Peak Stupidity, If Only

Jun 12, 2026

[Dubai, 6/11/26]

A Paradise Palace security guard is a Sudanese born in Dubai. Since there’s no birthright citizenship, he must maintain contacts with his ancestral homeland, though he hardly knows it. Though most Filipinas are here alone, I’ve seen some pushing strollers with Filipino babies, so these kids, too, can’t form a permanent attachment to their land of birth.

In January of 2026, Dubai finally decriminalized having a child out of wedlock. Before that, both free loving parties could be jailed for no less than two years. Dubai didn’t care for bastards or single mothers. Now, a child born to an Emirati father gains citizenship immediately, but not if only his mom is Emirati, and his dad foreign. Dubai must discourage its women from getting too frisky with all these guys from South Asia, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, Africa and much poorer Arab states. Though they make up the bulk of foreigners here, you wouldn’t know it from all these YouTube videos and Instagram photos of preening, gloating influencers.

With the sail shaped Burj Al Arab in the background, one stands barefoot on a canoe, yet wearing a turquoise dress, lifted strategically to show one leg above the knee. Looking backward dramatically, she runs a hand through wind blown blonde hair, cascading down. No less superficial, Dubai loves them.

Today’s high is 97, but, as usual, feels much hotter. Before starting this piece, I heard the loudest meows ever from a cat. Standing just outside Paradise Palace’s entrance, he could feel the cool air, but didn’t dare enter. All he could do was meow endlessly until, finally, he just ran in to sit down by the reception desk. Seconds of relief were better than nothing. On the streets, I have seen stray cats lying listlessly on the ground. I’ve also seen some outside glass doors, pleading. Today, this one was simply chased out with an electric fly swatter. I didn’t think they were necessary. I’ve seen so few flies. It’s not my business to suggest the cat be given some water. At least he wasn’t shot or tortured for amusement.

Paradise Palace’s cleaners work from 7AM to 7PM each day, with two days off each month. The guy on my floor is Indian.

“What do you do on your days off?” I asked. “Sleep? Drink beer?”

“No, no! I only eat rice and vegetables.”

“Are you a Muslim?”

“Yes.”

“Many Muslims drink alcohol.”

He just grinned.

“They must be bad Muslims!”

He laughed.

Turkey, Lebanon and Egypt all make good beer. As for Albania, many men drink rakia, a clear liquor, to invigorate their mornings.

Though I’m entitled to a daily room cleaning, I have him come in every three. No need to overwork anyone. In my 20’s, I cleaned houses and even washed windows, in the winter. Sometimes I ask him for bottles of water, tea bags or coffee packets. He always calls me “boss.”

With 90% of its population foreign, Dubai can’t be more multicultural. Wandering into Port Saaed yesterday, I saw an Afghani bakery that also made Indian, Pakistani, Iraqi and Uzbek flat bread. By a chai joint, three Bangladeshi asked me to take their photo. Across the street was an Iraqi eatery. So many of these immigrants have had their nations attacked, destroyed or at least deformed by Judeo Christians.

Occidental colonization has always been sanitized and sanctified as salvation. We must rape these savages to deliver them to our white faced God. Threatening to wipe out Iran, Trump speaks of saving Iranians. Christ’ daddy is the genocidal Yahweh. As usual, Judeo Christians are waging wars against the rest of the world, but their internal contradictions and tension, as manifest in their very Bible, are destroying them. Iran must finish them off.

Many T-shirts in Dubai say California, New York or LA. Today, I saw “ALABAMA” on a Filipina. Any reference to the USA is good enough. Dubai itself yearns for NY and LA, so has built a 21^st century Manhattan, but crisscrossed by wide avenues and sliced, right down the middle, by a super wide freeway, California style. Its dizzying overpasses noodle every which way. Like most of its residents, Dubai has been uprooted and displaced. Even Emiratis aren’t at home. Each second of each day, they’re swarmed by a tsunami of foreign faces. They’ve lost their nation. Like the USA, Dubai is a warning.

For a visitor, this feeling of universal displacement is rather liberating. With nearly everyone foreign, you’re just another guy passing through.

Oman, though, is much more grounded, I hear. In Port Saaed, I scoped out Al Khanjry Tranport. Buses leave three times daily. The seven hour ride affords views of the landscape, so rewarding in itself. No one should stare at a phone or book on any bus or train. In Ruwi, Muscat, it’s just a four minute walk to cheap enough Sun City Hotel. Though Muscat’s tallest building is just 16 stories high, it’s not because Oman’s GDP is an an eighth of Dubai’s, but because they see, unlike their Gulf State neighbors, that poking God, saints and all the angels when you’re given so much flat, empty land, is just stupid, at the very least.

Consider this remarkable bit from Abu Dhabi’s National News on 2/5/14, “Burj Khalifa tenants living as high up as the 108^th floor could be locked out of elevators and car parks if landlords do not settle [service fees] by Saturday.

“The developer Emaar has also warned that security cards giving access to the building will be deactivated. Services such as air conditioning will also be switched off.”

Such tenants included top global executives and international celebrities. Here, even bus shelters must be air conditioned, and most sidewalk foodstands, too, so you can imagine. Toasty at 1,400 feet, you must take 2,000 steps down, to get a $6 saffron flavored latte, then 2,000 steps up to reach your state of the art, tastefully appointed oven, with a minor Julian Schnabel tucked in a corner. Despairing, you might as well turn on the gas. Before expiring, you’ll perform Bartok’s Sonata for Solo Violin, of course, while staring at your artisinal, Venetian mirror that covers an entire wall. You will be naked, of course, and not just because you need to admire, one last time, your perfect body, as shaped by a team of Fit Squad DXB trainers at the Burj Club, right inside the Burj Khalifa, just 103 stories down. Besides your narcissism, unshakable till the end, it’s also 120 degrees. For obvious reasons, there are no open windows.

Imagine having a coffee mug dropped on your gawking, touristy face from the 108^th floor! “Should have gone to Disneyland instead” will be your last thought, just before impact. Standing over you, your reliably scolding wife will scream, “Didn’t I tell you to get travel insurance!”

Though nothing catastrophic happened in 2014, why slot yourself into any super structure, with all your needs dependent on another’s quirks, whims, lapses or mere sadism? It’s best to minimize your susceptibility to their plans. Having obeyed all diktats all their lives, the most gullible even paid to be fatally injected.

With my SubStack earnings trickling in so erratically, it’s probably best to go home. We’ll see. Plus, there are all those drones and missiles in the hood, so to speak. Kuwait, Bahrain and Jordan were all hit yesterday. Unlike Judeo Christians, Iranians have been most careful to avoid civilian casualties, though. Plus, should anything hit Dubai, it would be at the other, much swankier end, with all those ostentatious icons.

Trump has just declared, for the 39^th time, a peace deal with Iran is near, so the DOW shot up 930 points. Only morons think that moron’s inconsequential. His words alone can rake in billions. No one else has that power. Trump and his buddies are making banks.

At 4:08AM, all these nightclubbers, many clearly drunk, are leaving Paradise Palace. All night long they danced to thumping music. I hear much laughter. A short Filipino is trying to plant cheek kisses on a huge Nigerian bouncer, only to be pushed away. Now, he’s just slurring, laughing and rubbing the African’s arms.

A fat-bellied Filipina who’s clearly downed one thousand and one beers, many, many times over, is telling the Nigerian bouncer to say, “Putang ina mo.” To please her, he duly does so, with perfect pronunciation. All the Filipinos in the lobby laugh. Done with this, I will drink a tall glass of laban, then wander outside.