My Dubai neighbourhood in 2020
When I moved to Dubai nearly 7 years ago, there was a lot I didn't know -- how long I was going to stay, what everyday life would be like, what 50 degrees centigrade feels like, how much better the hummus would be than any I'd had before. What I did know for certain, though, within a week of getting here, is that I wanted my apartment to look out on to the Marina. And I was lucky enough to find such a place, with picture windows facing the blue-green waters, where gleaming white yachts were berthed and wooden ferries glided by every so often. It soothed me to sit and gaze out at this scene, especially in the early days of apprehension and uncertainty in a new city.
A VIEW OF THE DUBAI MARINA
The Marina has, for these past few years, signaled home, familiarity, comfort. I thought I might move at some point when I saw other neighbourhoods that I quite liked -- but never did. When I returned from a trip away and the car back from the airport turned off Sheikh Zayed Road with the Marina skyline in view, that's when I'd feel myself start to relax from the long journey.
This past week, after a two month hiatus most of which was locked in, I returned to the Marina Walk for an evening constitutional. I had postponed doing this even after restrictions had lifted because I anticipated it would be more crowded than some other spots. But on this particular evening I couldn't resist going back. I expected to be enveloped by a sense of familiarity, punctuated no doubt with moments of annoyance on spotting people not following the distancing rules. What I didn't anticipate was that I'd be walking along with tears rolling down my cheeks (and dampening my mask).
Perhaps the rush of emotion makes sense. It wasn't my first time seeing people in masks and gloves, warily avoiding each other, sitting solo on a bench reading with a mask on or running wide arcs around others, children being gathered back into the fold when they strayed too close to something they wanted to touch. But this scene that resembled a snippet of a dystopian Hollywood blockbuster, this time, was unfolding in my safe place. It dredged up every memory of carefree strolls I'd taken over the years, each late weekend breakfast sitting outside at Cafe Bateel, every rolled eye at raucous boat-party-goers... Each memory threw into stark relief the very different scenario I was now walking amidst. And it felt like my neighbourhood as I knew it no longer existed.
THE VIEW FROM MY FIRST APARTMENT
I suppose that's one of the central discomforts of this time we're living through -- we're still inhabiting the same Earth, many of us living in the same spaces, and yet what was once familiar no longer is. The context has changed. It's like learning something about a friend that goes contrary to what you've known about them so far. You can't help but see them through a somewhat different lens.
What I've been trying to focus on since the walk that exercised my emotions more than I expected, is the idea that a context switch needn't be a bad thing, or at least not wholly bad. Sometimes you're shaken up out of your nostalgia, your presumptions, your comfort zone -- whether literal or metaphorical -- for a good reason. I haven't quite worked out all that means for me yet, but I'm hopeful.
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