Welcome to Dubai (The Traveler)

  “Sure, some of my elders have felt that I had not properly earned my position, but that was years ago when I first began to develop properties. The International Suites hotel was one of my first big developments, and I am still very proud of it,” he boasted. “But surely, my elders have gotten over that by now. They know that I am a qualified builder with vision and ambition, and my age no longer has anything to do with it.”

  The counsel paused again, then dug deeper.

  “What about some of the men who have worked for you?”

  Abdul had not thought of that idea either. “What about them?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Are there any past workers who may not have liked you?”

  Abdul felt the question was beneath him. “Past workers? So what, they are immigrants. You think they could organize themselves enough to try and shut down my construction? What good would that do them? They only want the work. They cannot make any money for their wives and families back home without it.”

  The counsel fell silent. He did not want to create a dispute; he was only bringing up the facts of his investigation.

  “You are paying me to present every option. That is my job. So if I cannot obtain the answers I need from the immigrant laborers, then I would next think about asking the management.”

  Abdul took a breath to calm himself. Manipulative management would be even more troubling for him to imagine.

  “Thank you. That is enough for now.” He was obviously still irritated. He wanted to gather as much of the information early to ponder during his day, yet he did not want to be upset by it. However, as soon as he hung up the call with his private investigator, he began to think of the many men that he had fired over the years for their inferior performances on the job.

  He frowned and asked himself, What honorable man would complain about his own lack of performance and then try to poison the minds of others who need the work?

  He felt the idea was sacrilege. There was no excuse for failing to complete tasks. Either you were driven to be successful or you were not.

  You cannot blame anyone else for your own lack of accomplishment, he insisted to himself in the backseat of his car. So he felt nothing of it. Nevertheless, he was compelled to ask.

  With a quick glance at his Rolex, it remained early, before seven. However, Abdul was adamant in handling his investigation queries promptly rather than later—that way he could return to focusing on the real work of his day without lingering questions. He dialed his phone again.

  “Hakim, sorry to call you so early, but I must ask you, have you recognized any immigrant men on the job who have influenced the others negatively?”

  “Yes, I have noticed. So has Khalid. But many of these men we do not even know.”

  “What do you mean you don’t know them?”

  Hakim hesitated to give his honest answer.

  Abdul read his hesitation. “Hakim, you may be honest with me. I need to know.”

  “Okay,” his overseer responded. “Over the past few months, to speed up the construction as you have ordered, we have hired far more men than we could ever learn the names of. And yes, some of them have not been professional or friendly. I have had a few run-ins with them myself. And the Egyptians are usually the worse.”

  “Egyptians?” Abdul asked.

  “Yes, the Egyptians and Pakistanis act as if they are above the work that we give them. So if you must know, then I would say that they are a bad influence on the rest of the men.”

  Abdul paused before jumping to conclusions. The Egyptians of Dubai surely have the egos of a historical people. It is normal for them to think above laboring and to become stereotypically unruly. And the Pakistanis are a militant people because of their own nation. Abdul broke from his thoughts. “Is there anything else you have to tell me?” he asked Hakim.

  “It has gotten much better over this past week,” his overseer said. “Many of the rotten apples have left.”

  “You mean after the accident?”

  “Yes. Remember the group of men I said who had walked off?” Hakim reminded him.

  “The same day that it happened?” Abdul questioned.

  “Yes.”

  “Well, how come you didn’t tell me that then?”

  “I did tell you.”

  Their conversation was growing more intense by the minute. But Abdul stopped and thought, Maybe he did, and I was not thinking about it at the time.

  “Were there Egyptians and Pakistanis in that group of men?”

  “Yes, and I believe Rasik knows them.”

  “Rasik?”

  Abdul was not familiar with the name.

  “He is an Indian—a Hindu. And he speaks several languages. He has helped me to keep peace with the workers whenever he’s had to push them.”

  “Well, you ask him for the names of these other men.”

  “Yes, I will.”

  “And you call me back as soon as you have them. Are you at the site now?”

  “I will be there in twenty minutes.”

  “Good.”

  As soon as Abdul hung up, another thought popped into his head. Mohd Ahmed Nasir, a proud Egyptian soldier and engineer! And I fired him when he asked to return home to be with his sick wife, who later died.

  Abdul had forced himself to block the incident out of his mind. He had been too young and too stubborn to apologize. It was an early period in his development, where he was out to prove himself to the older Emirati.

  “Is he still here in Dubai?” Abdul asked himself aloud. He remembered that Mohd lived in the residential district of Sharjah, before the Palm Islands were complete.

  Abdul made a return call to his private counsel with the new information.

  “I have a name for you: Mohd Ahmed Nasir. He was an Egyptian engineer who worked for me during the time of constructing the International Suites. His wife had needed an operation at the same time as the crucial months of finishing my first big development, so I forbade him from returning home, because I needed his expertise on the job. But I did give him the money he needed to send home to his wife and family for the operation. I told him then to place his wife’s health in the hands of Allah. Nevertheless, she had complications and died later … after I had fired him for leaving his post.”

