More photos here at least until I can get them on Flickr, which is blocked in the UAE.
January 6, 2010
January 3, 2010
A Tale of Two
There are two interns who sit across from me at the paper.
One is Bangladeshi and one is Indian. They were both born here and neither is Emirati.
Their parents came here in the 1970s in search of a better life for their families. The grandfather of the Bangladeshi girl came even earlier, and would split time between Abu Dhabi and his home village. Both girls have two countries and none at the same time. Neither has spent any considerable time outside of the UAE, yet it is unlikely they will stay here. Each holds a passport for her ethnic country.
The UAE has no policy to naturalize citizens. It is happy to welcome immigrants to work, and even their families. As long as they leave.
There is a mandatory retirement age of 60 here and it applies whether you are Emirati or not. It is possible, from time to time, to get an extension of perhaps two years. But in the modern world, most people don't retire at 62. And while most anyone is welcome to work here, that's where the hospitality ends. Once a person has no job, that's the end of the line. Thirty days to leave town before the visa expires.
So imagine that you are one of these girls. You have friends and a community here You have attended college here. You would like to find a job, but as all over the world, jobs are a little more scarce than they used to be. You would like to plan your future, but you have no idea where that future will be. You are Emirati, but you're definitely not. Once the fathers of these girls retire, the girls must leave too.
They contemplate their options and try to think of places they could go. They are tourists, strangers really, in their "home" countries. And soon they will not be welcome in their adopted country, the only one they have ever known. There is a two-tier system here even for those who contribute to the society, who helped build it up. There is Emirati and there is not. Two families can live side-by-side, working at the same jobs at the same rate of pay and if you look closely you can see the discrepancies. Until recently, only one could own property. One will have a generous retirement. One will have free schooling for his children. One will have access to a marriage fund. And the other has to leave when the work is done.
One is Bangladeshi and one is Indian. They were both born here and neither is Emirati.
Their parents came here in the 1970s in search of a better life for their families. The grandfather of the Bangladeshi girl came even earlier, and would split time between Abu Dhabi and his home village. Both girls have two countries and none at the same time. Neither has spent any considerable time outside of the UAE, yet it is unlikely they will stay here. Each holds a passport for her ethnic country.
The UAE has no policy to naturalize citizens. It is happy to welcome immigrants to work, and even their families. As long as they leave.
There is a mandatory retirement age of 60 here and it applies whether you are Emirati or not. It is possible, from time to time, to get an extension of perhaps two years. But in the modern world, most people don't retire at 62. And while most anyone is welcome to work here, that's where the hospitality ends. Once a person has no job, that's the end of the line. Thirty days to leave town before the visa expires.
So imagine that you are one of these girls. You have friends and a community here You have attended college here. You would like to find a job, but as all over the world, jobs are a little more scarce than they used to be. You would like to plan your future, but you have no idea where that future will be. You are Emirati, but you're definitely not. Once the fathers of these girls retire, the girls must leave too.
They contemplate their options and try to think of places they could go. They are tourists, strangers really, in their "home" countries. And soon they will not be welcome in their adopted country, the only one they have ever known. There is a two-tier system here even for those who contribute to the society, who helped build it up. There is Emirati and there is not. Two families can live side-by-side, working at the same jobs at the same rate of pay and if you look closely you can see the discrepancies. Until recently, only one could own property. One will have a generous retirement. One will have free schooling for his children. One will have access to a marriage fund. And the other has to leave when the work is done.
Thoughts Get in the Way
I get several good blog ideas every day, but rarely when I actually sit down to write.
In the last few hours alone I've thought about young people who live in the UAE, Indian food, the lifestyles of people here who work very hard and where I might like to vacation. I'm sure I've covered Indian food (and have I mentioned how much I like it?? How and I can't imagine tiring of it?? Oh, yeah. I have). And nobody but me cares where I'd like to go on vacation. So that leaves me to dwell on the other two topics.
In a sense, they're related. So let's see where this takes us.
Most people who come here do so for money. For a job. For a better way of life for themselves or their families. The lucky ones, I suppose, get to bring their families with them. They are certainly in the minority. Most of the people who live here are foreigners; about 85 percent. The idea for so many is to leave their small villages to come here and work very hard and live very frugally and send home as much money as they can. It is not an exaggeration to say that entire towns and villages in the subcontinent are supported by those who work in the Gulf.
