A Trip to the United Arab Emirates (UAE)

The United Arab Emirates is a federation of seven emirates, founded in 1971. It is located on the Persian Gulf (also called the Arabian Gulf by Arab countries).   Dubai and Abu Dhabi are the two best known of the seven emirates. 

Dubai is both a city and an emirate, but the city and its surrounding areas basically comprise the entire emirate.  The city is the most populous in the UAE (about 2.1 million).  Only about 17% of the population of Dubai is Emirati; the rest are foreign workers, including people from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Europe and the US.  More than 75% of the population is male, largely due to the large number of expatriate workers who are not accompanied by their families.  This includes the construction workers, as well as many men in the service industry.  Every taxi driver that we spoke with was Pakistani, Indian or Bangladeshi, and did not have family living in Dubai.

The emirate of Abu Dhabi is by far the largest in area (about 87% of the entire federation) and has the largest population (2.45 million of which 20% are Emirati).  The city of Abu Dhabi (population 921,000) is the capital of the UAE, and the second largest city.

So armed with a little information, off we flew to Dubai.  It is a 3-1/2 hour flight, but they are 2 hours ahead of Amman.  Riding in the taxi into the downtown area, it was quickly clear to us that we weren’t in Jordan anymore.  The traffic flowed smoothly with orderly lanes and silent horns.  The driver spoke excellent English; he didn’t smoke or chatter on his cell phone.  People in crosswalks were allowed to cross without a car almost hitting them.  Wow!  Are we still in the Arab world?

Dense Buildings in Dubai

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all photos taken by Ed Quigley

By the time we checked into the hotel we had spotted the Tim Horton’s directly across the street.  For those of you who live in Dunkin Donuts country, Tim’s is a Canadian version of Dunkin.  I am a big fan, seeking them out wherever we go in Canada.  They have crossed the border and are popular in Buffalo as well, so on my visits there, I can get a regular Tim’s fix.  But who would have thought that we would find Tim in Dubai?  The Canadian maple donut was as yummy as ever.

Dubai has a new, modern metro that is a delight to ride.  There is even a car designated for women and children, but we consistently saw men in it.  The metro was heavily used, and most of the riders were men, not surprisingly since most of the residents are men.  I would imagine Emirati women would drive their own cars to the mall.

Of course we headed to an area where we could see some boats.  Dhow Wharfage on the Creek in the Deira section of Dubai was very different than we expected.   Dhows are old style mostly wooden boats that are used for fishing in the Persian Gulf and for trading across the gulf and around the Arabian Sea primarily with Iran, but also to Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, and the Sudan.  We expected to see a few boats, but in fact it was a bustling area with dozens of boats being loaded and unloaded, mostly by hand.  The crews were primarily Pakistani.  Everything that you could imagine was being shipped – soda, produce, household goods including refrigerators and stoves, even cars.  The men (and it was all men) were friendly, greeting us with the usual “where are you from?”  After land-locked Amman, we always feel better when we are with boat people.  So while others may have headed first to the amazing malls, we needed our time near the water.  Then on to another treat – Fibber Magee’s Pub.  Being a Thursday night (remember in the Arab world the weekend is Friday and Saturday) it was packed with an expat crowd of primarily Europeans.  A pint of cider and an Irish breakfast with pork sausage made for a good dinner.

Cargo at the Dhow Wharfage

Dubai is known for having the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa (828 meters, 2716.5 feet; 160 plus floors).  We could see it from our hotel room, gracefully towering over the other buildings in the area.  It was built in only six years, with the excavation beginning in January 2004 and the official launch in January 2010.  The highest open air observation deck in the world on the 148^th floor was obviously the place to go.  Of course Dubai also has more of the biggest – including the biggest shopping mall, Dubai Mall which is at the Burj Khalifa.  With around 1200 stores, one of the world’s largest aquariums, and a hockey size ice rink, it is an experience unto itself.  It also has one of the best book stores that we have ever been in – Kinokuniya (called Book World in the mall directory) is a Japanese chain.  It was wonderful to see so many books.

The mall directory provided a “courtesy policy” which had the usual things like no smoking and no pets, but also reminded patrons that there should be “no kissing or overt display of affection in the mall”.  The accompanying picture showed a male and female figure holding hands with the red slash line through them.

