It’s been a packed year for Abu Dhabi Week – and for Abu Dhabi. The city is bursting with new places to go, new eateries, new ideas. Things are going to get even better in 2010. In the meantime, here’s our look back at the best of the year ...
Sports
January – Abu Dhabi Golf Championship.
The Abu Dhabi Golf Club, named Best Golf Course in the Middle East for 2009, hosts one of the best golf tournaments in the region. This year’s Abu Dhabi Golf Championship was the fourth, and England’s Paul Casey won it for a second time. “This feels fantastic,” said Casey afterwards. “I think what's going to happen in Abu Dhabi in the next 10 years or so is going to be brilliant – it's nice to be part of that.” The 2010 Championship starts on 21st January.
March – Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge.
This year’s inaugural Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge has actually been running for 18 years under the name UAE Desert Challenge. It remains one of the world’s great off-road events; this year some 32 cars and 46 motorbikes (plus one truck) took part in six taxing desert legs around Moreeb and the Empty Quarter. Spain’s Marc Coma clinched his third victory in four years. This year’s event starts on 25th March.
November – Abu Dhabi Formula 1 Grand Prix.
Whether or not you’re a committed petrolhead, the F1 Grand Prix was surely the event of the year. Just about everything connected with it was stunning, with the possible exception of the race itself. But even then there was a good deal of pleasure in seeing the (relative) underdogs of Red Bull Racing take the top two places. The track is excellent, the organisation was generally superlative, access and the car parking systems worked pretty well, and the day/night format displayed the Yas Hotel to best advantage.
December – Abu Dhabi Adventure Challenge.
The gruelling six-day multi-discipline endurance race, with teams of four (at least one of them a woman) covering 428km of the Emirate by cycle, kayak and foot, is recognised as one of the world’s top extreme sports events. All the more impressive then than that Team Qasr Al Sarab won the Challenge for the third time in a row this December. The New Zealand foursome, led by Richard and Elina Ussher, finished in a cumulative time of 46h 19m 06s –36 minutes ahead of their nearest rivals.
December – Fifa Club World Cup.
The local interest didn’t last long, with Al Ahli falling at the first hurdle, and the early matches didn’t have full stadiums. But by the quarter-finals interest had picked up; the amateurs of Auckland City did well, FC Atlante of Mexico nearly caused an upset over Barcelona, and the final between Estudiantes and Barcelona lived up to its billing. Footballer of the year Lionel Messi turned it on for the crowds, too. The organisation was good, too, and the Club World Cup will be back in Abu Dhabi next year.
Gigs
March – Coldplay.
The weather couldn’t have been more dramatic – around 15,000 fans had to brave a real thunderstorm – but Coldplay turned up trumps with a show to remember. Well-known for superlative live performances, Coldplay pushed the then-new Viva La Vida album but also explored the back-catalogue favourites to give top value. Even the support act was excellent: Mercury Rev is one of the more interesting US bands of the last decade.
March – Andrea Boccelli.
The world’s biggest-selling classical soloist came to Abu Dhabi as part of the 6th Abu Dhabi Music & Arts Festival. It turned out to the event of the year; 11,000 fans saw a stunning performance as the tenor battled a dodgy sound system and strong winds to deliver crowd-pleasers like La Donna è Mobile from Rigoletto, a great rendition of Di Quella Pira from Il Trovatore, and Augustin Lara’s Granada. He left the audience on a real high with Con Te Partiro (Time to Say Goodbye). A classic of popular opera singing.
October – New York Philharmonic.
The New York Philharmonic had only recently acquired its new conductor Alan Gilbert, who replaced the somewhat cerebral style of Lorin Maazel with a more expansive, emotional approach. The result was really excellent, a concert that included Mahler’s Symphony No 1 in D major (Titan) and Emanuel Ax as soloist for Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No 4. That got the Emirates Palace crowd on its feet; less well publicised perhaps was the band’s concert at Al Jahili Fort in Al Ain (Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony and the Brahms Violin Concerto with Frank Peter Zimmermann).
November – F1 shows.
Flash brought a good collection of top live performers to entertain us at the F1 Grand Prix. Kings of Leon did what they do best, Beyoncé had a stunning stage show, Aerosmith shook the rafters and stretched the seams ... but the editor’s vote goes to Jamiroquai, a great set of loud funk and note-perfect delivery of old favourites and some new material.
