My fiance and I were tossing up the possibility of moving to Dubai for a few years. I’ve heard stories about nurses with 100k tax free salaries - is this relatively common? Because he checked salaries in his line of work (IT) and they’re not that impressive (roughly 60k-90k), even though all the websites say that IT workers are in high demand.
What sort of employment perks should he be looking at? I’ve seen companies offer insurance and yearly flights home, but you also mentioned a housing allowance?
Do you know many expats? What are their daily lives like? (Food/entertainment/driving/working hours, etc)
Thanks. He’ll have accommodation provided on top of a large salary. He already knows Dubai won’t be anything like Bangkok’s bar scene, but at least it will be something. He certainly doesn’t want to get 200 lashes for uttering the word “beer.”
[QUOTE=Desert Nomad]
Dubai is better for amenities and space, Sharjah is cheaper. Sharjah has a bit of a reputation has having backwards/very religious people in the UAE (Think Alabama, USA). The traffic from Sharjah to Dubai in the morning and back in the evening is horrible… like a parking lot on the expressway… 2-3 hours at least.
Labor will always be cheap with a billion Indians 3 hours away. It is already a tourist destination super-popular with Europeans, Americans less so. Nobody has carpet here… only tile. A 1000 sq ft flat will be 1 or 2 bedrooms and cost about AED 110,000 per year - roughly $30,000, payable in a single check when you move in… two checks if you have a good landlord. Nobody pays month-to-month.
15-20 years, hard to say, but I am hoping the metro coming in 2010 and the completion of many more apartments will turn things around.
when I was there a month ago, there were lot of ads, inviting others to invest and they were offering 3 years family Visa as a carrot when you buy property( since U A E allowed foreigners to own real estate).
Is it worth investing, it looking at 10 to 15 year returns.
How much will it cost to buy a 2 bedroom hall apartment in a decent locality , which can be rented out ??
I am an expat too. Such sallaries are not uncommon, but you do need to make sure you get a substantial housing allowance… no less than 10,000 AED per month. Keep in mind that your landlord will want a single check for the full year (and another one nxt year etc.).
30 days off and a flight home each year is the norm. The workweek is 6 days, a 5 day workweek is considered a good job as not all offer it. Friday in the main weekend day. You’ll be able to afford to eat out most all the time, but it can start to feel a bit artificial here - like Las Vegas without the casinos. We have any food you can think of, but getting around is slow - the roads are just very crowded.
The IT field is full of Indians who will work for less than Westerners, but a sad fact is your salary depends on your nationality… a local, Westerner and Indian all doing hte same job will make very different wages. Usually the Westerner will be in the highest demand as nationals (locals) tend to have poor work ethics. There is a law that 1 out of 50 employees has to be a national. There are quite a few companies here with 49 employees.
He will need an alcohol permit if he wants to buy any for home. It is not sold in normal stores, but in windowless shops of which there are a limited number. You can also buy it in Ajman on the other side of Sharjah, but as Sharjah is strictly dry, it is illegal to transport it through there… do not get pulled over by the police!
To buy a 2 bedroom place in a good area (old town near the Burj or the Marina) will be 1.8 to 3 million AED ($490K - $820K). The hard part will be finding one that is finished - most for sale units are not going to be ready till late 2008 or 2009 - some even 2011. You have to pay in installments and the building is finished. This does not allow you to know the final quality until it is too late. You might get lucky and find a smallish 2 bedroom place for about $350K.
The rent on a place like this will be 130,000 AED/yr or so - maybe even 150,000 or more - rents are soaring ($35K - $41K).
10-15 years is impossible to say as the market is so young here. If you buy from a government developer (Emaar or others) you get a 3 yr residency visa that is renewable. It costs about $1500 per person (you and your dependents) every three years.
Also note that will the general legal system is not based on Shariah, inheriance rules here follow Shariah law so if you are male and die, your brother might get the apartment before your wife does. Think about owning via a company to avoid this, but then the visa gets iffy if the place is not in your name.
I have looked seriously at property here, but am going to wait a couple years until the metro is running at least - it is all a big construction site running 24 hours a day right now.
Dubai is not in Saudi but the situation is similar. Young people here don’t work in sandwich shops or the like and get free university education anywhere in the world. They don’t all have golden taps tho. Mostly nationals work in government jobs (banks, post office, airport, phone company etc). They get more days off during holidays than in the private sector and work shorter hours. Even then, the government has to really encourage them to work as there is little incentive for many.
The situation comes down to a generation or two of nationals who do not have the skills to run their own country and thus become dependent on foreign labor. Internet is available throughout the Gulf but is censored (mostly “adult” sites, anything in .il, gambling, alcohol and dating sites). They also block Skype as it competes with the monopoly phone company. The highest speed internet is 4mbps (just became available as it was 2mbps for a long time).
The leaders here in the UAE are generally seen as having done a great deal in a short time, in Saudi the huge extended royal family has been more of a drain on resources. Oman is really the only country with locals working at all levels of society… an Omani might pump your petrol for you, an Emirati never would.
Sharia law does not come into play much at all, but does shape attitudes towards things: unmarried men and women can’t rent an apartment together, inheritance laws are different than you’d expect, but mostly we don’t think about it at all.
I would not openly/loudly proclaim myself to be Jewish, but I think most locals would not make a big deal about it… and certainly the Indians couldn’t care less. I have no idea about the number of Jews here.
When you apply for a residence visa, you are asked about your religion. This is mostly (I assume) to determine which court you are tried in if you run into legal trouble. Sharia applies to all people some of the time, Muslims, most of the time, but there are many court processes using a basically Western legal system. There is no chop-off-the-hand here for anyone.
In reality, the Indian laborer taking your residency paperwork punches it into the computer and doesn’t give it a second thought.
