Driving in Dubai

I can admit that driving isn't one of my favorite things to do...but in Dubai it continues to be a unique experience. Road signs never seem to have the actual location you are looking for and seem cluttered with lots of information (in both Arabic and English) but never the information for my particular destination. To add to the confusion sometimes road names (if the road has an actual name), neighborhoods and metro stations are all called the same thing but are not in the same location. After 15 months, I feel pretty comfortable driving within a certain radius of our house. Anything outside of this radius, almost guarantees me that I will get lost and turned around. (It doesn't take long to end up in the desert!) Unlike in the US, you cannot just get off at the next exit and back track. Many times, if you miss your turn or exit you have to go 15-20 minutes out of your way in order to turn around. My sense of direction has never been a strong point but I got used to driving in Detroit. I always new if I could get to a mile road, I could find my way home...not the case in Dubai. Most of the roads appear to have been designed by a go-cart enthusiasts, curving and wrapping in unexplainable directions.

Forget being able to looking it up on "Mapquest"...directions are given based on landmarks. Everyone seems to know the major landmarks for example "the big flag pole, Burj Khalifa, Trade Center Round-About (which is in 8-10 lane round about that I refuse to drive in), etc...

To add to the confusion there are many, many different driving "styles" in Dubai. There are drivers who drive incredible fast, no one uses a blinker, people tend to reverse down major roadways to go back to the previous turn or exit (to avoid the extra 20 minute turn-around). I feel like you have to have constant eyes on all the other drivers. They is also a lot of impatience. If you are not half-way through the intersection when a light turns green it is almost a guarantee that someone behind will honk. One time, the driver behind us got out of his car and starting heading toward ours because he thought I should have merged into traffic already! It is a different level of "road rage" but on a semi-polite level as raising your middle finger at the wrong person will land you in jail.

Chris is much more comfortable driving, so he does almost all of the driving if we are going somewhere together. Today, Savannah's playgroup was held in a location outside of my normal radius! Armed with the original directions and extra ones that the play group mom emailed me, we headed out. Almost all of the residential communities and apartment complex's are gated and have security. The first time we turned around I tried to ask the security guard for directions but he only had directions to the golf course...not where I was going. He kindly let me turn around only to then be stopped at a road block by the police (at 9:00 am). They were checking everyone's license and registration...of course Savannah started crying at this moment. I opted to not ask the police man and headed out again. After a few guesses and a few "turn-arounds" we finally found our location and had a great swim! Luckily a friend of mine from play group was leaving at the same time and guided me out in the direction I needed to go. Too bad, it made me realize that the apartment building we went to was probably only 10 minutes away from ours!