United Arab EmiratesA mall here is a district with a roof
The biggest malls in Dubai and Abu Dhabi hold hundreds of shops, an aquarium or a ski slope, a hotel or two, and car parks divided into named and lettered zones. Walking from one end to the other can take longer than the drive that brought you. Meeting someone at "the mall" is therefore not a plan: pick an entrance, a named landmark inside, or share your live location. Note the zone and level where the car is parked before walking away, because every level of a car park this size looks identical by the time you come back carrying bags.
Buildings are found by name and by pin
Street addresses play a smaller part in daily life here than most visitors expect. Directions tend to run by landmark: the tower beside the metro station, the villa behind the mosque, the hotel after the second roundabout. Dubai has added its own answer in the form of Makani, a ten-digit number on a plate by the entrance that pinpoints a building exactly. In practice, the most reliable address is a location pin, sent by the hotel, the restaurant or the friend you are visiting. Delivery drivers and taxi apps work from pins too, which means sending one saves several phone calls.
The metro, the card and the covered walk
For much of the year, walking between two places in the midday heat is a choice few people make twice. Dubai's metro is clean, air-conditioned and driverless, and many stations connect to malls and offices through enclosed walkways, so a route can stay indoors from platform to shop. Fares go on a Nol card, which also covers buses, the tram and the water bus, and trains carry a premium Gold Class carriage and a section reserved for women and children. Abu Dhabi runs its own buses on a separate card. Where the rail network stops, taxis take over. They are metered and plentiful, and ride-hailing apps can summon either one of them or a private car.
Past the last petrol station
Desert safaris usually collect you from your hotel in the afternoon in a four-wheel drive and head out to the dunes for the evening. Out among them, or up a wadi in the Hajar Mountains, signal is something to check rather than assume. The heat is its own reason for care. Keep the operator's number and the pickup details on the phone, share your location with someone before leaving the road, and download the route in advance if you are driving yourself towards Hatta, Jebel Jais or the east coast. Carry more water than seems necessary, and set off with the battery full.
