Hootie29

Hi there,

My husband and I are planning a move to Dubai. We are both British citizens but I'm asian and he's an Arab. My husband has been offered a role in Dubai. However, we've been told that I most certainly will have to face a lot of attitude wherever I go.

I'm well educated and work as an engineer and take what we have here for granted I suppose. I guess I'm panicking as I've been told that I would struggle to find a job in my field and if I do that I will have problems with salary and attitude from people from the airport to workplace etc. we have a baby and obviously I don't want to make the move if it's going to be as bad as what people say.

Any experience or advise would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you

mikewot

It is not only brit asians but all asians in general and especially those from the Indian Sub Continent, this is not a PC country. Just because your passport says you are a brit does not mean you will be treated as one. Because asians and those from the Indian Sub Continent will happily accept jobs which pay a third of what a Western expat would expect and no housing allowance etc. you may struggle to find employment.

mentalist

As you have a baby, you will presumably not be working anyway. I would not recommend leaving a baby with a nanny or house maid here in Dubai as they rarely have suitable qualifications or experience. They are often simply girls who cannot find work elsewhere.

archie159

As in so many things, it is not always that simple. Yes, many people here are very racist towards Asians, whether they came from Peshawar or Knightsbridge. But often this racism is as much "class-ism" (does that word exist?) as racist - it is directed at Asians in the UAE as being, mostly, from the menial working classes rather than from the upper professional classes. I've come across some extremely wealthy and successful Asians, direct from Asia, and they did not suffer problems of racism - but they looked successful, and had an aura of wealth and confidence. The same will apply to your Arab husband - if he is an Arab from Doha he'll be treated completely different to an Arab from Syria or Morocco.

Being blunt - will you be perceived by others (security guards, shop assistants, customs officials, etc) as confident and successful, or as a job-seeking migrant? If you look rich and powerful in the UAE (even if you are not) you will suffer far, far fewer racist problems than if you look poor, scruffy and lowly - irrespective of the colour of your skin.

"Engineer" is a broad-term - are you a senior google software engineer, someone who has designed space-shuttles/mega water-projects, or a person who fixes washing-machines (yet who, in the UK, still seem to refer to themselves as engineers). It is quite possible for females to be successful engineers in the UAE, but it is a lot harder to be female if you work in dirty-hands engineering. I know at least one successful female nuclear engineer here - the UAE is busy training nationals to help run the new power plants, and quite a lot of them are women, so if you can work in that field it might even be an advantage to be a female engineer.

I agree with the comment above about babies and maids... but, as always, there are plenty of fantastic maids, who will do a great job of looking after your baby, but you'll need to pay more, and spend more time looking.

Thinking about it - I'd almost go as far as saying "tell us your projected salary in the UAE, and we'll tell you how likely you are to suffer racism"... If that monthly salary is in the 20s or 30s, then you'll suffer it. If it is in the 80s, you probably won't. Etc...

NewCaledonia

What do you mean by Asian?

If you are "white" Far Eastern Asian (not Filipino), I think it will be OK. There are not many Chinese/Japanese/Singaporeans/Koreans in the Middle East and they are usually well-off. I have known some of them with very good positions. Probably in better jobs than the average Western expat because otherwise why would they have moved from Singapore?

Indian/Pakistani/Bangladeshi... I guess that is another story. I can't comment since I don't have first hand experience for obvious reasons; but I can imagine it will not be like in the UK unfortunately.

The Middle East is disgustingly racist indeed.

alfrombarking

Blacks have it much better in the Middle East than Asians. For some reason I feel like Arabs treat Asians much worse.

hong_konger

And just what is that supposed to mean ? Is there a specific way that Brits ought to be treated ? Is this different from the way another nationalities should be treated ?

mikewot

Whow! Take a chill pill! Archie159 nails it with class-ism, does not matter where your passport is from if you look/act a certain way you will be treated a certain way.

hong_konger

LOL and Agreed. My wife is brown Asian. But she walks, talks and acts like she owns the place and takes shit from no-one and she never suffered any racism in the UAE. In fact she says she was treated better in the UAE than anywhere else she has lived and absolutely loved it.

Hootie29

Hi all,

Thanks to everyone who replied.

So here are the facts:

In the UK my salary is 40k. The domains that I've worked in include defence, aviation and nuclear. My ethnicity is south Asian.

I guess from what I've read here I should be prepared to face some attitude. However what I was not going to compromise was getting the attitude at the workplace. I want a job where I will be paid a good package.

Baby will be 1 and a half when we go there so need to put her in nursery. I also don't want any attitude from staff there as well.

I guess I need to keep an open mind and visit the place to see how bad it actually is.

Bahtatboy

Good luck

mikewot

We have Asians and Indians (and here I mean the original family ethnicity, not where they were born, which for most was UK/Europe) in the company I work for as well as other Indiands/asians not from the West/Europe. There is a striking difference in packages but this is because the westerners come with a USP or specific skill set which is in demand, so they get the western package. The rest have skills which are not necessarily unique and many asian/Indian unis/colleges are pumping out a vast rate of highly educated people but they either have little or no practical skills or experience OR they have low expectations on wages etc.
I think all of my Western Asian/Indian friends & collegues have suffered various forms of discrimination compared to 'white' westerners. It is an unfortunate fact of life here and there is not much you can do about it, irrespective of how distasteful you may find it. Other than go home I suppose and having shaved 5 years off of my UK mortgage already I am prepared to put up and shut up, except when there is direct action I can take when I observe something going down which does not involve a local, because you do not know what wasta (connections) they might have.

Tockalosh

On the bright side you can play the brown card and never have to queue up Politely again.
Never suffer a delay waiting for a taxi at terminal 3 again. Just walk past the silly white folk, all lined up; 99% of whom won't say a thing

Bipat

I seem to remember you have previously expressed a lot of knowledge about the "brown people" of India. You still have something to learn!!
In a queue you stand arms 'akimbo', rock nonchalantly from side to side. Nobody gets past you

NorthernLad

One of my guys is British of Indian descent - extremely well educated and speaks better English than me. He's done a few years in The Magic Kingdom and still suffers from racism. His attitude, however, is that he's there to make money quickly, as such he just ignores the racism (and thinks smugly to himself 'I've got a UK passport you ****wits').

Unfortunately in this region racism is a fact of life (I get some hostility from Arabs, particularly Palestinians, for being British). Again, I ignore it...happily knowing I have a UK passport that means I can travel to most places once my bucket of shit is overflowing.

To some extent you sell your soul when living and working out here, it's all about the money.