Dubai – September 2022

After almost three years of quarantine and confinement, I finally broke my self-imposed restrictions on international travel.
I was celebrating a milestone birthday and was determined to treat myself to my number one self-care hobby: traveling. Further, creating memories to smile at when sitting on the porch thirty years down the road, warming up in the sun, seems to be taking on new urgency.
This Golden Girl was bent on having a great time! And since the Universe continually collaborates with our deepest wishes and desires, my cousin mentioned an upcoming trip to Dubai, Turkey, and Greece in late summer. I did not think about it twice.
And so, on September 3rd, I boarded a plane at JFK with Dubai as my first destination. I arrived late at night on September 4th after a layover in Istanbul. The desert heat hit as soon as I exited the airport gates, never to abate.
Dubai was interesting. In many ways. And a different experience.
As one of my cousins later remarked, Dubai is the capital of bling, eccentricity, and the superlative. It is easy to be overwhelmed.
My visit to the United Arab Emirates had a different feel than my previous travel journeys and ignited a further curiosity than I usually experienced from my travels abroad. This time my impressions and interest were not about the local culture but more about Dubai’s built-up environment. I wanted to know more about the science and technology that were used to turn this fishermen’s village into one of the world’s most advanced and extravagant urban centers. I wanted to learn about the City’s bowels and the technologies they use to keep it hospitable to so many. I wanted to hear about Dubai’s desalinization plant, its wastewater and sewage treatment plants, and how its constructors and techies collect the sun’s energy to power this sprawling modern City and maintain a ski resort in desert-like temperatures. I wanted to learn the mechanics of the City, in short, its nuts and bolts.
To the nerd that I am, the City’s interest mainly lies in its creation and the vision that gave birth to it. An idea backed by the financial means to transform a country of one million citizens into a center of employment for nine million immigrants or migrants, for a total population of ten million.
To that effect, visiting Dubai is an unforgettable experience. Every building reflects the works of world-renowned architects and a work of art. Their beauty and architectural lines grace a unique and ever-developing urban skyline.
The elliptical Museum of the Future is the most fascinating, allowing a glimpse into humanity’s future. Located along the public transportation mainline, the Museum of the Future transports its visitors to a world where the use of Digital Technology, Artificial Intelligence, and Augmented Reality illustrate the future possibilities for a better world. The museum, which opened in February 2022, and spans over 30 000 sq m or approximately 323,000 sq ft, is stunning and worth a visit.
While visiting the museum, I had the opportunity to design my own perfume. An algorithmic machine mixes different aromatic essences to create scents tailored to your personality. You must first answer a series of questions reminiscing of a personality test, and the device comes up with a combination of essences into scents that align with who you are. You leave with three different samples that you can reorder later. I guess it is the future of the perfume industry. We are each capable of being the next Coco.

Another tour of the City led to the world’s only official seven-star hotel, where luxury is given the seven-star treatment. A stay in one of the suites of the Burj Al Arab Dubai comes with your personal choice of linen, drapes, and towels monogrammed with your initials in the color and texture of your choice. Upon demand, the suites are decorated according to your taste for the duration of your stay. The goal, I suppose, is to make you feel at home. Guarded under high security, you can only take pictures at its gates and later claim that you stood on the sidewalks leading to the world’s most prestigious seven-star hotel.
Next, we had a tour of Palm Island, the manufactured island built in the Gulf of Arabia and home to the rich and famous.
A visit to the Souk or the bazaar is a must, of course, where every purchase follows hard bargaining and negotiations that feel like a joust and can leave one exhausted.
Overall, we spent four full days in Dubai and its environs, including a visit to Abu Dhabi. After a safari excursion, we squeezed in dinner in the desert and had enough time to tour the Museum of Islamic Civilization in Sharjah. Soon, it was time to continue to Istanbul, the City straddling Europe and Asia and from where the Ottoman Empire spread its influence to reach Eastern Europe and part of the Middle East.