After exploring Emirati history at the Sheikh Saeed Al Maktoum House, we crossed the Dubai Creek to head to the souks at Deira...
And here we are at the Dubai Gold Souk...
This is the mecca for all from far and wide for "relative;y" cheaper gold. And there are those legends about expatriates from the Indian subcontinent sneaking in gold past the prying eyes of customs officials, afterall, Dubai for long had been the El Dorado for the yellow metal...
Most of the shops here are owned and manned by Indians and that makes me wonder what if all Indians were to leave Dubai. Probably the economy here would collapse...
And one of strangest (or funniest) stories I heard in the 1980s was of an Indian expatriate family returning home from Dubai with loads of gold. In those days, they didn't have x-ray scanners at customs. The family concealed their gold in kachoris...
At the "opportune" moment, when the family was passing through customs, their kid felt hungry and demanded a kachori. He ate it and asked his mom for another one, a special one with the gold in it. The innocence of the kid did them in! The gold was confiscated and they up paying a hefty fine...
The craziest ornaments I've ever seen...
If it's ostentatious, it's Dubai...
If it glitters, it's in the souk...
I've always wondered why people are crazy about gold...
And we walked across to the Spice Souk...
And we found some extremely flavourful Iranian zaffran or saffron at extremely reasonable prices which we picked up as a gift for the family...
The Baniyas Road ferry terminal...
And now we head back to Business Bay to our hotel...
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