When I roll into a new town while on holiday, and it's something I've done in more places than I care to remember in more than 60 countries, the first thing that occupies my attention is finding an inexpensive place to sleep.
From bedbugs in India to grubby bed sheets in Thailand, from freezing drafts in Turkish caves to the hard floor of my parents' hotel room in Bulgaria, I can cope with just about anything if it's cheap.
Even in my mid-thirties, I will happily settle for a bunk bed in an odorous backpacker dormitory, confident in the knowledge that slumming it like a hardcore traveller is the best way to keep costs to a minimum.
Never mind if the reception is full of sinister chain-smoking men in black leather jackets, if the toilet stinks, if the hot water taps are broken and the windows cracked. Cheapness trumps everything.
However, I have recently had to rethink my extreme parsimony, and I am beginning to realise that instead of travelling cheaply, I should travel smartly. My change of attitude stems from a recent trip to Egypt, where I met up with a friend from school for a few days' holiday. While for me accommodation was a basic hotel in downtown, my friend enjoyed a five-star resort by the Pyramids.
His room was a duplex with fresh bowls of fruit every day, a balcony with a fine view and huge televisions upstairs and downstairs.
My accommodation was a slightly grubby room on the umpteenth floor of a dusty apartment block.
Well, I could reason, my friend, who I have known for more than 20 years, is a well-paid doctor who does not need to save on the pennies as he can look forward to a generous pension when he retires. It's only right that I am more careful with money, since I have none of the financial securities offered by working for Britain's National Health Service. The thing is, though, my friend did not pay a single penny for his room while I had to dig into my savings to fund my bed.
His trick was to make use of bonus points accumulated on a hotel membership scheme. And it wasn't the first time he has stayed for free somewhere. He seems to get rooms for nothing more often than he pays for them.
By checking the internet regularly for the latest offers, he vacuums up rooms that are being offered at a special discount. Instead of needing 25,000 points for a night's stay, for example, he pounces when the hotel is letting them go for just 5,000 points.
Of course, plenty of people make use of such membership schemes and enjoy luxury nights in places across the world at a minimum cost. However, my friend has honed his money-saving techniques to a fine art and as a result makes savings most other members could not dream of. For a start, he has three membership accounts using different addresses so that, when a special offer is only for a limited number of nights, he can stay longer by using more than one of the accounts.
And he books rooms for many of his friends through his accounts, so the points accumulated for their stays are credited to his account.
He even buys up rooms using the vast amounts of points he racks up, and then sells them back to friends, making a tidy little profit along the way. There are downsides to his approach to holiday accommodation, not least that his travel plans can end up depending too heavily on where rooms are on special offer.
And it's often the less popular hotels that are out of town that the hotel chain is keenest to flog off cheap. What you imagined would be a romantic setting in the old town can be 45 minutes' drive out of the city and beside an industrial park.
Then there is the very fact that you are staying in a chain hotel. The purpose of many of these is that they maintain the same standards wherever you are, which often means that once you step through the front door, you could be anywhere in the world. Forget about local character.
You can also forget about venturing off the beaten track, as the big chains are concentrated in the big cities and in many countries are rare or non-existent outside the capital.
But each evening in Cairo, when I went back to my slightly seedy and unwelcoming joint, and he headed back to his five-star luxury, it was hard not to feel like a fool.
The problem is, becoming a platinum member, as my school friend is with his favoured hotel chain, is not easy. To reach this exalted height, you must first, among other things, stay dozens of nights in a single year at the company's properties. And to do that means forking out a lot of money. Perhaps in the long run it would prove to be a good investment.
The money put in now may lead to plenty of cheap stays later on - they do say you have to speculate to accumulate. However, faced in the future with the choice of the cheapest room in town and paying full price for a luxury chain hotel, I know which one I will choose.
And for that reason I will be staying in cheap, grubby hotels for a modest cost forever. While my friend will enjoy five-stars for free.
dbardsley@thenational.ae
KILLING OF QASSEM SULEIMANI
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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Norway
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Canada
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How to volunteer
The UAE volunteers campaign can be reached at www.volunteers.ae , or by calling 800-VOLAE (80086523), or emailing info@volunteers.ae.
WOMAN AND CHILD
Director: Saeed Roustaee
Starring: Parinaz Izadyar, Payman Maadi
Rating: 4/5
What is an FTO Designation?
FTO designations impose immigration restrictions on members of the organisation simply by virtue of their membership and triggers a criminal prohibition on knowingly providing material support or resources to the designated organisation as well as asset freezes.
It is a crime for a person in the United States or subject to the jurisdiction of the United States to knowingly provide “material support or resources” to or receive military-type training from or on behalf of a designated FTO.
Representatives and members of a designated FTO, if they are aliens, are inadmissible to and, in certain circumstances removable from, the United States.
Except as authorised by the Secretary of the Treasury, any US financial institution that becomes aware that it has possession of or control over funds in which an FTO or its agent has an interest must retain possession of or control over the funds and report the funds to the Treasury Department.
Source: US Department of State
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
ESSENTIALS
The flights
Emirates flies from Dubai to Phnom Penh via Yangon from Dh2,700 return including taxes. Cambodia Bayon Airlines and Cambodia Angkor Air offer return flights from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap from Dh250 return including taxes. The flight takes about 45 minutes.
The hotels
Rooms at the Raffles Le Royal in Phnom Penh cost from $225 (Dh826) per night including taxes. Rooms at the Grand Hotel d'Angkor cost from $261 (Dh960) per night including taxes.
The tours
A cyclo architecture tour of Phnom Penh costs from $20 (Dh75) per person for about three hours, with Khmer Architecture Tours. Tailor-made tours of all of Cambodia, or sites like Angkor alone, can be arranged by About Asia Travel. Emirates Holidays also offers packages.
