Fourteen in Dubai: July 2006

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

I've taken a break from blogging for a while due to my chicken pox. I had fever and weakness so I couldn't get around to blog. Anyway now I'm a little better. The fever's gone. The spots are still there and they are terrible but I'm sure they'll go in a few days. I keep thinking about what I'll do when my pox marks go. I just want to go outside and walk around and celebrate the freedom. It'll be great to not smell of Calamine lotion again.

I'm watching loads of TV and movies. Yesterday I saw a show called "Shabaash India". Its basically about these people who can do crazy stunts. I saw one guy put seven (yes, seven) swords into his mouth, down his throat, and then take them out. It was pretty scary when he put them in.

I did take a "neem bath". Basically a couple of neem leaves crushed were mixed in water and these were pored over my spots. It was very very very soothing. After that I immediately fell asleep. I've learnt now to respect the amazing healing properties of Neem. My biology textbook really didn't specify exactly how medicinal Neem was. At least now I know.

Well thats all for now. Will blog later.

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Chicken Pox... oh my!

Today morning while having my bath I first saw them... these small spots all over body. My mom knew immediately I had chicken pox. Great. The doc said I'll be down for 10 days. So now I'm in quarantine in my room, with nothing to do except wait it out. That really messed up our holiday plans. We were planning to go to America on the 24th. Now we'll have to delay that. We had drawn up an itinerary from New York to Toronto to Calgary in Canada. Now we'll be going a little late to NYC and cancel out some of the pretty places we were going to stay at on the way to Toronto. Hopefully I'll be alright and ready to travel soon.

Anyone knows any home-remedies for chicken pox? Right now my grandparents are suggesting having baths with Neem leaves in the water, and keeping Neem leaves near my bed. Someone even suggested sleeping with neem leaves all over my bed but my parents assured me they would not do anything that drastic and sleeping with Neem leaves all over my bed was not medecinal. Quite frankly I'm alright with just applying the anti-ich cream the neem-free doctor prescribed.

Well, at least now I'll have a lot of time stuck in my room to finish my holiday projects! I kept delaying doing the projects. Guess God found a way to force me to do them.

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

World's Easiest Quiz

I fell sick yesterday. In the afternoon I suddenly started feeling really cold and now I'm down with fever. Tomorrow probably I'll go to the doctor. Coincidentaly tomorrow I've a dental appointment also, in the same clinic. Hopefully I'll get OK fast. I'm just feeling really weak and cold but I don't have a cough or nausea.

Here's something to keep you entertained:

The World's Easiest Quiz- (Answers are at the bottom, don't cheat!)

1) How long did the Hundred Years War last?
2) Which country makes Panama hats?
3) From which animal do we get catgut?
4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?
5) What is a camel's hair brush made of?
6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal?
7) What was King George VI's first name?
8) What colour is a purple finch?
9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from?
10) What is the colour of the black box in a commercial aeroplane?

All done? Check your answers below:

ANSWERS TO THE QUIZ
--------------------------------
1) How long did the Hundred Years War last?
*116 years
2) Which country makes Panama hats?
*Ecuador
3) From which animal do we get cat gut?
*Sheep and Horses
4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?
*November
5) What is a camel's hair brush made of?
*Squirrel fur
6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal?
*Dogs
7) What was King George VI's first name?
*Albert
8) What colour is a purple finch?
*Crimson
9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from?
*New Zealand
10) What is the colour of the black box in a commercial aeroplane?
*Orange, of course.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Note the worried expression of the man by the door.

This just highlights the ridiculous obsession of TV serials in India. And they are really quite stupid (fights between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law). What surprises me most is the TV is still working! Pehla doesn't work properly even after paying the money.

