A WEEK IN ABU DHABI

I flew here to Abu Dhabi on the 10th of May, for a course arranged by my company. I was looking forward to see the culture and lifestyle of the people around here, not so much interested in the course actually. In the end, it turned out that this course is probably one of the most interesting courses I have ever attended.

Let's not go through all the details of this course, or it will take a few weeks to complete this article.

It was 42 degree the day I arrived. Yeap, hot as hell. It seemed like a bad sign, why on earth did I signed up for this course here. On the brighter side, I felt that I am lucky to be borned in such a nice country (I used to curse Malaysia has such a hot and crazy atmosphere). Nevertheless, the hot temperature here is the only bad thing about this place I guess.

This picture was taken on the Marina Island. The other side is the Abu Dhabi city.

Abu Dhabi is an extremely safe place to stay. One of the taxi driver I met here said that this town has an approximate population of 4 million people, more than three quarter of them are Indians, Philippins, Indonesians and some from Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Only about eight hundred thousands are the local citizens. Imagine all the shops are all occupied with these immigrants, even the taxi drivers and megastores casual labors. Infact, you will see one original Arabian after seeing ten to fifteen immigrants as you walk down the pedestrian walkway.

They must really making good fortune in this country, as I heard that the cheapest house rent is about 3000AED (multiply with 0.85 to get into Malaysian Ringgit) a month, and the cheapest hotel is about 600AED per night stay. Even with this extremely high pays they have to afford monthly, you can still see them around texting with Nokia N91 or Sony Ericsson w960i, with iPods earbud inside their ears.

A friend of mine, a Brazilian, went to Dubai on the last weekend (it takes about two hours to get there by taxi). He came back with an explosive story that the cost of a can of Coke costed him 22AED, and he had lunch there with three of his friends at about 600AED. Another friend of mine suggested that we should go to Dubai and have a look around at the Burj Al Arab, the 7 stars hotel where you can find a hotel room that costs you a mere 50000AED a night. Luckily I thought that it wasn't a good idea to go Dubai on the weekend as time is a major factor which stops us from having a nice sightseeing around the westernized-urban Dubai. If I agree with him, I will have to pay about 200AED just to get into the lobby and look around.

Back to Abu Dhabi.

Me on the far left, with Bill and Nick.

As a whole, this big city is a nice place to take your family on a vacation trip, but make sure you come on winter, as summer here will get your skin burnt with almost 55 degree centigrade heat. But it will be better if your company or whoever gives you a full sponsorship on accomodations as the hotels and apartments here aren't easy to get, and quite pricey. For shoppaholics and tech brats, this place can be a good spend-my-money destination. Goodies here are slightly cheaper than in Malaysia, and electronic appliances can be really cheap. You can get a Sony DSC-H50 500AED cheaper than the outdated Sony DSC-H9 in Malaysia.

Marina Mall, the biggest shooping mall in Abu Dhabi. It is situated on an artificial island made up just for the mall itself, with Ikea and a watersport center around it.

Overall, everyone is most welcome to come here. It surely is a nice place to spend your quality family time.