Muhammad the Taxi Driver

The desert from Jebel Ali; example of a wrought-iron fence decorated with gilt; the Oman border with lovely minarets in the background

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As I struggled to adjust to life in a new environment – and a bewildering culture – all kinds of thoughts and impressions percolated inside me, trying to find places to perch in my brain – places that could become part of a continuity rather than a series of random flickerings. I’m still having epiphanies about things that happened during that year. It’s taken a long time for my experiences to coalesce in any sort of meaningful way. Memories recur and shift, like glass pieces in a kaleidoscope. Abruptly, I see from a distance, as if observing the length of a tree whose top was out of sight in the clouds but that now lies on the forest floor.

What I’m trying to say, I think, is that life flows in a more or less purposeful way. Explanations and reasons always exist if you look for them. Events don’t suddenly explode in a vacuum. Most of the time, however, our lives feel as if we live them in a succession of sealed boxes – which is a dangerous illusion.

The school was a bit disorganized at the beginning because the principal, Drew, did not arrive for start up. He’d been diagnosed with cancer over the summer and had to stay in Canada for treatment. The boys’ remarks about being ‘terrorists’ made me remember my interview with him. It took place at Ricky’s Restaurant in South Surrey, a suburb of Vancouver. The sheer unlikeliness of this can only be expressed in a joke shared by residents of another Vancouver suburb, “Richmond means never having to say you’re Surrey.”

Drew’s first question shocked me. “Are you Jewish?” he asked. “I know in Canada that can’t be asked but the owners of the school in the UAE oblige me to ask it.”

I hadn’t been formally asked about religious affiliation since I was ten years old. I think my mouth fell open. “No,” I replied.

“I didn’t think so,” Drew continued, “But I had to ask because Jews are not allowed in the UAE. Are you gay?”

My native wit made a feeble comeback. “If you’re asking whether or not I’m a Jewish lesbian, the answer is no.”

“Just another thing I had to ask you,” said Drew. “Homosexuality is illegal in the UAE. I believe what you’re telling me but I have to make it really clear that if you’re either Jewish or gay, and anyone finds out, you’ll be immediately deported. Which wouldn’t be good for the school. Or you.”

When I was figuring out which countries to visit in the three-week January holiday, my students told me to go to Jordan. “You’ll love it, Miss,” they said.

Yes! And wouldn’t it be wonderful to go to Jerusalem as well, since it’s so close. I was raised in a Christian home but can’t imagine anyone with even the slightest knowledge of Christianity not thrilling at the thought of walking the streets of Jerusalem. I babbled on about the wonder of it and received a lot of strange looks.

Eventually, someone said, “Annie, listen. If you go to Israel you’ll end up with an Israeli visa in your passport and you won’t be allowed back into the UAE. They won’t let you out of Dubai airport.”

I felt another distinct shock but didn’t yet have any inner framework on which to register it. Except for my year in China and a few months’ travel in Europe, I’d lived my life in Canada. When Chinese students asked me to describe the first thing they’d notice if they came to Canada, the first really different thing, I told them, “You would be surprised because in Canada there are no foreigners. Here in China, everyone knows I’m not Chinese. They look at me and think, ‘There goes a foreigner.’ The people in Canada come from everywhere, from every country you could name, and we have no way of singling out a foreigner. Also, my part of Canada is very new. It has just over a hundred years of history, and from the very beginning there were people from many countries so we’ve made that history together. It hasn’t always been good, but we haven’t stopped trying to make every single person feel it’s their home.”

Adjusting to a place where your religion denies you access to entire countries, where it can actually put you in danger, was more than I could absorb. So the knowledge went to a sort of inner holding pen. I was at the starting point of a voyage of discovery and a lot of experiences would end up in that holding pen until I’d learned what to do with them.

In the meantime, I had the practicalities of everyday life to deal with. Despite the occasional harrowing experience with rogue travel agents, most men I dealt with didn’t treat me like a Wayward Western Whore. I really hate generalizations, but educated men and men who frequently worked with foreign women understood that the majority of us didn’t deserve the “loose” label.

Muhammad the Taxi Driver, a wonderfully kind and generous man, is a prime example. Without him, my life in the UAE would have been considerably diminished. He came from a remote mountain village in Pakistan and had a wife and three children at home, to whom he sent a good deal of his money. I saw a picture of the older two, a boy and a girl, and they both looked healthy and well-fed.

When he first came to the UAE, he worked on a camel farm. After a year or two, he was able to get his own taxi and become an independent operator. He shared an apartment with several other men from Pakistan and they all took turns sleeping so the rent they paid was minimal and the money they could send home maximal.

Speaking of camels, shortly before my sojourn in the UAE, camels were a real problem on the Emirates highway that runs from Abu Dhabi to the Oman border. A few people still live in the old nomadic, Bedouin way and camels are their most prized possessions. Occasionally a camel would wander onto the highway causing a horrendous accident as well as financial hardship for the camel’s owner. When the accidents first occurred, the Bedouins tended to be ignored. At certain times of year, people (mostly men, I think) can seek an audience at the palace of the local sheikh in order to air their grievances. If the fancy strikes him, the sheikh graciously remedies the situation. So it came to pass that Bedouins began receiving fabulous sums for their dead or handicapped camels.

Recognizing a boon when it dropped in their laps, the Bedouins began purposely shooing their camels onto the highway. The human death toll mounted, as did the incidence of camel dishes on restaurant menus, while sums equivalent to the entire annual budget of countries like Laos were paid out to camel owners. Finally the government realized Something Had To Be Done. A row of greenery had already been planted along the edges of the highway to prevent sand from obliterating the road, so it was a fairly simple matter to install discreet screen fences amongst the trees. Problem solved. No more wandering camels. Fewer accidents.

Since I’m talking about highways anyway, I’ll mention that little drive-in mosques were also dotted along the length of the highway so no one could say a mosque wasn’t handy when the call to prayer came. And – for those really difficult moments – car trouble, perhaps, or a sharp blow to the head from a cantankerous camel – you could buy prayer mats with tiny compasses embedded in them so you’d always know in which direction Mecca lay no matter where you found yourself when the time for prayer rolled round.

These were some of the stories Muhammad told me during our first journeys together. Soon, though, I would start making his life difficult.

Next Up: Booking Muhammad