BACK IN DUBAI.

a draft

F i c t i o n a l i z e d.

THE BRUNCH

No shopping for a Porsche. Daniel thinks he knows me and he has postponed that project. Instead he arranges for a large gathering in my honor and that of his relatives visiting from Indiana. He doesn’t know me: I’d rather be shopping for the Porsche.

We report to a “five-star” hotel which is not related in any way to the Sun City Hotel in Muscat, a city where scrumptious South Indian meals go for $1.20. Here, the array of food is endless, and most of it is covered with so much oil, which makes it shine. Daniel understands my warnings about the fattening food and says his guests would never understand inviting them to a South Indian restaurant where he would be paying $1.20 per person. Here, he’s paying about $100 per person.

We’re the first to arrive at the “five-star” hotel, about ten minutes early. I refuse to wait at the table for the late guests. Instead I entertain myself trying out the fattening food. Daniel is at a loss on how to make me wait for the others. He likely thinks this is an American cultural trait where we don’t wait for late guests. I feel as if I’m stuck on one of these cruises, not wanting to take the trip, so food becomes the outlet for my frustration.

I’m amazed at the multi-ethnic and varied national background of the staff. I ask Daniel. Just as I was recruited, they were. Recruitment agencies scan the world over for staff. There are Indians (always), South Koreans, Arabs, Turks . . .

THE GUESTS ARRIVE, OVER AN HOUR LATE.

Okay, the guests are here, the expatriates and the Indiana ones. They don’t wait: they engage me in a “conversation” about politics. Daniel must’ve told them about this newsletter. (Daniel thinks I’m the best political advisor/analyst in the world; I’m flattered. Every time I talk, he tries to contradict me, then he snaps his head sideways in a sudden awakening as if to say “I didn’t know this is the way to think about this subject.” I’m flattered, especially when appreciated by such a right wing person.) I never learn that I should shut up in encounters with reactionary strangers. Why? Because the rich expatriates ask me about my views as a ruse to tell me theirs. Not that I don’t gain insight from theirs; in the end, I do. It’s only irritating while the encounter is taking place.

The rich expatriates are all staunch supporters of the US occupation of Iraq. And none thinks the harmful idiots made any mistakes, either in the decision to invade (my view always, and all that happened after was more or less a natural outgrowth), or while occupying (the view of the harmful idiots and the Jewish Right and its liberals who think not disbanding the army was a choice.) The rich expatriates believe that all that happened in Iraq and that which continues to happen, even mistakes, was and is planned. Planned; all planned. The Pentagon and the White House plan their own mistakes, so to speak. Very frustrating to rebut views of this kind.

James Harper later tells me he has the same problem with his students. That many of these feel similarly and he’s given up on trying to convince them that the Pentagon does make mistakes, as does the White House. That to teach them foreign policy and public policy is eminently difficult when they start with such stubborn illusions.

I’m under attack. The rich reactionaries are all over me. At some time I think about putting on the Russell Snowe hat. Russell was a late colleague, a lawyer, who I had always deemed to be the best propagandist around. And I’ve used his methods socially to great success. I’ve even used them to create a buzz about this newsletter, with some regret, as now I have to have a Big Brother escort when I leave the country and one when I return. I think about telling them that if the US -- which makes only planned mistakes -- wages war on Iran, that they can kiss their multi-million dollar real estate and their hefty jobs goodbye. That real estate prices should evaporate and their plum jobs should disappear. That the Pentagon owes them no obligation since most of them aren’t taxpayers, anyway. But I hold myself back since I don’t want to influence their investment decisions and their life styles in any way.

“THE US HAS EVERY RIGHT TO GRAB IRAQI OIL.”

One of them gives me a lecture saying as follows: the US should be allowed to take over Iraqi oil because the US provides the world with discoveries in medicine and technology and therefore the world owes it the oil from Iraq. That view sounds eminently okay, but for the fact that the Iraqis and US taxpayers (moi) should be making that decision, not rich reactionary expatriates who pay no taxes. (Someone ought to hire me to tax these people.) Besides, it’s difficult to explain -- and wasteful of energy , anyway -- that there are those amongst us who want our government to govern our country as a public policy project, to the extent politics allow it, not as a plantation. And to use politics to set a long-term agenda. To tax gasoline consumption and fund research and development in alternative and new sources of energy -- not the shameful project of ethanol-izing corn and other food staples. That this plantation government misjudges us Americans when it thinks that we forever want a so called “expansion,” tax breaks, and the life of a spending spree. That we’re tired of caffeine-ating ourselves pursuing cheap printed money so that we can catch up with inflation (an acute reality).

THE ALLEGED 800 FOLLOWING OF THE PRESIDENT – THE “'HASHIYA.”

One of the expatriates tells me he knows something I don’t. I don’t want to hear what he knows and I try to escape to fatten myself. What is it? He wants me to ask; but I don’t. “Listen,” he says anyway, “Bush on his last visit to Saudi Arabia had around 800 people with him. What do you think they’re here for?” He answers himself: It’s to assure the Saudis that the US will be staying in Iraq. Come what may.

Oh, the frustration I feel. I don’t say anything. First, I don’t know that Mr. Bush had 800 or 80 people with him. I hadn’t kept up with the press during his visit. Second, he hardly needs 800 people to communicate commitment to stay in Iraq. Third, he doesn’t control what will happen after he leaves; that -- even if the coalition of right wing Christians and Jews re-takes the White house ; that there’s no assurance that the public and the economy will allow them a free hand. Fourth, Iraqi politics can take so many turns, and some major turns might prove anti-American. Fifth, the new people at the White House, who would not be as oil-and-Saudi-minded as Cheney and Bush, might mandate that Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf countries cough up hefty amounts of their new-found wealth to pay for US military presence in the Gulf. Finally, viewing Mr. Bush’s tendency to reward allegiance before competence -- the “I’m-running-a-plantation” mind set -- he could have brought these along to plug them in finance and oil jobs associated with the Kingdom after they all leave office, and he does too. (In Arabic the alleged 800 are called 'hashiya. Going out on a translation limb, 'hashiya comes from the verb 'hasha, to stuff. ) The President likely is “stuffing” them into lucrative jobs and with Saudi money -- he’s transferring his 'hashiya/following to the Saudis, so to speak.

I bet they didn’t come in economy class, I tell the expatriate. Of course not, he says. Engineering a run on the dollar means among other things flying business and first class, I think to myself.

What I think to myself more than anything is the probability that somewhere in the US government bureaucracy there’s a memo about the need to supplement the Federal Reserve’s effort to engineer a run on the dollar by spending hundreds of billions of dollars on something. That instead of spending the money on a universal health plan, or a pilot project for such -- that this oil-and-Christian Zionism coalition administration chose instead to spend it on the invasion and occupation of Iraq. It didn’t think it’ll cost trillions; but it has; all the better. All of which was meant to diminish the value of U.S. currency to jumpstart a so-called economic expansion. Yet another expansion! Bubble-to-bubble-to-bubble.


(I’ve already written a while ago that the engineered run on the dollar will cause tension between Europe and the US since devaluing the dollar will hardly hurt China, the alleged target, but will Europe. There are signs that this is beginning to happen.)


NOWHERE TO GO.

Once the weekend passes I have nowhere to go. Here I have a few days left, but I don’t want to be in Dubai. Besides, the tax base is calling me to get on the treadmill and process printed dollars. I log on to see whether I can return early. Unlikely. I conclude that I should’ve bought my ticket directly from Delta and not have gone through Orbitz. That, it seems, could’ve given me a window for changing it with an acceptable penalty.

