It wasn't quite the same as seeing several thousand beered up, overweight, loud English football hooligans destroying the town squares of Germany, but when the UAE won football's Gulf Cup (a big thing regionally, but probably of no greater significance to English Premiership fans than Rushden & Diamonds winning the Conference) by beating Oman 1-0 last night, a sizeable party was had. On every street of the UAE it seemed.
The problem was that without alcohol, the next best thing that young Emiraties can use as a catalyst for unleashing their testosterone is their cars. Their large and expensive, noisy 4x4 cars. And so it was that from approximately 7.30pm until about 2am, all you could hear in Abu Dhabi was the sound of horns blaring, tyres screeching, engines over-revving and then back-firing in protest at the abuse they were being forced to take, coupled with the growing smell of burnt rubber and oil. Far from taking pride in their prized vehicles, the locals were taking pride in their country at the expense of their vehicles. I have never seen so many people, sometimes 8 or more to a car, bursting through all windows and sunroofs clutching their flags and soft drinks (bless), so determined to use their cars not to transport themselves to the Corniche (which seemed to be the unofficial meeting point for these mad folk) so much as to thrash their cars in order to have them make as much noise as possible. Add to that the sound of fireworks, firecrackers and, I wouldn't wonder, the occasional round of gunfire, and sleeping was going to be a luxury.
After a couple of hours, I would have happily handed out lagers all round in the hopeful expectation that at least after a few beers they would all fall down comatose somewhere and awake in the morning seeking the solace of somewhere peaceful and quiet for the few hours. But it was not to be...
Jack, of course, somehow slept through the lot.
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