Re-Visiting Abu Dhabi

I’ve left Abu Dhabi for 4 months. But now I am back… back to meet old friends, back to tie up the loose ends (a.k.a. cleaning the shit), back to desert life… At least this time around I got a direct flight. I flew in direct using Etihad Airways. Many people asked me what airline this is… well, to the uninitiated, Etihad is the national airlines of Abu Dhabi. This is relatively a new airline. Its sister would be the more established and well-known Emirates Airlines which is operated by Dubai. I will blog later on the history of Middle Eastern airlines on another date (I got a summary of that from an Emirati friend).

Anyway, Etihad was a world-class airline… much better than Qatar Airways, Lufthansa or Malaysia Airlines. The service was good, the seats were comfortable and the in-flight entertainment very personalised. Everyone has his own screen and there is a huge selection of movies, dramas or music to choose from in their in-flight entertainment. The flight was surprisingly full – I guess many Arabs were returning home after their summer holidays. I sat next to a Malaysian lady who’s going back to Saudi Arabia! Gosh… a Malaysian woman working in Saudi! She works as a nurse in a hospital in Dhamman, which is just across from Bahrain. According to her, life in Saudi was terrible but the money was good. There are many restrictions for women there – cannot drive, cannot go out alone (in fact dangerous!). You see, women are basically second-class in Saudi! I wished her all the best and hope she survives there.

I arrived in Abu Dhabi airport past midnight. The airport looked exactly the same as I’ve left it. The inverted ‘bee hive’ is still the master center piece of the terminal. There was as usual a long queue of South Asians waiting for their entry permit while I breezed through the immigration counter. Then, I went straight to the car rental counter and drove more than 2 hours to Jebel Dhanna where I’ll again be staying for the next 1 month plus (Insha-allah!) Reached at 4am there and checked into the camp. Tired, exhausted but not sleepy. Nevertheless took a warm bath and headed to bed.