Edifices in an illusionary world can not last long. Any discussion between the souls that weathered the turbulent recession period in Dubai recollect the horrific fall of the edifices of false pride and insensitivity with a chill in their spine. It took just a few days to see the turn around. Now, most of the projects that are completed with billions of dollars are lying vacant, waiting for any takers. Interestingly, these millions were borrowed money from foreign banks. When these foreign institutions suddenly took away all their money in a fine morning, the economy took a nose dive. The result of this reckless ‘development’ projects in Dubai was empty multi storied buildings all over the city and mentally shaken populace.
As Rajeev has been driving his car along the Sheik Zayad road, we spotted a cat lying dead right on the middle of the road. Sheik Zayad Road is the most used road in Dubai. It has 6 lanes towards each direction. Cars fly on this road- if there is any space available on the road. Almost all the big buildings stand tall on this road. The newly constructed Dubai Metro also runs parallel to this road for a good distance. This road connects Sharjah with Dubai and straight away leads to Abudhabi. As we drive past the pomp and flare of the illusionary world of Dubai, the rest of around 120 kilometers towards Abudhabi we could only see just desert all along. This reminded me of the life in Syria. The original inhabitants of this area live in makeshift huts elsewhere in this barren land along with their sheep and camels. These people are far connected to the rich world a few kilometers away. When we look back from the car , we could hardly believe that the jungle of concrete just behind us was built in a desert. We could see the high rise buildings and the flash lights from these buildings ascending towards the blue sky. In this jungle if anything smells so strongly, it must be the smell of the sweat and blood of Indians, especially the Mallus. They shed a lot of them in the process of building a dreamland.
Back to the dead cat; Rajeev said the cat had committed suicide. He said animals have the tendency to end their lives themselves. Though I did not take his statement at face value, when I came back to my room, I searched in the internet about this phenomenon. There were scores of links in the net that suggest the self destroying tendencies in the animals. Whatever is said and heard about this, do the human beings allow the animals live till they could even think of committing suicide? Before that we end their lives after -administering extreme torture on them.
As the city of illusions was raging on, the inhabitants and the expats were just watching it with awe. Prices of apartments were skyrocketing. Houses on lease were a dream- like commodity for the working class there. Lease for a decent apartment was increasing by minutes. Scared ‘servants’ started running away from Dubai. They found solace in the nearby emirate Sharjah. Rents there were comparatively low then. So, those could not pay the lease amount through their noses had to flee to Sharjah. There were long queues of hundreds of cars on the roads that lead to Sharjah from Dubai. Everyone started living in the cheaper emirate and drive to the rich emirate for job. It used to take more than two hours to cover a distance of around 30 kilometers from Sharjah to Dubai in the morning time. Similarly in the evening the reverse flow takes equal time to reach home.
Even in the post recession period, this situation still continues. Even at 0630hrs in the morning, cars line up on the Sharjah Roads. Even though it takes more than two ours to negotiate the heavy vehicle movement, the lane discipline is maintained by Chackos, Renjiths and Rajeevs. There will be just as many vehicles in parallel as the number of lanes. They line up in queues and patiently inch forward towards their destinations. However, once we could cross Sharjah over to Dubai, congestion gets eased to a large extend. They say, no one resides in Dubai, that is why the roads are free there. Anyway, we can not declare this city a ghost city as yet!!
The FM Radios do a commendable service in keeping the expat Indians connected to their homeland. There are many Indian language radio channels there, especially in Malayalam. There are news broadcasts in every hour. People are updated with latest happenings in India through these news bulletins. There are so many RJs who can speak good Malayalam and also there are so many female and male voices that virtually vandalise this beautiful language. I used to wonder why these broadcasting agencies and TV channels depend on people like Ranjini Haridas when there is no dearth of people here who can speak reasonably good Malayalam. The old songs flowing out of the small speakers of the cars on the road take us to the land of coconut trees and the tiny piece of our own land there and then, over to the nest like hut in that land. We unknowingly succumb to a kind of nostalgia. The car may take a turn over to the parking lot of the airport. Park the car there, throw the key into it and buy a ticket on the first flight to the land of coconuts. The procession of memories may conquer us. Images of those mango trees, pristine backwaters, green canopy of paddy fields, grandmothers, ‘chiratta puttu’, ‘meen curry’ and those still rustic friends may flash past your mind. No wonder if any one is carried away by these memory invoking songs.
Though not influenced by the old songs, many expats did abandon their cars in the airport and ran away during the meltdown. Sitting on the bandwagon of ‘development’ of Dubai, all and sundry took loan and bought cars and properties. As the horror of recession started unfolding, these ‘rich’men and women found themselves gasping for oxygen. Fired by the employers, many a king became paupers overnight. Hundreds had no means for sustaining life in Dubai, forget about maintaining a car. The simplest thing they did was to park the car in the airport and flee. Unlike other gulf countries, we need not have an exit stamp to leave UAE. Exit stamping is an employer favouring instrument to keep the helpless employees on their toes.
This time my taxi driver was a Taliban supporter. He gave a sermon about the jihad in Pakistan and Afghanistan and the emptiness and fruitlessness of life on earth . The true life is there at the Heavens. For reaching the Heaven at the earliest, he said he was willing to fight against America and other non believers. According to him, all those who were killed in the bomb blasts in Karachi or Lahore or Baghdad will definitely reach Heaven. He said all his relatives and friends, back at his home village in Waziristan are Taliban activists. He showed some video clipping on his mobile phone of some local Taliban leaders dancing to the tune of some crude drum beats. Please note…. morons are also driving cabs in Dubai!
