Experience Dubai

It was Friday night in Dubai when Onn and I decided to visit the renowned Gold Souk (Souk: a traditional market) and experience the Dhow dinner cruise which brought us cruising along the beautiful, serene creek.

The creek is indeed a wonderful sight, especially at night.

Now, while others might give you a taste of sweet experience first, I'm going to feed you the sour side of my experience.

What I'm about to highlight here is a lesson you HAVE to learn when you're on a trip in Dubai. It can be scary to travel in a big city. Trust me.

So, RENT a car.

Yes, you're now thinking, "Hey, there are cabs everywhere! It's a metropolis."

Gosh, you're so wrong. You're right if you're out there on the weekdays before sunset. Don't be fooled.

The problem will only present itself when night falls and sometimes, even during the day!

So, we finished strolling along the creek and the Gold souk at around 9.30pm (Dubai time). We didn't want to stay there longer as we were afraid we might not be able to catch a cab back to our hotel.

Unfortunately, our fear manifested.

By car, we could reach our hotel in 15-20 mins.

That night, we ended up going back to our hotel in 2 whole hours on foot, with only brief seconds of rests. It was the longest two hours in my life!

Not only did the people cut queues, cab drivers were extremely selective! They only agreed to take passengers going to the direction they had planned or wished to go.

That was 'the' moment when I felt like going on a rampage. The rage was neck high.

Note that Dubai has no well-planned transportation system despite being the fastest growing city.

Along the way, we tried to hail cabs. We stopped several times hoping to get a cab to drive us back since we were already very exhausted, but to no avail. In the end, we had no choice. We walked back to our hotel and finally reached at 1.30 in the morning.

When we were approaching our hotel, I was like "Ahhh...,Finally!" I managed to give a faint smile to Onn. We were so glad to have reached, but at the same time, we were totally fatigued. My legs ached and I could barely speak.

Without that experience, we wouldn't know that Dubai's a very safe city! Or, could it be we were just plain lucky to have not bumped into any bad guys?

I was telling Onn about this and I told him, "If it wasn't for those taxi drivers, I wouldn't have known the level of my endurance and it wasn't so bad after all because I have you to accompany me, not anyone else."