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Blog // Travel
November 8, 2005

On Being In A Postmodern City

Greetings from sunny Dubai! We flew in on Saturday and settled into our accomodation with little fuss. We enjoyed a lesurely lunch, a walk along the beach, then watched the cresent moon (with acompanying early star) set over the Arabian Sea. Our hotel is directly opposite the famed Burj Al-Arab, which I have to say […]

Greetings from sunny Dubai!

We flew in on Saturday and settled into our accomodation with little fuss. We enjoyed a lesurely lunch, a walk along the beach, then watched the cresent moon (with acompanying early star) set over the Arabian Sea. Our hotel is directly opposite the famed Burj Al-Arab, which I have to say is far larger and more impressive than I had expected. Our hotel is packed with the usual quality entertainments and C in enjoying the adventure park, pools, beach and range of food.

Monday morning saw me back out on the golf course, playing the Desert Course at Arabian Ranches. This was the location for the most recent Desert Classic tournament (won by Ernie Els). It is a wonderfully laid out course that utilises the slope of the terrain and extensive sandscapes on either side of each hole. In fact, playing a long approach to the heart of a well-bunkered green from amongst desert grasses and bleached bones is a memory that will linger for a long time. However, the round was a struggle beyond the normal demands of Golf, as I appear to have come done with some sort of gastric bug. I am feeling better now, but sadly I missed the chance to play the Majlis course this morning.

Arabian Ranches (an enourmous housing and leisure development on the outskirts of Dubai) itself was fascinating experience, as was the afternoon trip into one of the downtown malls. It releaved the deeply postmodern nature of Dubai, something I will reflect on more over the coming days.

[tags] Dubai [/tags]

Responses
Toni 18 years ago

I’m interested in your interpretation of ‘postmodern’.

The most recent description I heard that seemed to fit my thinking was the word ‘unprincipled’. Postmodern seems to mean that “whatever works for you is OK, as long as I can do anything that works for me”. To me, that would imply a city of readily available vices, each to suit a different taste, but kept clean and neat in appearance.

f 18 years ago

I would would want to define postmodern quite a bit more robustly than that. For starters, my sense of the postmodern starts with globalisation and social movement, rather than with morality. I’ve never liked the notion of reducing post-modern-ity to “anything goes” morality, simply because that seems an easy move, but also because it seems to not be at all unique to the last 40 odd years of history. The desire to be morally unconstrained in the private sphere whislt retaining a veneer of decency on the surface of things seems to have been a part of human history for a long, long, time.

I’ll come back to the theme of what a postmodern city when I’m back at home. I’ve only got a couple of days left here and there’s still a bit to se and do…

Cass 18 years ago

Arabian Ranches “Desert Course” is not where the Dubai Desert Classic is Played, its played at the Emirates Golf Club “Majilis Course”. It’s been played there every year since it started.

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