5:30am, Dubai, United Arab Emirates – Sweat is beginning to collect anywhere it can at this point. 20 seconds ago I was nearly cold. I’m doing my best to keep up behind Paulino, a short, 30-something technician from the Phillipines. He’s climbing a sketchy ladder up the nether regions of Dubai’s fantastical indoor ski hill, Ski Dubai. En route to the roof, he tells me he wants to come to Canada to work at a ski resort, but for now, it’s easier for him to find work here. He’s giving me a tour of the facility, making our way through it’s bizarre envelope – an odd space that divides the 40C degree desert heat from the sub-zero snow slope inside. While much of Dubai sleeps, we’ve been dancing back and forth between doors that divide outside, inside, and the mysterious world of in-between. Each transition is marked by extreme gradients of temperature and moisture. The sweat pours. I ask myself what the hell I’m doing here. Paulino climbs another ladder towards the envelope’s ceiling and opens a trap door. Arabian sunlight pours in and drowns the dim incandescence. I squint as I reach the top of the ladder and emerge on the roof at sunrise. Paulino cracks a smile, he’s never taken media here before he tells me. It’s 30 something degrees. Later today it will reach nearly 40. Light filters through a humid haze and so does the answer I’ve been looking for – I’m here to witness the contrast. Contrast in temperature, moisture, culture, and ideas. That skiing exists in this desert climate is fantastical. That the facility is part of the shopping mall is an affront to any backcountry skier’s sensibilities. That a charming ski community is growing out of the sand, the unlikeliest of ecologies, is nothing less than intriguing.

Dubai – A Skier’s Journey will appear online in fall 2012.