Bumps

It’s a remarkable study in human geography: throughout the Emirates there are to be seen various stages in the development of communities around speed bumps. I do find that interesting: as an inattentive and impossibly inky-fingered schoolkid, I vaguely remember being told about how communities will establish around natural land formations such as the confluence of rivers or trade routes. And, in fact, there is evidence of communities built around trade routes in the Emirates from 3,000 years ago: specifically in the megalithic burial site to be found in Bitnah, which is a village on the wadi system from Masafi to Fujeirah which has, incidentally, been scandalously neglected by the government of Fujeirah. That wadi was the lower, and probably would have been the easiest and therefore principal, crossing of the Emirates from the coast, across the Hajar mountains and over the desert plains, the higher being Wadi Bih from Dibba to RAK.

Today’s trade routes are black-top and almost every set of speed bumps on a busy road will see chaps selling baby-doll pink candy-floss, fruit and vegetables or black mountain honey from rickety carts or packing-case stalls to the cars as they slow down. More established markets, such as those on the RAK road through Umm Al Qawain, put up scaffolding frames and tack corrugated iron roofs on to make more permanent shops. And then you have examples that have turned into semi-settlements, such as the Masafi Friday Market, a speed-bump community on the Dhaid/Masafi road. This now sports some concrete and block buildings, including a mosque and has turned into quite a large on-road retail park.

More established communities are to be found on the Abu Dhabi highway: again these started as speed-bump communities in the days when the highway was a two-lane affair with no camel fencing and some famously wicked speed-bumps that would regularly be adorned with lorries on their side that had come in too fast and lurched off the road. Today, these are small villages that have outlasted the speed-bumps that prompted their foundation. There’s another one of these on the Dhaid highway from Sharjah: a roadside truck-halt kind of community.

I do find it amusing that the UAE has two types of developing communities built on selling people candy-floss...

Sober

Here's a sobering read for anyone that thinks media freedom is a good thing: the World Association of Newspapers represents over 18,000 newspapers and its report into media freedom in the world today cites abuses of freedom of expression on a truly global basis.

"In the Middle East and North Africa, the past six months have been marked by a number of setbacks in the area of press freedom, mainly due to autocratic regimes that do not hesitate to take drastic measures to prevent independent voices from making themselves heard. Bloggers throughout the region continue their relentless battle to spread news and information ignored or censored by the mainstream media."

I do find it interesting that the WAN, a body representing the 'mainstream media', made that comment about bloggers in the Middle East, although I do hasten to point out that this particular blog is involved in a relentless battle to be daft and of no particular value to anyone. There are a number of blogs and websites that are challenging traditional thinking on media ownership and the role of media in the Middle East. Before, back in the good old days, you could just make sure that only trusties could own licenses to publish. Now the very nature of what 'publishing' is has been upended by the Internet. The UAE publishing law is, of course, desperately out of date and we still await new regulations that reflect the world around us - and the UAE isn't alone. Globally, much legislation has fallen behind the rapid transformations and innovations that Internet technologies are driving.

Meanwhile, seven journalists have died in Iraq since November 2007 and Reuters cameraman Fadel Shana, namechecked by the WAN report, was killed by an Israeli tank whose crew couldn't read the word PRESS on his distinctive blue flak jacket. The shell that killed him, shamefully, was an anti-personnel flechette round that launched thousands of tiny, evil little darts buzzing like angry, deadly black steel mosquitoes into the still air around him: a hail of shaped steel shards that cut him down as he stood there with a camera on his shoulder filming his own death.

Editor

Letters to the Editor

Letters to the Editor are the most popular form of giving vent to public grievances; and you should learn how to write them. The letters to the Editor are like any other letters. There is nothing new or special about them. Here are a few samples.

To the Reader

Dear Reader

India is faced with a crisis of character. The dark forces that are creating this crisis should be ruthlessly exposed.

All of you are called upon to give us a helping hand in this crusade of ours to expose injustice, corruption, communalism, casteism, parochialism and all such disruptive ‘isms’ and place the culprits in the dock of public opinion. You should send us news exposing such dark forces operating in your town.

News must be accompanied by your full address and signed pledge that it is true and factual. We assure you that this would be kept confidential and disclosed under no circumstances.

This is your crusade.

Editor


Only Goat Skin

Sir

Please refer to Mr. A. Kumar’s letter (The Hindustan Times, Aug 11). The alleged ‘musk gland of the musk deer’ is nothing but goat skin puffed with coal dust, earth particles and small pebbles sewn and tied with professional tact sprinkled with cheap musk perfume. These are not the ‘testicles’ of male deer as alleged by Mr. Kumar. There is no need to be alarmed about the possibilities of the extinction of deer. This business is in line with other fraudulent business practices in the country.

