In Transit

January 5, 2017, Friday Evening

On the way from the airport to our hotel, I kept trying to see Dubai itself, but since it was already evening, the light was not bright, and being near the airport mean that all the buildings looked industrial or commercial except for the many hotels. Holiday Inn Express is more ubiquitous than Starbucks in Seattle. Everything was incredibly tidy and clean, or under construction. We had a voucher from Emirates for our overnight stay, and I was expecting a gloriously elaborate palace experience. So, imagine my disappointment when we drove into a small, ordinary courtyard and entered the equivalent of a Motel 6—or maybe a Quality Inn— with a small, modest, and rather stark lobby and rooms. All was very clean and adequate, but there wasn’t any exotic touch except for a small traditional Arab seating area in one corner of the office. This sort of hotel is contracted with Emirates for transit passengers, which probably thinks we are all non-Muslim workers headed somewhere else and not worth much bother. I suspect the transit passengers in First Class get much better accommodations.