After a day braving the heat to explore ‘old Dubai’ down by the creek, Dave and I decided to save some dirhams and take a cheap local bus rather than an expensive taxi back to Annie’s place. After questioning a few locals, we were pointed in the direction of the bus station and informed that we should take the number 8.

As luck would have it, a number 8 pulled into the stand as we arrived at the bus stop. A queue formed and we joined the back. After 5 minutes, the driver still hadn’t opened the doors to let us on. Melting in the heat, we asked some people in front of us what was happening and were told that the bus wasn’t leaving for another 10 minutes and they wouldn’t let us on until it left. Great. So the driver gets to sit with the air-con whilst we all burn and dehydrate (remember, it’s Ramadam at this point and we can’t drink in public).

Finally the doors opened and everyone pushed on. The bus was pretty full when we boarded, all the seats were taken and there were many people standing. ‘Two tickets, please’, I requested. ‘There are no more seats’, replied the driver. ‘That’s ok, I’ll stand’. The driver sighed, ‘You can’t stand. Ladies can’t stand’. ‘What?’, I looked at him incredulously. ‘Ladies can’t stand so you must wait for the next bus’. I couldn’t believe it. It’s not ok for a lady to stand on a bus but it is ok for her to stand in the heat waiting for the next bus. I wasn’t having it and neither were my fellow ladies already on the bus.

In unison they piped up ‘she can share a seat with us’. The driver argued, ‘there are no more seats, she must get off’. But power to the women, mainly from the Philippines, who gave the driver what for, squashed up and insisted I sit with them.

It turns out that on the buses in Dubai and Abh Dhabi, there is a ladies section at the front of the bus where ladies must sit and if it’s full, they are not allowed to stand in this section and can’t get on. The men sit and stand at the back of the bus, and aren’t allowed in the ladies section. Who knew that getting a foreign bus could be so complicated…?