  “Hmmph,” his private counsel grunted. “Where did he live?”

  “At the time, he lived in the residential district of Sharjah. But I don’t know if he ever returned to the Emirates. It was a hasty decision that I wanted to forget. This was nearly ten years ago.”

  He paused and added, “I have tried to make amends from my earlier immaturities, but I guess I have not yet done enough.”

  “We have all been young with haste at one time,” his private counsel stated, then said, “I will check into it.”

  When he hung up his phone again, Abdul dropped it beside him on the leather seat of his Rolls Royce and prayed, “Merciful Allah …”

  *****

  Hakim arrived at the dusty construction site amongst the hundreds of men on the early shift and sought out the amenable Indian man, Rasik. But Rasik was not to be found.

  Spotting Khalid, who had hired the resourceful Indian and knew him well, Hakim asked, “Have you seen Rasik today?”

  Khalid shook his head. “No, I have not. He would usually be here by now.”

  Hakim looked around and was ready to ask some of the other men.

  Overhearing their conversation, a short Filipino man nervously offered them what he knew.

  “Ah, Rasik, he, uh … someone killed him last night in Deira.”

  The Filipino man had been disturbed by the murder, and he knew that someone would ask about Rasik sooner or later. So he was courageous enough to be the first one to tell them in honor of Rasik’s humility and friendship. He had been a good man.

  Hakim heard him and became excited. “What? He was killed in Deira? Last night? How?”

  Rasik had been at work, happy and healthy the day before.

&nbs
p; The Filipino spoke up with dignity and bravery as the other immigrant laborers began to listen. The man explained in slow and choppy English, “He was stabbed and robbed on the street.”

  “Near his apartment?” one of the other laborers asked.

  Many of the men lived in different working-class areas in and around Dubai, but the Filipino man lived in the same gray cement building as Rasik, in Palm Deira.

  “Yes, last night … right around the corner from our building,” he said. “I saw the ambulance and police take his body away.”

  As he continued to speak, other men from the Palm Deira district began to fill in the details of what they knew while Hakim listened and thought to himself in shock, Merciful Allah! What is going on?

  Hakim could not imagine why anyone would want to murder or rob Rasik. He was a peaceful man who sent every dime back home to his wife and family. Everyone already knew that about him. He practically bragged about it.

  But that was only the beginning of the news. The men then began to speak about two older laborers, who were found with their throats slashed in the same neighborhood of cement apartments in Deira. And when the men repeated their names, Hakim recognized them as old hands who had also worked for Abdul.

  Hakim immediately broke away for privacy and could not wait to call Abdul back.

  “Hello,” Abdul answered quickly.

  “Merciful Allah!” Hakim said. “Rasik was stabbed and killed in Palm Deira last night, and they found two older men in their apartment with their throats slashed—older men who had worked for you,” Hakim added in nearly a whisper.

  “Merciful Allah. Is there a conspiracy?” Abdul asked rhetorically.

  Hakim answered him anyway, “I don’t know. But this has to be more than just a coincidence.”

  Abdul could overhear the commotion from the men in the background. So he told his overseer tensely, “Hakim, you keep this all to yourself, settle down the men and get them all back to work. I already have someone working on it. That’s why I asked you these questions this morning.”

  “Yes, I understand,” Hakim responded. But as soon as he hung up the phone and turned to look into the eyes of the men, filled with panic and disbelief, he knew that it would be a very long day for all of them.

  *****

  Back inside Abdul’s car, the Emirati businessman took another deep breath and exhaled. He had arrived only a few blocks away from his downtown Dubai office. He then made another cell phone call to his private investigator and counsel.

  “Yes, it’s Abdul again,” he stated glumly. “I have more news to report. And names.”

  Chapter 15

  Ramia Farah Aziz received an unknown call on her cell phone. She was up early, watching old footage of herself from a month ago where she had logged hours of interviews and features on the people, places and things in and around Dubai. She had nothing more to do with her time that morning, and she did not want to read so early in the day.

  She looked at the unknown number that popped up on her cell phone screen and hesitated. The call came in slightly after nine. “Who is this?”

  She then thought of all the applications she had filled out for employment that week and snapped out of her apprehension.

  Oh, wow, my first job call, she thought to herself, her eyes wide. “Hello.”

  “Yes, I’m calling for Ramia Farah Aziz,” a subtle male voice said in clear English.

  “Yes, this is she,” Ramia responded.

  “You applied for a job with the Dubai Safari Tours?”

  “Yes, yes I did.”

  Her excitement jumped through the phone.

  The gentle-voiced man even chuckled at her over the line. “I heard that your interviews went quite well. And you take a nice picture.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Are you able to come in by noon today for your first training session?”

  “Yes! Yes!”

