The ME, Myself and I

[Neo]

I'm off to work in Dubai as some of you know, thought I'd chronicle my experience along the way. So this will either be a very short thread if UAE totally blows, or what I'm hoping for.. an epic megathread.

I'll be avoiding cultural/religious/ethnic snipes in the thread as that's a sure fire way to get terminated one way or another in a region that's clearly got some major issues right now, but hopefully you can fill in the blanks for me and add some anecdotes of your own.

I'm pretty stoked, new horizons... I've been pushing for change in my career over the past 5 years and it's been tough at times, but this really is what I had in mind. Time and place plus hard work seems to have paid off. Probably have a different view on that after months of 50c bum rash, but for now it's looking quite rosey. I've lived through -20c for months on end in Scandinavia, so this is going to the other end of the scale.

A bit of background on what I do as some of you might already know, it's not all glam, or at least hasn't been over the years. I'm an accident repair technician, worked as a contractor for many years and more recently hit the books at night school and work as a technical trainer for the trade.

Over the years I've had the opportunity to work for manufacturers on some pretty cool projects including these...

Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren


Koenigsegg CCXR


Aston Martin Vanquish and DB9


McLaren P1


Obviously lots of high end vehicles in the ME and a big demand for the standards required to work on them. There are issues of confidentiality, not in a ninja kind of way, but corporate/personal disclosure plus of course the Smeg factor. The company is a well established multinational and the role is a 50/50 split between managing the regional representatives and giving technical training to the employees of the numerous workshops in the region.

So that's the background... there's a lot of travel involved, typically flying out of Dubai to another ME country on Sunday and flying back in on Thursday and living for the weekend in Dubai.. it's a tough gig right.. but someone has to do it

[blue]

now work as a technical trainer

whats that ?
anyway happy travailing
don't forget your camera

[Neo]

now work as a technical trainer

whats that ?

It means I don't have to work as a tefler

[thaimeme]

Indeed.
Can't have enough high-end vehicles in one's life.

Mindless accumulation is the key.

[Neo]

I don't own them, I just work on them, mostly it's straight up hard work, but occasionally there is a sense of achievement and enormous pride.

Is that alright with you Jeff..? that most people on TD have lives that are somewhat constructive or engaging.. or should we all cop out with the peasants and sit in the bush eating rice with rat meat while talking pseudo intellectual codbollocks on the net..?

Fuck off Jeff.

[Dapper]

^
No trip

[Dapper]

But best of luck with your future endeavours mate.
Chok Dee

[Chittychangchang]

Best of luck, looking forward to this thread.

[klong toey]

Have fun and good luck.
Maybe you helped out in the development of some of these cars.

22 Abandoned And Forgotten Supercars In Dubai

[bsnub]

Why not get an F1 job?

[Neo]

^^ That's just a shot of the airport parking lot

[bsnub]

Fleeing the country no less

[terry57]

Brilliant stuff mate,

I wish you all the best. Huge money to get one of these cars serviced in Australia.

If you moonlighted there doing this work you would make a squillion.

[Neo]

Whynot get an F1 job?

Plenty of reasons why not, it's incredibly demanding for one.
Have one friend at the moment working for a F1 team and he's never at home, always checking into another country, another hotel and the work ethic is fucking brutal on the road... guaranteed burnout in a few years as happened to another friend who worked for Pro Drive/Suburu WRX during the McRae era.. now works as a storeman and has zero motivation to do anything.

Plus F1 is full of knobjockeys and wankers


The real passion is in Supercars, the builders, the owners, the test drivers and designers and technicians.

[nidhogg]

Sounds a cool gig. Good luck. Make sure you stash a bit of the loot!

[Bower]

Looking forward to this.
Very good luck to you.

[Luigi]

And don't shag the exhaust until it's fully cooled down.

[wasabi]

I am so pleased for you, enjoy the fruits of your labour .

[BaitongBoy]

Cheers, Neo...Thanks for the info, man...

And best of luck...

[Roobarb]

Good luck with the role Neo. There are a large amount of complicated, high-end cars out here and, on the basis that getting many things done out here is a bit of a lottery, I'd suspect there's not a lot of people who actually know how to fix them. Plenty of folks capable of breaking them though.

Unless your new role stoops to the lowly level of spanner-work on a VW Golf I doubt we'll meet professionally, but if you want to catch up for a beer when you get out here then drop me a PM.

Cheers

[somtamslap]

Kudos. Looking forward to the thread. Especially the goat kebab pics.

[jimbobs]

Good luck Neo
I hope it's a happy and rewarding experience

[NZdick1983]

Good luck mate, lucky bugger! (envy)...

Don't suppose you'll have time for lowly old BF4 with your jet-setter lifestyle... take loads of pics - cause where there are fast cars, there are bound to be fast women ;-p

*so pics of both please...

[reddog]

NEO,nice thread this,keep it coming.
I do like the Mclaren,a well engineered car,one just won the Bathurst 12 hour a couple
of weeks ago against all the other high end supercars,one up for the poms there.

[Neo]

Yes McLaren has a great heritage, and the P1 is an incredible car, was a great place to work in... the Ron Dennis work ethic is punishing but it gets the job done. 375 P1's all went out the door on time. Fantastic building to work in too, designed by Norman Foster it has a concourse lined with F1 cars which you walk through on a daily basis.