On my first morning with nowhere to go, I wake up early and walk outside. It turns out that mornings in Dubai in April aren’t bad – even nice. But you need to wake up before the sun rises. The earlier the better. I walk about among the villas and am fascinated by the multiplicity and richness of the flowering trees around these, all watered by desalination. One of the most arid deserts in the world can be made to bloom!

I see tourist buses hauling construction workers all about, and I see these getting off these buses and dragging their feet along to the sites. Orange is the color of choice for their overalls. On one construction site near Daniel’s house, a few construction workers have built their own open air shack and are sleeping so peacefully on foam mattresses inside. Strangely, there’s beauty to the sight. The laborers look peaceful and content. The outdoors’ shack beats the alternative. The poorer expatriates live in congested quarters. The police arrests an Indian man for murdering his roommate. The article in the paper reveals that the two roommates live with fourteen others in one room. Sixteen to one room. These laborers save any money they can to send back home. Though Lebanon and all Arab countries have a decently tight social structure, I think that in such places as India, Pakistan and the Philippines the social structure is way tighter. To program men and women to give their lives away to help their families back home makes me feel that we have more in common with ants and bees than with apes. An Indian man helps his mother board the bus to Dubai. He kisses her hand and lowers his forehead to have it touch her hand and kisses it again. Talking about tight social structures!

In contrast, Daniel’s wife complains that the children don’t even respond to her emails and her calls. Nothing accounts for this impoliteness, she comments. I tell her that her children have grown up in that cargo cult in Lebanon which dogs the West, the same cult which is horrified of any sign that reminds it that it is of the East. She doesn’t want to hear any of it. She herself is of that cargo cult and had encouraged her children to apply for membership. She may not have been wrong. The older son is finishing an MBA in a Scandinavian country. The state there is generous with him and other students. It gives him $30,000 to start a small company as part of a program meant to encourage students to take the initiative in starting small businesses. It also keeps showering him with prizes, such as computers and other like gadgets. Abdallah, an American friend from the Sudan, rushes over to Sweden to be with his sister who’s dying of terminal cancer. He returns with so much praise about the Swedish health care system. They never left my sister alone and did a wonderful job managing her pain. What a civilized country, he keeps on repeating for months after he had returned.


“EAT AND DRINK”

And so, while walking about aimlessly I reach an area which features two supermarkets, a drugstore, other businesses and ...”Kol Washrab” -- a restaurant called “Eat and Drink.” Though the name is Arabic, the food and the staff -- it’s all Indian.

What a discovery. I now have a “where” to go!

I’ll preface my description of Eat and Drink by saying that in the few days that I all-but-resided there, I saw a woman eating at the restaurant only once. And I saw two Emiratis. So, in essence, it’s an Indian men’s place.

My routine for the few days: Wake up early; walk to Eat and Drink (10 minutes); have breakfast and lots of tea; walk back; swim and sun bathe; walk back to Eat and Drink; have lunch and lots of tea; walk back; swim and sunbathe; walk back to Eat and Drink; have dinner; walk back ; shower up; wait for Arab guests of Daniel’s to arrive for dinner two hours late. Eat again, reluctantly. Focus on tabbouleh to which Daniel’s wife adds fresh and sour pomegranate seeds. Delicious. Try it.

I slip and fall by the pool, and twist my knee. The pain is excruciating. I sleep it off on the lawn. I can walk afterwards but the knee is quite swollen. Now it has water in it, I suspect. In D.C. I’m still trying to find a physician to drain it. I call a Lebanese physician who once had attended to my sister. He calls me “habibi” (my dearest or, more precisely, my love ! ) 4-6 times in a conversation that lasts less than one minute. He recommends his neighbor and another physician. I’d have to wait until Monday to see if one of them will see me. But I have a busy week. I called the Lebanese physician because I had gone to Georgetown and they had given me consent forms to fill out and circulate to all physicians I’ve seen throughout my life in D.C.; that’s the only way the Georgetown specialist would see me. Once your records arrive, we’ll call you. Ha! That’s why I called the Lebanese physician. I’m trying to speed up things here. But it doesn’t look good. The Lebanese physician I called didn’t have time to talk. I may have to drive to Cleveland to have a couple of friends drain the damn knee.

Eat and Drink serves hundreds of people. It’s part of a network of restaurants by the same name. The kitchen always has four men working the various parts of the cooking operation. Large containers, always cooking, feature all sorts curried mixes and sauces. Humongous aluminum water heaters are always boiling and their water is used for the likely hundreds of tea the restaurant serves. The inside can seat about 20-25 people. Customers take seats all over, even at tables which already are occupied but not in full. So you can be eating with total strangers. As you walk in, the cashier is to your right; the seating area to your left. A fridge features soda and bottled water. If you continue on you’ll run smack into a window to the kitchen from where food is pushed out. Facing that window, you’ll find to your left two faucets. Customers wash their hands before a meal. No napkins are provided to dry up the hands. But, if you’re in the know, as I become, you head to the cashier. There, you’ll find sandwich wrapping paper which you can use to dry up your hands. Ditto for afer the meal. Be mindful that Indians (it seems) eat their food with the fingers of their right hand. They mix the rice with the curry sauce and mix again and again before taking it into their mouth.

Outside, abutting an alley, there are three tables and their chairs. At noon the tables and the chairs become full of take-away lunches in plastic shopping bags. It turns out that a seemingly large number of the construction workers I spot in the morning, being hauled in by humongous tourist buses, likely have their lunch prepared by Eat and Drink. A couple of men in orange overalls pick up the tens and tens of lunch bags.

Eat and Drink, too, serves tens of drivers. These come second in numbers after the construction workers. The drivers all wear neckties. The shirts vary, mostly striped, though the most striking being the white shirts with red epaulettes. The men wearing these also wear a red tie.

Municipality of Dubai workers are third in numbers. Their baseball-like hats feature that municipality’s name in Arabic, under which is the English acronym: D.M. (Likely for Dubai Municipality.)

Then there’s the scruffy white cat, which sits under the tables outside. A couple of times I find it next to my feet. No one bothers it. And it bothers no one.

Eat and Drink’s food is to kill for, all at less than two dollars per meal. But at noon, for lunch, they don’t have vegetarian.

Though it has waiters, Eat and Drink’s system of service is haphazard. Amazing for a place that serves hundreds of meals a day. I never know where to order: I use the waiter, the cashier, go straight to the window, the one inside or the one outside. Haphazard though the service is, communication must be near perfect since I always get my food fast and I always seem to pay for exactly what I got.

Women pass by: Western, Asian . . . But the men never even notice. A stark contrast from Mediterranean countries. Reproduction in India must be so well calibrated that there’s no need to hunt on one’s own. Or maybe because it’s the UAE. I don't know.


D.C. JAMES

I have two cousins in Dubai. I don’t know either one of them. I try to retrieve their emails using search engines and other sites, and I dispatch notes to the addresses I retrieve. To no use. My fault. Lack of organization, I send my sister an email asking for their email addresses or phone numbers. She doesn’t answer. Busy as usual. Such a a great member of the tax base.

