Airport

As I mentioned, my flight connected through London on Christmas Eve. Heathrow airport is fine, but given that it is Britain's largest air hub, I was stunned and disappointed that I did not see Santa as I expected. I was also put off a bit that so much wall space in the airport was simply empty, with only a half-hearted attempt to fill the blankness with advertisements. Not being assaulted by an unending stream of vulgar airport ads was my first bit of culture shock.

Here's a photo:



And here's another one. It was Christmas, after all:



Lovely pictures, aren't they? They really capture the essence of the London airport on Christmas, don't they?

Except that they weren't taken in London. Those are the third and fourth pictures I took from Dubai. This is a cafe under the arrivals gate in Dubai International Airport. That London Dairy was a little ice cream shop, just across from that giant Christmas tree. Any thought that I might be moving into some Islamic tent city in the desert was put to rest at that moment.

Well, that's a lie. That notion was put to rest the instant I stepped off the plane into the terminal. The first sight to greet me was a giant blinking spaceship hanging from the ceiling. Yeah, that's right. Feast your eyes:



The image is a little blurry because I was trying not to faint from the shock. I turned around and was greeted with this sight:



Again, the blurriness as I struggle to control my slack-jawed drooling. Also, I'm a shit photographer. But believe me when I say: Dubai airport is the most glitteringly modern thing I've ever seen. They were auctioning off a Rolls-Royce outside the duty-free shops where rich Arabs -- and everyone else -- buy their dirt-cheap liquor.

One of the themes of this website will be the odd and hilarious way the western world and the Middle East have collided here in Dubai. My first inkling of that came as I walked toward passport control. Unlike in London, the Dubai airport is littered with wall ads -- just like home sweet home. At the welcome port of this Muslim country, I saw a enormous ad for Chivas Regal, I saw the familiar little M&M characters saying "Experience the Fun!" and I saw a spot for some Dubai resort featuring a grinning Arab guy holding up a surfboard in one hand and a giant thumbs-up sign in the other. As the nervousness of the flight gave way, my first impression of Dubai was, "What in the HELL is this place?"