Planners

Have you ever noticed how often new things are dug up again? Roads that have just been laid that suddenly have teams of people turning them into trenches, gardens that seem to attract JCBs the second they're established?

Following that trend, the road that stretches from the infamous National Paints roundabout to the delightful seafront mangrove swamps of Khor Kalba, the Mileiha Road, is now being dug up. The road itself is less than ten years old, with the intersection currently overlooking the digging having been completed some three years ago. Why they are compelled to dig it up again is a mystery.

But that's not the good bit. The good bit is that they've been working on the road for months, slowly coming in from the desert and now reaching the road between Sharjah English School and the University City.

Presumably the planners thought it was a good idea to dig up the roads outside a school with all the attendant traffic chaos, misery and increased risk to the kids during term-time, rather than completing this work in the summer months and then doing the desert stretch away from the school now.

Yes, yes, I know. What planners...

Gumpf

Well, General Motors certainly don't think much about the treatment they've been getting at the hands of bloggers.

According to a report in the Financial Times, carried today by Gulf News, GM's spokesman Tom Wilkinson reckons, "We've found that the travails of the auto industry have spread beyond the business pages to the general media. Bloggers and others tend to pick up misinformation and recycle it endlessly."

So here, perhaps, is an example of a company that didn't just sit back and sulk when it doesn't like what's happening out there in the Internet. It got off its bum and did something about it. GM's GMfactsandfiction.com website not only directly addresses hard questions, it even asks readers to submit rumours!

"If you’ve read or heard something about GM we’d love to know about it so that we can have an opportunity to address it."

It's certainly an agressive and targeted outreach effort that pulled major global media hits when it was announced on the 5th September. The editor of GMFactsandfiction.com is, incidentally, one Tom Wilkinson!

If you Google General Motors Blogs, you'll find that at least the first three pages of results are utterly dominated by GM's own blogs: a nice effort at SEO domination, for sure. A quick search of other coverage shows much of it is 'on message', too. Top marks for GM?

Well, let's not be so quick to go clapping backs.

It's actually quite hard to find the 'negatives' that GM has reacted so strongly to. So at first glance, we've got an impressive piece of PR work that got GM's story out there and shouted down the critical voices quite neatly, apparently addressing their assertions and restoring 'balance' to the debate. But it's done so with such efficiency that there's no debate at all to speak of...

And the GMF&F site doesn't allow people to post comments. So it's not really dialogue: it's just big-budget shout it from the rooftops assertion. And the trouble with that kind of assertion is that you can't really take a realistic tone and address the debate as a participant - you're just blaring your viewpoint and not listening to others. And that's not polite conversation.

There's this blog, for instance, which accuses GMF&F of 'cherry picking' and then goes on to take a sharp cutlass to the site. And, in fact, there is an increasing volume of comment on blogs of a similar nature, although the tone of response is generally cautious and wary rather than condemnatory.

As one forum comment put it: "I looked at that website. It's sad when a formerly proud American corporation resorts to peddling half truths like that on a website. No solid facts are provided about their dire financial situation and yet GM has the arrogance to try and dupe the public into believing they aren't receiving a government handout. Sad, sad, sad."

Perhaps interestingly, the day before the outreach on facts and fiction started, GM apparently recalled almost a million vehicles due to a fire hazard... the recall is also carried on the US NHTSA database under NHTSA Campaign Number 08V441000.

Although GM appears not to have issued a release on that... Almost a million fire hazards wouldn't be as important as 'addressing myths'.

Or am I just being too cynical again...

Warned

Aren't blogs funny? It never rains but it pours. Some days you've got nothing at all to add to the world, some days things you want to get out of your system just come tumbling out.

Some people read this post. I'm sure quite a few more read it when it ran on Arabian Business. Some even heard me blithering about it on the radio (and were kind enough not to complain).

But, surely, this poor berk wasn't among 'em - otherwise he'd have thought twice about the way he tried to handle disappointed consumer Moryarti when he posted his 5th September grumpy blogpost about a hotel Ramadan tent that failed to live up to expectations. Yes! Cue relentlessly positive comments from someone quite obviously working for the hotel in question. And then some rather... acid responses from the Moryarti himself... a fun read!!!

They can't say I didn't try to tell 'em, can they? >;0)

Ma’am

Has anyone out there realised what a mad month December’s going to be in the UAE? It’s certainly great news for certain teachers I can name: National Day falls on the 2nd/3rd of December (1 day for the private sector), then Eid Al Adha will likely fall from the 7th-10th December. And then the English schools break up on the 18th December!

