My first weekend and after an 11 hour sleep to catch up on my jet-lag, I ventured as far as the local grocery shop to realise it is really too hot to walk far during the day so ventured back to the air conditioning of my apartment.
In the afternoon Ahmed, a colleague from work, took me on a tour of Dubai. It is actually a lot larger than I had expected and the amount of high rise buildings and apartments is astonishing. You go from low rise buildings with narrow one-way streets in the old town (known as mini Mumbai)...to the creek (which must be 3x wider than the Thames)..to the business district and the skyscraper strip on Sheikh Zayed Road...pass the local villas (locals have their own compound where the villas are built for them)...onto Jumeriah and the Marina where all the famous hotels are located. Here there are endless apartment blocks for about 2km all 40+ stories high.
Then we went for dinner and watched the England game in one of the hotel bars called "The Underground" with a few other people from Barclays and their friends. I could have been in Essex in the bar but I am informed that I have not been to the Atlantis yet!
One of the people I met is staying in the same apartment block as me and it is really nice to have met a few more people.
Saturday 19 June 2010
Friday 18 June 2010
Medical Test
Forgot to write on Wednesday about my medical test. For residency you need to undertake a medical test which consists of a blood test to test for HIV and a chest X-ray to test for TB. HR had already advised that because you need to have this done in a government testing centre and it is on a first come first served basis that it could take about an hour or so and I needed to take my visa, passport and 2 of 12 photos I had already sent over (am realising that anything government related requires several forms and photos).
I am suspecting this is going to be pretty chaotic and bureaucratic but this is UAE not India right?...thank god for my driver.
First off you have to go to a typing office to fill out the test form in Arabic (2 copies)... then we walk around the corner to the centre and there are hordes of people scrambling to get through the manned doors. The driver just pushes us towards the front speaks to the man on the door he takes my paper writes a number on it and I'm in. Well in a waiting room...packed full of people and no apparent queuing system. I walk passed them all and straight to booth number four, hand over my typed forms, 2 photos and 470 AED. I am pointed towards the ladies waiting area. The waiting area is essentially a corridor/thoroughfare with chairs along either wall.
There must be at least 40 people in front of me, all looking like they are applying for a visa or visa renewal...mostly from Philippines, India, Pakistan and Nepal. So you sit and wait.
Meanwhile the form is now being rechecked by a man and receiving some more stamps. When that is complete you wait until someone picks up the form from the office and hands it to the nurse. Then you wait until you are called. The number scribbled on my paper at the entrance appears to create some system with, of course, the exception of any friends of the local Arabs.
An hour passes and the nurse comes out with my form...in I go....blood taken. “All done” says the nurse. So I enquire about the chest x-ray. ...”oh you need to go the chest x-ray area” and the process starts again....you fill out another form....this gets checked...checked again...you wait...have your test and 2 hours later all the testing is done.
All that is left is to pick up the results the next day and go through a 10day process to get my visa stamped in my passport!
I am suspecting this is going to be pretty chaotic and bureaucratic but this is UAE not India right?...thank god for my driver.
First off you have to go to a typing office to fill out the test form in Arabic (2 copies)... then we walk around the corner to the centre and there are hordes of people scrambling to get through the manned doors. The driver just pushes us towards the front speaks to the man on the door he takes my paper writes a number on it and I'm in. Well in a waiting room...packed full of people and no apparent queuing system. I walk passed them all and straight to booth number four, hand over my typed forms, 2 photos and 470 AED. I am pointed towards the ladies waiting area. The waiting area is essentially a corridor/thoroughfare with chairs along either wall.
There must be at least 40 people in front of me, all looking like they are applying for a visa or visa renewal...mostly from Philippines, India, Pakistan and Nepal. So you sit and wait.
Meanwhile the form is now being rechecked by a man and receiving some more stamps. When that is complete you wait until someone picks up the form from the office and hands it to the nurse. Then you wait until you are called. The number scribbled on my paper at the entrance appears to create some system with, of course, the exception of any friends of the local Arabs.
An hour passes and the nurse comes out with my form...in I go....blood taken. “All done” says the nurse. So I enquire about the chest x-ray. ...”oh you need to go the chest x-ray area” and the process starts again....you fill out another form....this gets checked...checked again...you wait...have your test and 2 hours later all the testing is done.
All that is left is to pick up the results the next day and go through a 10day process to get my visa stamped in my passport!
Football
There may not be flags on every car but world-cup fever is deifinitely here...there are air-conditioned marquees as well as cinemas showing the matches but this one made me laugh...
...an ice-rink in the Dubai Mall
...an ice-rink in the Dubai Mall
Wednesday 16 June 2010
Downtown Dubai Apartment
Monday 14 June 2010
Carriage awaits
35mins before my taxi arrives...am finally heading to Dubai after what has felt like a long build up!
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