Palm Frond O

After a long week at school of marking midterm exams and getting progress reports ready before our next holiday, Julie and I had a very nice and relaxing day.  It started at Etisalat Academy, the recreation facility we joined (Etisalat oddly being the main cell phone company here).  We had a nice time swimming and sitting by the pool.  After getting back and a little bit of planning for our trip to Ethiopia, we went out to the Jumeirah Palm.  That's right, onto Dubai's famous man-made island.  Amidst recent complaints about the Palm that the sand was not smooth enough and the sewage systems did not always work adequately with the shifting sands, it still was very neat to be out on it.  A friend of a friend's aunt is staying at his aunt's house while he is on an internship in Dubai.  The house was massive, as are most of the villas out on the Palm.  We had a nice walk on the beach around the tip of the Palm.  It was nice just being outside of our flat and in such a special place (although I would not want to live there).  So next time you see the palm on the map, you can see where I walked on Frond O, the second closest frond to the shore on the southwest side of the Palm.  

      


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Disney Land Dubai

Lots of the places in Dubai feel like an Epcot or Disney Land version of commercial and consumer life in the US.  The style and images that the stores are trying to create is the same but the effect of these image is slightly altered.  It is as if in molding the puzzle of consumer life in Dubai, the stores maintain the same shape of the puzzle piece, but they now need to be twisted 15 degrees to fit the realities of life here, to fit together in the puzzle.  This gives rise to some quite odd consumer outlets and experiences.  At Starbucks, for instance, the stores are modeled the EXACT same as at home down to the displays, chairs, and the different coffee and mugs for sale.  Here, instead of a white woman serving you coffee though, it is a Philippino man.  Sitting next to you is not a student working on his laptop but two Emirati men.

The next example came the night before last when we went to Uptown Mirdiff, an area in Dubai with an upscale outdoor shopping mall.  Mirdiff feels like it could come from the charming downtown of a North Shore of Chicago.  Except here the shopping center is modeled on these towns.  So no mater how hard they try to make it feel "authentic," it never quite does.  Everything from the upper end department stores to the Caribou Coffee is marketed the same.  This gives it an odd feel that you're visiting an Epcot Center rendition of a day in Evanston or Winnetka.  The last example that I came across recently was when I was buying boots from Columbia Sportswear for our upcoming trip to Ethiopia.  At the store, the walls were lined with pictures of people hiking in their gear in the Rocky Mountains, not trekking the malls (or even deserts) of the UAE.  

What these different consumer products offer is allusions to a certain social position, one to be desired (whether for the leisure, wealth, or adventure associated with it).  Since each store's style is not always congruent with the content that is being offered, the masking and representation (or re-presentation) of these consumer images becomes very evident.  When the re-presenting is done in a new context, one that is not necessarily more or less valid but always different from the first, the ultimately vacuous nature of consumer products and their associated image becomes apparent.

So if it is all about the artificiality of the product's image and the ease at which it can be resituated, then does it matter where it is being sold in the first place? Can it be said that one locale is more "authentic" than another if the stories behind a product's image are developed to create desires of a social position (and the luxuries that correspond with it)?  Can anything be authentic in a consumer society if the layers of a product's image obscure the content (if any) that lie beneath (or on the all to evident surface)?

Juice

There are several definite luxuries about being in the location that we are.  My favorite for the time being is the fruit.  There are lots of small restaurants around where we live that in addition to selling shawarma and other Middle Eastern, Pakistani, Indian fair and the assortment of burgers (not hamburgers), they sell the most delicious juices I've ever had.  Sweet Melon (honey dew) was the first we ever tried.  It is made from milk and honey dew melon.  That's all.  The next we tried was Lemon Mint.  This juice is deep green from how much mint is in it, just to take the edge off the fresh lemon.  Julie's current favorite is Kiwi.  The juice is only made with Kiwis,  no water or sugar are added.  There were probably at least a dozen kiwis in the large drink that she got today.  It tastes like you put a straw into a kiwi and drink everything in it, and then start with your next one.  It is utterly and completely refreshing.

Julie and I have also tried to eat at least one pomegranate a day.  Its form varies from putting it in smoothies, in couscous, or just mixed with kiwi and eaten straight out of a bowl.  So while vegetables and lots of other food is about the same price at home, there are some great deals on fruit here.