Dubai is such a strange mix of cultures.  We saw many men wearing the thobe (long white robe) and usually a white scarf.  Many women wore the black abaya and quite a few veiled as well.  Although travel guides encourage Western women to dress modestly, we saw many short skirts and bare arms.  Many of the Indian and Afghani merchants and the Pakistani seaman wear the baggy pants and long tunic tops, while others have Western style shirts and pants.

Foreign Construction Workers Waiting for Transportation at the End of a Shift

Dubai is all about shopping, whether at the malls or the souks.  In the malls you find all the high end stores and in the souks you find everything.  Several streets will be filled with textile shops and every type of ribbon and ornament to add to a custom made dress.  Other streets will be filled with shoe shops and in another area there is only gold – more ornate gold jewelry than I could have imagined.  In many of the southern Asian and Middle Eastern cultures, gold is an important part of the marriage contract.  We especially enjoyed a long chat with an Afghani merchant, where we learned about business practices and social customs.  As usual, Ed’s picture taking opened the conversation.  Soon the merchant had one of his employees pull up two stools and called out for the tea merchant to bring us steaming cups of tea.  We sat in front of his shop, watching the world go by.  For us, these encounters with ordinary people are the best part of traveling.

Men Waiting to Transport Goods in the Souk

In Abu Dhabi the sight to see is the Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan al-Nahyan Mosque, also known as the Grand Mosque.  Construction began in the 1990s and it opened for worship in 2007.  Its white marble façades make it shimmer in the sunlight.  With four minarets and 82 domes, the mosque can accommodate 10,000 worshipers in the internal area and another 30,000 in the courtyard.  The main chandelier weighs approximately 12 tons.  Materials used in the mosque were sourced from around the world to symbolize the unity of all mankind.

Sheikh Zayad Mosque

Courtyard of the Sheikh Zayad Mosque

From the city of Abu Dhabi we drove through the desert to Al Ain, in the emirate of Abu Dhabi.  Here the main attraction was the large camel market.  We saw camels of all sizes and colors, gathered here from Saudi Arabia, Iraq and other places, waiting to be auctioned.  Owners from Yemen and Oman and Pakistan and the Sudan lounged and chatted with each other.  We even saw some camels in the back of Toyota pick-up trucks, being transported to the market.  I suppose it is quicker than making them walk, but it seems incongruous for the haughty ships of the desert to be loaded into a truck.

Camel with One Day Old Calf 

There were many more highlights of the trip to UAE, but we’ll save the rest of the stories until we return to Boston.

The Twisted Building and its Neighbors

Spring Semester at the University of Jordan

I like to write. And I’m a good writer. My first professional publication was shortly after I completed my nursing master’s degree. In the 1980s, when we lived and traveled on our boat, I published a number of sailing articles. And there were a couple of travel articles in newspapers after we returned from our long sailing trip. My colleagues have frequently asked me to critique papers and offer an opinion. But teaching professional writing? Really? When the Vice Dean for Graduate Studies asked me if I would teach the subject this semester, I said “yes, of course” and wondered how to proceed. I was a bit disappointed that I would not get an opportunity to teach either of the syllabi that I proposed in my Fulbright application (global nursing and quality and safety in the clinical setting).

 My class consists of eight female doctoral students. Five of them were in my class last semester and three are new to me. All of them wear a hijab (head covering). Two of the women are in the military and come to class in uniform. One woman is from Kuwait. She wears a veil, which she takes off in class after I close the door because there are no men present. She has been in high level positions in the Ministry of Health in her country. I won’t be surprised if she becomes the number one nurse in Kuwait after she completes her doctoral degree.

 When I told the Vice Dean that I did not have my APA Publication Manual with me, she assured me that she would get me one. I wasn’t surprised when I received a photocopy. One of my biggest ethical challenges here in Jordan is the copyright violations. Everyone photocopies books. Last September the Jordan Times reported that the National Library Department was cracking down on pirated books. But the reality is that photocopying is the norm. Books are estimated to represent only 5-6% of the overall pirated items. Software, CDs and DVDs are the bigger problem. The estimated loss to the software industry in Jordan (2013) was $35 million. Only 333 cases of copyright infringement were “referred to the court” in the first 9 months of 2014. I have not seen any information on how many of those resulted in convictions or the extent of the fines. In fact, last week when I was in the university library with my Fulbright colleague, she inquired about checking out a book and was advised to “take it (a book from the stacks) to the basement to have it photocopied”. We didn’t. Maybe something was lost in translation, but I don’t think so.