Events
Abu Dhabi Classics.
A six month long celebration of classical music, with crowd-pleasing favourites played by a mixture of good youngsters and established bands. The programming is very clever, the music is refreshing, and the overall benefit to the city’s cultural scene is invaluable. The 2010 season is already under way.
Creamfields.
You probably wouldn’t normally have associated Abu Dhabi with electronic dance music, but what a great evening this was – three DJ stages running simultaneously, and Calvin Harris was a storming success.
MEIFF.
The Middle East International Film Festival faces serious local competition but it is growing nicely into a celebration of cinema based on films from the Middle East but also venturing further – including some slightly left-field medium-budget Hollywood films. The mix is a good one; this year’s programme had some excellent Arab-language movies alongside The Men Who Stare At Goats.
Womad.
World music is a much more predictable fit for the conventional Abu Dhabi image. This year saw the first Womad Abu Dhabi and the line-up was about as varied as it could be. Robert Plant headlined, but it was the heady all-round mix that stole the show. Dates for 2010 – 22nd to 24th April on the Corniche, plus a new Al Ain venue for 22nd and 23rd April.
New restaurants
Blue Grill Steakhouse.
Yas Island has well nigh doubled the number of very good steak eateries in Abu Dhabi. The Yas Rotana’s candidate is a realistically priced option, with a commendably hearty selection of steaks that are nicely cooked to order – and you do get what you want in terms of bloodiness, for instance. There’s nothing particularly fancy about the menu ... or the bill. And the restaurant has one of the more reasonably priced cellars in Abu Dhabi. 02 656 4000
Kazu.
The Yas Hotel is pretty stunning, a kind of Barbarella-inspired fantasy with the most beautiful colour-changing roof canopy. When there are no events on, there has to be a good reason to make the trip out to Yas; and the hotel’s Japanese restaurant is definitely one – Yas Hotel has invested heavily in the best chefs, superb staff and a great ambiance. The food is absolutely excellent, the kind of Japanese-inspired cooking inspired by Nobu (and not unsurprisingly, that’s where Kazu’s chef came from). 02 656 0600
Marco Pierre White.
A raft of new eateries has opened in Abu Dhabi this year, but probably none was so eagerly awaited as MPW’s restaurant in the Fairmont. That’s because of the man’s reputation, of course, but also because it’s a reputation he can’t afford to lose; you’ll pay for the privilege, but you’ll get some of the best grill work in town along with interesting saucing and creative (but not OTT) taste combinations. The cellar is brilliant, too. 02 654 3333
Ushna.
Contemporary Indian cuisine sometimes means the same old tarka dal served in stylish modern dishes, but Ushna in the Souk Qaryat al Beri has a clever formula – fabulous views over the grand mosque, of course, and an array of dishes based on lesser-known (to Western palates) recipes. The food is classic Indian in a contemporary setting, as promised, and there are no overambitious or misjudged fusion ideas at play here. 02 558 1769
New buildings
Aldar.
The developer’s headquarters building should be ready for occupation in a few months, but already the disc on Raha beach is an iconic gateway to the city.
Capital Gate.
The world’s most “leaningest” building will be the other instant symbol of arrival in Abu Dhabi. It’s clever, quirky, organic and due to open as a Hyatt later this year.
The Yas Hotel.
Inside it looks like a 1950s interpretation of the future, all curves and white manmade materials; outside it has that cloud-like canopy with its changing lighting scheme. Overall it’s a stunner.
Ferrari World.
Also on Yas is what will be the world’s largest indoor theme park. It’s also housed in one of the city’s most interesting structures, a vast and elegant hanger with the Ferrari logo writ large on its sweeping swooping roof.
Sheikh Zayed Mosque.
The Grand Mosque is everything you want from this kind of building – dramatic, theatrical, spiritual, inspiring and beautiful. We’re lucky to have it
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It was a good year for ... Abu Dhabi. As the oil price stabilised, a couple of the property developers wobbled – but overall it’s a case of “world recession? What world recession?” Manchester City. From perennial underachievers to the world’s best-funded club in one leap. Now for some points ... Flash Entertainment. Lots of money to spend on bringing big-name artists to the capital, but boy have they used it well Etihad. Awards ‘r’ us, now including “world’s best airline” – they don’t get much better than that Abu Dhabi Week. Going from strength to strength ...
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It was a bad year for ... |
