Richard Turen
The news was starting to get to me. Too much negativity. The world seems to be in a knot, a twisted, convoluted series of pressure points, any one of which can explode at any moment. My clients have concerns. I have concerns for them as they travel the globe. I needed to get away with the family, away to the safest place I could find on this angry planet of ours.
So we packed up and flew 14 hours on a new Airbus 360 to a place where I knew we would be safe and where I hoped we would find a pleased and productive populace.
Norway would have been nice, but I wanted a safer place than that. After months of following the news at home, the tinkling of cowbells in a Swiss village might be soothing, but I wanted to go to a place that was better for families.
This was an important family vacation. Safety and cleanliness were my primary concerns, along with great hotels and world-class restaurants. I wanted to spend two weeks in a place where I would never encounter rudeness or obscenity, a place where we could take our 9-year-old daughter anywhere without concern. I was hoping to find a place on this planet where crime is virtually nonexistent, a place where you don't have to use your hotel safe, where locals leave the front door unlocked.
I suppose I was looking for the safest place on Earth.
I flew the national airline. It had a lounge at the rear of the plane where I spent two hours talking with various crew members who had left their homelands to move to the place where we were headed. The airline required it.
It struck me that each person I spoke to seemed thrilled with the decision, and several told me that I had, indeed, found the safest place on Earth.
We landed at a large, busy airport, unlike any I had ever experienced. What was it, I wondered, that was different? Quiet, the calm order of things seemed to characterize everyone's behavior. Dozens of people waited in line to approach the customs desks staffed entirely by men in white.
Our driver took us to the home of our friends who moved to this place three years ago and never want to leave. As we drove, we passed through a belt of incredible architecture, all of it appearing to be newly built. Skyscrapers reached to the heavens, a gathering of giants with seemingly unique characteristics. Here a high-rise twisted like a pretzel with the middle narrowed to a single condominium, then, in perfect symmetry, unraveled floor by floor. There, a series of beautiful buildings where the window shades open and close automatically based on the position of the sun and the outside temperature.
We would have 10 days here. As I looked out the window during my first hour after arrival, I noticed something. I could not find a piece of paper on the streets or along the highway. I was in some super-city of the future where the cleaning people had just left.
In the days that followed, I came to realize that I had indeed chosen a vacation location that was safe. But I mean that in a very specific way. This place has never had any terrorism. There is no theft. There are no bad neighborhoods to avoid.
I started to really wonder about the phrase "paradise on Earth." What would that mean, what would that entail?
Well, first of all, it would need to be a healthy place. Check. It turns out that all citizens of this country have cradle-to-grave complimentary medical care, much of it of a superior quality and much of it imported. But let's say a citizen becomes ill with a malady for which in-country treatment is not available. No problem: The citizen is flown, at government expense, to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., where treatment is covered.
Paradise would have to have a well-educated citizenry. Check. Education is free up to and including university, and its literacy rate has improved dramatically in the past four decades.
There would have to be world-class beaches. Check. This place sits on the sea, and where there is construction they simply add water where necessary. Most of the better hotels are built on islands with nearly every deluxe room having sea views. Cruise ships have recently started sailing from the harbor, Azamara, Holland America and Royal Caribbean among them.
There would need to be great housing opportunities and truly memorable hotels in my travel paradise. Check. This place has the world's top-rated, seven-star hotel. I stayed in the lowest category of room they had, a two-floor suite overlooking the sea with dining room, living room, fully equipped office, a few bathrooms, a butler and exquisite service. I stayed at several other hotels that were each among the finest I have ever experienced anywhere in the world.
Most of the locals live in small, gated communities of 20 to 40 homes. It is considered rude to show off one's money or assets with the possible exception of the cars their drivers drive. One night I saw a Rolls parked on a crowded street. It was silver -- not painted silver but silver-plated. I was told there were several gold-plated Rolls around town.
Paradise would have to have things that a family can enjoy. Check. During our stay, my daughter rode a donut boat, assisted at a falconry hospital, rode in a Formula 1 model at Ferrari World and went waterskiing. She also visited a kids area in a shopping mall, set up as its own country, which issues kids passports. Inside, a miniature city is filled with all sorts of municipal and private businesses. Kids enter any business that interests them and get 10 minutes of training. If they then fulfill certain tasks, they are issued payment that can be redeemed at the local toy store. My daughter was a hotel clerk, a model and a disc jockey.
But since the place was located in the world's largest shopping center, with more than 1,200 stores and restaurants, she had other options, like playing hockey on a full-size rink or walking through a major aquarium.
I took this trip just after the midterm congressional elections in the U.S., which involved months of carping and attack ads. Paradise would have none of that. Was there, I wondered, a place left on Earth where virtually the entire population supported its rulers totally on the basis of their competence? Check. This place has that. In an interview, the country's leader was asked why he felt the need to move so fast. Why, he was asked, was it necessary to have the world's best airline, its busiest airport, its tallest tower and highest per-capita income?
"Why not?" he replied. "If it took New York 150 years, why must it take us 250 years?"
In fact it hasn't. I found the world's safest place just 150 miles from Iran, just south of the Sea of Hormuz. I am in the United Arab Emirates, spending my vacation in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, a very safe place in a dangerous neighborhood. It's a wonderful example of perception vs. reality when it comes to those crucial decisions regarding where we ought to be sending our clients.
In 1973, this place had no currency or tourism, and the economy was based on a tribal barter system. To arrive and see what they have accomplished under the leadership of two royal families eager to use their wealth to improve the life of their citizens, is, I think, an amazing story.
(To be continued.)
Addendum: Since this column was written, an American schoolteacher was killed by a knife-wielding assailant following an apparent altercation in a restroom in Abu Dhabi's Al Reem Island Shopping Mall. The reasons for the altercation were not clear at press time.