A brief comment on growing up in Dubai
Recently I was speaking with close friends about Americans schools having the pledge of allegiance every morning and the national anthem played often. At which point they turned to me and said so did we.
Bar my case of apparent Alzheimer’s, as I still have no memory of this even though it happened every morning for nearly 4 years of my life, it reminded me of some of the quirks of growing up in Dubai that I would like to share.
Dubai whilst being a country full of immigrants - roughly 89% of the population is immigrants. Has a remarkably different culture to the Western World. It is very clearly a country run by Islamic law with its culture at the forefront.
On the low level Dubai used to have a different working week, the start of the week was Sunday and the last day was Thursday. Not a hugely uncommon feature of some countries in the Middle East - Although this has changed now to mirror the Western World - but something that used to confuse people when I told them. The consequence of this is, to this day Sunday is the start of the week in my brain.
However, one of the biggest things that shocks most people is Ramadan. Ramadan in Islam is the month of fasting and reflection as a commemoration of Muhammad's first revelation. In the early years of being in Dubai, you would find during Ramadan all the food courts in malls shut down and not a morsel of food to be found.
Standalone restaurants wouldn’t allow customers to eat in, or they would put up curtains to prevent people seeing in. Alongside this if you were found consuming food or water in public you were liable for a fine.
Another key cultural difference stemmed from Islam’s restrictions on pork. It was quite expensive, so as a result I very rarely had it as a child. Often if you went somewhere for breakfast instead of pork, you would be served Turkey bacon, which in my opinion as actually quite a fine substitute, that to this day I think about from time to time.
Dubai is one of those places that feels like a fever dream to explain to people. It is a city with such drive to improve and grow its place in the region that change is lightning fast. Often times leaving for a few months meant a radically different built environment and I imagine large parts of the city will be unrecognisable to me after not being there for so long.
Whilst Dubai is often remarked as a place without culture, this is a simplistic criticism - one which I myself have sometimes repeated. Dubai does have this reputation for glitz and glam with one of the largest shopping malls in the world, the tallest building in the world, and often a favourite when shared with people, an indoor ski hill (where I first learnt to ski and often went as an afterschool activity). There is a culture of flexing your wealth on other people, and certainly there is an element of soullessness.
But Dubai is one of the most strongly international cities in the world. In Dubai it was common to find people from every nationality. At my final school, an international British school, there was over 60 nationalities represented. The level of cultural diversity was strong and has played a large part in my childhood and who I am as a person. The result of which is I know people quite literally spread across the globe in almost every industry imaginable.
Whilst living there food from every culture was available at the drop of the hat and cultural practices from every part of the globe are celebrated. Yet on the local Emirati culture, Dubai is still strong.
This cultural identity is preserved in Old Dubai with the gold souks and spice souks still present and thriving. Alongside this the Emirate is certainly trying to grow and preserve its own culture through Dubai Museum, which is in Al Fahidi Fort, one of the oldest buildings in the city built in 1787. Islamic culture is still prioritised with elaborate mosques' built to celebrate their religion and islamic architecture permeating the design culture there. In the neighbouring Emirate, Abu Dhabi, there is also further efforts to sustain an arts and culture scene with the Louvre open in 2017 and the planned Guggenheim in 2025. The arts scene is small but is certainly growing.
I often get asked if I would recommend going there for a holiday and it’s one of those difficult questions as some people are extremely averse to the place due to political values.
However, I certainly think it is somewhere everyone should at least visit once. But whilst they are there try to deviate from the stereotypical path of staying only at fancy hotels and spending all their time in shopping malls. There is certainly a great life to be lived there with rich culture from every part of the globe you just have to look for it.