So, here I am in the Middle East, working on a project that’ll take me through until almost the end of February. For someone who hardly travels for work, being away for almost 2 months is a new experience and a challenge.
Whether true or not, Paul and Linda McCartney were said to never have been separated for more than 24 hours until her death. When Mei and I married, that romantic idea came into my head and was promptly dispelled a few months later when I set off on my 5-week Celebrate Malaysia Ride.
It wasn’t so bad then of course as we were in the same time zone and just a few hundred kilometres apart, and then she also flew up to meet me in Penang when we celebrated my friend’s wedding roughly halfway through the ride. This time around Mei is 4 hours ahead and many thousands of kilometres away. 6pm is still very much a working time and chatting by Skype then is not always practical and almost never private enough.
Our project involves a mid-sized team of people and we’re housed in the Aloft hotel next to the National Exhibition Centre where the event will be. The Exhibition Centre is a huge building maintained by an army of foreigners. The smooth tile floors are kept spotless, slippery and shiny with a perpetual waltz of dry-mop heads guided by Bangladeshis and Filipinos. The little toilet near our office is manned by an attendant who keeps the floor spotless and the sinks dry and pristine.
I walked in one night at about 9 and found this solitary attendant wiping the counter top. I’d thought they’d knock off work around 6 but here was this chap still hard at work. Surprised, I greeted him and asked what time he would finish work and he replied ‘11, sir’.
My colleague, Johann has described the UAE as an example of excess and I agree. Perhaps Abu Dhabi has not the overt opulence and grandeur of Dubai, but excess is everywhere and in many forms. We sometimes gather for dinner around the empty tables of the closed restaurant down the corridor from our office. Closed it may be, but every single light stills burns brightly. Now you may know I do know a thing or two about lights so let me tell you that there are row upon row of 50W halogens in this place, and more than a few 100-150 watt CDMs too. It would be no different to leaving a few kettles of water boiling all night long, every night.
This toilet attendant, keeping 3 urinals, 3 sinks and 6 toilet cubicles clean is on duty until 11pm at night when after about 7 the staffing levels drop significantly. Why? If not just a sign of or a belief in excess…
Then there’s that smooth tiled floor… My shoes slip and slide ever so slightly on that floor and that makes walking about this large building just that little bit more tiring than it should be. And for some annoying reason, in some highly polished areas, my shoes squeak - producing a wheezy sound not unlike that of a toddler’s squeaky shoes. Just today I found I could just slide each foot forward in turn, moving ahead in an ice-skater’s manner, without lifting a foot. I kept this up for almost a hundred metres… Which is probably a bit excessive too.
That's Pulau Tekong directly below - see how close it is to Johor and why the protests by the Malaysian government about Singapore's land reclamation affecting the environment are valid?
Jo's sis, Juli who flies on SIA was actually on the same flight as me when I first got here. She returned a few days later when Jo arrived and brought us a fantastic Indian lunch. Here we are on the rooftop of the hotel enjoying the view... and 3 types of naan, some roti, mutton and butter chicken and palak paneer and...
Solar panels aplenty on the lower roof of our hotel.
There were a few very foggy days. Here is Jo walking a foggy carpark to our office.