I email James Harper and get a reply right away. Welcome to the UAE. You’re coming to stay with us in Abu Dhabi. I talk to him by telephone. I explain that I had fallen by the pool and hurt my knee quite bad. That it’s better if I stay where I am. We agree on a time when they’d come over. Daniel wishes they’d come over late so he can meet them. They have two young ones, four and two. Difficult to do. But we’ll try.

James and his wife and the two children arrive at a time when no one is home. Daniel’s wife is with the maid, shopping for the maid’s trip back home. James is dying for conversation. I never made good friends here, he says. His wife agrees. The two girls are gorgeous. James is accepting that his German wife teach them German. He says something funny happens. When the two girls are seated at a breakfast table in the morning, and James is in the kitchen without the mother, the two girls speak English to each other. When their mother is in the kitchen, the two girls converse in German.

Daniel’s wife is back; we have coffee together then head out for some walking by the Dubai Creek and for dinner. The younger child delays us and James tells me he calls her “Bottleneck,” for the tactic she has of delaying any departure. I call the older one “Scout.” She’s like me; she ventures away to discover. Very independent. Overall, however, I can see that in the US the couple will find it more difficult financially to pay for the children. Unlike in the UAE where they can have a maid relatively cheap -- James brings in one, not live-in, nearly daily, at $4 per hour -- in the US he’ll have to check immigration rules. I doubt that he’ll be able to obtain help cheaply, though I do see a lot of foreign nannies in my neighborhood. (But property in my neighborhood is owned -- versus rentals -- by people with trust accounts, with Porsches and BMWs in the driveways. James doesn't have that.) If you have children at a late age, as James, you really need help, including a maid. I can see it based on the few hours we spent together. That’s how Daniel, though young when he got married, raised his children in Lebanon -- with the assistance of a live-in maid from Sri Lanka. I limp throughout the hours we’re together.

James has ambitious plans for these few hours. But Bottleneck and Scout stand in the way. We are able to converse only thanks to their mother who would retrieve them away. She’s not doing well; she’s recuperating from a surgery. And it’s very hot.

We return fairly late and Daniel insists that the Harper family come in. The mother offers an alternative: she’ll stay with the girls and attend to their needs, including bathroom and water, while James and Daniel can talk. You can tell that Daniel wants to be a good host but the lateness of the visit and the little girls stand in the way. Daniel and James exchange phone numbers and email addresses and promise to visit with each other. They’re more specific: Daniel is heading to Abu Dhabi on a specific date. Both agree to get together then.


When James leaves I feel emptiness. His departure announces mine; I'll be leaving a childhood friend and the sun I cherish. Soon, I’ll be back on the plane. In retrospect, my only regret: I should’ve seen a doctor in Dubai and not waited to go through the morass of assembling my own medical record.

FLASHBACK: THE HARMFUL IDIOTS AND SAUDI ARABIA IN PLANTATION LEBANON.

For input/insight on Plantation Lebanon and the ongoing events, please refer to the Sunday, March 9, 2008 post, in this blog/newsletter:

“Saudi Arabia’s Bind and the Limit of Things: the Harmful Idiots in Plantation Lebanon.”

THE CURE: MUSCAT, OMAN.

rough draft – first-and-a-half

f i c t i o n a l i z e d

The bus ride between Dubai and Muscat, Oman, takes less than six hours, including the stops at the border. It costs $24 one way. There’s more than one company with buses between the two cities. My choice is haphazard. I use “al-Khanjari.” Our bus breaks down before we leave Dubai. Lucky. We change buses.

The Indian movie is eminently annoying noise.

The distance between Dubai and Muscat shows you enough of the desert. Comes a time when you stop seeing the occasional shrub or dried up tree, and you see actual sand dunes. But overall, there are towns sprinkled all about.

I can’t get over the fact that Dubai and Muscat are watered by desalination. Part of why I find it incredulous is that in neither city do I have to limit my use of water. I would love to see the desalination operation. Daniel explains it thus: you sell a barrel of oil for $115; you power the desalination plant at $15 per barrel; you sell the water for ther equivalent of $25 a barrel; you’re ahead.

SUN CITY HOTEL

The bus’s final stop is Ruwi, a suburb/section of Muscat. Before I do anything, I need a tea. I enter one of many coffee shops and ask for tea, instructing the owner not to put in the standard condensed milk, and only half a teaspoon of sugar. Lipton does brisk business in the UAE and Oman. Tea is offered as would a large espresso, with not much water, and a lot of sugar and condensed milk. It costs about 30 cents.

Now that I’ve had my tea I turn to lodging. I stop a young man in his national Omani jellaba and head gear -- all wear that -- and ask him to recommend a hotel. Here’s one he says, right near us, which I hadn’t seen. It turns out that the coffee shop where I sat is part of the Sun City Hotel. The young man says that I should check it out and if I don’t like it, that he’d be glad to drive me to another hotel.

I like it. Recently renovated. The room is huge and the bathroom is too. My room sits right atop the coffee shop. It smells of tobacco, mildly. On that observation the attendant fires up the AC. I open the window and shout “shukran” (thank you) to the young man. He smiles and drives off in his Toyota -- the most popular brand of cars in Muscat.

The room costs 20 riyals per night -- about $76.00. Later I discover that the floor’s common kitchen is so badly kept up that cockroaches fill it. I spot them in so many places in that kitchen. Never in the room. What a waste: after the fancy renovation, to fail at cleaning well the common kitchen! Daniel’s maid is the best cleaning person I know. That kitchen of hers is spotless. Daniel’s wife chastises me to stop feeling guilty and have the maid make my tea or clean after me after I do. “She’s rich in Sri Lanka, you know,” she says; “she’s built a house and now rents it; and she’s asking for a steep raise. We have no choice but to give it to her. She’s been with us from Lebanon.” I sort of accept the instructions. Before I leave I give the maid a gift of $100 to spend I say on her upcoming return home after six years away. Daniel’s wife goes with her to help her shop for gifts for her trip back. She's worried about her not returning.

I have to admit: It’s so nice to have a live-in maid. Everything is always clean and you see no clutter whatsoever.

THE MAN FROM KERALA

A man from Kerala, India, runs the coffee shop. People from Kerala run so many things in Muscat -- and a lot in the UAE, too. The Kerala man isn’t a natural at owning a business. His temper is short. I never see him smile. I think likely he should’ve been a professor, but is stuck at the coffee shop. I’m not being facetious. His brother or cousin helps him out in the evening. He’s handsome and more patient and pleasant.

The hotel and the coffee shop tower over bus stops that take you to many towns and places in Oman, and to Dubai. In the morning, the sun hits the Kerala man’s coffee shop and most people use the coffee shop across from it, where there’s plenty of shade. In the afternoon, the roles reverse: the sun shines on the opposite shop, and most customers use the Kerala man’s coffee shop. The Kerala man can add a few parasols, which would bring in some business in the morning. But he isn’t interested. He’d rather teach at university.

I spot quite a lot of dissatisfaction among taxi drivers, bus drivers, and coffee shop managers in Muscat. Remember: Oman isn’t as rich as other Gulf countries. I query about the bus drivers. An Omani tells me that they make 200 Riyals per month (@ $750) driving 6 or 7 days per week (he isn’t sure) between Dubai and Muscat – that’s at least 11 hours per day. Now I know why the bus driver coming from Dubai, though courteous, was nonetheless uninterested in helping out. I tried to ask him some questions and he puffed. On the way back to Dubai, the driver is hell bent on not even having a drink of water. He seems mad, but the Omani way: gently. And he’s a good and careful driver. In Mexico, I’ve taken buses where the drivers were outrightly reckless. And they’re even worse in Jordan, Syria, and Lebanon, In one ride between Playa del Carmen and Merida, in the Yucatan, not for a moment was the driver not engaged in programming his cell phone or conversing sideways. I’m still alive to write about it.

