Last night I went to an Arabic nightclub. They were not sure that I would enjoy it because it is quite a different experience from the usual expat oriented clubs that most of the newsroom goes to. I was quite excited to go however, because the usual club here in the hotels is just like any normal club back home. So, right after getting done with work, we walked back to my apartment, I dropped off my laptop and we took a big shot to get us on our way. Back in the heavy humid heat of the Abu Dhabi nights, we walked as fast as possible to the road nearby to catch a taxi. The driver was listening to an audio tape, as most taxi drivers tend to do which sounded like a sermon. As usual, relaxed and watched the buildings go by, and enjoyed the wild skills taxi drivers use to get you to your destination. Maximum speed, Minimum time. We headed into the hotel which looked old, yet still in good condition. One thing you quickly learn here is that 'old' means anything built more than 5 years ago.
The first thing that surprised me was that the lift had a glass wall, and I could see into the lobby. So I kept watching out of it to see what would come next. The next floor I caught a glimpse of an Indian nightclub, then the floor above that one was also a club! Each floor had a different theme or was for different nationalities! I had discovered not just one new club to visit but 6! The lift stopped, and Muhammad pointed at the sign that said 'under 21 not allowed' and mentioned that this must only apply to the men because all the women look younger. I was not sure what to make of this since he had explained that this was a men only club, and that I should not bring Elysia with me because it was not allowed.
The music was loud and the smells were louder. The smell of shisha greeted us at the doorway, and we walked in to the club with flashing lights and the band blasting around us. I took a moment to look around and saw the room consisted of a stage shaped like a large bulbous T with tables placed all around. Men in dishdashas and western clothes sat puffing away on shisha and cigarettes. Some had beer or other drinks while others of them drank juices and ate fruit slices. We spotted Alaa on the other side of the stage and made our way over to him to pull up our own chair.
We ordered a drink and sat back to enjoy the show. The show mainly centered on watching the beautiful, almost but not quite scantily dressed women dancing. The singer/announcer sang songs I did not understand at all, but the beats were really enjoyable. I have found that there is something in the flow of Arabic music that is entirely different from what we are used to, and I like it very much.
I smoked a bit from the midwakh with my first drink, then moved on to the easy drags of apple shisha. I puffed out clouds of smoke over the dance floor while watching the dancers shake and move across the floor in time to the music. Then one of the girls danced to the edge of the stage where a man placed a Lei around her neck, then put one around each of her arms. She danced back towards the middle of the stage, then threw all 3 of them off the stage into the corner of the room. Well, I thought, that was odd, I was half expecting her to do some sort of dance involving them. So, back to watching the singer and the dancers and the crowd puffing away. Until it happened again with another girl. I asked Alaa, "Why does she keep throwing them away?" "So another girl can have a chance to get one." Of course this didnt explain anything to me. After seeing my look of that plainly meant 'uhh...?', he told me that the men can pay for one to give to the girl they fancy the most and that each one cost 50dhs (about 13$). "Each girl makes only 1200dhs a month here and so they get money buy receiving the Lei as a sort of tip. They get to keep 5% of what the club makes from each one." That makes this similar to the practice of pushing some cash into the thong of a stripper, but much tamer, as one would expect here.
I was asked, "which ones do you like?" Always a difficult question to answer with two single guys on both sides of you and a wife at home. Naturally I said they were all beautiful and it would be too difficult to decide this. It was easy to see that some men in the audience had no such trouble deciding who they favored. One fellow, probably in his late forties with a mustache (basically looking like thousands of other men in this country) chose as his favorite a tall asian girl with pouty lips and highlights in her hair. I had noticed her earlier, and she was most remarkable for what she was doing. Or rather, not doing, as she was in the back of the stage most of the time, looking not very happy to be dancing like many of the others who were quite into the show and were dancing fast, and 'jiggily' and all over the stage. This one simply stood in back and did a sort of one, two, one, two slight leg kick to the beats the whole time in her tall knee high white boots. I was most impressed with how bored she looked as opposed to all the others. The singer called her forward and began to throw leis at her feet as she stood, barely dancing and not looking happy to be making money with each one that was thrown. At first they had been putting the lei on the chosen girl's neck, or around their arm, but with this one it was different. The manager was throwing lei after lei onto the floor around the girl while the man sat, watching, and waving his hand to throw more! Every ten minutes or so the manager would arrive with another armload of leis which the fellow would wave to be thrown to her. After a few armloads, the manager took a piece of paper from the man, and gave it to the girl. I was told that he was giving her his number.
After watching this spectacle of all these leis being thrown to the girl I started to realise that the sums of money he was spending were getting to be out of control. I said to Muhammad that it looked like he was probably going to spend an amount equal to our monthly salary if he kept it up.
Finally the show was over and all the girls took their bags and walked off stage to applause. I waited around while the bill was paid. As we walked out, they said that the manager told them he had spent 11000Dhs (3000USD) that night. Of course I was amazed by the throwing away of so much money, quite literally. As I was saying how crazy he was to spend so much money to give the girl his number, they told me that one man had spent 20000dhs (almost 5500USD) for a night with one of the girls. damn, thats a lot of money! But some people have the money to blow it seems. Or maybe not. As we left in Alaa's car, he told me that the man paid with 2 credit cards. "Put 7000dhs on this one, and 4000dhs on the other" he said. I hope it was worth it for him!
