Dubai Metro Chronicles - Issue 4

26-4-2011

Hi reader!

What an incredible week has gone by yet again. The Holy week felt completely new in this country. I have realized what a blessing it is to have been lived and experienced so 27 years of my life in the protective shelter of my Parish and its Church (read people). The emotions that gush in one’s heart on Good Friday in my Parish back home are incomparable to anything in the world. The essence of the passion and suffering of The Christ indescribably comes to life in the passion play. A million thanks to ‘The Lord’ for his ignominious death on the cross; which is a fine paid by him for our transgressions and sins.

One pays a price for many things in his life. The only price that gives him no chance of a bargain is the price of a fine / charge. Here in this nation, the land of sky scrapers, luxury cars, 80% expats and sprinkle of dessert sand here & there, the concept of slapping a fine on residents is like as though serving them a warm cup of coffee. Though some of the reasons for giving a ticket; as the Americans would like to say, are legitimate and viable, but there way too many of those legitimate reasons for one to venture out and do something being oblivious of the fear of a fine. Parking fine, road crossing fine, eating or drinking even water in the metro fine, stopping the escalator fine, sleeping in the bus fine! Tell me who would like to pay a fine just because he took a short nap during his bus ride after a long day’s work. Well, whether you like it or not, in Dubai…All is fine!

The ride to work the past week presented me with a situation which transformed my outlook towards Dubai. An unfortunate, poor middle aged man from the neighbor country to the sub continent stood exhausted, sweating, holding a small bottle of filtered water. The passengers seated and standing next to him or close to him could all notice how profusely he was perspiring since the moment in embarked on the train. From the look of his attire; which was patched with big sweat marks, shoes layered with sand and dust, his face pink as a flower yet wrinkled with white lines below the eyes, gave me the feeling that he was surely a construction labour. The man was very thirsty and desperately wanted to drink some water that he was carrying. But the big sign inside the train said 200 dirhams fine for eating or drinking (read liquids). At that very moment my memory instantly reminded me of a day when I saw a man eating noodles while travelling in the train. I very well remember, it was an 8.15am train from the start point of travel and he was already have way through his Chinese breakfast in the train. I wondered how come this is fine and the guy trying to just take a sip of water to quench the ache of his thirst was so obediently scared of a fine. One word, yet two frustrating meanings. This whole episode has made me to share a few concluding lines of some important aspects of life in Dubai…unseen by many and erased from the mind as an unfortunate scene by some.

There are both old & young men and women who are scourged by the burning heat of this dessert land everyday while they work on construction sites, as domestic helpers, road cleaners and other hard labour jobs. My eyes have so many a times defeated my will power and forced me in shedding heartfelt tears. Just the other day on my walk to the bus stop, under the hot sun, encountered me with an appalling scene at a construction site close to home. A construction labourer; his head covered with a piece of cloth to protect his head from the brunt of the glaring hot sun, sweaty and tiered (8.30am), holding a piece of bread in his hand and a cup of sulemani tea (black tea), staring at this guy (me) who is dressed in decently ironed clothes, good shoes and eyes comfortably hid under the cooling shade of sun glasses. I couldn’t turn my eyes away from him as I saw him seated on a small rock on the opposite side of the road, as I walked passed him. He looked at me and surprisingly gave me a gentle smile and raised his hand which held the piece of bread as a sign of saying hello to me. I graced that warmth of human affection with a big smile for him and a Salam! I tell you truthfully my dear reader, the smile from that man was ten times warmer than the heat of the day and yet I would not complain. His smile beat the trauma of walking for fifteen minutes from home to the bus stop. There was such a joy in that smile and there were so many things expressed by it to me that made me value life and its gifts even more thereon. But as life is full of surprises both good and bad, my face wore gloom on itself within 2 minutes of walking ahead. There was this domestic helper sweeping the lawn of her employer’s house. I couldn’t but ignore the look on her face while she was sweeping dust under a temperature that could evaporate water fallen on sand within 2 minutes. Imagine what her conversation with God might be. If she has been doing the tasks what she was doing, since years, then I am sure this is what she or others in her place elsewhere might tell the BIG man up there. ‘I’m glad that it me who gets to bear the pinch of this scorching heat while my Mom back home can sip her cup of tea under the cool shelter of a little house. I’m glad that skip 2 meals a day so that my children won’t have fight to decide who gets a bigger share of bread in the house. I’m glad that you have chosen me sleep among a group of 15 and more men or women in one small sharing room, when my old father and mother can comfortable sleep in the luxury of a decent cot all for themselves and also enjoy their minds giving them the liberty to have sweet dreams. I am glad that you have put me in situations that don’t give me the freedom to dream for luxuries, because if I do then that will rob of me the very reason why I left home…to give a ‘life’ to those who mean a lot to me, much better than what they deserve. God, I am ready to take every spat of a test you have for me, with an assurance that you will protect my family and grant them the joy I wish them to have. But I still dare to ask you of a small favour. Could you please let me have my youth, health and enthusiasm alive after those many years that you want me to toil here, that when I embrace my people back home for good, I am left with the zeal to enjoy more happiness with them for few more years. If yes, then I beg you to give me the courage to sacrifice more for their sake’.

I now entered the main road and what I see again? A speeding hummer, a scintillating Nissan SUV and a fancy motor bike among the many other awesome luxury wheels, zooming away even before I can wipe the tears that my heart shed just a while ago.

And you know…in Dubai…All is fine!