I suspect that the coffee shop “owner,” the man from Kerala, ends up coughing up a lot of his profit to the mandatory Omani co-signer on his shop. His silent partner who does not work. Hence likely the dissatisfied disposition. His cousin’s good looks make up for the relative economic disadvantage of an Indian expatriate running away from relative poverty at home, and maybe that’s why he has a better disposition. Looks go a long way in making for better disposition, I think. I recall an incident where a Syrian soldier manning a checkpoint in Bhamdoun, Lebanon, punishes my cousin for taking the “military route” by stopping us and having us wait, forever. Another soldier comes out from a building nearby. I swear he is James Dean incarnate, he’s so handsome. I seek his attention and talk to him. I tell him about his colleague, about the punishment. Throughout the conversation, he holds on to my arm. After he hears me out, he tells us to leave. I remind him that his colleague has an AK 47. Not to worry. Paul, my cousin, takes off. Then Paul tells me to look back. I do: the James Dean look-alike is having a shoving match with the ugly soldier.

Another time, I’m heading to my father’s hometown in the Bekaa valley. The Israelis had just bombed a Syrian radar at Dahr al-Baidar in Lebanon. The Syrian intelligence service man who checks me out asks me what I do for a living. I say I’m a lawyer, without specifying that I’m an American lawyer. I show him what they call Ikhraj Ayd -- a document from the hometown mayor with a photo in it attesting to origin. It’s as good as any identification. He looks at it and claims he knows my father’s hometown from where the Ikhraj Ayd was issued. He doesn’t and I say to him with venom in my voice that his outfit should teach him some geography before sending him over to occupy a country. He smiles. He’s a handsome guy which, according to my theory, makes for a good disposition, generally. Okay, go, he says. I leave not thanking him. On the way back, there’s a lengthy queue of cars waiting at the Syrian intelligence checkpoint. But the handsome intelligence guy sees me from afar. He waves me over and I pass the lengthy queue. “Go Istaz (counsel).” I smile at him.

THE MOROCCANS

Dissatisfaction in Muscat makes for some entertainment. On my first day I meet a bunch of Moroccan expatriates who gather regularly in the Kerala man’s coffee shop, every late afternoon. These men become my guides about Muscat; I follow their instructions on what to see and do. They don’t like the man from Kerala , and he hates their guts. That’s how it looks at the surface. The same encounter between Morocco and Kerala repeats itself daily: They arrive; they take over a table outside after they say hello to me; they shout for tea, soda, and bottled water. The Kerala man refuses to budge. They scream and make a scene; he screams back from inside his shop.

Simple: he resents their bossy attitude and their disrespect of his policy of not waiting on tables. They’re to come in and pay for their orders and take them outside to their table. It’s not worth his while to wait on tables. The sad and funny part is that they seem to enjoy irritating him, and accuse him (to me) of being an awful coffee shop owner. He doesn’t care. He looks at me and looks at them, and then back at me and makes an attempt at snickering (He's incapable of that), with a dismissive wave of his hand. “These assholes,” he seems to be saying, “who do they think they are?”

The Moroccans always return to the Kerala man’s coffee shop to repeat the same act.

MATTRAH (“A PLACE”)

I go to many parts of Muscat, and on one long distance trip to Nizwa. I will not waste your time. I only liked Mattrah and its port and Corniche. (The Corniche could actually be located in the city of Muscat itself, not in Mattrah; I never bother to find out. I reach it via Mattrah.)

At high tide, the mini-port of Mattrah becomes a virtual aquarium. I can’t begin to describe the schools of fish that parade by as you watch. I wouldn't know how since I'm not familiar with marine biology. But the place should be protected, I know that much. All colors, all sizes. And I see my fair share of sea turtles. It’s a true feast to the eyes.

At low tide, the place is disappointing. As water retreats, you can see the ground at the edge, and on that ground you see garbage strewn all about. One day, children swimming at low tide take Styrofoam with them and shred it to no end in the water. The place fills up with white Styrofoam , which a mild current moves in unison to one end of the port. Local fish swim below it, including a weird-looking obese fish which feeds off under water rocks. Many times I spot people disposing of garbage to the ground or into the bay.

THE PROUD GERMAN MAN

A man passes me by in a hurry. We say hello to each other. Then he returns. He apologizes for rushing away. I say it’s okay, that I understand that he wanted to take the photo of a yacht as it was leaving the mini-port. It’s not a yacht, he corrects me; It’s a super yacht. He mentions the German company which manufactured it. With sincerity I ask whether he works for that company. No, no, he says, impatiently. It seems he’s proud of the German product, period. Suddenly I feel so bad about not being proud of the seating on the Bowing 777. I don’t share this with the German man. He might accuse me of treason.

The German man returns to his wife to explain away about the yacht – I mean: super yacht.

The one thing about traveling: you’re thankful you didn’t get married young and had stayed with the same woman. I know it sounds awful. But the man looks young and his wife looks like she can be his mother. I prefer my mother’s hometown’s paradigm of marriage: marry young, children, children move to Beirut or immigrate to Oklahoma, mother follows them, father stays in the hometown and remains drunk on arak with his buddies, until death. That scene -- the one where I don’t regret being unmarried -- repeats itself often on this trip. It could be my age. Not that I don’t miss women when traveling solo. I do. Once it had been the most important reason why I traveled each summer to Cyprus -- for the Swedish women. Once, in Mexico, after traveling inside the Maya country for days, and not seeing but Maya women, on returning to Cancun, I run in downtown Cancun on spotting from a distance a non-Mayan woman, just to see her. She has a waist, a defined waist. And I’m awed and speechless. At last: a defined waist. I’ve always had a weakness for women with a defined waist.


BACK IN TIME

Food in Muscat is to kill for, as it is in Dubai. South Indian cuisine, which many tell me is better than that found in India itself. I discover a place in Mattrah which makes amazing paratta. But these are decent all over, including at the coffee shop under my room, the Kerala man’s shop. The South Indian food is so cheap, to boot.

In Mattrah, too, I want to avoid returning to the taxi stand using the souk; I’m getting tired of the solicitations. By taking all sorts of cuts, I get lost. And, what a place to get lost. I come out in a neighborhood which, but of the presence of a couple of cars, could’ve been Muscat circa 1867. For a short while, I feel hesitation. As if I’m transported back in time. James Harper, my friend from D.C. who lives and works in Abu Dhabi, later tells me that the same thing had happened to him. And that he had been so awestruck that he felt fear – that he really had gotten lost in time. To get back to 2008, I look about for the minaret of the mosque abutting the souk, and make my way accordingly back to the beaten track. For how long will these neighborhoods last? Especially that the Oman government’s budget is over $1 bn in the black.

One incident in the souk: I enter a public bathroom. I’m wearing beach combers and shorts. I start using one urinal, but my lower legs and feet are being drenched with urine. I stop and look down: Yes, the urine goes straight into a canal beneath. The urinal is missing a pipe, I think to myself. I move over to the next urinal, thinking the first is in need of repair. The same thing happens to me. I accept my fate. The missing pipe is a planned event.