We run lots of stories about this. How there are more than 300,000 Filipinos here legally, and another 200,000 maybe not-so-legally.
Sixty percent of them are skilled or professional workers, 25 percent are in the service sector and 15 percent are household workers. Our taxi driver and our housekeeper are Filipino.
Works from the subcontinent, though, outnumber all the others. And as bad as their jobs may seem to me, with bad pay and worse conditions, these jobs are better than what they can find at home. And this is something I try to keep in mind. I am far from my friends and family, much the same as they are. But I have Paul with me. And we have a small home, but we are not living six to a bedroom, or 24 to an apartment. The weather here is miserable nine months of the year, but we work in an air-conditioned office. We, too, are trying to save our salaries and send money home. But not like some of these workers.
It is not unusual for an immigrant worker to make around 2000-4000 ($544-1088) dirhams a month. And to send home all but 200 dirhams. We plan to stay for maybe 18 months. These workers plan to stay for many years. To stay long enough to put their children -- whom they rarely see -- through school. To feed their families. To build a home for when they must go back; one big enough for several generations. To provide dowries for their sisters. And when you consider that making $500 a month working six (or seven) days a week with one month off every two years is better than what you can do in your home country, you've got to wonder about the conditions in those home countries.
So this is its own land of opportunity. People come here for their own little slice of the economic pie, no matter how small. And we are all the same, but all different. I try to remember this every day, and I don't always succeed. I try to be grateful for this opportunity and for my good fortune.
It's probably not a bad way to start the year.
(To be continued)
In the last few hours alone I've thought about young people who live in the UAE, Indian food, the lifestyles of people here who work very hard and where I might like to vacation. I'm sure I've covered Indian food (and have I mentioned how much I like it?? How and I can't imagine tiring of it?? Oh, yeah. I have). And nobody but me cares where I'd like to go on vacation. So that leaves me to dwell on the other two topics.
In a sense, they're related. So let's see where this takes us.
Most people who come here do so for money. For a job. For a better way of life for themselves or their families. The lucky ones, I suppose, get to bring their families with them. They are certainly in the minority. Most of the people who live here are foreigners; about 85 percent. The idea for so many is to leave their small villages to come here and work very hard and live very frugally and send home as much money as they can. It is not an exaggeration to say that entire towns and villages in the subcontinent are supported by those who work in the Gulf.
We run lots of stories about this. How there are more than 300,000 Filipinos here legally, and another 200,000 maybe not-so-legally.
Sixty percent of them are skilled or professional workers, 25 percent are in the service sector and 15 percent are household workers. Our taxi driver and our housekeeper are Filipino.Works from the subcontinent, though, outnumber all the others. And as bad as their jobs may seem to me, with bad pay and worse conditions, these jobs are better than what they can find at home. And this is something I try to keep in mind. I am far from my friends and family, much the same as they are. But I have Paul with me. And we have a small home, but we are not living six to a bedroom, or 24 to an apartment. The weather here is miserable nine months of the year, but we work in an air-conditioned office. We, too, are trying to save our salaries and send money home. But not like some of these workers.
It is not unusual for an immigrant worker to make around 2000-4000 ($544-1088) dirhams a month. And to send home all but 200 dirhams. We plan to stay for maybe 18 months. These workers plan to stay for many years. To stay long enough to put their children -- whom they rarely see -- through school. To feed their families. To build a home for when they must go back; one big enough for several generations. To provide dowries for their sisters. And when you consider that making $500 a month working six (or seven) days a week with one month off every two years is better than what you can do in your home country, you've got to wonder about the conditions in those home countries.
So this is its own land of opportunity. People come here for their own little slice of the economic pie, no matter how small. And we are all the same, but all different. I try to remember this every day, and I don't always succeed. I try to be grateful for this opportunity and for my good fortune.
It's probably not a bad way to start the year.
(To be continued)
December 23, 2009
Trying to Get Legal
This is a country that has lots of rules, in terms of personal behavior, and few rules in terms of safety.
I cannot buy alcohol in a shop without a license and to get that license I need a letter of permission from my employer. The same holds true if I want to, say, get a driver's license. Or change jobs.
