Dubai Factotems

• Posted speed limit is 120 km/hr. Practical limit and posted limit in Abu Dhabi is 160 km/hr. That's 96 MPH for the engineers in the audience.
• If you exceed the speed limit by more than 50 km/hr, your car will be confiscated.
• The son-in-law of one of the sheikhs was killed in an accident involving a semi trying to pass another one. The result was a law banning the practice of trucks passing trucks and immediate deportation of the driver doing it. (it's nice to live in a benevolent dictatorship sometimes. Don't you wish they had that law in the US?)
• Inflation is hitting the Emirates. Housing costs have gone up 50% in the past two years. It is no longer a cheap place to live and, with the dollar weak against the pound, British expats are feeling the pinch when they are paid in dollars.
• I watched a crew putting in landscaping along the highway this morning. They had to add a layer of loam. It was delivered in man-handleable size sacks as opposed to the dump truck load. The laborers were placing it sack by sack. That's what you can do when labor is cheap.
• And is it cheap! Labor costs about $167/month for a laborer to work 6.5 days a week, 12 hours per day and share a room with 8 of his buddies. Laws are being enacted to limit habitation to 6 per room with a minimum of 2 sq meters for each man.
• There are as many tower cranes in Dubai as there are in the rest of the world. Work goes on 24/7.
• There is chart on the wall at the urinal. You use it gauge your level of dehydration based upon the color of your pee.
• Motto above entrance to the Dubai jail: "Human before Place" I have no idea what that is supposed to mean.
• The Middle East uses about 20% of the worlds supply of rebar. They expect that to increase at 9% a year until 2010.
• Its probably a good thing that we didn't let Dubai Ports take over ports in the US. I've been here about 2 weeks and just got my pass for the port and free trade zone. In the meantime, I have travelled freely in and out and the same is true for my driver. So much for security. And the nuclear carrier USS Nimitz was in port as well!
• Safety sign in fab yard: "Do you realize how important your hands are to your quality of life?" Probably more true than they realize for all those sigle status laborers packed 6 and 8 to a room.
• It's amazing how little contact you have with Arabs over here. I met at least one. He was a grizzled old taxi driver but other than that, you interface almost exclusively with Indians and Phillipinos.
• Visibility here is as bad a LA. Rarely is it above 4 miles. The sky has a continuous brown haze from the dust.
• I don't see the attraction of this place as a beach resort: It's too hot to enjoy the beach, there is no breeze unless its a hot one, there is no blue sky and no white clouds. Why bother? But I guess if you come from Scotland, you think you have found paradise.
• Swimming pools here need to have chillers or the water will be bath temperature within a few days.
• News Item: "India is to cease granting emigration clearance to women under 30 seeking employment overseas as housemaids. The move, designed to stop the trafficking of its women for prostitution, will cover 17 countries including the United Arab Emirates." Now I know why the cleaning staff in the hotel is all male.