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Blogosphere: January 22, 2008
Gulf News web editor Adam Flinter plunges headlong into the blogosphere to find out what bloggers from the Middle East and beyond have on their minds
- By Adam Flinter, Web Editor
- Published: 00:54 January 22, 2008
- Last week's wet weather has given the UAE's bloggers plenty to write about.
- Image Credit: Gulf News Archive
Gulf News web editor Adam Flinter plunges headlong into the blogosphere to find out what bloggers from the Middle East and beyond have on their minds.
Pick of the week: Blame the people
It's a bit chaotic out there. We've had rain for four consecutive days now, a record 110 mm in Dubai to Tuesday according to the Met office.
The previous record for the whole of January was 81.9 mm. We've had more overnight and this morning too, so the record has been well and truly broken.
Not surprisingly many roads are flooded, some have had to be closed, various traffic lights aren't working. Car parks are under water too - probably about a third of the Knowledge Village car park has ankle deep water on it.
Inevitably a lot of the problems, particularly on the roads, are caused by people doing the wrong thing.
Drivers of high vehicles like buses and 4X4s going ridiculously fast through the floodwaters, throwing water all over the rest of the road, onto windshields, making it even more dangerous for the rest of us.
The inevitable hazzard light idiots driving along with indicators flashing on both sides of their car so the rest of us have no idea when or where they're going to turn.
Tailgaters are driving as normal, right up behind the vehicle in front. If they have to hit their brakes they're going to aquaplane into other vehicles.
http://dubaithoughts.blogspot.com/
Sharjah comes out to play
What's not easily available in Sharjah: No deliveries of fresh milk, no bread and khubus in small groceries, no water bottles.
Garbage not emptied by the municipality
OK, if yesterday's raft wasn't enough here is some more pics of a jetski in a residential building's car park!
http://www.snaz777.blogspot.com/
Drip drip drip
Oh dear. Wet patches have now appeared on our bedroom ceiling. Water appears to be leaking through from the terrace above. There are no pouring flood waters, but I'm worried that they're a sign that damage has been done elsewhere.
Fortunately our apartment is still under warranty. I'm confused as to why a brand new, quality apartment could possibly be constructed in such a way that water would leak in when it rains, which it does every year.
http://blogs.sun.com/christophersaul/
category/Dubai
Rain? What rain?
To paraphrase the title of a Supertramp album, Crisis? What Crisis? Whoever said it doesn't get wet in Dubai? The last few days have been mayhem. Dubai typically has less than 10 days rain per year and these are generally only small showers but it has been raining heavily over the last week with the greatest downpour today. One would think they're in England or Taiwan for that matter.
Since it doesn't rain a lot here, the Dubai infrastructure is not really well set-up for drainage. The run off from buildings mostly runs into the street and there are few storm water drains compared to other cities of this size, so with prolonged rainfall, the streets basically turn into swimming pools - or ponds (or puddles) as they are called here.
T
he Gulf News has some excellent pictures of what it's like at the moment.
There are many cars broken down or water logged but people will still drive like maniacs in the wet.
http://vga001.blogspot.com/2008/01/
travel-dubai-rain-what-rain.html
Wet wet Dubai
On Monday night there was heavy rain in Dubai, the next day our construction site was flooded with rain water. Not only that, our site office was also affected as the temporary site office was never designed for such heavy down pour. The result: our site office was leaking and flooded.
It was my first time to see the rain in Dubai. To me it was only like normal rain in Malaysia, but I can see many roads were flooded by rain water.
Today we only managed to clean up the office to resume our work, luckily my computer was not affected by rain water.
http://kenny-ng.blogspot.com/2008/01
/wet-wet-dubai.html
Floating away
Dubai has planned for so many things and it's funny to think they might have totally forgotten about the possibility of RAIN! I walk into malls and see little buckets of water everywhere where the walls are dripping!!
You needed a boat to get to your car if you lived in Sharjah or Ajman. Your car might also have floated away and you might have needed to row your way to work. :) I LOVED the RAIN! It was kind of hilarious to see how people in the UAE react to FLOODS!
It's like they don't know how to deal with it and are afraid to drive over the tiniest puddles!
http://dinodaloo.blogspot.com/2008/01
/uae-ghirkaaaneh.html
We got a Bush
George Bush Came to Dubai and All We Got Was These Lousy Traffic Jams. We has a Bush! And then, we hasn't. He came, he saw very little, he made noises about Iran to stop the hawks of Washington from indulging in a snit, he b******* off to Saudi to promise cheap weapons and beg for cheaper oil.
We did get a public holiday though, making Bush for once moderately popular here.
Before flying to Dubai, Bush began his activities Monday by viewing a cultural exhibit and visiting business leaders in Abu Dhabi. At an exhibit on energy economy in the Gulf, Bush praised the United Arab Emirates federation for examining how to move beyond a reliance on oil.
"It's amazing, isn't it?" Bush said. "This country has gotten its wealth from the ground and is now reinvesting in alternative forms of energy."
Good point, so good that he then went to Saudi and asked them to pump more.
http://dinodaloo.blogspot.com/2008/01/
uae-ghirkaaaneh.html
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