On the other hand, apparently I am free to let my child ride in the front seat of the car, standing up against the dashboard. Or to let said child hang half-way out the window or stand up through the sun roof. Forget about car seats; I've never seen one here.
The regulations for building safety here also are few and far between, although the government is making some headway there. In its efforts to be business-friendly, the country is quite worker unfriendly.
But I digress and that's a whole other post. This is about me trying to get some booze for the holidays.
A colleague told us during Thanksgiving that he'd found an easier path to getting an alcohol license. One still needed three photos, a copy of the visa and passport, an employment contract and a "letter of no objection" from one's employer. But instead of driving all the way out to Khalifa City, the license could be obtained at a Western-style grocery store.
This was good news. In early December I asked the newsroom manager for my letter and I figured I'd get around to the store sooner rather than later. She produced it within a few days and it was valid for a month.
Today I had a doctor's appointment nearby the grocery store and could run both errands in the same outing.
But. (And there's always a but here)
It turns out that the grocery no longer provides this service to its customers. I seem to remember hearing that at Christmas-time something happens. I'm not sure if the government steps in and says, "Whoa!" or if the owners of the market don't like the volume, or if it draws too much attention to them and they've been doing it sort of surreptitiously .... Regardless, on this day, they were not providing the licensing service. I needed to go out to Khalifa City police station, the clerk said, and handed me a form.
Khalifa City is a good 25k from my home, and I was a good 10k farther away at that moment. The clerk was encouraging, telling me it wouldn't take long to get the license this way -- same-day service, apparently, as opposed to going through the grocery which might take a week. And they were open till 3 p.m. she said, so I could get there in plenty of time
That, as you may have deduced, is the key part of this discussion.
So I manage to get a cab with few hassles. Good start. He is willing to take me to Khalifa City, and more importantly, willing to wait there for me while I get the license. Khalifa City is a suburb of Abu Dhabi. It's off the island, and is a collection of large villas that cater to Western expats. (Or, as my taxi driver none-too-subtly suggested, only white people live there). But it has few amenities, in terms of shops and restaurants and there are almost no taxis available. While we are in a residential neighborhood now, we are not really in the suburbs.
Anyway, the taxi driver says he'll wait for me, and suggests that I check all my documents and fill out the form before I arrive. As I'm doing so, I realize I don't have the necessary photos. Everything here requires photos, and I spent the better part of an afternoon yesterday trying to get them. It's not that it's difficult, it's that the shops that provide them close from 1-5 and I never seem to remember this.
Again we encounter the time-frame issue.
The taxi takes me past my house, I pick up the photos and some extra documentation, just in case, and off we go out to the boonies. Past the lovely Grand Mosque, past the new sports stadium and almost to the airport.
I get there, the taxi parks, I go in and find plenty of people sitting around doing nothing ... except for the person who handles the alcohol license. That person, clearly, has gone home. Or gone somewhere. Too bad, the Emirati behind the counter sings to me. Closed! I say, but I thought you were open until 3? Now it is only 1. I admit that I kind of beg. Are you sure? Really, I was told 3, I say. Come back in the morning he says. I ask him to check my documents; I don't want to come back a third time. He waves me off to another colleague, who only says to me that she doesn't handle the licenses, come back tomorrow. They both vaguely wave to a third colleague who is praying in the corner.
(Yes, I see the look on all your faces )
I wait for him to stop praying. You're not supposed to watch people pray. It's considered rude. So I sit down so as not to be so obvious. He sees me out of the corner of his eye when he gets up, but tries to avoid me. I call out to him and ask him to look at my documents. He clearly speaks very little English. He hands me a form. I tell him I already have the form. I ask him to look at my documents, please, to see if I have everything. He says come back tomorrow in the morning.
Dejected, I leave and the taxi driver is surprised to see me so quickly. Finished already he asks? No, I say. They're closed. At 1. He feels bad. Where to, he asks? Home, I say.
We chat a bit in the car. He tells me where I can buy alcohol without a license. He likes to drink a little, he says. Whiskey with his friends on his day off. He asks me how the license is supposed to work. I know that he cannot afford to buy alcohol in the hotel bars and restaurants. I don't need a license, necessarily, but it will be good to have. He gives me his phone number so I can call him in the morning, if I want to go back.