Yours, etc.

Ram Swarup Goyal

Bus Conductor’s Conduct

Sir,

I was travelling by a Route no 85 bus (1616 express) at about 10am on 3^rd August. The driver was driving the vehicle very rashly and an old woman was about to be crushed to death near the Baird Road bus stop. I requested the conductor to give me the complaint book so that I may write the complaint. He refused to give it to me. He challenged my right to demand the complaint book.

Yours, etc.

Shri Bhagwan Sharma

Art for Art’s Sake

Sir,

Art for art’s sake has been debated by academicians for long. For a breath of change, let’s say – art for people’s sake too. We need not necessarily by committed to socialist realism. Incidentally, what deters us from evolving a cultural policy in tune with national aspirations of the people as Sir Aourobindo visualised long back? As we celebrate the Silver Jubilee of our independence, there could be no fitter tribute to that Yogi.

Yours, etc

A.K. Shukla

Next week: Letters to the Leaders

Evil

I don't know what it is with people and Modhesh. Last year one grumpy blogger even went so far as to refer to our cheery little yellow friend as a relentless tide of infinite-eyed, grinning evil! Some people have no sense of fun!

But the time is upon us again as Modhesh statues start to appear around Dubai. The endearing little chap is the mascot of Dubai's Summer Surprises shopping festival, although his ubiquity appears to annoy certain groups of irritable expatriates. Shame on them for being so grumpy!

Yesterday saw the official press conference to inaugurate this years' festivities and they're sure to include loads of wonderful Modhesh fun. And who could complain at the little chap's cheery ways as the thermometer hits 50C and we sweat our way through a summer of stop start traffic and construction-related mayhem?

Oddly, the press event appears to have generated less than stunning coverage: this government story didn't even make it to Emirates Business 24x7, which is simply amazing. But I'm sure it'll pick up soon enough.

He's got his own website, you know, although all the links appear to be broken...

Whatever, he'll be with us for the next couple of months... everywhere, everyday and in every way... Happy summer, friends!

Tunes

The Internet has made a huge number of things easier to do. The processes of disintermediation, whereby a supply chain is shortened by ‘cutting out the middle man’ and simplification, whereby complex transactions are reduced to a ‘one click’ action have meant that we can now conduct transactions across a vast range of products, services and geographies. For the past few years, for example, we have bought gifts from friends and family online rather than buying stuff locally, packing it up and posting it. So a customer from Dubai can review, select and buy a product from Latin America from a French website and have it shipped to Scotland – and do it in a few minutes. If you stop to think about that, it’s pretty mad.

But one area where the Internet has actually complicated things is in music. You see, I can’t buy music online, unless I buy and ship a CD to myself. Apple’s iTunes service doesn’t support the Middle East and neither does Amazon.com or Napster – if anyone out there knows of a company that will sell music to the Middle East, please do tell me. In the meantime, I’ve used my UK credit card and a UK address, so now I’m buying music from America using a fake British identity and sending it to Dubai. Which is also mad, albeit a different mad.

And don’t even get me started on the brilliant online music streaming service Pandora. That’s closed to us and I’d have bought a huge amount more music if it wasn’t.

What’s amazing about this is that the music industry is complaining about online piracy and the like – it’s hardly any wonder that people unable to get the legal product will buy the illegal one. And in the Middle East they are doing so in remarkable numbers. In fact, one Lebanese colleague was famously surprised to be told that you could actually buy music online rather than downloading it from a sharing site.

So I was delighted to read in that rather natty newspaper The National that GETMO Arabia has been launched – a download site that offers access to online music, movies and the like. Over 800,000 titles, apparently. It’s nice and easy, you just go to www.getmo.com and sign up. The site looks smart enough, the log-in process is simple and effective. It’s great all the way up to actually buying some music. For a start the selection is extremely limited – you’ll find way more choice at the airport duty free. And when you actually do find something you want to buy (it did take me a while. I’m not your average R&B buying Dubai punter) you discover that you’re expected to subscribe – at a hefty €5 per month if you want unlimited downloads – the next plan down at €2 per month supports a whole three downloads. And that before you even get told what price each download is!

So that’s where I stopped. Because I’m not paying €5 per month for unlimited access to a highly limited choice of music at an unknown price. Nope, I’ll stick with my daft iTunes account – and feel sorry for anyone that doesn’t have a UK address and credit card up their sleeves, because the region’s music fans – and music industry – still doesn’t have a decent download site that can be accessed from here.

