My first visit to Dubai (December 2008)

In the company I work for it is called an orientation trip. It is a global practice to provide such kind of trip to each employee and the spouse accepting a job overseas.

The hotel we stayed at was Hyatt Regency, a 5-star hotel located in Deira next to the vegetable and fish market. The hotel was great, well it should have been as one night stay was something around 1 thousand AED (~ 180 EUR or 270 USD).

The trip was 2 days over a weekend of which one day we spent with a relocation agent touring around the city and seeing apartments, and the second one we were just hanging around on our own.

The company hired a relocation company called Crown Relocations which managed the whole relocation process. An agent met us right at the airport upon arrival. She was a very friendly Iranian lady, very polite, very knowledgeable about Dubai, dedicated to help. We really liked the attitude.

From the airport we went directly to see apartments for rent in Al Warqaa and International city areas of Dubai. Although the apartments there were quite cheap (comparing to prices in fancier areas), the surroundings were construction and desert.

My wife didn’t like the areas as she knew that she wouldn’t work in Dubai, and she did not want to be bored sitting at home alone there. However, those areas are extremely good options for single men spending all time building career and do not bothering about construction outdoors. And saving money of course because flats for rent there are fairly cheaper than in many other areas.

After that we had a tour around the city, took a look at Bur Dubai area, Downtown Burj Dubai and Burj Al Arab hotel, finishing the tour with lunch in Mall of the Emirates and a quick look at Ski Dubai.

Then, we had a look at apartments for lease in The Greens and Downtown Burj Dubai. These are mostly known as ‘expat’ areas with fancy shopping malls and restaurants close by. The Greens is a nice area. The only issue with it right now is terrible traffic out of the area because of construction nearby. The apartment we saw at Downtown Burj Dubai was a tiny studio with a construction view. The price was overwhelming 115,000 AED / year (~ 20,800 EUR or 31,300 USD).

This is the view from the window, not really nice

I don’t know why we didn’t go to see Dubai Marina and Jumeirah Beach Residence. Perhaps, our housing budget was not enough for Dubai Marina those days. Prices have dropped a lot since then.

She dropped us in the hotel in dinner time, presented a useful book about living in Dubai called Explorer and a box of candies, and after having a shower we went to see surroundings.

Surroundings were Deira’s small shops and cafeterias. The area was a bit dirty and overcrowded. After a short walk we returned back to the hotel to have dinner and sleep.

Hanging around Dubai, Day 2

I encourage you to read something about the city before you go. I didn’t. In the morning we found ourselves studying the book we were presented just before we left the hotel.

We didn’t go out of Deira as the agent told us that it would be expensive (we shouldn’t have listened to her though). So we went to see the fruit market which as very very good and the fish market which was… well you really have to like fresh fish to like the fish market :) . We walked through Deira small shopping streets and Dubai Creek shore down to Deira City Centre Mall. We started to like the city that day. The sky was blue with rare white clouds, the temperature was around 25 degrees and the sea was amazingly blue. Uhh and it was mid December.

We caught a cab from the Deira City Centre mall to go back to the hotel. It was around 10 AED.

For dinner we wanted to try local food, so we went to Kan Zaman restaurant at Heritage Village on the other side of Dubai Creek. The restaurant was quite nice with amazing view to Dubai Creek and its dows (small wooden ships). I didn’t take my jacket on. That was a mistake, as temperature goes down to 15 degrees in winter time.

We left Dubai next day feeling happy about coming relocation :)