When I get home, I realize we have driven nearly 70km. In a town this size, that's a lot. The taxi bill is ridiculously high by local standards. Just under $30 with a tip. My daily trip to work costs $2.70, including a very large tip.
And I still have nothing to drink.
I cannot buy alcohol in a shop without a license and to get that license I need a letter of permission from my employer. The same holds true if I want to, say, get a driver's license. Or change jobs.
On the other hand, apparently I am free to let my child ride in the front seat of the car, standing up against the dashboard. Or to let said child hang half-way out the window or stand up through the sun roof. Forget about car seats; I've never seen one here.
The regulations for building safety here also are few and far between, although the government is making some headway there. In its efforts to be business-friendly, the country is quite worker unfriendly.
But I digress and that's a whole other post. This is about me trying to get some booze for the holidays.
A colleague told us during Thanksgiving that he'd found an easier path to getting an alcohol license. One still needed three photos, a copy of the visa and passport, an employment contract and a "letter of no objection" from one's employer. But instead of driving all the way out to Khalifa City, the license could be obtained at a Western-style grocery store.
This was good news. In early December I asked the newsroom manager for my letter and I figured I'd get around to the store sooner rather than later. She produced it within a few days and it was valid for a month.
Today I had a doctor's appointment nearby the grocery store and could run both errands in the same outing.
But. (And there's always a but here)
It turns out that the grocery no longer provides this service to its customers. I seem to remember hearing that at Christmas-time something happens. I'm not sure if the government steps in and says, "Whoa!" or if the owners of the market don't like the volume, or if it draws too much attention to them and they've been doing it sort of surreptitiously .... Regardless, on this day, they were not providing the licensing service. I needed to go out to Khalifa City police station, the clerk said, and handed me a form.
Khalifa City is a good 25k from my home, and I was a good 10k farther away at that moment. The clerk was encouraging, telling me it wouldn't take long to get the license this way -- same-day service, apparently, as opposed to going through the grocery which might take a week. And they were open till 3 p.m. she said, so I could get there in plenty of time
That, as you may have deduced, is the key part of this discussion.
So I manage to get a cab with few hassles. Good start. He is willing to take me to Khalifa City, and more importantly, willing to wait there for me while I get the license. Khalifa City is a suburb of Abu Dhabi. It's off the island, and is a collection of large villas that cater to Western expats. (Or, as my taxi driver none-too-subtly suggested, only white people live there). But it has few amenities, in terms of shops and restaurants and there are almost no taxis available. While we are in a residential neighborhood now, we are not really in the suburbs.
Anyway, the taxi driver says he'll wait for me, and suggests that I check all my documents and fill out the form before I arrive. As I'm doing so, I realize I don't have the necessary photos. Everything here requires photos, and I spent the better part of an afternoon yesterday trying to get them. It's not that it's difficult, it's that the shops that provide them close from 1-5 and I never seem to remember this.
Again we encounter the time-frame issue.
The taxi takes me past my house, I pick up the photos and some extra documentation, just in case, and off we go out to the boonies. Past the lovely Grand Mosque, past the new sports stadium and almost to the airport.
I get there, the taxi parks, I go in and find plenty of people sitting around doing nothing ... except for the person who handles the alcohol license. That person, clearly, has gone home. Or gone somewhere. Too bad, the Emirati behind the counter sings to me. Closed! I say, but I thought you were open until 3? Now it is only 1. I admit that I kind of beg. Are you sure? Really, I was told 3, I say. Come back in the morning he says. I ask him to check my documents; I don't want to come back a third time. He waves me off to another colleague, who only says to me that she doesn't handle the licenses, come back tomorrow. They both vaguely wave to a third colleague who is praying in the corner.
(Yes, I see the look on all your faces )
I wait for him to stop praying. You're not supposed to watch people pray. It's considered rude. So I sit down so as not to be so obvious. He sees me out of the corner of his eye when he gets up, but tries to avoid me. I call out to him and ask him to look at my documents. He clearly speaks very little English. He hands me a form. I tell him I already have the form. I ask him to look at my documents, please, to see if I have everything. He says come back tomorrow in the morning.
