agencies think the sound of some sarf London bird sounding like she's just taken in two bottles of Moet and a hard hit of amyl will make people believe the dream) and the press is pumped to bursting with insane, blissed out exhortations to dare to dream, live the life, love your dream, dream your dare.

Some examples for those of you unlucky enough not to be assailed by the constant high volume feelgood psychobabble today:

Let the love affair begin. Enter a sumptuous garden paradise that will invigorate the heart and the soul, and recapture the ultimate passion for life.

Unique lines and curves, terracotta roofs, warm colours and cobbled driveways...a stunning architectural concept in a background of perennial blue skies.

For as long as you refuse to compromise on your dreams, we will see eye to eye.

Sensual, expressive, opulent... all about living with a truly fashionable elegance.

Strategically cushioned on the iconic shoreline of Dubai...a home for the privileged few in refreshed luxury.

Prosper in life. Prosper in business. Prosper with one of the finest properties in Dubai. A place where prosperity beckons naturally.

the perfect destination where you can relax peacefully, bond with family, and enjoy life at its fullest.

Argh! Refreshed luxury? What the HELL is 'refreshed luxury'? Let alone a 'strategic cushion', an 'iconic shoreline' and we're not even going down the road of prosperity beckoning naturally!

Rather brilliantly, one developer is offering, in huge type across the page, "A lifestyle of excesses."

I quite like the sound of that one...

Pooling

Do go to the RTA's new Sharekni website and have a giggle.

Yes! Thanks to the brilliance of the RTA, you can now register to share your car with other people! Other people? Yes! Other people!

For those wondering what on earth is going on about this carpooling business, it was illegal to share your car with other people in the UAE because of the prevalence of illegal taxis - ie people sharing their cars for money. As I've pointed out in the past, if the taxis were a little nicer, neater, more knowledgeable about destinations and carried passengers at a reasonable market rate, the demand for 'illegal' taxis would be practically non-existent.

However, the issue was, apparently, that people were running 'illegal taxis', hence the move to make all car-sharing technically illegal. I'm really not sure that the level of 'illegal sharing' was such a safety threat, or revenue threat to the RTA, but there we go. The imposition of the law into this situation may seem a little draconian: others might have run an awareness campaign about the dangers of car sharing, re-evaluated the taxi service to make it more competitive or perhaps even just put up with a little natural attrition for the taxi company as those less well off shared their cars.

Having imposed the move as law, this obviously poses some problems, such as 'If I want to give my friend/colleague/neighbour/ a lift to work/the club/the beach then I damn well will'. And nobody would be particularly keen to live in an environment so mad as to actually seriously enforce such a piece of legislation. Would they?

The RTA's new solution to the issue, the 'Sharekni' service, attempts to allow drivers to register, stipulate the type of passengers they're willing to share with, the days they're happy to be 'driver' on etc - and then lets them log up to four passengers together. The site also supports passengers looking for a driver. The site then issues a 'permission' document that will satisfy even the most ardent police officer when you're stopped to see who the four strange people in your car are.

As Kipp points out, the Sharekni car pooling website isn't exactly a Web 2.0 marvel. Rather than making it all fun and social, the site is more like a government form filling exercise. The 'quick search' failed to find anything I tried and the registration link failed, the form failed and pretty much everything else I tried to do failed, too. I gave up in the end.

Although I'm sure they'll fix the site in time, the whole idea really does still make my mind boggle. To try and legislate, and enforce that legislation, against people having other people in their cars is surely an utterly pointless exercise. To offer them the chance to register for the chance to share their car with strangers for no incentive other than a 'permissible' sharing of the cost of petrol ("Cash exchange is not allowed between the passengers and the car owner; however the car owner can be compensated by paying the gas price.")?

I somehow don't think it's going to be wow of the century... but then I'm just cynical and overdue leave, so I might simply be wrong...

Alas

Talking about new lows in advertising, as we were last week, today's soaraway, sizzling slab of superlatives, Gulf News, carries an advertisement for a rather unremarkable little development called, as far as I can see, 'Sundance'.