  “I would advise you to wear long shorts or pants for the sand and good walking shoes. We will give you a safari hat and a shirt when you arrive at the office before noon.”

  “Okay. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I’ll be there,” she told him profusely.

  “Your enthusiasm is good. It should rub off on our guests and make them feel very comfortable.”

  “Yes, thank you. I love to meet new people.”

  When she hung up, she jumped for joy and pumped her fist. “I have a job! And I love to have something to do and make money.”

  She was as giddy as a child.

  “My dear cousin Basim was right,” she admitted aloud to herself. “Allah has blessed me this morning. And quickly.”

  She immediately dialed her cousin’s cell phone number to share the news with him.

  Basim answered all of Ramia’s phone calls as soon as he could, with a hint of nervousness in case there was some type of emergency, especially after the rash of vicious knife murders that had broken out in their neighborhood the night before.

  “Guess what?” Ramia asked him.

  Basim was not in the mood for charades. “What? What is it?” he questioned her solemnly.

  “You were right! I was called today for a job, just a minute ago. Isn’t Allah magnificent? I start training today at noon,” she told her cousin.

  “But I do not get off work with the car until late. How will you get over there?”

  Ramia frowned. “I will take a cab. I still have some money.”

  “You shouldn’t take a cab after those murders last night,” her cousin said, overprotective. He had been thinking about the murders in their neighborhood ever since he left Ramia that morning to head off for work. He was even tempted to take her into work with him, like an intern.

  “You should not be waiting outside for a cab,” Basim insisted.

  “Then I will call one to wait for me at the curb,” Ramia countered. “What is wrong with you? People all around the world are murdered every day. But that should not stop us from living the life we all want to live.”

  “What time are you supposed to be there?” he asked her.

  Ramia cut off his plans, saying, “You are not coming to get me. I will not allow it. You have a job to do and now I have a job. So I will call you when I leave and call you again when I arrive there … and you can pick me up afterward.”

  Basim’s younger cousin had it all mapped out. There was nothing left for him to say. But he thought something up anyway.

  “You call me as soon as you step into the cab, and I’ll talk to you until you get there. All right?”

  He was trying his hardest to make a safe deal with her.

  Ramia sighed deeply and thought it over. Her cousin had a way of wearing her down with his calm persistence. “Okay. I’ll call you.”

  *****

  Gary rolled over in his king-sized bed at the Hilton downtown and stretched in a gray University of Louisville T-shirt. It was eleven o’clock, and he felt for a moment like a lazy college student sleeping in and skipping class.

  “Urrrgghhh, that was a good sleep,” he moaned, pushing out his arms and legs while kicking off the white sheets and thick quilt. “Here comes my first full day in Dubai.”

  He looked over at the clock on the nightstand and marveled at his perfect symmetry. He had a tour appointment at two, giving him plenty of time to shower, get dressed and grab something to eat before leaving.

  On cue, his phone rang. Gary picked it up and answered without looking to see who it was. What difference did it make? He was up and he could use the conversation.

  “Hello.”

  “You were a big hit last night, man. They all want you back for more. What are you doing tonight?”

  It was Johnny. Gary shook his head and grinned. The guy was a living dose of coffee.

  “I didn’t do anything but smile and talk to people. What could they possibly want more of?” Gary asked him.

  “They want more of you, man, your presence and essence. You have the it factor. No one can explain it, it just is,??
? Johnny told him. “You’re like me, man. I have it. So me and you together make a great team.”

  Johnny continued, “I don’t even have to charge you for this. You took my game up a level. I got numbers I never could have gotten before last night before meeting up with you. So I need to thank you for that. People were talking about the fight you had with the big bloke at The Beach last night in the parking lot too.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t get too used to that. I need to avoid problems over here. So no more drama girls, all right?” Gary joked.

  “Oh, I hear you, my friend. No more of Saeeda. But she did call me twice last night for you. Twice.”

  “Well, thanks for not giving her my number.”

  “No way, man, she’d have to pay me for that. Nothing’s on the house unless you make me money,” he boasted. “So what are you doing today?”

  “What are you doing?” Gary asked him back. The man sounded like he had a lot of free time on his hands.

  “Oh, I’ve already been at the airport since eight this morning. I’m making my third trip back now. I got four-hundred dirham in my pocket already. I’m on my way to six before noon.”

  Outside of his obvious British accent, Johnny would fit right in with the movers and shakers of New York, Philly and Boston. He was fast paced and constantly buzzing.

  “Do you ever sleep?” Gary asked him.

  “Yeah, I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” he joked. “So what are you doing today?” he asked Gary again. “I wanted to give you a few more hours of sleep before I called to wake you up. You know it’s only one o’clock in the morning American time. It’s eight o’clock in Britain.”

  “Thanks for reminding me,” Gary said. “But I’m going on a Dubai desert sand tour today.”

  “Oh, man, I love those tours. They’re big fun, with the dune buggies, sand skis and camels. What time are you going?”