You say Dhabi and I say Darby!

Abu Dhabi always seems to live in the shadow of its more famous neighbour, Dubai. It doesn't help that the names are similar. Many people think that they are one and the same place. It confuses further that the airport here is Dhabi International Airport and the other Dubai. I have had conversations with people from the UK who I tell I live in Abu Dhabi and they then reply, “So how is Dubai”. After a while you give up and say “Very nice, you must visit some time”. I wonder if that is why I have heard people talking about living in Abu Darby.

The development of Abu Dhabi has never been as quick as that of Dubai and this has pluses and minuses. The traffic volume is much less bad, although the driving standards are equally atrocious. The accommodation is much harder to find at reasonable rent (Dubai uses Sharjah as a commuter town). The nightlife is less exciting, but is more approachable. Abu Dhabi had allegedly the largest flag in the world but Dubai had the largest flagpole. Dubai has the Burj Al Arab and Abu Dhabi now has the Emirates Palace Hotel, different but similar.

One of the problems for Abu Dhabians has been that nobody knows (or cares) that Abu Dhabi is the Capital. Everyone else in the world thinks Dubai is in charge (I won't get political in this blog). They were going to host the GCC (Gulf Co-operation Council) conference here last year. All of the road signs in Abu Dhabi and the surrounding countryside – sorry sand-side – were changed to read “Abu Dhabi – Capital of the UAE” in English as well as Arabic. This meant that you struggled to read them due to the smaller text size. I note that this has been changed back again now. A bit sad because it was always good for a laugh.