So they’re getting to work a whole seven days in the whole month! And while they’re swanning around on the beaches complaining about being bored, the rest of us have to negotiate a highly disruptive ‘day on, day off’ month at work.

Grrr. I’ve never really liked teachers...

Exchange

寧為太平犬，不做亂世人

"It is better to be a dog in peace than a man in chaotic times."

I quite like that. I had always thought the Chinese curse was 'May you live in interesting times' but apparently not, according to the Wikithingy. Whatever, times is certainly interesting - and probably chaotic is a great description. Have you SEEN the exchange rate this week? It's mad. And I, like pretty much every Brit in the Middle East, am a considerably richer man for it.


Sterling/Dirham at 6.4 again - and on a pretty aggressive looking downward trend. What on earth is going on?

New

Emirates has got a new toy and this is a picture of it. I guarantee this will be the picture the papers run tomorrow for no better reason than the other one of the two they sent out with the press release was crap.

The new terminal will go operational on the 14th October, launching flights in a three-phase, staged cut-over from the existing terminal which is, as eny fule no, totally maxed to the max and beyond, with the morning busy period being my personal favourite hellish awful airport experience. Now that will all be (we hope!) a thing of the past.

Perhaps interestingly, EK has learned from its erstwhile friends over at BA/BAA and has gone for a cautious, carefully phased move to operations rather than lunge at it like an over-eager schoolboy discovering his first bra strap.

Phase one will be America and the GCC. Phase two the rest of MEA and then the third phase will see all EK flights cut over - some 269 flights a day.

The new terminal is something else: it'll feature 250 check-in counters, including 126 for cattle class, a set of outsize baggage check-ins located in the car park (neat, huh?) and a dedicated floor of 'themed lounges' that'll offer some 2,000 lucky little pampered pax a slice of pre-flight luxury.

I have to admire Emirates, and often do (I am, remember, a paid-up fanclub member) although humbly suggest that they haven't quite got the tone right in their media releases. The gushing hyperbole can come from the media - the releases don't have to claim things like 'a well-orchestrated move' and 'a well planned move'. That conclusion's for the media and public it serves to reach later on - with hindsight and success in hand. Alternatively, it's appropriate for that kind of endorsement of the company's work to come from a third party - for instance, a third-party analyst saying that Emirates' move has been well-orchestrated. Coming from the company itself, that kind of language can trip you up. It's that kind of 'we've got it right and we're great' language that contributed to the pasting BA got over T5.

The facts, with EK's T3, speak for themselves. You can see the care they're putting in, the planning and professionalism that's going into it. The releases don't actually have to make claims of excellence or performance. EK doesn't, IMHO, need (or want) to do that.

People will be more likely to let the occasional hiccup or teething problem go if they haven't been bombarded by how clever Emirates is. A little touch of humility often goes a long, long way. Even if you are announcing that sliced Hovis is, indeed, a thing of the past!

Tiny

Here's a gift for you geeks out there.

It's Tiny URL.

Tiny URL lets you add a widget to your browser toolbar and then, when you find a web page you like/want to share, you just click on the widget. Tiny URL then kicks in and converts the URL of the page into, literally, a Tiny URL - a small, manageable one.

Take this stunning triple-nested Klein Jar image, for example:

http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/images/I046/10314758.aspx

Becomes

http://tinyurl.com/6qtwa5

Or, even more compellingly,

http://www.amazon.com/Fear-Loathing-Las-Vegas-American/dp/0679785892/ref=pd_bbs_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1220453012&sr=8-1

Becomes

http://tinyurl.com/6xtjhn

It even puts it on your clipboard automatically. So, no more emails with links that break a line and become unuseable, no more mad, long URLs and no more being unable to slip a link into things like Tweets and Facebook updates!!!

Sorry, the inner geek got out. And yes, I do feel better now...

Mobile

That old Campaign column about mobiles reprised. Because some people are just soooo curious! :)


8am
Realise I’ve forgotten my mobile. Awareness dawns with an unpleasant feeling of nakedness and exposure. It’s too far back home to go and get it. Decide to go ahead with the day without phone.

9am
Send email to clients and colleagues letting them know. Colleagues start ‘I’ve been trying to call you but…’ jokes.

9.45am
Realise that I don’t know the number of our Jordanian office. Or my account manager’s mobile number. Put off making call and do job by myself.