You do see it in attitudes towards things like how much skin the ad billboards on the highway can show.
Would it be a bad idea to answer “atheist” or “agnostic”? Or will they not particularly care? If you’re an atheist and have to lie, what’s the best answer? “Christian”?
If you are white, put Christian… it is what they expect and nobody will question it or inquire further. Putting atheist or agnostic probably will not be understood by the low-paid guy entering things and will just complicate matters.
I’ve found the concepts of “atheism” and “agnosticism” to be entirely beyond the grasp of many in the Third World. White men are simply assumed to be Christian, and no end of confusion entails if you say otherwise. It’s like saying you’re from Mars. I play along with it, or if it’s a form that looks like it will be innocuous I’ll put “None” under “Religion.” You can always say that simply means you’re not a specific Christian, like Methodist or Baptist.
My sister and her husband are living in Dubai. He’s working on one of the resorts on one of the Palm islands, helping put in a water park. She’s teaching part time at a university. Their emails provide fascinating glimpses into life over there. For instance, she has some great conversations with some of her students - specifically, a group of a half dozen young men in their early 20s who all wear the traditional Arab robes and whatnot. They LOVE American culture. She got into a rather headscratching conversation with them about how much they love “24”. Despite the fact that, you know, Jack Bauer is fighting Muslim terrorists more often than not. She pointed that out to them, and their response was “Oh, that’s just TV. No one takes that seriously. They’re the bad guys! Go Jack Bauer!” I’m not sure why, but that left me feeling vaguely optimistic about the world.
Locals (Nationals in local-speak) by and large love American culture… you may not find them working much, but they are always hanging out at Starbucks or wandering around one of the Virgin Megastores. I can’t think of a National I’ve met who wasn’t super-nice, if a bit lazy at their government job.
I think the real shame is that they have imported so much labor that they have lost their own country. I am an expat too, but am basically here on my own with a small business. I don’t think foreigners should ever exceed 50% of the population. Certainly the UAE does not feel like an Arab country… it feels like India and Pakistan combined, but with American infrastructure. There are so few Arabs here it is rather depressing for an “Arab” country. In terms of a more proper balance, Oman is more “real”. Dubai is the Las Vegas of Arabia.
So, what’s it like for female expatriates? Are there very many? Do they tend to be married, or single? Is it expected/required for them to wear hijab out in public? How do attitudes in the UAE compare those of other countries in the area* as far as women are concerned?
*i.e. unmarried women not being allowed to travel to Oman without a male relative, women not being allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia.
Wow, thanks, Desert Nomad. Traffic sounds even worse than I’d heard.
So I guess “Neo-Pagan” is out of the question?
:: rereads thread ::
So is the religion description just a case of “Islamic” versus “non-Islamic” then, if they’re worrying about what court you may be answerable to? It sounds a little like Ontario, where you select “Catholic” or “public (historically, Protestant)” for which publically-funded school board you want your school taxes to go towards (long story that involves the British Conquest, the Constitution, the UN, and Og knows what else).
There UAE is almost like the West… at least in Dubai. There are thousands upon thousands of female expats here both single and married and there is no requirement at all for hijab. Only Saudi Arabia is like what you imagine.
At the malls and in the neighborhoods popular with expats, you see women in western clothing all the time. Just near our place is a large park with a running track around it (3km all the way around) and women in shorts and tank-tops can be seen running around it every morning. At the beach near here, most women will be in bikinis and a few locals will be in full black chadors. Some locals may well be in bikinis (tho not likely I’d imagine)… it’d be impossible to tell who is who.
Women here can drive, work, and lead a normal life. In Sharjah (the Emirate next to Dubai which is almost an extension of the city now), women are expected to cover up a bit more, but no hijab is needed… mostly a ban on shorts really.
Around the peninsula, Dubai is the most liberal, followed by Bahrain, Oman/Qatar, Kuwait, Yemen, and then Saudi. Only in Saudi and Iran do women have to cover up by law and in remote Yemeni villages it is best to do so as well.
The traffic has to be seen to be believed. It is not like (for example) Kampala, Uganda where there is absolute chaos but nobody is driving super fast and the quality of the roads is poor with animals, bicycles etc. The roads here are as good or better than any in the US and people (a) drive too fast (b) change multiple lanes without signaling (c) follow too close… and are just erratic and unpredictable.
The local avenues are not so bad, but the Emirates Road and Sheikh Zayed Road are scary most of the time (these are major highways with 7 or so lanes in each direction). The Emirates Road is probably in the top three most dangerous roads in the world… everyone (including large propane and dump trucks) drives way, way too fast and too close.
The religion question also comes into play if you are Hindu I believe as I have heard they have special courts for family matters. Basically if you are white and Christian/Agnostic/Athiest, it is best to put Christian and nobody will care. Putting something like Neo-Pagen will cause mass confusion… I am not sure if the computer just has “Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist” selections or if they have to type it in. It is not printed on the residency visa.
Well, thank you for fighting some ignorance. It’s easy to lump all those places together, especially when the ones you hear the most about are the more restrictive ones.
(And for some reason all the pictures of people in the UAE I was finding had very covered-up women in them.)
Locals will cover up most everywhere in the Gulf, but in general Westerners can wear what they like (at least in the major cities) of UAE, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and Kuwait.
Shorts are not a good idea except in Dubai (and even then it is disrespectful but lots of tourists from the cruise ships do it).
You also need to remember that the ratio of men to women here is probably about 3:1 or more as most of the imported laborers are not able to bring their families from India/Pakistan/Bangladesh etc. Thus, pictures in the old city center with lots of merchant shops will tend to have fewer women than most other cities.
On Thursday night (the start of the weekend), there are long lines at all the money transfer places as they send money home. Whole villages in Pakistan are supported by people working in the Gulf.
