Still single in the city

Always on a Sunday

Pawandeep, this is the second post that has been triggered off by a comment made by you (remember your earlier one about how I've gotten serious post my Delhi departure?). Posting a blog every Sunday (or Saturday night) is a thought that I have been toying with for a while now. So, this evening, as I was (a tad) guiltily (since I have not posted for over a week) going through the comments section, I came across Pawandeep's suggestion and was pleased as punch that great minds think alike. She too feels that I should post every Sunday morning. That's the way it's gonna be from now on -- unless, of course, I have something terribly important to tell you.

It's déjà vu, but here goes again: The reason why I have not been blogging for the past one week is that I finally managed to shift to an apartment -- a giant step that was preceded by days and days of SERIOUSLY irritating stuff like applying for a local bank account (a procedure that has the longest gestation period ever), getting a cheque book issued (second-longest gestation period), hassling the Boss for a salary advance, calling up brokers, paying them truckloads of money by way of commission, wallowing in the awfully depressing feeling of being flat broke (even though I've never invested in the stock markets) and what-have-you.

My 'studio apartment' is housed in an area called Bur Dubai, which is nowhere as posh as Jumeirah or Marina, and doesn't have a sea-facing view. For the life of me, I cannot figure how the hotel facing my building is called Sea View. There's not even a beach close by. No skimpily-clad frolicking global citizens making out near the sea as the waves lap up on to the sandy shore (there was a big debate in Dubai over an incident where a British couple were caught necking -- and more -- by the local police and ticked off; then of course, everything went flew off the handle, and the couple were put behind bars).

Bur Dubai is an honest-to-God ‘family' area: supermarkets, hypermarts (there's a thin line of difference between super and hyper, I've discovered, other than the hypers being more hyper), dry cleaners, Iranian restaurants, an Andhra cafe, ‘Amreekan' fast food joints, photo studios, travel agencies...

‘Family' is the reassuring epithet that is used to indicate that, you know, things aren't SHADY. You see, after sunset, if you are walking down the promenade, cars slow by, and inquisitive (and hopeful) glances are cast your way. There are murmurs that everyone wants to have ‘fun' here, and it's not sand-dune bashing or desert safaris or gold souk trails that they have in mind. Anyways, as a friend of my mine told me (she's been in Dubai for the past couple of years now), as long as you don't make ‘expressive' eye contact, it's the safest place to be in.

Getting back to my just-shifted-in apartment, it is, in retrospect, strictly not a studio since the kitchen is separate from the bedroom. I've learnt a new word here: en suite. Studios come with an en suite kitchen -- you basically cook at the place your bed ends. My place isn't quite that and the kitchen is separate, although it was advertised as a studio. For my part, I'm happy that cooking smells -- or pots and pans -- won't become a bedtime ritual.

A Pakistani colleague from work had gone looking for flats in an area called Deira, where rents are a wee bit cheaper, but he got seriously put off when he discovered notices in buildings stating that if there are couples wanting entry into any of the pads, then they better produce a marriage certificate.

I've not stopped telling people that, by way of rent, I'm paying more every month in Dubai than I did every year in Delhi. I spoke to Black Sheep -- who's scurried off to Amsterdam to arm himself with an MBA degree -- a few days ago, and he suggested that I record this bit (about the Dubai-Delhi rentals difference) and play it back to whoever next I was speaking with.

See you Sunday!