In Ruwi, I purposely walk about away from the market area, and I discover where the toiling masses live. Actual shacks and huts. And little deli-like stores. A far contrast from the villas at Qorm where I had gone to sun bathe.

THE OMANIS: VISIBLE AND POLITE

Omanis, unlike Emiratis, are out and about a lot. They man the taxis, for instance. They’re very polite. I become angry once with a shared taxi driver who’s supposed to drive me from Nizwa to Muscat; but he drops me off 40 kilometers outside of Muscat. It doesn’t make sense to me. We had agreed that he would drive me to Muscat itself, to Ruwi. He says that’s their standard stop, 40 kilometers out, and that’s what everyone in Nizwa understands by “Muscat.” He’s dazzled and apologetic though he truly believes it’s not his mistake. He doesn’t write the rules. I find out later from the Moroccans that he was right. The stop where he left me is understood by all in the trade to be the “Muscat” stop for anyone returning from Nizwa.

Still, it’s strange that he had not tried to explain that earlier, when in Nizwa, since I clearly appeared to be a tourist. And it's not like he was aching for riders.

One night I wake up late. The window is open. I look out and I see that two men are sleeping at the entrance of the bus dispatcher’s office. For some reason, it doesn’t feel that bad. They both have mats under their bodies. Later I find out who the two are. They’re Omani and wear the standard national garb. I think the national garb is such an equalizer, and perhaps that’s why I didn’t feel bad for them when I spotted them asleep in the outdoors. Daytime: they're indistinguishable from the rest. Too, it’s warm and not hot at night.


On my last day I enter a small store in Mattrah, “owned” by a Pakistani man. It’s a watch repair shop. But he had these great-looking watches. I buy five of them. He gives me a special price: about $20 each. (Even less.) A steal. I consider buying the national garb, then think it’ll only add to clutter in my life The watches: I can give away as gifts. The garb will be abused and worn for Halloween. I look for gifts for women. No luck. The women’s watches aren’t that great. I buy perfume. But I’m not sure it’s worth giving to anyone. It’s so difficult to open the bottles.

I wake up early on my departure day. I sit in the café across from the Kerala man’s shop. I’m able to write a poem I’ve long wanted to write. It flows so fast. I continue to edit it on the bus. Is this why I travel? I’ve written most of my poetry (in Arabic) while traveling.

PASSPORT, GOOGLE, GOOGLE, AND THE MUKHABARAT (INTELLIGENCE) MAN

The trip back is uneventful but for the presence on the bus of a Mukhabarat (intelligence service) guy. He doesn’t buy a ticket; I know that because when the comptroller boards the bus to check ours, he shows none. And all those in the know — driver and aide and all those who work for the Bus company, who hop on and ho off – come by and pay their respect by lowering their head and shaking his soft hand. He’s a tad heavy. I don’t know that he’s there for me. If he is, it’s because the hotel copies my passport and likely dispatches it to the Mukhabarat. Google; google; boogle; spoogle. Then a bus ride from Muscat to the border with Dubai to assure that this guy (moi) has really left. They’re afraid I’d jump off the bus and have some secret plan to survive in the desert. The Mukhabarat guy leaves the bus at the border.

I think to myself: that’s why Dubai is successful; it doesn’t have much oil. But its ruler doesn’t dispatch Mukhabarat people to track Tony Khater, or to make sure he leaves the country. Doesn’t bother.

WOULD I RETURN TO OMAN?

Yes, but only if I can fly business class. Oman is a great place to visit, and to get lost in it, before the government’s money spreads to the neighborhoods which time has forgotten. If I can put up with another 14-hour flight, the next time I’ll rent a four-wheel drive and head to Salalah in the south and to Jabal al-Akhdar.

James Harper wants me to come to Abu Dhabi so that we can do the region together. He’s a great traveler, has traveled the globe over, and he just bought a four-wheeler with the idea of reaching places he hasn’t reached before. I know I should take advantage: no one can show me the region as James. Besides, time is of the essence: James is now searching for a job in D.C., his hometown; it’s better for the children, he says. He has two master degrees and has taught English as a foreign language (and other courses) for the better part of his adult life. I can easily lose the opportunity to have him show me the place. I saw him last summer in D.C. when he interviewed in Texas; then he recently interviewed in D.C. itself, ini Georgetown.


It hit me: Oman’s sun has cured me so thoroughly. I feel healthy and am giddy. It’s such a gorgeous place. On the way back I can’t get over the fact that I’m feeling so much better. What makes the experience even more special is that the Omani people are so polite. And the expatriates are –- oh well, hilarious. I miss the Moroccan expatriates already, and I miss the Kerala man. It’d be worth going back if only to see the two dismiss each other.

I return to Dubai, uncertain; I don’t want to; but I feel an obligation to spend some time with Daniel, and the only time he has is over the weekend. I’m praying I will not have to go shopping for a Porsche.

DONA QUIXOTE (IRAN) AND THE HARMFUL IDIOTS

draft

THE MILITARY'S BIND

I don’t envy the military. To be placed in such a bind by the harmful idiots must be unbearable:

– in a state of so-called counter-insurgency mode, while occupying a country 6000 miles away;

– in a bind as to what to do with as many as 110,000 Sunni insurgents placed on the payroll, forever, with a civil war brewing amongst them, a ticking time bomb;

– in a state of illusory hope that the Badr Brigade government (I’m using the old name on purpose), allied to Dawa, will turn against Tehran;

– in a state of denial about the fact that both of these organizations -- Badr and Dawa -- had been reared by Tehran;

– in a state of false hope that the harmful idiots (in this case, the politicians) can squeeze Tehran financially and politically, and that Dona Quixote cannot squeeze back while raking in higher and higher income from oil, thanks in good part for lower and even lower interest rates in the US -- the imperial blind spot;

– in a state of utter illusion that the Turks and the Kurds will hug and kiss, oblivious to the fact that structurally there’s no hope under the sun that the flirtation would succeed;

– in a state of war with Moqtada al-Sadr who, if one avoids a short-term perspective, and avoids buying one’s self-referential propaganda about him being a “radical” just because he’s a politician, and if one thinks long term, (Sadr) would be Iraq’s best hope to (eventually) stand up to Iran. Not a sure thing by any measure. Still, if one is betting, Sadr would be the better bet. By far. Instead, the harmful idiots are assuring the welding of his fate and that of the Sadr family saint-like legacy, to Iran’s goals.

CONTROL THE TERRITORY

Abdel Halim Khaddam, the Syrian Sunni man who the Saudis placed in a palace in France, in their silly and self-defeating war with Syria, used to say that whoever controlled the ground/territory, controlled the political outcome. He was referring to little Lebanon after the harmful idiots and their Jordanians had destroyed it on behalf of their beloved Israel -- to dodge the formation of a Palestinian state. Wait a minute: Khaddam didn’t mean an army (and another army of mercenaries) imported from 6000 or so miles away. He meant local forces supplanted by Syrian and Palestinian fighters, who look like local forces, dressed up as Druze or other fighters to roll back the proxies of the harmful idiots and Israel. Successfully.

(I really feel like stopping; I feel like a teacher at a school for the learning-challenged.)

NO HELP

Okay, a tea and I shall resume.

