DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES -- Nations around the world are lurching into lockdown, steeling themselves for a brutal surge as the Omicron variant spreads like wildfire.
Maskless debauchery has returned to dance floors. Brunch-goers are drinking with abandon. Home-buyers are flooding the market. Tourists are snapping up hotel suites. Now, Sinopharm is no longer an option in Dubai. Those who received both doses, including the emirate's legions of low-paid foreign laborers, also have opted for double vaccination with Pfizer-BioNTech. The government offers Pfizer boosters to all adults.Encouraged by widespread inoculation and record-low mortgage rates, more properties were sold in Dubai in November than in any other month in the last eight years, according to website Property Finder.
"You can go to restaurants. There's no debate about remote working. This is not the case in Europe where it's still locking down," said Christophe De Rassenfosse, the chief product officer of Property Finder, about why he moved his family from Brussels to Dubai in October. "You don't necessarily have a huge percentage of elderly people which occupies the hospitals."
Taxis have been missing from many street corners, with fleet owners that downsized operations during the pandemic citing shortages amid "unprecedented" demand.
Feelings of déjà vu seem spooky, however, when we understand the common tricks our memory plays on us, there’s nothing unusual about these eerie experiences. In reality: Time will decide whether Dubai got it right. Let's hope it doesn't become - déjà vu all over again.
Interesting the leading measure of an Islamist state's success is its 'bustling bars'. Good to see they have emerged from the iron age.