Sunday, July 09, 2006

Food Fest

There's a nice 'Food Fest' at Lamcy Plaza for kids from 7:00 to 9:00 pm until 12th August. I won a couple of Luna products. They started off with some games for kids (stack up the Luna Cream cans), then there was a ice-cream eating competition. I really wanted to participate but unfortunately that bit of the show was only for adults. The people who took part were horrendous. They all ate so slowly it was like as if the slowest one would be the winner. They were given each a pint of Baskin Robbins ice-cream to finish. Two men and a lady took part.

The first man cleaned his mouth with tissue paper after every bite, and then took a sip of water. I almost wanted to yell at him , "IT'S A RACE!!!! What the hell are you doing??" The lady was even worse. After seven or eight spoonfuls (and they were those small plastic spoons) she kinda just gave up. Atleast she could have given the remaining ice-cream to someone in the audience. The other man ate it 'till the end, but he took three whole minutes. I would have gulped down the whole ice-cream in under 40-seconds.

Then there was a quiz... I got an audience question right (Total estimated age of the earth- 4.6 Billion years) and won a couple of small packets of some Luna product... forgot what it was. After that there was a competition for kids in which you had to gulp down a 500 ml bottle of water with a straw and then fill it up with some beans.

On a different note, I changed my blog layout today. Hope its nice. Any suggestions you can drop me an email or comment.

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Dubai Wikipedia Article

I was browsing through various Wikipedia articles for a school project and I came across the article on Dubai. It started with some basic information (flag, location etc;) and a brief history. But their is a special article on Human Rights and Labour. It had a account of the miserable conditions of the laborers in Dubai:

"...workers "typically live eight to a room, sending home a portion of their salary to their families, whom they don't see for years at a time." Others report that their salary has been withheld to pay back loans, making them little more than indentured servants."

Also:

"The BBC has reported that "local newspapers often carry stories of construction workers allegedly not being paid for months on end. They are not allowed to move jobs and if they leave the country to go home they will almost certainly lose the money they say they are owed. The names of the construction companies concerned are not published in the newspapers for fear of offending the often powerful individuals who own them."

Well lets hope Etisalat doesn't block Wikipedia for this article. There is more in the article. Just click here and scroll down to the bit about "Human rights and labour".

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Justice is blind...

... at least in Dubai. It can feel money and nationality though.

Music producer Austin Dallas proudly carried cocaine into the country, waved it in front of Dubai Police, and left, without any kind of punishment. Wonderful.

What is the point of having a court in Dubai anyway? "Dubai Courts" should be renamed as "Bank of Justice". Deposit some money and get justice as interest.

I remember an incident when I was nine and living in Karama.

I had a group of friends who I used to play with downstairs between two buildings and their parking lots. The guard/cleaner of one used to hate for God knows what reason (we used to not shout, play with balls or jump on cars... the Arab kids used to do that). He kept trying to scare us away. We asked our parents to talk to the fat GCC guy but he was so thick-skinned he would just grunt in return. One day I was playing with my friend A. and some other kids when he came to shoo us away. A.'s mom (who was pregnant for eight months) was there and she tried to argue with him. The man became very aggressive and started to push her roughly with his hand. She called for her husband who came running out of nowhere and pulled the GCC guy away. There they had a big physical fight 'till some passers-by pulled them apart and called the police.

The Police came and listened to A.'s father's story and were getting ready to arrest the GCC guy when one of his GCC friends came to help him. There those two GCC guys took the Arab policeman aside and had a long chat in Arabic. After ten minutes the policeman gave A's father a warning, said bye bye to the GCC guy and left.

After this incident my mom stopped having me go down to play so often near the GCC guy. What wonderful justice. First assault a pregnant woman, then fight with her husband, then have a friendly chat with a policeman and go back to your house. Justice has been served.

Tuesday, July 04, 2006

I won the draw, but...

Pepsi is having a promotion... every can/ bottle you buy you get a number under the cap. SMS that number to 4404 and enter a draw to win a gazilion different things. So I entered the draw... and won. Nothing much though, just a "normal football signed by Pepsi Stars" according to the SMS. This is what the said:

You won! Please visit your nearest Pepsi redemption center to collect a normal footbal signed by Pepsi Stars. Password is .

