A Futurist in Dubai: Bring on the Mega-Malls
After my meeting with FX Fowle, I went to visit Diera City Center mall, one of the major middle/upper-middle income malls in Dubai.
It was quite the eye-opener…with more than 370 stores, and parking decks that seemed like they could fit the entire Hyderabad airport (including a play area/arcade that I know for certain was several times larger than the entire departure waiting area in Hyderabad)….this thing was big, more than a little fancy, and also showcased an amazing variety of cultural flows.
The mall had everything—from a Carrefour and a Virgin megastore, to an 11-screen cinema, myriad restaurants and a massive food court (which, aside from the occasional Arabic lettering and prominence of Asian fusion, could fit right in at any American mall), and of course, more clothing, jewelry, and computer game stores than you could shake a stick at. It’s quite the popular hangout—on weekend nights (Thursday and Friday are the official weekend in the UAE), the taxi queues can run up to two or three hours!
What struck me most, however, was not the sheer size of the mall (though that certainly made an impact!), but rather the countless cultural juxtapositions I saw just walking past stores. Women in head-to-toe abayas would be followed by those in rather…minimalist European style dress. Indian families, with women in traditional saris, might be closely followed by guys who, from their biceps and their tattoos, you could easily imagine to be a part of a Western military. And that’s just a sample of the people walking by—inside the stores, I talked with clerks and sales staff who were Kenyan, Palestinian, Lebanese, Uzbek, and Romanian, to name a few.
The end of my first day left me wondering what, if anything to make of this cultural hodgepodge…and curious to see the luxury that now defines Dubai.
Matt Sollenberger
in Futures Expeditions, Consumerism, Middle East
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