The harmful idiots had emaciated or destroyed every country that had allied itself to them. I’m thinking Egypt. Now useless -- and hungry -- and can’t help in Iraq. I’m thinking Lebanon which, had the harmful idiots built up a Palestinian state, would’ve been a hell of a pro-harmful idiots country -- all of it; Now even the harmful idiots’ erstwhile ally, Michel Aoun, seeing who controls the ground/territory, runs away from them, that after they had left him stranded alone fighting the Syrians and getting run over. I’m thinking Saudi Arabia, which doesn’t even have an army to speak of, and is now relying even more on the harmful idiots; Saudi Arabia, which happens to produce some of the most vicious fighters in the world, but only for export, instead of recruiting them into a fighting army. I’m thinking Jordan, which teeters about waiting forever for a Palestinian state to relieve the threat of the Islamists -- saved mostly by its King’s ingenious ways at obtaining cargo for an otherwise hostile population.

ILLUSION AND WISHFUL THINKING

And here are the harmful idiots swimming in an ocean of illusion and wishful thinking about the Badr Organization Shia state in Iraq. Here’s Robert Gates, on April 11:

“I think the Iraqi government now has a clearer view of the malign impact of Iran’s activities inside Iraq...I think they have had what I would call a growing understanding of that negative Iranian role. But I think what they encountered in Basra was a real eye-opener to them.”

Say what? You’re building a state in Iraq, dumping billions upon billions on that state with the hope (!) – with the hope (!) – that it’ll have “a growing understanding” of Iran’s “malign” role? I’m cringing.

Here’s Ali al-Dabbagh, spokesman for the Iraqi government, on May 4, responding to a question about the repeated allegations by the harmful idiots that Dona Quixote has been sending weapons to Shia militias -- they mean the Mahdi Army -– and training these. His answer:

“We don’t possess like evidence.” (My translation from Arabic.)

About the Iraqi delegation visiting Tehran to talk about Dona Quixote’s role in arming and training the Mahdi Army -- Mr. Al-Dabbagh: these people don’t represent the Iraqi government.

In other words, we the Badr Organization Shia government aren’t so stupid as to pick a fight with Iran, once our mentor and host, and so well embedded amongst us that we’re one and the same. We really are one and the same.

Thank you very much. We really appreciate your help. Please come again.

BOGGED DOWN ON ORDERS BY THE HARMFUL IDIOTS

Here’s Admiral Micheal Mullin, on May 5, from beloved Israel:

“I am actually very hopeful we don’t get into a position where we have to get into a conflict [with Dona Quixote] ... It would be a very significant challenge for the United States right now to get into a third conflict in that part of the world ... I think it is very important that we increase the financial pressure, the diplomatic pressure, the political pressure, and at the same time keep all the military options on the table.”

Translation: we really cannot afford a war with Dona Quixote. That, in effect, our job as the military at the service of the harmful idiots, is to keep a state of stasis, of stagnation, including of our own miliary in Iraq, until the end of the Bush term. To be bogged down so as to preserve the fighting image of Bald Samson and the Christian-Zionist Crusader -- as warriors for one hundred years.

FRESH PARSLEY

I need some fresh perspective. I go over to see my dad at his garden. He’s checking his parsley, which is coming through, now that he’s removed the straw -- so necessary for successful sprouting of parsley seeds. I ask him. May God bring victory to the US, he says. He’s repeating what they say at his church. This is my Maronite father speaking; I need to bring out the politico in him.

I change my tone. What are you talking about? I retort impatiently. Victory doesn’t come to those swimming in illusion and wishful thinking. Answer my question please: do you think the Shia Badr Organization government will turn against Iran? You’ve spent a lifetime in a sect-dominated culture in Lebanon and had had many Shia, Sunni, and Druze friends, and countless acquaintances among these sects. You filled my head with sect and politics. He hesitates. Then he answers: No; I can’t imagine it. It’s a “tabkhet Bo7s” (“a meal of pebbles”) for the US.

Thank you. Now you can go back to admiring your parsley. How can I make up for my impatience at his earlier reluctance to answer my question? It’s gonna be a bumper crop, I comment. God I can be mean.

TRAVELOGUE: THE UNITED ARAB EMIRATES AND OMAN; PART 1.

second draft

F i c t i o n a l i z e d.

INDEPENDENCE AS A LEVANTINE PREDICAMENT?

I need a lot of sun, both for vitamin D and to treat what I suspect is SAD —Seasonal Affective Disorder. I used to do it by shuttling to Miami Beach. But I can’t stand that place any longer. I’m forever running away from anything that compromises my independence. Call it a Levantine predicament. The Lebanese-British historian Albert Hourani knew it. He had said something along these lines: to be a Levantine is to be thoroughly familiar with two worlds, maybe three, but not to belong to any. Quite a damning predicament. Couldn’t go to Miami, a hub of Israeli and Lebanese Christian right wing expats. (Refer to the post, “Chance Encounters.”) Add to that my late mother’s sickness and dependency. And so for five years, I’ve gone nowhere but on trips by car . I tell a lie: I’ve done one three-day weekend by plane.

Albert Hourani, it’s now said, was British intelligence. I don’t know if that’s true.

I’m nursing the end of a cold, and I feel miserable.

Daniel, an international and contracts lawyer, a friend since our high-school days, has been calling and emailing. I’ve got to come to the UAE. He can’t resist wanting to show me how well he’s doing -- making as much as a partner at a large American law firm. I keep on telling him not to tell me. He tells me anyway. Good: now I won’t feel any guilt to be the beneficiary of his UAE largesse. He needs to show me. And I’m fine with that. He’s one of the best hosts I know.

On the off-chance that I may want to stay there, I check out the American law firms in Dubai. At heart I know I’m not interested. But, who knows? A friend says, “Re-write your resume; you’re a litigation lawyer.”

I buy my ticket on Delta, for less than $1100, including all taxes and fees.


AN ESCORT ALL THE WAY TO THE DUBAI FLIGHT GATE

As I rush to catch the underground tram at the Atlanta airport, to make it to my Dubai gate, I notice an Amazon standing right behind me. I see her reflection on the tram’s glass doors as it pulls up. Inside the tram, her long legs tower over me as she eyes me intently. She’s wearing shortened jeans that go all the way to below her knees, and carrying a large nap sack. She looks like she could be my friend Colin’s sister. Both of them have this Anglo colorless skin and eyes that are too round. Descendants of Sherwood Forest – Robin Hood’s people. Little sun; no color. When I had first met Colin, he was standing against a marble wall at a courthouse, wearing a light-colored suit. If it weren’t for his eyes fluttering at some moment I wouldn’t even had spotted him. He had melted away into the faux- marble. Later, together, we handled a sizeable securities fraud case and proved to all that inexperienced lawyers can bone up fast and make things right for their clients.


I leave the tram and rush to my Dubai flight gate; the Amazon is on my heels. I’m relieved that I made it. She turns back and away. She scares me; such intimidation.

Someone wants to make sure I know that I’m under surveillance. I’ve succeeded beyond my wildest imagination at creating a buzz about the newsletter. Now I’m getting an escort all the way to the departure gate out of the country. If it goes on like this, I’ll be changing the focus of the newsletter, closing shop really, away from political analysis to something else. I’m already thinking about the new direction -- away from constant surveillance. No one really gets it that at heart I’m tailored for what I do. But is that what Big Brother and its right wing Jewish imperial pillar want me to do? Close shop? I need to think this over.

CLOSING SHOP BECAUSE NO ONE LISTENS?

