Welcome to Dubai (The Traveler) (6 page)

“Welcome to the Hilton in Dubai.”

Gary felt weird. It was his first trip overseas alone, and without his mother or his best friend around. He had not traveled outside of the U.S. since his mother was kidnapped and killed and his best friend murdered. He still missed them both, dearly.

Gary took a deep breath as he headed toward the registration desk inside of the hotel.

There’s no turning back now,
he thought.
It’s time for me to grow up.

Chapter 5

Ten days had passed since the tragic accident at the hotel construction site on the far west side of Dubai. The building inspectors had turned in their reports, the UAE police officers had turned in theirs, and the family of the deceased back home in Pune, India, had agreed to accept an offering of twelve years in wages for the loss of their productive husband and father. The rapid construction of Dubai continued.

Abdul was in his office on the twenty-seventh floor of his building when he was paid a late-afternoon visit by the UAE building commissioner. The calm, experienced and gray-haired official sat across from Abdul’s ornate desk in a comfortable chair, wearing a fine-tailored suit. He spoke slow and deliberately, with his hands folded in front of his chin, right under his thick, gray mustache.

“Abdul, we must all learn to reevaluate the speed and caution that it takes to complete these buildings. In our haste to finish them all so rapidly, we have put far too many men in unnecessary danger, particularly with so many inexperienced workers.”

Abdul responded respectfully from across his desk, “We cannot prevent all accidents. There are a lot of people on a construction site and an accident can happen to anyone.”

“Yes, but these accidents and rumblings from immigrant workers will only continue to increase if we do not proceed with more prudence,” the commissioner countered. “I fear that you younger developers, in your love for Western capitalism, have pushed construction to the point of breaking. But these are
humans
and not machines. So I have held on to this position, well past my time, so I can continue to negotiate better practices, not only for the commercial buildings of Dubai, but for all of the new construction of the United Arab Emirates, including new residential housing.”

Abdul was well aware that there had been constant reports of faulty apartment buildings for low-income workers and families who lived in and around the poorer districts of their wealthy nation. He also realized that the commissioner was approaching ninety years old, and that new and younger commissioners might not be as tactful or as responsible as he had been for more than thirty years.

Abdul was not even born in the early era of Middle Eastern development, where the commissioner had first made his mark. He had learned much about building from Europeans and Westerners himself. So Abdul respected the man immensely. The commissioner held an expansive wealth of knowledge.

Abdul nodded. “Yes, I understand.” And he thought again of his outspoken wife’s plea to slow down.

The commissioner added,
“En sha Allah,
we will arrive where we ultimately want to go, as one of the greatest nations on earth. But we must understand, as great as the pyramids are in Egypt, none of them were built overnight.”

There was nothing more that Abdul could argue. The commissioner had made himself perfectly clear, so all that was left to do was offer him an evening meal.

Abdul bowed in his chair as a show of respect. “May Allah be Merciful of my bad judgment and hear my blessings for His forgiveness.”

The commissioner smiled. “I’m sure He will. Allah is the Magnificent. We are able to do all through His blessings.”

Abdul stood from his desk chair and asked, “Would you allow me to invite you to dinner this evening?”

The commissioner stood gingerly from his own chair and extended his old hand. “I would love to, but my grandson has chosen his first wife, and we are going to eat with her family tonight.”

“Ahhh, Merciful Allah!” Abdul cheered him. “How old is he?”

“He is twenty-one, and far too young,” the commissioner joked and laughed.

Abdul kissed his hand and showed him to the door, where the commissioner’s own security team awaited.

“Give my blessings to your feisty wife,” the commissioner continued to joke to Abdul. It had become common knowledge that the young real estate developer had chosen an overzealous woman who loved to speak in any setting.

Abdul laughed it off. “And you give my blessings to yours.”

When he closed his office door behind him, Abdul continued to think about his wife. He had watched the interview that she had given the day of the accident, and he had agreed that it was good. She was much better with her words than he was, but her excellence did nothing to improve his image amongst other Muslim men.

