It's Thursday morning and soon we will be sailing out of Dubai and heading to Doha, Qatar. Yesterday we took an Oceania excursion to the Emirate of Sharjah which is northeast of Dubai. We could see the skyline of Sharjah from the port.
The first part of the tour was a drive past the huge University of Sharjah located in University City. Our guide said that, with all of the colleges, there were about 100,000 students in attendance although it was on holiday break when we were there. It all looked very new but with very Islamic inspired architecture.
Continuing on, we came to the Quran Roundabout with its monumental Quran. Here, at least, we did have a photo stop after circling the roundabout two times.
Our next stop was along the waterfront to visit the Sharjah Museum of Islamic Civilization. The museum houses a collection of Islamic artifacts including a whole section of technology. It was also, perhaps, the only museum we have visited that provided free food and coffee under its beautiful dome.
Next was a visit to the Sharjah Fort (Al Hisn), which is a reconstruction of the fort dating back to 1820.
The last stop was at the Souk Al Markazi which consisted of two large buildings, one with general merchandise and one was, of course, gold and jewelry.
One thing that we learned was that Sharjah is more restrictive than Dubai or Abu Dhabi. For example, there is no alcohol for sale anywhere there. I found an interesting contradiction in the gold souk for such a restrictive place - the seductive images of women trying to entice you to buy jewelry.
We've now spent 4 full days in the UAE. As I've said before, it is amazing to see what they've built there in such a short time. But it also makes you have to think about the society there. Of the population, only about 15% are native Emiratis. The rest are expats. Most of the expats we met were from Pakistan. Our guide yesterday was from India. Other than the men at passport control, I don't think that we had any interactions with Emiratis. There is a clear split between the populations. Emiratis are very well provided for by the government with free housing, free medical and free schooling. Expats have to pay for all of that. Our guides always spoke very respectfully of the Sheikhs, referring to them as His Highness. I, perhaps cynically, got the impression that this was a scripted part of what they were told to say as guides. It seemed clear that living in the UAE was not cheap for them. It all makes me want to have the opportunity to sit down with an expat and have a real conversation over a glass of wine (or perhaps a cup of tea). In any event, it has been a fascinating introduction to a very different society and culture. I should also say that everything is so incredibly clean and that we felt totally safe wherever we were. There are no drugs and we were told that if someone was caught with drugs they would be executed within a week. I guess that's a benefit of a restrictive society.
Next, we'll have the opportunity to compare and contrast with Qatar.
Peace and blessings,
Linda and Larry
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