First-time airline, inaugural flight
I have always heard good things about Emirates Airlines,
even arranged dozens of flights for friends and colleagues on this airline, but
have never actually flown it myself.
That changed two days ago, when exercising my loyalty to low prices
rather than to any particular airline, I found a really good price for a
round-trip itinerary to Uganda with Emirates Airlines. Even better, I decided to fly out of Newark
NJ, rather than my usual JFK, since that saved another couple of hundred
dollars. I did not realize that my June
1st 11:50am flight from Newark was an inaugural flight for Emirates
from this airport, adding to the nightly flight – that might explain the good
price.
The check-in process went smoothly despite the fact that my
three large piece of luggage probably went over the limits both in weight and
dimensions – I had already paid online for the excess piece (beyond the two
free allowed) and therefore saved 20%.
The boarding process was also painless since we boarded by zones. I had
picked one of the back seats (near the kitchen and bathroom obvious reasons),
after all it was a 13-hour flight!
A cosmopolitan crew
I knew I was in for a treat when the captain came on PA
system and introduced himself as being Jamaican with the accent to match; his first
officers were from Spain and I believe France.
There were a couple others in the cockpit, including one Emirati among
those who wear three or four bars on their shoulders. I was surprised at how cosmopolitan the crew,
both within the cockpit and outside were.
Our stewardesses came from all the continents, including Chinese, Indian
and Filipino ladies, and South Africans.
Most national airlines seem to recruit primarily from their own
population – but apparently, not Emirates.
Delayed flight, missed connection
A few hours into the flight I realized that I would not make
my connection to Entebbe, since we left Newark a little late – perhaps due to
teething problems for an inaugural flight; also I had a short connection in
Dubai. But I decided that I would cross
that bridge when I got to Dubai, and simply enjoyed my flight, praying and
sleeping, eating and drinking, enjoying the state of the art entertainment
system.
A guest of Emirates Airlines
On arrival in Dubai, Emirates personnel were waiting for us
late passengers with new flight arrangements.
These arrangements included a rebooked flight (for me the next day),
hotel reservations, vouchers for three meals and instructions on getting a
visa. There was after all a silver
lining to this missed flight. Now I had
24 hours in Dubai, to rest, eat (as a guest of the Emirates Airlines) and for a
small fee take a tour of the city. And
take this opportunity, I did.
Where the heck is Dubai?
Did you know that Dubai is just one of the seven emirates
(states) which make the United Arab Emirates (UAE)? Dubai’s monarch is also the vice-president
and prime-minister of the UAE, since it is the second largest emirate, the
largest and most important being Abu Dhabi, whose leader also serves as the
President of the country.
I remember losing a bet (a fountain pen) to a classmate during
the 1986 world cup, because I picked the UAE over West Germany; I thought that
UAE was a combination of all the Arab countries and would therefore
mathematically stand a better chance against half a country – the western half. Clearly I was ignorant, both geographically and
historically. My 24-hour break more than
made up for my lost bet.
Modern city
Although oil has a played a large part in its economic
development, Dubai also prides itself with being a commercial hub and having
great real estate. In fact, we spent
most of our tour driving past dozens of hotels (they are about 300 in the city),
most of them five-star hotels, as well as other architecturally impressive
structures, such as the tallest building the Burj Khalifa, the man-made island
and its Atlantis hotel, the Blue mosque (a replica of the Hagia Sofia in
Istanbul). We also drove by the souqs
(markets), the great big Mall, the fountain that put on a five-minute show with
lights and all at dusk, the King’s palace and the many palaces in the
neighbourhoods, most of them occupied by single families. There are even palaces just for the royal
family with private beaches to match. We
spent a few minutes at the beach, where I was surprised to see bikini-clad
women freely enjoying themselves in the water, despite the UAE being nearly
100% Islamic.
Religious compromises
Speaking of Islamic/Arabic practices, Dubai seems to allow a variety of options.- Some women wore the so-called Islamic veil in all its various formats, but others did not, just wearing dresses, trousers, skirts, what you would find any woman wearing on the streets of New York City.
- My visit happened to occur during the month of Ramadan, when Muslims fast; and fast indeed most of them seemed to be doing. In fact, at the hotel, the restaurant was cordoned off and the glass doors covered over with a curtain, for us non-Muslims to enjoy our sumptuous buffet without tempting those who were fasting, until iftar (the break-fast) at sundown. And during the tour, our tour-guide asked us not to drink water outside the bus, out of consideration for those who were fasting. I thought both requests were a reasonable balance that satisfied all parties.
- Our tour guide told us that although the UAE is majority Muslim, other religions are practiced, including Catholicism, Hinduism and Sikhism, the principal religions of the UAE’s large immigrant population. And so I went to www.masstimes.org to see if there were any Catholic churches and indeed there are four in UAE under the Vicariate Apostolic (Diocese-like circumscription) of Southern Arabia, which besides the UAE includes the countries of Oman and Yemen. In the UAE itself, it seems there are three Catholic parishes, one in Abu Dhabi, another in Al Ain and one in Sharjah, very close to Dubai. Their mass schedule does not look anything like mass schedules in Western countries, since the immigrant workers can only pray early before work or late after work, as well as probably not being able to be have Sunday off, since it is not a holiday, and so must pray on Friday the Muslim day of prayer.
Of course the political tensions of the area are never far
from the surface. As we flew over Asia, I noticed that the flight path of our
aircraft was avoiding the airspace of Iran (a non-Arab country – Persian),
faithfully staying on the Iraqi side of the border.
One race, one people
And so, my missed connection after all turned out to be a
blessing in disguise, since it broadened my horizons about the world, and
especially about this part of the world.
Most of all, I especially appreciated meeting all kinds of people besides
the Americans with whom I flew from Newark.
I met a Chinese young lady on her way back from home to Buenos Aires
(which I continually confused with Rio de Janeiro), where she is a
Spanish-Chinese translator – since I did not speak Chinese and she did not
speak Ateso, my native-tongue, we spoke a bit of English and Spanish. Our tour guide was from the Indian
sub-continent, but spoke English wish such clarity and had such a knowledge of
Dubai that attend to our experience of the city; he knew, by heart, the dates
on which different hotels were opened and different events happened. Then there was the Emirati carpet shopkeeper,
who not only spoke English to the whole tour group, but Mandarin with the three
Chinese tourists in our group, and Arabic with the Iraqi man in our group. At the airport duty-free shop, as I was
debating on how many bottles of port wine and amaretto to buy, the Kenyan shop attendant
went to consult with a Ugandan colleague about the Customs allowance in Uganda and
gladly told me that I could take two bottles – much to the delight of family
and friends when I got home.
Finally, there was the gentleman travelling from a
conference in London with a young man who had some mental and physical
challenges; I noticed that he seemed lost; even the uniformed personnel did not
seem to be able to help him. When I
approached to offer help, he told me he was looking for Gate C26 – when I tried
to find it, there seemed to be no Gate 26.
Then I asked to see his boarding pass –there was no gate number on
it. But then I read the destination; it
was Entebbe, my same destination. So, I
told them to follow me, I loaded their back-packs onto my cart and we made our
way to Gate C6, and onwards to Uganda.
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