10.40am
Colleague manages (do not ask me how, it still baffles me) to bruise her coccyx. Is in agony, bent over desk in silly posture and laughing helplessly. Reach for phone to take picture. No phone. Damn.

11.00am
Borrow colleague’s phone to SMS wife and let her know not to call me on the mobile. Struggle without predictive text and unfamiliar handset/interface.

11.10am
Wife concerned about receiving strange messages from a mobile she doesn’t know.

11.15am
Client wants to know why I don’t care about their account any more. We last talked at 5pm the night before. No, he hasn’t read his email. Why didn’t I tell him by ‘phone? I just about manage a smile and a cheery word, despite my heart being black.

12.00pm
Have a meeting. Run into traffic, running late. No mobile. Damn.

12.30pm
Get to meeting 30 mins late. Meeting has left the building as he didn’t hear from me and assumed I’d forgotten. Given I have a head stuffed with kapok, this is understandable, if frustrating.

1.30
Get back to the office only to find everyone’s ordered lunch without me because I wasn’t answering my mobile. Manage not to strangle someone. I have, after all, been making a huge fuss about it all day. You’d think they’d know by now.

2.00
Get around to ordering my lunch from… Go looking for menu because their number’s on the mobile.

2.15
Find menu. Number’s changed since then.

2.45
Get sandwich from Emarat. I can’t describe this in print because they’d sue.

3.00
Feel ill.

4.00
Apparently my behaviour is unforgiveable. Nobody in the office is talking to me. Day is beginning to look up. Actually get some work done.

4.30
Journalist complains to client that I haven’t been answering his calls. Client highly amused. PR less so. Add journalist’s name to the list of those that are first to go come the revolution.

5.00
Last meeting of the day. Nothing unusual at all happens.

6.00
Get to car, meeting some pals after work. Open door. Mobile, which fell into footwell on way into work, falls out.

6.01
Kick car. Hurt foot.

Avis

I was so busy posting up stuff about champagne over at The Fat Expat that I totally forgot to post this, although I had promised myself I would.

Flying back to LalaLand from LHR, we'd checked in and were going through security when I went to put my mobile in my laptop bag before going through the scanner. A creature of habit, I always put my mobile in the laptop bag for security. Not this time.

There was no mobile. I'd left it in the hire car. Now I don't know about you, but my mobile is relatively important to me. I once got a whole Campaign column out of the day I forgot my mobile. To fly back to work sans mobile was not an option. I had to get it back. We called the 'phone, but no answer. There was only one thing for it.

The nice bloke at immigration wouldn't let me just unleave the UK. I had to arrive again. So I left an exasperated Sarah and some mildly resigned hand baggage and made my way to flight transfers, where they said I could go to visit the UK again. Then I had to go the wrong way through a lot of scanners and amused security people. And then, finally to arrivals, where I waited at the bus stop for an Avis bus to turn up.

Now I was perfectly aware of my chances. Who in the world would expect to get that phone back from a hire car checker in the world's busiest airport? I stood, mentally kicking myself until I finally, three hours later (ten minutes, really) saw a red bus hove into view.

I explained. The driver got on the radio, called his control, who went on a quick search and then confirmed they had indeed got the mobile and would send it over on the next bus. No messing around, thoroughly pleasant and helpful, efficient and generally wonderful. And twenty minutes later I had my phone and was back at departures in plenty of time to do some last minute shopping and have a couple of swifties with herself.

Which, along with their excellent, flexible and intelligent customer service throughout our complicated holiday car arrangements, is why I'll be using Avis from now on.

It's also why I went to the UK twice this summer - and managed to leave twice in an hour!

Ramadan

I have a small wish to share for Ramadan this year. And here it is:

I wish that people will just stop a second to think that there are others around them; that each time someone in a car does something stupid, they interpose themselves into someone else's life - an unwelcome guest often carrying an unwelcome payload of injury, sadness and death.

I wish that people will remember that they're fasting - and therefore are more likely to make mistakes and so give themselves that little extra margin of care and extra time; that they think twice and err on the side of caution rather than hurting themselves and others.

I wish that people won't scream home at 180kph because they're late for iftar, driving recklessly as if their very car is a weapon, tired, hungry, thirsty and run down but yet convinced that they are immortal for some reason.

I wish that we don't all have to see as much glass on the roads of the UAE as we saw last Ramadan. And that's not meant to be self-important or smug, about whether someone is fasting or not fasting. It's a genuine wish that everyone will be safer on the roads this year.