In Western society, Hamda would have been a fabulous asset, professionally as well as a wife. But in the Muslim world, he was forced to continue to negotiate how much she could do before it was acceptable.

Or maybe she will be the first to do great things for all women of Dubai,
he mused often. He already realized how much the younger women revered her. Nevertheless, many of the
Emirati
and Muslim men didn’t see it that way. They viewed Hamda as one of Abdul’s many weaknesses. So he remained conflicted about his wife’s strong will and spirit.

He sat back in his chair behind his desk and thought of call ing his wife to announce that he was on his way home, as he had always done. But then he stopped himself and contemplated everything.

Is it possible for me to love my wife too much?
he asked himself.
Maybe it’s time for the balance of a second wife.

But he didn’t want a second wife. He loved Hamda too much to share his time, his heart and his wealth with anyone else. So he picked up the phone and called her anyway.

*****

After the construction site incident, the news of Abdul’s handling had reached the older and more established real estate developers of the UAE, as well as the
Emirati
council. A trio of wise men decided to hold a private meeting to discuss their shared concerns about their country’s most recent obstacles. Sheikh Al Rashid, Sheikh Al Naseem and Abdul’s uncle, Sheikh Al Hassan, all met at the latter’s villa home in the capital city of Abu Dhabi for dinner and dialogue. And in the privacy of Sheikh Al Hassan’s home, they were free to eat and socialize at the large marble dinner table without need to wear their public headdresses.

“How many more buildings in Dubai do we have yet to complete? Five
thousand?”
Sheikh Al Rashid asked the other men. He pulled a piece of bread in half to eat. He was the oldest of the three distinguished council members, but he was the smallest in physical stature.

Sheikh Al Naseem, the youngest and the largest of the three, chuckled at his elder’s exaggeration.

“We don’t have that many. Or at least I don’t believe so,” he commented. “But I do understand what you mean. We have had a lot of overproduction.”

Sheikh Al Rashid became insistent. “We have been overproducing for
years
now. So much, in fact, that we will soon cease from being recognized as an Arabian nation.”

Sheikh Al Hassan smiled and spoke casually. “We are still an Arabian nation, my friend. No amount of immigrant workers or tourists will change that. But you must also remember that we are still a very young nation—less than fifty years old. So we are still establishing ourselves around the world.”

After hearing the younger council members’ comments, Sheikh Al Rashid pounced on them with vigor.

“Yes, and in less than five more years, it will be the youth, like your nephew
Abdul,
who will undo our establishment as a respectable nation through too much
greed,”
he blasted. “We do not need to open up our country to
everyone.
For the Mercy of
Allah,
how much tourism and immigrant workers are enough?”

Sheikh Al Hassan sighed deeply and bit into the white breast of his sesame chicken. His overly ambitious nephew had caused him a lot of heartache and embarrassment through many impulsive decisions. Nevertheless, Abdul had been the only Hassan kin to apply himself through business and enterprise, where Sheikh Al Hassan’s oldest son, Talib Mohammed Hassan, had only managed to waste several opportunities before abandoning the Middle East and moving with his young wife and family to London.

Sheikh Al Rashid continued, “Now I know that Abdul is your favorite nephew, and that he has many talents in business. But his ways are just too—” He stopped and shook his head in search of a word. “They are just not
humane,
or in the honorable methods of Allah. We should not submit people to human sweatshops, like the businesses of China and Southeast Asia. It is an
abomination!”

Sheikh Al Rashid had always been passionate in his words. Maybe it was his older age and his desire to outpoint his younger council members. But the younger men each found it hard to match his ire.

“The ways of international business have always been complicated,” Sheikh Al Hassan responded. “Without thousands of immigrant workers, the best foreign engineers, equipment, finance and urgency, the great cities of Dubai and Abu Dhabi, as we know them today, would have never existed.”

“This I know,” Sheikh Al Rashid admitted. “But if these methods of international business do not adhere to the ways of Allah, then how closely should we follow them?”