My photocopied APA Manual

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At the end of December, I attended the first induction ceremony for the Jordanian Honor Society.  After one year, this society will petition Sigma Theta Tau International to become a chapter of the international nursing honor society.  I was disappointed that they did not include ‘Nursing’ in the name.  However, the ceremony was very nice and I am proud to be inducted as a founding member.  I gave a presentation on what being a member of Sigma has meant to me since my induction at Boston College, oh so many years ago.  Princess Muna was an honored guest at the induction.  It seems that she rarely misses a significant nursing event; this is the fourth time that I have seen her and the second time that she has spoken to me.  The newly formed chapter has already planned some activities: a book fair, where recent nursing books that are donated by professors will be sold at a low price to students, and several writing workshops.  I will be doing the first presentation on each of the three days of the workshops.

Her Royal Highness Princess Muna

I have also been attending task force meetings on continuing education at the Jordanian Nursing Council (JNC).  The JNC wants to have a bylaw enacted that would require all nurses to participate in some continuing education activities each year.  They were shocked when I told them that some of the states in the US do not require any continuing education.  Quite frankly, it shocks me too.  It also makes me laugh.  My first publication in a national journal was entitled “Speaking Out: The Time for Mandatory Continuing Education is Now”.  That was in 1977.  Some things in nursing change at a very slow pace. 

In February my name was put at my office door

This past week I went with a nursing professor to the clinical setting.  She is responsible for 8 students who are assigned to either the emergency room or the hemodialysis unit at Jordan University Hospital which is only a short walk from the Faculty [College] of Nursing.  It was a totally different experience from how we work as clinical instructors.  The students were already there when we arrived to check on them.  They were not assigned to work with a specific nurse or to care for a specific patient.  Dr Amani encouraged them to find a patient with whom to work.  For the most part the students seemed unsure of what was expected of them.  We left each site after talking to the students, with the promise that we would return in an hour or so to see if they had selected a patient and completed an assessment.  In the hemodialysis unit, the students gave a presentation to the staff on what was described as a new venous access method that was beginning to be done there.  The short on-line video that they showed was supplied by a medical products company, copyrighted in 2000.  In all of her conversations with students, Dr Amani encouraged the students to relate assessment findings to pathophysiology and to nursing diagnosis and nursing interventions.  It is clear to me that she has a broad knowledge of medical surgical nursing.

The students use the same medical surgical textbook that we use at Curry.  Dr Amani assures me that they buy the book, but I have to admit that I am skeptical.  Unfortunately the student handbook is only available in Arabic so I cannot compare their student policies with ours. 

Although I did not see much of the hospital, what I did see was clean; but it reminded me of county or city hospitals in the 1960s – rather dingy.  We passed one seating area for a clinic and my colleague commented that even though people have appointments, they will spend many hours waiting to be seen.  There was a medical and a surgical emergency room.  They were basically open rooms with stretchers and curtains between them.  There was little room for working on the patient and even less room for someone to stay with the patient.  The hemodialysis unit had modern looking dialysis machines (but I have not been in a dialysis unit at home for many years).  The setting was not attractive. 

One thing that always strikes me as odd is the lack of cultural relevance in pictures.  In several hallways I saw pictures of a blonde woman in a white uniform with her finger to her lips.  The message of quiet was easy to comprehend, but looking around at the staff and the patients and visitors, almost everyone was in a hijab.  Not one person looked like the picture.  I also saw this in the clip art my students used last semester in their presentations.  Pictures were of blonde blue eyed children and scenes that were not at all relevant to this desert landscape. 

Graduating Students Memory Autograph Books

I am hoping to have another opportunity to attend clinical where the students are assigned to a medical or surgical nursing unit as well as the skills lab and some undergraduate classes.  When approached about this, faculty sound receptive, but in fact they seem hesitant to actually set a date for me to be there.  I don’t want to miss these opportunities, but it is a fine line between being too insistent and being respectful of their feelings. 

 January Graduates with Their Memory Books

So, for my nursing colleagues, I hope you enjoyed reading about my experiences here.  For those of you who are not interested in the hospital, the next post should be more interesting.  We are going to Dubai next week so in two weeks I plan to write about our travels there.