No one listens anyway. The country’s foreign policy is run haphazard, the product not of thinking people who can intellectually and organizationally pull it all together – financial, economic, political, and military -- the last as a last resort. A team comes into the White House representing the Jewish Right and oil interests (Cheney /Bush) which, through the President, controls the forces of the Christian Right. Ingenious link. This team wants Iraq, badly, the right wing Jews for Israel, and the oil interests for oil. The Christian Right forces: for jobs in the armed forces and as contractors.

The White House activates some “Iraq Project” collecting dust on a shelf at the Pentagon. It does so to run away from a necessity: to raise taxes and invest in energy research and development. It refuses to accept that America's strength is technology, before all others steal it. Instead it pushes the envelope on oil by seeking to control Iraq’s. Strategically, it hopes that by controlling that oil it’ll have a choking hold on China and Europe, boosting American power not by tending to one’s garden at home (too costly politically -- recall Bush-father’s promise not to raise taxes), but by stealing. It seeks domestic support for its pathetic and cowardly policy choice and finds this support in the Jewish community and among the crusading Christian Right, so pervasively present in the military-industrial complex where the jobs are, as the other jobs have moved to China. The former (the right wing Jews) is sold on the idea that Arabs should either be hung (the Jewish-American US Senator Arlen Spector lecturing the Saddam Hussein murderous Kangaroo court on speeding up the lynching of an Arab leader) or subdued by false charm after the Jewish Right realizes that the Iraqi Sunni resistance had failed its Israeli scheme (Thomas Friedman lecturing Saudi Arabia’s King Abdallah, that the Saudi King should share in Friedman’s love for Israel, as should everyone.)

What escaped the harmful idiots was that their very policy of not taxing such staples as oil, and not investing in research and development, was such a runaway affair that it enriched China, Russia, Iran and other rivals. And, I would submit, it had weakened the federal government, a goal of these people, always. In other words, even if one were imperial and right-wing and harmfully idiotic, and wanted to conquer Iraq and control its oil, invading to achieve these goals was done at the wrong time. At a time when all rivals had been made rich in hard currency reserves by the harmful idiots’ push for “globalization” and by always running away from doing the right thing at home. A financial balance of power had been effect by the time the harmful idiots ordered the invasion. That balance was made all the more solid by the miscalculation: that the Sunnis would be dumb enough to accept defeat without resorting to igniting a civil war -- their best defense. The rivals reaped a whopper of a profit as oil prices skyrocketed. Now the rivals can fund what they please. Presently, I would add that even an intra-Shia civil war (Badr Organization AKA Iraqi army v. Mahdi), so encouraged by the harmful idiots, benefits Iran. But that’s a different subject altogether.

THE FLIGHT FROM HELL

My cold is persistent, albeit at its end. The economy seats on the Bowing 777 are awful, so narrow with hardly any leg room. The plane is full of contractors and troops in civilian clothing. The haircut gives them away. Others are muscled and tattooed beyond comprehension. These must be the security contractors -- the mercenaries. Iraq and Afghanistan. The plane is full to the brim. Not a single seat is empty. I’m in the aisle seat. I pity the guy next to me, in the middle seat. He’s a heavy-set man from the south, as are mostly all of them. It feels like the war establishment in imperial America is a southern establishment. We in the north go to law schools instead. The man is squeezed pretty bad. But he’s courteous: he’s careful not to spread his large body sideways. I’ll be giving him many breaks since I’ll be spending most of the 14-plus hours walking about.

Still, it’s really uncomfortable, and I promise myself that I will not take such long flights any longer.

The vegan food is horrific. I refuse to eat any of it. My neighbor gladly accepts my offer to take the dessert and a couple of other small things -- like the cheese wedge. As if vegans eat cheese, anyway.

My sickness catches up with me. I start to faint. I lower my head to between my knees and am able to abort passing out. But every time I start to straighten up I feel like I would be dropping to the floor, unconscious. I’ve lowered my head down so far that I’m avoiding a fall by pushing my arms against the floor. The plane is so dark. We’re flying into the night. An attendant passes by and asks me if I want “medical.” I ask for water instead. He returns soon with a glass of water. I sip it while hunched down, keeping one arm pushed tightly against the floor. I feel better.

A couple of seats in front of me is a striking woman. She can be Indian or Iranian. She’s laughing uncontrollably at some situation comedy.


AT THE DUBAI AIRPORT

We arrive in Dubai and the striking woman and I talk about situation comedies. I make it look like I can write these. The George Costanza phenomenon. She’s from Charlston and coming to visit her two brothers. Her name is Zainab Ameri , from Iran. My luggage comes first and I bid her goodbye. Her brothers, she says, will be meeting her outside.


Outside I spot Daniel. We wait for the valet to bring over his brand new Land Rover — or Range Rover? This is the UAE. Inside, I advise him to avoid driving a Porsche -- that nothing is sillier than a middle-age man driving a Porsche. He’s a tad struck; how did I guess? We’re buying a Porsche any day now. Like I’m surprised.

I tell him about Zainab Ameri, that her two brothers would be waiting for her. They work with me, he says. He recites their names. A small world.

ARABS: A CULTURE TRAIT

At home he gives me around $500 in UAE money. To get me started , he says. Arabs are nothing if not generous. This is one of the ways their society re-distributes wealth. (Another is marriage -- hence the fact that nearly every Arab movie has a wedding scene, as American movies have a peaceful house with healthy lawn and cars -- and crime; yes crime is a redistribution of wealth scheme in the US.) The worst thing you can call an Arab is “stingy.” The worst thing you can call an American is “a bum.” Can’t afford to have bums in the society of the tax base and accumulated capital. Need to contribute in taxes (e.g., work) and move that capital (e.g., personal injury law suits), always. Women in America are reluctant to reproduce with a “bum.” You can be a sleazeball; that would be okay to many American woman. They’d reproduce with you in the bathroom of a plane. But don’t you dare be a “bum.”

My closest friends’ neighbor in Bethesda still visits a serial killer serving a life sentence in jail. The man had murdered three immigrants, including the George Washington professor in the parking lot of NIH. My friends’ neighbor had dated him. She cries when she talks about him. She misses the serial killer. After all, he moved capital, didn’t he -- what with funeral services for his victims, police work, transporting the bodies of his victims to their home countries? He even told her that on her birthday, after they had split, he had broken into her house and sat crying in her daughter's empty room as his ex-girlfriend was having sex in her own bedroom. That he considered killing her that night. My friends, her neighbors, are understanding and full of sympathy. The serial killer had been their painter and his work had been impeccable. I want to kill myself.


DUBAI: WHAT’S THERE TO TELL?

I spend the weekend (Friday and Saturday) with Daniel and his wife. Dubai, it turns out, is just another city. From a touristic perspective, there’s nothing to recommend it. To me at least. There’s no question that its ruler Sheikh Muhammed bin Rashed Aal Maktoum is a genius. He had caught on to a way to enrich his people beyond their wildest imagination. To draw in “smart money.” He had opted for total openness, economic and social. He knew he needed not worry about socially disturbing the Dubai natives, his subjects, since these had such a tight social structure that little could pierce it. Even their “villas” were so surrounded by high walls that no foreign influence could find its way to within their grounds.

By the way, Dubai can’t be half-open, as Stuart Levy the terrorism finance guy at Treasury would like it to be. I get out from its airport faster than fast. In contrast, when back in Atlanta, I almost miss my connecting flight. The immigration queue is endless. The security via the short immigration interview (When did you leave the country? Do you have any food on you? Were you by yourself? Always by yourself? What countries did you visit? What was the purpose of your visit?) , the re-checking for security to board the connecting flight, weighs so heavy. The dogs circulate about sniffing our luggage. The customs agent asks me to take my bag off my shoulders and place it on the floor so the beagle can sniff it.