And that ensures the online music piracy in the Middle East will go on. You have to admire the music industry – a bunch of yo-yo toting cretins if ever there were one.

Toll

I can see bloggers' keyboards melting down today: the news that two new Salik gates are to be installed is virtually guaranteed to get 'em going. Well, it's certainly done the trick for this one, as you can see!

The news comes on a busy front page for Gulf News, which is more than usually lively. Kylie's 40, Suu Kyi's shameful detention is to continue, a new Bond novel has been written by Sebastian Faulks (and launched with a bonkers, brilliant, publicity stunt), Bahrain has decided to stop issuing work permits to all Bangladeshis following the murder of a Bahraini by a gentleman of that nationality and a Dubai nightclub is to operate a 'you're in if we like the look of you' door policy (and the difference is...).

What larks, Pip!

But it's still Salik that tickles me pinkest. The new gates are part of the second phase of the Salik system, Dubai Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) boss and 'traffic expert' Matar Al Tayer told Gulf News and anyone else who happened to be listening. This is the very second phase that Al Tayer dissembled about when asked about future plans by media back in January: a second phase that clearly had always included more toll gates. Why on earth the RTA cannot clearly and simply communicate what it is planning is beyond me.

One of the new gates is an additional gate on the Sheikh Zayed road, while the other one will add a charge for the Al Maktoum Bridge: the bridge that most people use to avoid the Al Garhoud Bridge Salik gate. Having effectively forced traffic onto Maktoum, the RTA now notes that Maktoum is busy. They really are clever little bears.

Part of the announcement appears to be the undertaking that motorists will be charged only once for passing through the two successive gates on the Sheikh Zayed Road. I'll be interested to see how they implement that one. Will you have a time limit to cross the two gates for no additional charge? And what happens if there's a crash and you're held up?

Gulf News reports that the reason for the second gate on the Sheikh Zayed road is that people have been driving around the original gate, another piece of human behaviour that has apparently surprised the RTA. The new gate is, we are told, "the only solution" to the problem. Although an alternative solution would be to resite the Barsha gate, no?

There are more gates on the way, for sure. Except the RTA absolutely refuses to be transparent (let alone consultative) about its plans and our media appear unwilling to get to the facts. One journalist I know who chatted to Al Tayer following an interview some time ago says he was told off the record that it was Al Tayer's goal to increase the cost of car ownership in Dubai to Dhs 10,000 a year. If it's true, that surely needs to go on the record.

I suppose I'd better do a Salik Talking T-Shirt now...

T-Shirt

The art of conversation is a difficult one to get right. Being interesting is something we all frequently fail at and this is nowhere more true than at social occasions such as parties. I have found myself increasingly engaged in conversations that I simply don’t want to have any more, simply because the topic has been boiled to death so many times previously that it seems pointless to once more go through the weary motions. And so I have invented the Talking T-Shirt. All you have to do is download the PDF file attached at the end of this link and print it out onto T-Shirt transfer film. Then iron the transfer onto a plain white T-Shirt and you will never, ever have to talk to someone at a party about Dubai traffic again. Just point at the T-Shirt and conserve your energies for the pursuit of that Brunette from Barsha.

No, no, please. No thanks necessary. I consider it a public service...

And now, thanks to NZM, the blindingly obvious (to NZM, not to me!) solution of a JPG file, so you can click on the pic below and print out from that if you don't want to go linking externally to PDF files!

TV

Today’s Gulf News is an unexpectedly racy read. Not only are Dubai Police warning transvestites, with top cop and sometime poet Dahi Khalfan Tamim pondering the fact that mixed education is to blame for the rise in transvestism in the UAE, but there’s been an outbreak of lesbianism, too! Two women have apparently been jailed for a month each for ‘cuddling and kissing and behaving like a married couple’ on a public beach, according to the multi-kilo wodge of daily paper. One can only assume that they had a row because one of them had forgotten the sun-tan lotion.

But it’s the transvestites story that has that lovely touch of pottiness to it. There’s something quite delicious about a five-day crackdown on cross-dressers: “transvestites have been seen of late in public places, including shopping malls” we are told. I can't wait for it: ladies with suspiciously large hands and adams apples had better watch out, no?

It’s all rather reminiscent of early 1960s Britain, to be honest – the ebb and flow of a society struggling to preserve its values in the face of the pressures of the modern age. Touches like blaming a rise in transvestism on mixed education really give it that whiff of Ealing comedy, though.

A sort of Middle Eastern version of Passport to Pimlico is what’s needed, methinks...