Buckingham Palace, Mysore Palace, Palace of Versailles...

Trumpets the ad, getting my attention for a start. What new Dubai Lalaland superlative awfulness are we in for next?

ALAS!

Screams the copy.

None are commercial towers!

Oh, alas indeed! I'm sure Liz is bemoaning that very fact as she gets tucked into her tupperware full of Frosties this morning! The copy goes on to warble about how this humdrum little building is to be 'a business space fit for the emperors of the business world' and how 'if you ever feel the need for a space befitting your empire' you need search no more.

It's not often that something cuts through the constant background buzz of Dubai's prozac laced, hyperbolic real-estate promotion and actively manages to provoke irritation. The idiotic comparison between this drab little square of low-rent office space and great works of architecture shouldn't really get my goat. There's even some merit to the scheme. The idea that Buck Palace would be better utilised as commercial tower space would, I know, dovetail very neatly with my Irish and staunchly Republican wife's view that the British Royal family should be fed to the nearest available carnivore.

It must be me. I must be due leave...

Mafsoum

Mafsoum is a great Arabic word. It’s something of a meme in the company wot I work for, made popular by the Jordanians and a word all of us use frequently, and amusingly, in conversation. It’s very useful, one of a few compelling additions to Ten Word Arabic and, when used judiciously, it will scatter your enemies like shouting ‘I’ve got a cobalt bomb in this briefcase!’ would scatter a WEF Plenary. Because mafsoum means ‘schizophrenic’.

Isn’t that cool? Just slip it into conversation: “Enta mafsoum!” (you’re a schizo!) if you’re feeling like risking a black eye, or a sly “Howi mafsoum!” (he’s a schizo).

Why am I babbling about schizophrenia? (‘ere listen to ‘im: ‘es ‘avin’ a go at ver bleedin’ schizowotnots now!)

The fact that Etisalat is promoting a service, on its Weyak mobile services platform, that lets mobile users take pictures and upload them to their Facebook page surely is evidence of a most fundamental schizophrenia. On the one hand they’re blocking social sites like Orkut, Flikr and Twitter and even lumps of Facebook itself, on the other they’re trying to drive the adoption of these services!

Rather cack-handedly, if I’m professionally honest: a blunderbuss of SMS spam is probably not the best communications tool to use in driving adoption of a Facebook related service. Perhaps they'd have been better using... errr.. Facebook?

Is this evidence of an internal battle between conservatism and free thinking radicals? Is it a cross-company integrated strategy to build adoption to the point where the block is untenable? Perhaps it’s just good old fashioned addle-pated organisational idiocy?

Or just simply that they’re mafaseem!...

Modhesh Delivers Dubai Summer Surprises

"Registrations for the exclusive DSS summer event, the Modhesh Friends' Club, take a hectic pace as a number of parents accompanied by their holidaying children are rushing to the DSS Office to grab the last few remaining seats available for the Club all set to start on June 24."

So, in tones of overwrought hysteria, goes the press release announcing that uptake has been a little slower than anticipated for the Modhesh Friends' Club summer kids' event. It's quite possible, of course, that demand has been reduced because parents simply don't believe they'd have a chance of getting their kid in because the demand would be so great. After all, as the press release (posted here on arabianbusiness.com) tells us, application forms are "fast flying off the shelves" so it must be popular.

If you'd like to learn more about Modhesh, you can go here. There's more information there than anybody in their right minds can take, all presented in a comforting palette of colours designed to trigger scary roller-coaster flashbacks from that time you dropped an experimental tab or two back at Uni. In fact, uncontrollable brain-skitter is a constant danger in Modhesh's online world, but I do recommend you pop in to enjoy, if nothing else, the relentless tone of the prose offered up to you.

Here's a sample:

"His popularity is truly inspiring, growing constantly over the years. As summer time approaches children anxiously wait for their favourite character to return and become a part of their lives. His yearly visits to Dubai win him friends and fans in huge numbers indicating to his popularity among children of all ages. Even grown-ups can’t help but join in the celebrations when Modhesh invites them to shop at the malls or be a part of the weekly themed events."

Quite.