NEWS FROM THE UAE
SOURCE : THE NATIONAL/GULF TODAY

One in Ten suffer from stress'

Dealing with stressors and time management will help ease depression and other effects of stress, a Dubai-based specialist physician in internal medicine, has said.

Getting enough sleep, as well as creating a realistic wish list were also the solutions to overcoming stress, which Dr Anna Jacob of the Welcare Mirdiff Clinic, suggested when she recently talked on coping with the condition.

She defined stress as a "response to pressure and the adverse reaction people have to excessive pressure or other types of demand placed on them."

Saying that stressors are anything that causes people stress which could be physical such as extreme heat or psychological brought about by home and work-related issues like difficult relationships, social worries and health problems, Jacob claimed stress has become so common in recent years that one among 10 patients that consult her are suffering from it.

She said a research conducted in the United Kingdom had revealed that one in five people "find work extremely stressful" while "work-related stress has been shown to contribute to a third of all new incidences of ill health."

On the other hand, American Psychological Association surveys in April showed that more than 80 per cent see the worsening economy as a great source of stress, second to money at 81 per cent. Work and family problems completed the top three stressors both at 67 per cent.

"First of all, we have to know what stresses us and directly deal with them," Jacob said.

She cited the prevalence of couples consulting her due to too much problems at home and at work as well as in their home countries, "too much to handle."

"They come in couples as even if only one is affected, the other one also gets affected," she said, adding that while family problems rank high, horrendous traffic and job cuts have contributed to the list of stressors.

It is more workload and less workforce, Jacob also said, adding that her patients, due to depression, anxiety, back pains and musculoskeletal problems resulting from stress, have been undergoing psychiatric and neurological treatments. "We just have to learn to talk with our co-employees and even our boss if the workload is too much already," she said.

"Once the stressor is identified, it is important that we take steps to avoid it whether it means leaving for work 10 minutes earlier to beat the stress of traffic or reporting a bullying colleague to the boss or line manager, to relieve stress in the workplace," she said.

Time management is crucial since missing on the big things and not giving these priority will lead to guilt.

"Prioritise the most important because if we end up doing things and miss out the essentials, we will have the guilt and then the burden of how to cope," she said.

Jacob said lack of sleep which affects women more than men and who have to juggle time between home and career, is an add-on to stress.

Her suggestion: learn to sleep between six and eight hours a day and to catch up with sleep because it relaxes the body as it prevents other illnesses namely hypertension, anxiety and gastritis symptoms.

Dubai hospitality industry booms

Dubai - May 04: Dubai is continuing to attract increasing number of tourists from across the globe, despite financial crunch in many parts of the world, suggests latest statistics released by the government authority.

According to the statistics released by the Dubai Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DTCM) on Thursday, Dubai's expanding hotel industry has done brisk business. During the first three months of 2009, Dubai's hotels have registered a five per cent increase in guest numbers, 17 per cent rise in hotel room inventory and 30 per cent increase in hotel apartments.

During 2008, Dubai hotels played host to 7.5 million guests, an increase of 8.3 per cent compared with 2007, while guest nights swell by 9.2 per cent to touch 22.42 million.

Commenting on the success, DTCM Director General Khalid A Bin Sulayem said that the performance of Dubai hotel establishments in the first quarter of 2009, on the back of a strong 2008 performance, confirms the emirate's solid standing on the world tourism map despite the global economic downturn. It also reveals that the promotional and marketing agenda are on the right track.

A total of 1.89 million guests stayed in Dubai hotels in the first quarter of 2009 compared with 2008 period. The number of operating hotels and hotel apartments rose to 519 in the first quarter of 2009, up from 475 during the corresponding period in 2008.

The revenues of hotel establishments during January-March 2009 period was Dhs4.26 billion. The total hotel rooms available touched 40,864 in the first quarter of 2009, up by 17 per cent from the same period in 2008.

The number of hotel apartments rose to 46,355 in January-March 2009 period, an increase of 30 per cent compared with the corresponding period in 2008. The first quarter of 2009 recorded 5.34 million guest nights.

The UK remained the top source market for Dubai tourism industry in the first quarter 2009, followed by Iran, India, US, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Russia, Pakistan, France and Kuwait - same as the first quarter of 2008.

"The performance reaffirms that tourism industry in Dubai is healthy and strong. The results confirm excellent growth in almost every segment. The stunning performance also reaffirms the strong co-operation between various organisations in both public and private sectors," said Sulayem. 
 
 
Salam Street roadworks on schedule, say managers

ABU DHABI - May 07:The Salam Street improvement works are on track and within budget, the project’s managers said yesterday.

Though there have been delays in construction in the downtown area because of the lack of space to work in, it is still going to plan, said a spokesman for Parsons International, the consultant for the Dh5 billion project.

“Up until now everything is going well, as scheduled,” said Ahmed Saleh al Sayari, head of Abu Dhabi Municipality’s road and construction division.

