UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: Merry National Happy Day Christmas: Holidays In a Flat World

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: Merry National Happy Day Christmas: Holidays In a Flat World

Christmas in Dubai

Starting midway through November, the green and red and white streamers appear; houses are bedecked with sparkling lights and buildings attempt to out-bling each other in outrageous green, red and white displays.  Festive lights and decorations sprout along streetlights and across shop windows and children get restless in school waiting for the holiday.

Except the red-white-and-green don’t signify Christmas but the UAE National Day, which is celebrated on December 2nd and commemorates the day forty-two years ago when the rulers of seven different fiefdoms signed a constitution and became the United Arab Emirates.  Sheikh Zayed, the leader of Abu Dhabi and the first President of the UAE, died in 2004 and his likeness is everywhere on National Day. For those of you in the United States, imagine if George Washington or Thomas Jefferson had died only ten years ago and you’ll have some sense of Zayed’s very long shadow.

For three years now, I’ve experienced a kind of cultural dissonance around National Day, as its colors and lights intersect in my mind with images of New York gussying itself up for the winter holidays. True, the UAE flag has a black stripe in it too, but when the buildings are lit up, they’re mostly lit up in what I think of as “Christmas colors.”  In my Facebook stream (which as an expat sometimes almost seems like a real space rather than a virtual one), pictures of people celebrating Thanksgiving or decorating their tree bump up against pictures of cars wrapped in UAE flags and buildings displaying Zayed’s face in lights.

Abu Dhabi prides itself on being a relatively open culture; there are expats living here from almost every country in the world. The international population means that that the city is a smorgasbord of holiday traditions, from Ramadan to Diwali to Christmas; I have friends here who (quietly) celebrate the Jewish High Holy Days, as well.

The malls and shops reflect this cosmopolitan community but in sometimes disconcerting ways: holiday Christmas displays feature Santa on a camel, or Christmas trees draped with UAE flags.  It does seem, as Thomas Friedman wrote several years ago, as if the world really is flat. Friedman is talking about economics rather than cultural traditions but I’m starting to think that we can’t really separate the one from the other. Eventually, it seems, we’re all going to be living in versions of the same place: a mall.

The other day, as we walked to the movie theater in the mall (in Abu Dhabi, everything is at some mall or other), past the prayer rooms and the Christmas trees and the UAE flags, my younger son said “How come people fight about religion?”  I didn’t have an answer and he’s not yet old enough to be able to appreciate the irony inherent in his question: that in the “Middle East”, a phrase (and place) that still scares many people in the West, my son seems to be learning that different cultural practices can co-exist — not always comfortably but nevertheless without violence.

So happy National Christmas day to you all: may Santa (or whomever) ride his camel to your house and leave you white, red, green, and black striped gifts, and may you all have a happy new year, no matter which calendar you’re using.

This is an original post for the World Mom’s Blog by Deborah Quinn.

Photo credit to the author.

Mannahattamamma (UAE)

After twenty-plus years in Manhattan, Deborah Quinn and her family moved to Abu Dhabi (in the United Arab Emirates), where she spends a great deal of time driving her sons back and forth to soccer practice. She writes about travel, politics, feminism, education, and the absurdities of living in a place where temperatures regularly go above 110F.
Deborah can also be found on her blog, Mannahattamamma.

More Posts

Follow Me:
Twitter

Travel Itinerary for the Week of July 23rd!

On Monday we’re part of a blog carnival, and who doesn’t like a good carnival? Jennifer Burden, our founder from New Jersey, will be writing a post for international childhood vaccine advocates Shot@Life.

On Tuesday, we head to UAE to hear from Manna Hatta Mamma. This mom lives in a melting pot of cultural diversity, where everyone seems to make statements about other groups on the basis of what their cultural background is. She ponders the question of how to erase the divisions between groups.

On Wednesday, we will hear from Carol @ If By Yes from Canada, where politeness is a way of life. Or is it? Perhaps the difference between the US and Canadian sides of the border is not a question of manners, but of forms of expression.

(more…)

World Moms Blog

World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children. World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.

More Posts

Travel Itinerary for the Week of April 30th!

We are all over the map again this week, with a different country for each day!

On Monday, we will start the week in South Carolina with Maggie Ellison, who has had to pick her roots and move more times than she can remember. When her stability was threatened yet again, she reached her breaking point. She takes us on her courageous journey to recovery from a dreadful ordeal.

Also, on Monday, we have a guest post up by founder, Jennifer Burden, over in the UK at BritMums!

Come with us to the Philippines on Tuesday, where Martine de Luna finds herself under pressure to have another baby! Come read as she tells us whether she is planning to resist the pressure or bow to it, and her own plans for her family are.

We are proud of the multicultural group of writers on World Moms Blog. As diverse as we are, there are some things that don’t change, no matter where in the world you happen to be parenting your kids. One of them is the “terrible twos”. Mama B in Saudi Arabia is dealing with this now, while she tries to juggle three other children. Come read about her adventures! (more…)

World Moms Blog

World Moms Blog is an award winning website which writes from over 30 countries on the topics of motherhood, culture, human rights and social good. Over 70 international contributors share their stories from around the globe, bonded by the common thread of motherhood and wanting a better world for their children. World Moms Blog was listed by Forbes Woman as one of the "Best 100 Websites for Women 2012 & 2013" and also called a "must read" by the NY Times Motherlode in 2013. Our Senior Editor in India, Purnima Ramakrishnan, was awarded the BlogHer International Activist Award in 2013.

More Posts