Life's a beach

Photo GulfNews

For much of the latter part of 2007 I puzzled over what I saw from my office window overlooking the Abu Dhabi Corniche. There was a Herculean effort under way, dredging sand up from the bottom of the lagoon then spewing out closer to the shore. Then there were daily convoys of trucks bringing more sand and sometimes gigantic boulders and it was clear that a kind of beach expansion was being constructed. On this newly won terrain many of the 2007 National Day events were staged and it was shortly thereafter that I left Abu Dhabi to start my German mission. Now I know what I would be looking down upon were I still at my Abu Dhabi desk; it is just a beach, for the delectation of the general public and it was officially opened a couple of days ago. Of course, given that we're talking about the Sandlands, there had to be a superlative involved; the red ribbon formally cut by His Excellency was the longest such ribbon in the world. My understanding is that it stretched the full length of the Corniche, from the Sheraton to the Hilton.

The beach is probably an excellent idea and will be welcomed by many. I still miss, however, the old Volcano Fountain...