While there was a long line at immigration, it actually moved pretty swiftly. I don’t know what happened with the visa requirement — I thought I had to pay for one when I landed but maybe that’s in Oman.
I stopped by an ATM to get some AED currency, partly to always have some for incidentals and partly as I need to reimburse Reda for all the tours she helped precook for me!
Even the ATM was welcoming me to the marathon weekend!
Once outside it was super easy to find my prebooked cab to the hotel. I’m so embarrassed to say I didn’t understand my driver’s name when he told me and instead of asking again I played the “heeeeeeeeeey, you!” card. But he’s on shift until 5 am, moved here from Pakistan three years ago and was surprisingly self conscious about his terrific English skills. I told him his English was light years better than my Arabic or Urdu.
When we first walked to the car he asked if I needed a cigarette break which was clearly a thing in Dubai. It was like walking through an ashtray. But despite my usual “when in Rome… or whatever place I’m in… do as the locals do” philosophy, I draw the line at tobacco. No worries, as his second offer was to take me to a convenience store for water, juices, food. I grabbed a bottle of water and a Coca Cola Light… and then he wouldn’t let me pay for it. It was 5 dirham or roughly $1.35 but still — what a nice thing to do.
I kept butchering the Arabic word for thanks. It’s “shokran”and yet I just couldn’t get it. I’m trying though. I told him I had scribbled down some basic Arabic words and of course left that paper at home. But I said the one I wanted to make sure I knew was “thank you” as I feel like when traveling and even when just at home, it’s ALWAYS important to say thank you to people. It takes two seconds to be polite and nice and that’s time well spent.
At 2:45 AM there wasn’t a lot of traffic… I don’t know if it was entirely Emily Post but I asked him if I could snap a selfie with him to let people know how nice everybody is in Dubai. I look a little worse for travel wear but here ya go:
Check in was easy enough at my hotel and I sent a message to Reda with my room number so she can call me at a more reasonable hour and we can meet up tomorrow… er, later today I guess.
The jet lag is tough though. Despite the rigors of travel and the notion that in 26.5 hours I’ll be running the Dubai Marathon, and that there’s sightseeing afoot soon, I can’t seem to sleep. Maybe not despite the aforementioned… maybe it’s BECAUSE of the aforementioned.
