A new life certainly started for the 'old' girl (who I would like to think isn't so 'old' yet) and I quite like it. Things have started out well here, with little to no hassle (other than my lost passport). The flight was very smooth and I have to say that if any of you come to visit me while I'm living here, you really must fly Emirates Airlines. The straight flight from LA was a life-saver and the attendants, service and quality of the plane were really un-paralleled in my experience.
So far, my accommodations for the next month are in a serviced hotel apartment. It's equivalent to a 3 star hotel (to be generous) and costs about $8,000 USD per month. Crazy. When I arrived, I was actually a bit skeptical to what company would put me up in such a place, but then I soon realized that this really wasn't a "cheap" place to stay, regardless of how it seemed. The staff, however, have really proven to be amazing and make me feel welcome each day when I come home and leave for work. So, that has helped to quell any uneasiness related to the quality of the room, etc.
Upon arriving, my kitchen had been stocked with bread, butter, crackers, cereal, grapes, Pringles……and milk and Oreos. There's just something that felt good about coming to work for a company that would stock my room with milk and Oreos.
I slept very well the first night, despite the construction and traffic noises going on outside my hotel window. I woke up at 5am to the eerie sounds of the city wide wake up call that I had read about, but completely forgotten until it had penetrated it's way into my dream where I found myself walking through a mosque. Eventually, I came out of the dream, looked around to find that I was definitely not walking and certainly not in a mosque, although I couldn't really make out where exactly I was. All I knew was that there were some odd sounds surrounding me and I was in a dark room that I couldn't discern. I was definitely not in San Diego. That I knew for sure.
The second call, which is actually the Morning Call to Prayer, happened 30 minutes later, just as I was falling back asleep. This time, not only were there Arabic sounds coming through a PA system, but I could also hear people outside my window responding to the Call to Prayer in Arabic. It was beautiful to me, even in it's being somewhat eerie. The Call sounded dark in a way, very surreal, and then the response being even more surreal. I knew right then and there that I would never sleep past 5:30 am here. So, I made the decision that the beauty of this would be my own morning Call to Prayer. For my ass. Yep. This would be my "wake up and go work your ass out" Call to Prayer. So far, I've yet to sleep past 5:30 am, but I'm not yet in a place with fitness facilities, so instead of "working out" at 5 am, I lay in bed and watch re-runs of According to Jim, which is apparently a very popular show here in Dubai. Not everything can be amazing, I suppose.
The following day after I arrived, my boss had scheduled to have lunch with me at 1:00 pm. This is the same boss that I had some questions about prior to arriving due to the fact that I had yet to have received confirmation of my flight until one week prior to leaving. Naturally, this had left me feeling very uneasy as I packed, sold and gave my life away…all without a confirmed ticket to the place I was moving my life to. So, I was somewhat "skeptical" about this man, to be honest. I had put a lot of faith in him and was anxious to see if that had been a mistake or not.
Thirty minutes prior to 1:00 (our meeting time), he texted me to say that he was going to be 30 minutes late. My skepticism went into full force at this moment. I didn't even bother responding to the text. I simply waited downstairs for him, fully expecting for a 50+ year old, short, sinister type of guy to show up, at which point I was planning to pack up my little 350 lbs of luggage and haul ass back to the US.
Instead, a tall man in his late thirties showed up, beaming smile, sincerely apologetic in saying that his 3 year old wasn't feeling well and that he had to help his wife get some things together before leaving. I love being wrong; especially when being "right" means going with cynicism and distrust.
We went to lunch and I knew right away that my initial instincts about him had been correct. He was a good man. He just had an issue with time. That's funny…I don't know anyone else like that!
I was surprised to look around the little restaurant where we ate to find that women were dressed in bikini bathing suits with cover ups, short skirts, flip flops, tans, halter tops, shoulders bare, etc. I felt like I could have easily been in San Diego, LA or San Francisco. And the food was incredible….and cheap! On average, I've found that eating out here is 20% or so less comparitavely than eating out in San Diego, so that came as a pleasant surprise.
My current mode of transport is via taxi, which is sometimes very nice and others (like yesterday) a total drag. I had waited maybe 15 minutes for a taxi, which doesn't sound like a long time, but when you're on a busy street corner in the heat of Dubai, with dust and dirt everywhere…it's a very long 15 minutes, so I was happy to see a very dirty taxi pull over to pick me up and take me across town to the Mall of Emirates (Dubai's first famous mall—it was just this weekend superceded in size by Dubai's newest world famous mall). I should first mention that I get vertigo almost every time that I'm sitting in the backseat of a car. I had previously reminded myself to get in the front seat of the taxi, but that day, for some reason I got into the back seat. Very bad idea. Let's just say that I spent the first 20 minutes at the mall with my head down on a table and an ice cold rag on my neck. Front seat taxi riding is the only way to go from here on out!
The following day was my first day of work, and I really couldn't wait to get started. After living, breathing, talking, walking, eating, sleeping...revolving everything in my life for the past couple of months around this job, I was anxious (in a good way) to see what lay ahead for me in the office. I woke up very early that morning…even prior to the first morning call. I showered and was ready to leave for the office at 6:30 am. I didn't have to be there until 8:30, so I went to the grocery store, bought a Dubai phone, had a leisurely breakfast, read about Barack in the Arabic news and walked into work 10 minutes early. I'm hoping this is an example of my organization of time in the months to come. Wouldn't that be nice.
My colleagues couldn't be more gracious. The receptionist is this cute, petite Malaysian woman named Mabel that calls me "Ms. Tiffany". It makes me feel like I'm in a spa or something, which is certainly not a bad feeling to have when walking into the office everyday. The staff consists currently of 4 CAD technicians from Pakistan and India, two lighting designers from France (one from Marseilles, one from Leon), one designer from Germany, one from Malaysia (who came here from LA), one from China (also coming from LA), one from Brazil (the model, although I have to say that he must look better in print…I didn't see "model" when I looked at him) and Ziad, the Principal from Lebanon. So…our office is certainly 'diverse'. Next month we have 6 new designers arriving from all over the world, which is very exciting.
I share an office with Ziad, the principal. I have a table that is maybe 3' x 3' with room for the monitor, a table, 1/4 of my arm and the keyboard. And I'm completely happy here. We're remodeling the office right now, so it's very cramped, there's a LOT of construction noise, the AC has been off for 3 days while they are re-working the mechanical units and I sit contently for my 10 hour day thinking how lucky I am to have found this opportunity.
What little I've seen of the City, in terms of 'touring' has been amazing. My camera, however, is packed somewhere in one of the boxes that I haven't wanted to open up and dig through yet, so I don't have any pictures to share as of yet. What I know of the future pictures that I will surely take is that they won't do the city justice. I already know that. It's enormous. Even with a small population of only 1.5 million people, the city spans a distance of approximately 30 miles or more. This is not like urban sprawl in a city like LA or San Diego, where there is a concentrated "downtown" area with suburbs surrounding, etc. The skyscrapers and towers of Dubai span this distance. It's incredible. It's quite an interesting city plan. Sheik Zayed Road is the main road of Dubai, similar to the "strip" in Vegas, only it's 10 times that (at least) in size.
I have to say that I'm really happy here so far. I feel "at home" in a way that's odd to me for having been here so few days. It's not like the way I feel "at home" in San Diego…it's just a comfort in being where I am and feeling like it's perhaps not as "foreign" and "far away" as it seems. I will certainly make the most of my time here, but already look forward to being home in my real home city again.
More to certainly come…
