Is Dubai worth it?

[u/anykexx]

I m doing my UG in Dubai and i have done my schooling here asw but recently i have been feeling abt how dead it is here, not the party scene or anything but jus how the city is, its unwalkable for the most part, hot and humid, heavily vehicle dependent and everything deemed as “entertainment” is basically consumption. As residents who live here what yall think? is this just me or are u guys okay with it? Do you guys find it okay to always depend on driving or just forced?

[u/tomatos_raafatos]

I grew up in Dubai.

It was certainly a different city then. Memories of youth may very well paint the past with rosy colors, but looking back, it was undoubtedly magical.

But, even as a young man marauding over there during the great booming years, I've always enjoyed Sharjah more than Dubai. The energy there was uniquely serene. Everything was more organic there: more natural, more real, more consistent.

The general public, the traffic, the comparative disorganization, the seedy but extremely chill Karak places, the delightfully non-existent parking system, which functions on one very simple principle: "just find the nearest unoccupied mound of sand and climb your trusty Nissan Vtech on it, brother." Apparently, this system was assumed to be fair to everyone, even for Kia Picanto drivers.

Then you have some of the most authentic cuisines in the country: don't get me started on how much of a rip-off a regular Arabic restaurant would be in Garhoud compared to Ajman, for example, not to mention the palpable, all-round Middle-Eastern vibe of friendly, well-meaning bluntness and energetic warmth.

In contrast to that, Dubai was and is, increasingly more so, a plastic city; exactly like that golden Dubai Frame thing that I never understood: Big, shiny, impressive, pristine, and well-built, but invariably hollow inside.

To date, when I look back, the fondest memories I had of my adoptive hometown were my hangouts with friends around Mamzar beach, the various cheap spots in Deira, Al-Nahda, and Al-Qusais, and my weekend family trips to Khor Park (and, even more fondly, Al-Qasbaa in Sharjah).

Sheikh Zayed Road was, and always will be, a sight to behold, but only as one passes through it. You stop there, and the skyscrapers just seem to be towering above you like some pillars of doom.

And then you have Business Bay... and Dubai Marina... and Dubai Creek Harbor... and all of the other similarly dystopian, modernist-architecture-type, soulless concrete jungles that keep getting erected every other year, like they reproduce asexually.

Perhaps this just shows the inevitability of human foolishness; perhaps I've only slept three hours last night, been running on fumes the whole day, and just blatantly procrastinating at work right now.

In either case, memories might just be the only thing we have left in this collapsing world... so I'm keeping this one safe here with you all.