I have not posted for almost a month now, partly due to the holy month of Ramadaan and partly due to three projects which I had simmering quietly and which all suddenly started boiling simultaneously!
Ramadaan is the Holy Month for Muslims, which is marked by a month of fasting and abstaining from “pleasures”in order to bring one closer to God through patience and resisting temptation. Most Muslims here use Ramadaan as a time to focus on prayer and family and Dubai becomes a slower, gentler place for the duration. While I find the law of not eating or drinking in public quite a challenge, after 12 years I must say I am almost used to it ! The thing I find the hardest is not drinking water whenever I need it….with summer temperatures reaching 46 degrees C, one really needs to hydrate regularly and I often stop at a gas station and hide in a back room to drink some water and to avoid causing any offense to anyone who may be fasting! The Eid weekend is fast approaching and we get almost 5 days off work, which is great- everyone goes out to celebrate by meeting friends and family at restaurants and malls for meals or coffee and lots of shopping! The stores all have Eid specials and sales and we take full advantage of the reduced prices! It is a fun time and the whole city comes alive again , and returns to the normal chaotic hustle and bustle we know and love…
The other thing which changes my routine completely is the fact that businesses are only allowed to be open 6 hours a day-that means that our office is open from 8 am until 2pm and it is amazing that the shortened day can cause so much havoc for me! I have been trying to cram all my work (which I normally do in about 10 hours ) into 6 and it has exhausted me! Our sites usually start working at 7am and finish at 1pm so it can be somewhat chaotic trying to check on progress on site and then rushing back to the office to complete any paperwork which I may need the girls at the office to do!
Added to all of the issues above, is the fact that all three of my fairly large projects started to kick off at almost the same time , leaving me with little choice but to try and be three places at the same time……still haven’t quite managed to get that under control though! My palace project is currently being prepared, my hotel project is in the sampling stages and my Penthouse project is in its final two weeks but is plagued with contractual issues(which fortunately are not my fault) so I am literally being run off my feet right now.
I hope this sound more like an explanation for my lack of posts rather than a bunch of excuses, but I have some great ideas for posts in the next few weeks and as the summer starts to wind down, I will be feeling much more inspired generally(cooler weather always seems to affect my creative abilities in a very positive way) and I hope to share lots of these ideas in the next few weeks….
A Decorator's Notebook 