You're wondering why I have a heading such as I have and pictures of trees and skyline. Well that's how my evening had begun. I stepped out onto the balcony and was amazed by the colour of the leaves of the tree outside the balcony. Well I had stayed there for so long but had never noticed how beautiful the colour of freshly sprouted leaves could be, well especially on this tree. So I dashed in for my camera and started clicking. The light was perfect. It was just a little after the sun had set and would soon turn dark. As it did my focus suddenly shifted to the bright red hoarding in the background among that clutter of outdoor signages. It was like a jungle out there and this was like the Lion among them beckoning readers to the land of Gold, Dubai.
Well much later when I had left and driven half way home I come upon the catastrophe that was visible from a distance. There were flames leaping into the sky behind some buildings and people running up the bridge with their belongings, some weeping, some with children in their arms as I descended the bridge. The closer I got the more evident it got that the shanty village behind the buildings was under siege by the raging fire billowing thick black smoke into the sky. An occasional explosion could be heard as traffic had come to a near standstill. Once near the site of the fire a manic crowd had taken control of the road and the police in the background standing behind the barricades on the road were just mere silent bystanders. The rowdy crowd were diverting traffic back, so we followed their direction and took a u-turn and headed back in the same direction we had come from towards Science City. I shouldn’t speculate, but the oddity of the scene makes me wonder, a fire that had engulfed such a huge area and looked menacing endangering lives of people and materials had yet not got the attention of the Fire Services? Just makes me wonder if there was some vested interested in the razing of all that “prime real estate”?
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