The main event that caught our attention for the weekend was the 15th annual Carpet & Art Oasis, held at the Expo Center near the airport. We are interested in buying carpets while we are here and thought this would be a good way to get started. It was not hard to find the Expo Center, but when we got there we saw very few cars, not a good sign. We asked a workman sitting outside if the carpet show was open and he indicated that it wasn't but pointed to a building we had passed, so we backtracked and parked with the few other cars. Walking up we saw a big sign for the show and an open door, so we entered. It turned out that it was open, even though the brochure we found at the door suggested it was only open on weekdays, but it soon became clear that we were the only visitors! We had expected some exhibits and informational displays, but before we could even look around we were overwhelmed by a thundering herd of salesmen descending upon us from every direction urging us to come look at their carpets. We felt like raw meat in a den of starving lions. All we wanted to do was walk around the enormous room to see what was there, but we never even made it around once! The room was filled to the brim with beautiful carpets from Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere but it was hard to get a sense of it, since we seemed to be the main attraction. To make matters worse, we could hardly make sense of what the salesmen were so eagerly trying to tell us. They seemed to want us to tell them what we were looking for, which of course we didn't know. We finally were "saved" by a savvy young Iranian carpet dealer who spoke excellent English and maneuvered us into his "lair", a huge cordoned off display area in the middle of the big building, obviously a choice location. He was a very talkative and likable fellow and knowing right away we were Americans began by telling us about his studies at Texas A. & M. He proceeded to accost us for the next hour with stories of all his dealings in Iran, Russia, China, the US and the Middle East. I wanted desperately to get away as he seemed to mistake us for extremely wealthy potential clients who had nothing better to spend their money on than expensive carpets, but his stories offered the allure of gossip as he claimed to be friends with Sheikh Mohammed. He told us that he agreed to anchor the Carpet Oasis as a personal favor to the Sheikh, otherwise it wouldn't have taken place this year, and in return the Sheikh is to make an appearance this week. He wasn't too complimentary about Dubai's prospects, though, as evidenced by the obvious lack of business being done in the room. He may have used the word "doomed." He had even worse things to say about doing business in Abu Dhabi, where he set up a huge exhibition under contract in Emirates Palace only to be told to leave midway through on an hour's notice when some bureaucrat decided he shouldn't be there. Apparently the contract meant nothing! He raved, however, about doing business in Russia and China. He bought a house in Russia and almost immediately was doing millions in business with just the people in his neighborhood. And China was a whole different story--wealthy businessmen who would never show their face but contracted for massive services sight unseen for huge new developments, such as the Mission Hills golf course and resort in Shenzhen near Hong Kong.
Despite his friendship with the Sheikh, he did not seem to enjoy his dealings with Arab clients. He was hired to find a small carpet for one wealthy bureaucrat's office, and offered it for free as a personal favor since it was such a small item, only to be told that such a gift could not be accepted and he must provide an invoice. So he sent an invoice, listing just his cost with no markup. Later he was accused of cheating this client after another dealer quoted him a much lower price for the same carpet. The second dealer, it turned out, had purchased the carpet from the first dealer at a much higher price and was simply undercutting the first dealer to make him look bad! The story made me feel even more uncomfortable and disinclined to buy any carpets so I kept nudging my husband to make a quick getaway, which we finally were able to do, only to be chased some more as we tried to look around. We were glad to get out of there unscathed!
Our carpet buying will have to wait for another day. We got the Iranian dealer's card, and he offered a private showing in our apartment, but we are not ready to open up our shabby abode or make that kind of investment. An hour's time seemed too much already! And we still know sadly little about these beautiful carpets!
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