Dejected, I leave and the taxi driver is surprised to see me so quickly. Finished already he asks? No, I say. They're closed. At 1. He feels bad. Where to, he asks? Home, I say.
We chat a bit in the car. He tells me where I can buy alcohol without a license. He likes to drink a little, he says. Whiskey with his friends on his day off. He asks me how the license is supposed to work. I know that he cannot afford to buy alcohol in the hotel bars and restaurants. I don't need a license, necessarily, but it will be good to have. He gives me his phone number so I can call him in the morning, if I want to go back.
When I get home, I realize we have driven nearly 70km. In a town this size, that's a lot. The taxi bill is ridiculously high by local standards. Just under $30 with a tip. My daily trip to work costs $2.70, including a very large tip.
And I still have nothing to drink.
December 20, 2009
Listening For the Call
The call to prayer is a fact of life here in Abu Dhabi. It is broadcast five times a day.
I like it, for the most part. It gives me an idea of the time (dawn, mid-day, afternoon, sunset, night) and it is a pleasant melody. It reminds me of a cantor chanting in a synagogue, oddly enough.
The call here seems different than in other Muslim countries I've visited. My recollections of Marrakech and Cairo are that the recordings are high-pitched and scratchy. Not at all pleasant.
Here, there is a mosque approximately every 300 meters -- at least one in every residential block -- so it is unusual to be out of range of the call. A person is not expected to cross a major street to get to the mosque. And if you have to go five times a day, it needs to be convenient.
(Let's leave aside for the time being the question of how anyone gets any work done ...)
At the newspaper, there is a mosque down the street, and a special mosque for workers of our company (not unusual). The speaker is right outside the entrance where I sit, so I hear it all the time. I'm often surprised to hear it, as in "Huh, it's already 7 p.m.?"
Our new apartment is about 150 meters from the mosque in our block of villas, and the sound bounces around our little patio. Our apartment is U-shaped, with the patio between the two sides. We keep the windows open this time of year, and the call to prayer is really the only thing we hear outside of the chirping birds and the hum of traffic from a nearby major road.
But I didn't expect to hear it quite so loudly in the morning. when we were at the hotel, we could hear it through the double-paned glass, and I only heard the noon-time call. Paul would know he had stayed up too late if he heard the morning call.
For the last few days, I have been woken by the call at dawn. It startles me, and incorporates itself into my dreams. Clearly, I'm not sleeping very well if it's waking me. I suppose it's a better way to be woken than having a cat poke me in the nose. It's slightly more subtle.
And I always know what time it is.
I like it, for the most part. It gives me an idea of the time (dawn, mid-day, afternoon, sunset, night) and it is a pleasant melody. It reminds me of a cantor chanting in a synagogue, oddly enough.
The call here seems different than in other Muslim countries I've visited. My recollections of Marrakech and Cairo are that the recordings are high-pitched and scratchy. Not at all pleasant.
Here, there is a mosque approximately every 300 meters -- at least one in every residential block -- so it is unusual to be out of range of the call. A person is not expected to cross a major street to get to the mosque. And if you have to go five times a day, it needs to be convenient.
(Let's leave aside for the time being the question of how anyone gets any work done ...)
At the newspaper, there is a mosque down the street, and a special mosque for workers of our company (not unusual). The speaker is right outside the entrance where I sit, so I hear it all the time. I'm often surprised to hear it, as in "Huh, it's already 7 p.m.?"
Our new apartment is about 150 meters from the mosque in our block of villas, and the sound bounces around our little patio. Our apartment is U-shaped, with the patio between the two sides. We keep the windows open this time of year, and the call to prayer is really the only thing we hear outside of the chirping birds and the hum of traffic from a nearby major road.
But I didn't expect to hear it quite so loudly in the morning. when we were at the hotel, we could hear it through the double-paned glass, and I only heard the noon-time call. Paul would know he had stayed up too late if he heard the morning call.
For the last few days, I have been woken by the call at dawn. It startles me, and incorporates itself into my dreams. Clearly, I'm not sleeping very well if it's waking me. I suppose it's a better way to be woken than having a cat poke me in the nose. It's slightly more subtle.
And I always know what time it is.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