All this is very nice, but where in the world is the redemption center??? The SMS came from 4404, without any number to call/ website to visit and find out where to redeem the prize. Does anyone know where the redemption center is?

Monday, July 03, 2006

They insult us...

Today I came across a really funny article in Gulf News (Page 10) - "They insult us in freedom's name" (by Ayesha Sultan, a UAE columnist). It was basically a report on how the English newspapers in the UAE "insult" UAE nationals by carrying provocative reports and letters in their pages against the nationals. Just a few quotes from the article:

"Recently, an English language newspaper published letters from their readers that carried comments against the policies of the Labour Minister Dr Ali Bin Abdullah Al Ka'abi with reference to his latest decisions concerning the emiratisation of human resources and personnel managers and secretaries in the private sector."

"The newspaper has encouraged its expatriate readers to dare the country's laws and citizens, implying that it is not the UAE's right to issue such rules."

No, it was simply implying that the expatriates (which make up more than 70% of the total population) should have at least a small say in the matter.

"Even worse, it carried letters that insulted UAE nationals and referred to them as the 4-wheel drive citizens ? !"

How terrible... they missed out the bit about the blacked-out BMWs, Mercedes' and Bentleys.

"In a letter, a reader said the UAE citizens cannot work in such positions or handle their jobs properly because they are lazy and cannot shoulder the responsibility and work around difficulties."

Right on! That is sooo true I would bet my Visa on it!

"This has gone too far and reached unbearable limits. Therefore, I believe a high-level official resolution must be issued to prevent the audacity of such newspapers."

That isn't already happening? It's called 'censoring' in English. Perhaps that should ring some bells.

"Foreign workers are treated with respect and nicely as long as they do not cause any harm to the country and its standard policies."

Yeah well, what can we do if EXISTING is causing harm to the country and its standard policies.

"Strangers should always be polite and this is the dominant golden rule followed everywhere in the world."

Oh, so now we're strangers? Who built your country while you were watching the World Cup over some Shisha?

The article can also be found here.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Arabic- Oh what a pain!

I really wish I was born just 3 or 4 years early. That way I wouldn't be studying Arabic now and would have finished it in Grade 8. Now they have made it compulsory 'till Grade 10 and optional 'till Grade 12 (an option not worth taking).

Arabic education is really terrible. It is taught very poorly. Despite learning the subject for 9 years, the taxi drivers can speak better Arabic than us, and they have not gone for Arabic classes at all. Before Grade 9, we used to have 4-5 classes a week for Arabic. This year, we'll have only 2 classes, and more amount of portion to cover. Its been disastrous. Half the class failed. I passed quite miraculously. And its a compulsory subject (you have to pass if you want to go to the next class).

This year, they asked us to write two compositions in the exam- none of which we had learned before. We have never done a composition in Arabic without memorizing it beforehand. They asked us to translate sentences from English to Arabic, make sentences and questions we didn't know the meaning of.

Most boys in my class cannot say "the bird is sitting on the tree" in Arabic, and they expect us to write compositions. Futhermore the GCC teachers are horrible. Ours can't speak English AT ALL (he talks to us in Hindi, that too broken up but better than the English). In my last school we had female Arabic teachers who used to hit you with a steel scale (my, my, I wonder whatever happened to that Ministry rule).

And as if that wasn't enough, we got a picture composition without the picture in our exam this term! It was quite funny, The questions went like this:

Where is the bird? What is she doing? Where is the bird now? What is the boy doing?

*Note: They didn't correct that mistake and all of us lost 5 marks on that question. Its all our fault, of course. We should have memorized the pictures in our textbook.

I hope the Ministry sees the plight of us students and gives us some better teachers. 'Till then, I pray that I pass next term and they don't introduce some other ridiculous rule making the subject compulsory for Grade 11&12 also.