Work is going on round the clock, seven days a week, to ensure that construction is finished on time, according to Michel el Hajj of the Louis Berger Group, which is managing the entire project.

“It really is a lot of work, and a lot of money has been spent on this project, which began in October 2007,” Mr el Hajj said.

He said every slab of concrete being laid had to be fully waterproof because the water level was very high in some areas, such as the Sea Palace junction. “We have to reduce the water level in order to make the excavation,” he said.

The Salam Street development work has been divided into four sections and includes widening of the road and the construction of a series of tunnels and overbridges.

After completion, scheduled for next year, the road’s capacity will be doubled to more than 6,000 cars per hour.

Local traffic will not be affected by the rise in volume as there will be no bottleneck effect, Mr el Hajj said.

“The access ramps are built in a way that can take a lot of traffic, so everyone will get to their destination with ease. People will use the tunnel for different reasons. When they exit they can use local roads.”

Once completed, Salam Street will have an eight-lane tunnel extending from Mina Road to slightly beyond the junction with Al Falah Street, where it will become an exposed underpass.

A bridge and tunnel interchange will provide three levels of traffic at the next junction, with Hazaa Bin Zayed Street, enabling more vehicles to pass and improving traffic flow in the business district.

Existing electrical cables along the route will be replaced after the work is completed. “We cannot cut them off now because they supply power to the neighbourhood.

“They are live so we need to keep them, but once the tunnel is done we will replace them,” Mr el Hajj said, adding that there would be no power cuts while this was done.

According to Mr Wasir Alani, an engineer at Parsons, about 1,000 people are working on the first tunnel coming in from Dubai, near Khalifa Park, which should be complete in August 2010.

Slip roads are being built to allow for further residential development in the area, he said.

Mr el Hajj said the seven temporary pedestrian bridges built across Salam Street so far may become permanent because they were well made, and more such bridges would be built in future.

Though businesses near the Abu Dhabi Mall say they have been affected by the construction work, Mr el Hajj said the improvement to the road would benefit local trade in the long run.

“If there is no good infrastructure, no people will come.

“With more roads, more people will come to Abu Dhabi, bringing more business, with a little bit of patience,” he said. “We cannot just snap our fingers and everything is complete.”

  
Summer in Abu Dhabi promises cool fun

Abu Dhabi - May 04: As temperatures begin their annual ascent into a shimmering wave of 40°C days, schoolchildren and their parents face an equally inevitable question: how to fill more than two months of holidays.

The organisers of the Summer in Abu Dhabi festival say they have the answer.

This year’s festival, held at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (Adnec), will have three times more attractions than last year’s, including archery, bowling, go-karts and wave and ski simulators, they say.

The Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (ADTA), which is planning the event, also said it was considering a magic act, a musical, an ice show, a circus and a performance by a Shaolin acrobatic troupe.

The festival will use all of Adnec’s nine exhibition halls from July 1 to Aug 13. Additional events will be held throughout the city.

Summer in Abu Dhabi made its debut last year and included an indoor amusement park and animatronic puppets. It attracted 130,000 people. This year, Dayne Lim Kok Chun, the ADTA’s product development division director, said the festival hopes to bring in 150,000 people, despite the traditional summer downturn in tourism.

“People make too much out of the summer,” he said. “For centuries people survived here in the summer.”

For now, the ADTA expects most of the festival’s attendees to be from the UAE and GCC.

Mr Lim said the authority would soon begin a roadshow to promote the event to the rest of the region in the hope of buoying tourism in Abu Dhabi during the hot months.

“Given the current global situation, the Gulf markets are arguably our best bet,” he said.

Mr Lim also said the ADTA would encourage local hotels to offer discount packages to regional tourists.

Summer in Abu Dhabi will include 38 events in five themed “islands” entitled Adventure; Science and Technology; Art, Culture and Heritage; Sports; and Entertainment.

Several parents at Al Wahda mall in the capital said the festival would give them something to do when the weather heats up and school events calm down.

Alia al Ali of Abu Dhabi said she often had to travel outside the capital to find activities for her two sons, Mohammed, eight, and Mansour, four, in the summer.

Summer in Abu Dhabi “sounds nice,” she said. “I may think about taking my sons there. We sometimes go to Dubai for things to do, but it would be nice to have something here to go to.”

Simply hearing that Abu Dhabi had a summer festival in the works was heartening to Freya Jaffar, who recently moved here from London.

She said she struggled to find things to do with her children and planned to take them to Summer in Abu Dhabi. “There is a lack of information about events in Abu Dhabi. We usually find out about an event after it’s already happened,” she added.

Ticket prices have not yet been determined.

Although Summer in Abu Dhabi is aimed at families with children between the ages of seven and 15, the ADTA also hopes to bring in patrons of all ages.

“A number of attractions are still being finalised, including a team-building assault course, which will be marketed to the corporate sector and available to them during daytime,” said Faisal al Sheikh of the ADTA.

“We will also be working with educational providers for special needs students to ensure this important segment of the community does not miss out.”

The festival will be open between noon and midnight every day.