Return to Normalcy

When a US president introduced the neologism 'normalcy' after World War I, it was generally agreed by speakers of standard English that, for some places, the closest they can ever come to normality is normalcy.

In the case of Dubai, the heightened security for Easter is now over.

Dubai has two main church districts, one in the older part of Dubai, and one in New Dubai, about 30 km apart. Both were heavily patrolled during Holy Week and Easter, with church car parks cordoned off, a luxury Mercedes bus service from remote car parks to the church districts, and large numbers of policemen and policewomen searching passers-by who wandered through the districts.

Today, I was walking through the older district and found that the security is gone, and the once-cordoned car parks are, once again, filled with parked cars.

Presumably, there was a threat, though no one would say anything about what rumours had prompted this new, heightened level of security for Easter 2008 (there was no extra security visible during previous Easter seasons in Dubai).

So the police presence managed to deter any incidents over Easter, for which those of us who have to walk through the church districts are quite grateful.

There was one explosion, but it was more than 10 km from both church districts, and just seems to have been caused by a group trying to smuggle illegal fireworks, and presumably had nothing to do with Easter.

So things have returned to normalcy for Dubai.