You Got [no] Mail

Tired of getting three credit card applications a week in the mail along with 17 L.L. Beans catalogs? Then come to Dubai because there is no home mail delivery here.

Paradoxically, everyone has PO box number. In fact, it's impossible to live in Dubai without one. Yet, I've been in Dubai for 3 months and gotten no mail. None. I'm not complaining btw. However the effects are far reaching.

Employers assume the mail delivery burden. Getting the mail from the post office box, sorting, delivering... it's a clerical task that business pays for and certainly lowers the civil service payroll. Employees are encouraged to use the company's mailbox number, (as I do) so personal mail goes to your workplace. People sit at their desks with their electric and phone bills in hand. Is there anything you don't want dropped at your desk? You can rent a personal mailbox, maybe, if you can find one. I think having so much of your personal life not private inhibits people from straying too far from a narrow acceptable norm. Changing jobs means mail will go to your old employer until you fix it. Good luck with that task.

There are consequences to a feeble postal service. Few businesses risk income on mailing invoices. My friend got a car loan. He spent about an hour at the bank signing 36 checks, each dated another month in advance for three years, and the bank promised to cash them in the appropriate month. Only then did he get a cashier's check made out to the car dealer. This is normal.

My landlord took a year's rent "in three cheques" as we say. To move in, I post-dated three checks and therefore pay rent 4 months in advance for the year. This is quite liberal. Many landlords require 6 months or even 12 months rent in advance! You're in a weak position to break the lease or move out early. Puts a damper on personal choice and change.

There's no mail order industry: no catalogs, no printing companies, no Victoria's Secrets models, no internet shopping. Sears & Roebuck became a retail giant in 20th century America because there was a postal service.

Instead, Dubai has mega-malls and a crush of people shopping. It's no wonder Dubai is a shopper's paradise, it's the only way to live.