Dubai can’t be like that. If it apes Atlanta, it’ll die a natural and not-so-slow death. You cannot be half-open, or a half-virgin. If you do that, the Dubai phenomenon will move to another place. It already had moved from Lebanon to Jordan to Cyprus and now to Dubai. Levy wants to squeeze the air out of Iran’s financial lungs, which are the UAE. But Iran can retaliate with bombings, or with stirring of Shia sentiment, both of which are certain to move the Dubai phenomenon to another place.

It’s a precarious balancing act. Extremely precarious. No beagles for the Dubai airport. People (Russians and Iranians, I heard) are welcome to come in with millions of dollars and Euros in cash and buy real estate.


Brad is right. An old friend who I could trust about my upcoming foreign trip laughs when I say I’m heading to Dubai. “Is there something old,” I ask him, “where I can hang out?” He laughs again. I had bought the ticket and he isn’t about to disturb my construct of a desert place, the romantic I am, always with Wilfred Thesiger on my mind.

We head to the impressive Mall of the Emirates, another mall, to buy a Rolex. Not for me. For Daniel’s wife. A priority, Daniel says; you’re not married, you don’t understand, he repeats. He’s trying to pre-empt what he thinks is my view that the entire thing is superfluous. He doesn’t know me. I think the entire thing is superfluous, including my existence and his. Anyway, the word has spread that the price for Rolex watches is going up this Sunday, by as much as fifteen percent. Strangely, that doesn’t motivate me at all. But it certainly puts the fire under the feet of Daniel and his wife -- and all Emirati and the upper classes among the large Arab and other expatriate community. Inflation is hitting a product that’s dear to these people. The phones are at work throughout Dubai, I imagine. Buy the Rolex for $60,000 and you make a profit of over $8,000 overnight. And you’d be wearing a Rolex to boot. In Oman I buy a watch for $20, pure gold...plated! Even Daniel notices it and thinks it’s pretty; I tell him it’s for $20; he dismisses the watch.

I shouldn’t frown on the luxury purchases of the Emiratis and the expatriates. There’s wisdom to it. Arabs have always bought gold, not trusting paper money nor the stability of their states. They’re right, aren’t they? If the harmful idiots wage war on Iran, paper currency should plummet and the expat community should return home. Real estate values and prices should evaporate. What are they gonna have as security but movables, such as gold and Rolex watches?

I, member of the tax base, like the struggling masses the world over, am more concerned (mildly) about the prices of wheat and Thai brown rice, my main food staples. And about health care cost.

By the way, before I forget, Arabic in the UAE is nearly useless to you. Daniel had assured me that English is way more useful. You’re more likely to deal with people from the Indian subcontinent than with Arabs, Emiratis or others. My later forays outside Daniel’s villa confirmed it.


THE MATING DANCE

Daniel and his wife are inside the Rolex store. For a very long time. To Daniel’s credit, he’s always understood that I’ve forever been spartan and have never had any interest in such symbols as Porsche and Rolex. So he doesn’t insist that I partake in picking the watch. Instead, I stand outside the store with a tea. (The Mall of the Emirates doesn’t like benches.) For a while, I don’t notice. Then I do. There’s a mating dance happening right under my nose.

Emirati men in groups of three or four, and Emirati women in groups of the same size, donning the national dress, white for men, black for women, are circulating about the floor where the Rolex store stands and where I stand. They pass by me again and again. They never talk to each other. The women’s faces look light-skinned Semetic; they can be Lebanese. The men too, though they look more Arab, with darker skin, than the women. The difference in skin hue likely is due to the use of cosmetics by the women. All are of reproductive age, in their late teens and early twenties. Again, I never see them talk to each other, men to women or vice versa. Their politeness and dignity are pronounced. There’s no doubt that they’re checking each other out. Yet they’re doing it in accordance with a code which requires silence. This mating dance is made attractive by the dress code and the total absence of communication. I notice that they seem proud of their Semetic noses. Sadly I predict that Lebanese cosmetic surgeons with tons of experience should be flooding Dubai to change the Emiratis’ mind about their proud features.

The mating dance continues: I suspect that if a woman is drawn to a man, or vice versa, that she or he will know through the network of friends and friends-of-friends who he or she is. I suspect they already know who’s who. She or he can use an intermediary, as would the Samoans in Margaret Mead’s days -- Coming of Age in Samoa. But in Dubai, as in the rest of the Arab World, the guy’s mother usually goes at it head on, no intermediaries necessary. All that would be needed is a smile by the young woman at the Mall of the Emirates, and the young man can activate his mother. She will lay the groundwork. Then the Rolex and the gold, then marriage. Then the villa.

An ex-girlfriend and ex-fiancee, half-Arab , used to comment that the old Arab system of mating (still in use in many parts of the Arab world) was so much less exhausting than the American. She would mention her mother on a plane to the home country being approached by the mother of a young man in medical school to strike a marriage deal. It all looks good until you find out how much neurosis this creates to the Arab parents. Arabs say “we’ve married him off,” or “we’ve married her off,” referring to their son or daughter. The parents use the active tense. In essence that means that they played an active role in getting their daughter or son married.

Jennifer Smith, a close friend in D.C. and a well-published clinical psychologist, sees her fair share of Arab clients. I’m her “informant,” anthropologically-speaking, about Arab culture. I remind her often about the neurosis created when the parents fail to marry off their offsprings. Or when they choose the wrong mate for them. I became aware of this when I noticed my parents talk about someone’s marriage by referring to the parents of the married person and using an active tense in describing the parents’ role.

That neurosis is made all the worse in the severe social vacuum that is the West when compared to the tight social network present in the Arab World. (To each its advantages and disadvantanges, by the way.) Daniel, for instance, hardly sleeps. He works until late at night, then he either has Arab and other friends over for dinner or has to attend one himself. I repeatedly turn down his pestering invites; I prefer to watch concerts of old Arab music -- Abdel-Halim al-Hafiz, Umm Kalthoum, and Muhammad Abdel Wahab, on Rotana Tarab, owned by Waleed bin Talal -- than to swim in a social scene of fixed noses, bleached hair, and Rolex watches. The Arab social network needs constant upkeep and finessing: Daniel’s wife is on the phone so much of her time, arranging and responding to social invites. The social network is tight and busy. There’s no room for depression or neurosis. But, in the West, in the great social vacuum, when Arab immigrant parents “fail,” they and their children end up at Jennifer’s office.

Jennifer and her husband have cats and dogs. No children. The cats and dogs are neutered and spayed.

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(To be continued, if allowed by Big Brother and its right- wing Jewish pillar of imperial aggression against Arabs and Muslims; the civilizers who dispatched Arlen Spector to lecture the kangaroo court set up by sadistic harmful idiot “consultants” with no conscience, Nazi sadomasochists “doing their job,” mandarins running after an income, little capitalists consumed by financial security -- on how to speed up the hanging of Arab leaders. Their next target: Moqtadha al-Sadr. I suspect they have serious regrets for not having finished him earlier. The guy just doesn’t want his country occupied or broken apart. Hence he’s a “radical.” Where’s the logic? What I see: the harmful idiots are once again shooting themselves in the foot and breeding reactive and new “spiritually”-inspired secret Shia terror networks. )