A footnote: I wonder if Scottish people in Dubai dare wear their kilts over the coming week? Now that arrest would make a marvellous news story...

Club

It is now some weeks since I started posting a weekly extract from the book that appears as if it may change my life, 1111 Letters for All Occasions. I am becoming very grateful indeed that I have found it.

As an insight into the lives, loves, morality, interactions and struggles of 1970s India, 1111 Letters is a rare document of no small historical importance. Thanks to New Light Publishers of New Delhi, we are able to delve into the lives of everyday Indians in a very special and insightful way. Many readers of this blog have been delighted by the colourful and charming vignettes unveiled by this most special of books, to the point where I have been asked to present a lecture at the University of Michigan on the contemporary culture of 1970s India as seen through 1111 Letters for a not inconsiderable emolument. This is expected to be the start of an extensive lecture tour and I have, as a consequence, retained an American Agent to look after my interests.

Needless to say, I retained his services through a letter I wrote him that closely followed the template given in 1111 Letters.

However, I promised I would share an extract each week with you and, regardless of my other obligations, I shall be true to my word. Today, we investigate the section titled ‘Club Correspondence’ – a scathing attack on inequality in every way and a quite riveting correspondence. I apologise for the extract being a little long and complicated, but club membership was obviously not easy in days of yore.

I confess that the last letter in this series made me cry.

Club Correspondence

To join a social club you need some social correspondence with the Secretary of the Club before you are admitted and become a member. Some such letters are given below.

Qualifications

The Secretary
Chelmsford Club
New Delhi

Sir
Can I join your club? What are the qualifications necessary for becoming a member of the Chelmsford Club?

Yours faithfully

Reply to Above

Dear Sir
A brochure is enclosed herewith giving all the necessary information for the new members.
Yours faithfully

Introduction

Dear Sir
I am quite new to New Delhi and I think I know no member of the Chelmsford Club. Then, how can I be introduced?

Yours faithfully

Reply to above

Dear Sir
Please attend our Club dinner tomorrow night and bring the papers along duly completed.

I will have you introduced.

Yours faithfully

Reply to Reply

Dear Sir
I regret that I shall not be able to meet members of the Chelmsford Club tomorrow as I am flying to Bombay tonight.

Please make it later.

Yours faithfully

Open Offer

Dear Sir
Come to our club any evening at your convenience with the completed form.
Please ring me for an appointment.

Yours faithfully

Sending a form

Dear Sir
Kindly find enclosed herewith the Application Form of the Chelmsford Club duly completed and introduced.

Please enrol me as a member.

Yours faithfully

Negative Reply

Dear Sir
I am placing the form before the Governing Body of the Club in their next meeting.

I will inform you of the result some time next week.

Yours faithfully

Membership

Please intimate me the decision of the Governing Body about my enrolment as a member.

Thanks

Positive Reply

I am glad to inform you that you have been duly enrolled as a full member of the Chelmsford Club.

Negative Reply

I regret to inform you that the Governing Body has not been able to accord you membership of the Club. Your cheque for payment is returned herewith.

Reply to Reply

I fear the Chelmsford Club continues to be a Whitemen’s club with Whitemen’s mentality as in the days of the Whitemen’s burden.

The black must bear the burden of the White.

Next week: Letters to the Editor

Blacktop

Nipped up to Hatta yesterday for a quick tour with visiting guests. Having seen a bunch of workers starting on it last time we were up there a few months ago, I had expected to find tarmac on the track and my expectations were fulfilled. After the first crossing of Wadi Hatta itself, the road is 100% blacktop all the way through the mountains and down onto the plan. Blacktop stretches out to the left at the T-junction, the way to Al Ain. And blacktop stretches to the right as well – and has done for quite some while now. I’m fond of jinking off this road to the left, through Wadi Sumayni and through an Omani border post: the landscape here has some unusual rock formations not unlike those found in Wadi Bih and the foothills give way to the Madam plain and then into the desert. The transition of landscapes is quite amazing and you can then nip up onto the dam across the wadi and then up to the Madam/Al Ain road. Except that now the Omani border fence stretches all the way up to the Hatta Road and they’ve welded the damn dam gate shut. So we had to roar up the graded track to the Hatta road.

Our visitors, from Australia, delightedly christened the long green border fence, ‘the rabbit proof fence’, which did rather amuse me. What amazed them was that miles and miles of concrete and steel fence topped with twists of razor wire then simply opened up at the main road with no crossing or check point. They saw the whole thing as utterly pointless and I must admit it’s always mystified me.

The long and short of it is that, sadly, yet another of the great tracks through the mountains is now a metalled road.

RIP, then, the Great Hatta Track.