Sheikh Al Naseem ate his rice, chicken and salad, while he watched and listened to the two older men as if he were a spectator at a tennis match. After their conclusions, he nodded in concurrence with the elder council member.

“I agree with Sheikh Al Rashid. Even your nephew’s wife, Hamda, has taken on more of a Western woman’s aspiration to speak out in public places and in business affairs. Did you not notice how often she addresses business officials and reporters without first seeking permission to speak? She is setting a bad example for the next generation of Muslim women.”

Sheikh Al Rashid grunted. “She has already done so. And your nephew has not managed to control her.”

Sheikh Al Hassan had been guilty of admiring Abdul’s wife himself. Hamda Sharifa was very impressive. She represented a new wave of Arabian woman, and one who was unafraid to find her voice. Sheikh Al Hassan even viewed her as a strong example of courage and achievement for his own young daughters and grandchildren. So he held his tongue from more slander and decided to defend her ambitions.

“So, what am I to say to my eight daughters and granddaughters if they are not allowed to speak their minds in the twenty-first century?” he responded artfully. “More women are getting educations and qualifying themselves to speak, more so than some of the men who speak out unwisely.”

Sheikh Al Naseem admonished, “You may tell your granddaughters to utilize their education and ambitions to speak out when they are
asked
to do so.”

“And when may I ask is that?” Sheikh Al Hassan countered quickly.

As Sheikh Al Rashid prepared to add his own views to their argument, Sheikh Al Hassan’s youngest daughter, Sara Mumia, entered the room, wearing her covered garb and veil, to inform her father in Arabic that she would be on the way to the library.

He responded in Arabic for his daughter to be careful and to take an escort for security. He also told her to call her mother after she arrived.

“Yes, I will,” she promised her father in English.

As soon as his daughter had left the room for her outing to the royal library of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Al Naseem questioned, “Is that basic respect too much to ask of a wife or a daughter? I believe it is
not.”

Sheikh Al Hassan continued to grin while enjoying his meal. He said, “There will come a time when we will be forced to recognize the value of a woman who is much
more
than just a
wife
or a
daughter.
Like
Aishah,
the Prophet Muhammad’s youngest and most gifted wife, there will be women amongst us who will be destined to rule, whether we are prepared to accept it or not.”

Both Sheikh Al Naseem and Sheikh Al Rashid began to laugh out loud.

Sheikh Al Rashid conceded as much as he devoured his fruit and garden salad with light dressing.

“You are probably right, my friend. But at my old age, I may not be around long enough to see it,” he commented. And the
Emirati
council members shared another laugh.

Chapter 6

The same young reporter who had been fortunate enough to interview the honorable
Emirati
wife Hamda Sharifa Hassan, continued to reflect on an opportunity that could have made her famous amongst the Muslim and Arabian women of Dubai. Ramia Farah Aziz dreamed as she watched old footage from a year ago, presenting the grand opening of a downtown hotel where Hamda was allowed to cut the ribbon and congratulate her husband as one of Dubai’s top young developers.

Ramia watched the old footage on a small television set in a cramped apartment room on the man-made island of Palm Deira, where she had moved in with her cousin Basim. And she found herself having a hard time letting the excitement of the unexpected interview go. They had arrived there to find footage of unsafe immigrant worker conditions at various construction sites, not to capture a Muslim icon in a one-on-one interview. But now that the
Emirati
government was onto them, the police pressures had forced their camera crew to lie low for a while, leaving Ramia with idle time and a need to find other work.

“Ugh, we were so close to something
great,”
she fussed to herself while slapping her face with both hands. Ramia was determined to lead a life of courage and enlightenment, while taking destiny into her own hands, which was why she had challenged herself to leave home in Jordan and to room with her cousin in Palm Deira three months earlier. Showing fearlessness and exceptional presence in front of a camera, a group of guerilla newsmen and film producers dared the young Jordanian to help them report the many current events and cultural happenings in and around Dubai. And with the blessings of her big cousin, Ramia jumped at the opportunity. But after more than a week of the group’s inactivity, she became eager to find something else to do to occupy her time. She and Basim began to job hunt.