Amsterdam-Dubai
A
one-way ticket to Dubai with Transavia was so cheap that we didn’t mind the
early departure. Although I wasn't so sure about that when we were waiting at
the gate at 5AM. We had spent the past 1½ hours looking for security and
immigration counters that were open. It makes sense that not everything is open
at night, but there could have been better signage...
It
was strange, flying for 7 hours in a narrow body aircraft without service. But
the staff was very friendly and everything went fine. We just had not expected
to be dropped off at a low-cost terminal in Dubai. Kind of an old shed. No
metro here, as in the shiny terminal across the tarmac. It took a while to find
out how to take the bus into the city, but in the end that worked out well.
At
dusk we walked the last bit to our hotel.
Deira
We concentrated on Deira, the old town on the north side of the creek. Well, not all was old, our hotel was at the site where the fish market used to be.
Across
a major road was the Gold Souk, which is a maze of ancient streets and lanes.
You have the hypermodern Dubai with skyscrapers and shiny malls. You have the new construction like in our neighborhood, which is quite tasteful. You have the 60s-80s buildings along the main streets in the old city, ugly concrete buildings of 3 to 4 floors that contain all those gold shops. And you have the small alleys behind them where they forgot to demolish the houses from the time they used mud as a construction material.
We
walked a bit along the gold shops that were on the tourist route, where you
were constantly harassed, and then entered the smaller streets of the perfume
market and the textile market. It was very pleasant and peaceful there. We were
admiring the colorful dresses in a shopwindow when a lady approached us and
said that this was a great store. Under her black robe you could see the edge
of such a colorful dress. When I made a remark about that, she opened her black
robe wide to allow herself to be admired.
In
the area in and around the Gold Souk, most residents, shopkeepers, restaurant
staff and gold traders are from Kerala. We got talking to a salesman who came
from Kasargod - the first town in Kerala that we want to visit. We immediately
got his cousin's phone number.
All in all it was a nice trip around the back of the Gold Souk.
The
great thing about Dubai is the mishmash of half the world you see. Tourists
from half the world, workers from half the world, everyone with their own
clothes and their own habits. An Arab lady all covered in black; a Philipina in
shorts and a tank top; a stout lady in an African dress; a Russian with too
flashy clothes and too much make-up and too bleached hair.
Food
is also available from all over the world, we ate Indian and Iraqi.
Dubai-Mangalore
Once
in the city and in our hotel, we were a bit overwhelmed by the huge transition
from organized Dubai to the total chaos of India. After six years we had
forgotten how dirty everything is, how everything once broken, stays broken,
how big the holes are in the road and that there are even bigger holes next to
the road, how you are constantly submerged in noise and air pollution.
Mangalore seemed to have all the lesser sides of India, without the mysticism
of Junagadh for example or the atmosphere of a city like Mysore.
Mangalore
The
next day we were able to discover a few gems in Mangalore.
In
the morning we walked through the oldest district, where it was very busy with
carts and lorries loading and unloading goods in the narrow streets, to the
river. We took a ferry to the other side. There was a long and narrow peninsula
between the river and the Arabian Sea. It had a village feel, there were more
cows, goats and cats on the street than cars, and the houses seemed to be built
on dune sand. We zigzagged through narrow alleyways until we reached the beach:
miles of white sand. Birds and fishermen hunted for fish.
In the evening we visited the third oldest mosque in India, almost 1400 years old. Built in the year 22 of the Islamic era, only 5 years after the death of the Prophet. This could happen so quickly because of the existing trade routes between Arabia and the Malabar coast. The oldest wooden part was somewhat hidden behind a newer hall. An old man said that women were not allowed to go to the back. But when I got there and got talking to some of the elders, they were okay with me to go and fetch E. She made an impression by knowing the name of the father of the sultan who renovated the mosque. Together we admired the ancient architecture and lavish carvings. Very impressive.
Trichy-Kuala Lumpur
We
traveled by train and bus from Mangalore to Trichy (*).
It
was an interesting experience: with one-way tickets booked separately, with
low-cost airlines, with small planes from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur. All in all
a successful experiment.
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