Dust and sand storms compared
Sand storm
- Particle size: Larger, heavier sand grains
- Visibility: Often dramatic with thick "walls" of sand
- Duration: Short-lived, typically localised
- Travel distance: Limited
- Source: Open desert areas with strong winds
Dust storm
- Particle size: Much finer, lightweight particles
- Visibility: Hazy skies but less intense
- Duration: Can linger for days
- Travel distance: Long-range, up to thousands of kilometres
- Source: Can be carried from distant regions
Jetour T1 specs
Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
Power: 254hp
Torque: 390Nm
Price: From Dh126,000
Available: Now
ELIO
Starring: Yonas Kibreab, Zoe Saldana, Brad Garrett
Directors: Madeline Sharafian, Domee Shi, Adrian Molina
Rating: 4/5
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The biog
Title: General Practitioner with a speciality in cardiology
Previous jobs: Worked in well-known hospitals Jaslok and Breach Candy in Mumbai, India
Education: Medical degree from the Government Medical College in Nagpur
How it all began: opened his first clinic in Ajman in 1993
Family: a 90-year-old mother, wife and two daughters
Remembers a time when medicines from India were purchased per kilo
The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
Getting there
The flights
Flydubai operates up to seven flights a week to Helsinki. Return fares to Helsinki from Dubai start from Dh1,545 in Economy and Dh7,560 in Business Class.
The stay
Golden Crown Igloos in Levi offer stays from Dh1,215 per person per night for a superior igloo; www.leviniglut.net
Panorama Hotel in Levi is conveniently located at the top of Levi fell, a short walk from the gondola. Stays start from Dh292 per night based on two people sharing; www. golevi.fi/en/accommodation/hotel-levi-panorama
Arctic Treehouse Hotel in Rovaniemi offers stays from Dh1,379 per night based on two people sharing; www.arctictreehousehotel.com
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
TRAP
Starring: Josh Hartnett, Saleka Shyamalan, Ariel Donaghue
Director: M Night Shyamalan
Rating: 3/5
Women & Power: A Manifesto
Mary Beard
Profile Books and London Review of Books
World Cricket League Division 2
In Windhoek, Namibia - Top two teams qualify for the World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe, which starts on March 4.
UAE fixtures
Thursday February 8, v Kenya; Friday February 9, v Canada; Sunday February 11, v Nepal; Monday February 12, v Oman; Wednesday February 14, v Namibia; Thursday February 15, final
World Cricket League Division 2
In Windhoek, Namibia - Top two teams qualify for the World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe, which starts on March 4.
UAE fixtures
Thursday February 8, v Kenya; Friday February 9, v Canada; Sunday February 11, v Nepal; Monday February 12, v Oman; Wednesday February 14, v Namibia; Thursday February 15, final
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
1,000 Books to Read Before You Die: A Life-Changing List
James Mustich, Workman
RESULTS
5pm: Watha Stallions Cup Handicap (PA) Dh 70,000 (Dirt) 2,000m
Winner: Dalil De Carrere, Bernardo Pinheiro (jockey), Mohamed Daggash (trainer)
5.30pm: Maiden (TB) Dh 70,000 (D) 2,000m
Winner: Miracle Maker, Xavier Ziani, Salem bin Ghadayer
6pm: Maiden (PA) Dh 70,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner: Pharitz Al Denari, Bernardo Pinheiro, Mahmood Hussain
6.30pm: Maiden (PA) Dh 70,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner: Oss, Jesus Rosales, Abdallah Al Hammadi
7pm: Handicap (PA) Dh 70,000 (D) 1,400m
Winner: ES Nahawand, Fernando Jara, Mohamed Daggash
7.30pm: Maiden (PA) Dh 70,000 (D) 1,000m
Winner: AF Almajhaz, Abdul Aziz Al Balushi, Khalifa Al Neyadi
8pm: Maiden (PA) Dh 70,000 (D) 1,000m
Winner: AF Lewaa, Bernardo Pinheiro, Qaiss Aboud.
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
Sector: Water technology
Number of staff: 22
Investment raised: $4 million
Guns N’ Roses’s last gig before Abu Dhabi was in Hong Kong on November 21. We were there – and here’s what they played, and in what order. You were warned.
- It’s So Easy
- Mr Brownstone
- Chinese Democracy
- Welcome to the Jungle
- Double Talkin’ Jive
- Better
- Estranged
- Live and Let Die (Wings cover)
- Slither (Velvet Revolver cover)
- Rocket Queen
- You Could Be Mine
- Shadow of Your Love
- Attitude (Misfits cover)
- Civil War
- Coma
- Love Theme from The Godfather (movie cover)
- Sweet Child O’ Mine
- Wichita Lineman (Jimmy Webb cover)
- Wish You Were Here (instrumental Pink Floyd cover)
- November Rain
- Black Hole Sun (Soundgarden cover)
- Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door (Bob Dylan cover)
- Nightrain
Encore:
- Patience
- Don’t Cry
- The Seeker (The Who cover)
- Paradise City
Europe’s rearming plan
- Suspend strict budget rules to allow member countries to step up defence spending
- Create new "instrument" providing €150 billion of loans to member countries for defence investment
- Use the existing EU budget to direct more funds towards defence-related investment
- Engage the bloc's European Investment Bank to drop limits on lending to defence firms
- Create a savings and investments union to help companies access capital
The biog
Name: Timothy Husband
Nationality: New Zealand
Education: Degree in zoology at The University of Sydney
Favourite book: Lemurs of Madagascar by Russell A Mittermeier
Favourite music: Billy Joel
Weekends and holidays: Talking about animals or visiting his farm in Australia
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