Making Vlogs in Dubai and a Rollercoaster Fail

I love Yorkshire and I have written extensively about why it is such a special county for me. I love living here, bringing up a family here and working here. However, when I was offered a trip to the UAE, making vlogs in Dubai, I jumped at the chance.

One fateful WhatsApp message from a friend of mine, alerting me to this opportunity, was enough to justify my decision to go freelance at the start of the year. Of course, being employed by someone provides security and a regular income, but how often do you get the chance to drop everything and head off halfway around the world with just seven days’ notice?

I moved some work around thanks to some very understanding clients, negotiated with my wife a promise to fulfil a year’s worth of late-night get-ups with the youngest child beginning on my return, and responded with a resounding ‘YES’!

Making Vlogs in Dubai? Really?

Do you ever have those moments when something seems too good to be true? Well, this was certainly the case for me here. I heard about the job on Friday, spoke to the relevant person on Saturday and the plane tickets popped into my email inbox on the Tuesday (like a globetrotting Craig David). That was three days before I was set to fly and at that point I was still fairly certain it was a wind up.

I thought it might be part of a Jeremy Beadle-style special in which I’d turn up at Manchester Airport and, through a series of ‘hilarious’ mishaps, end up with a face full of custard pies. On a side note, I always felt sorry for those victims of his pranks who were told they’d bagged a new job, only to find out it was all a ruse to mess around with them for a couple of hours and fill five minutes of Saturday night TV.

I hope they hadn’t made any plans on the back of finding employment. Imagine if they’d rushed out to snap up a mortgage and had to return to the bank on Monday morning explaining that their new, safe, long-term employment was actually just sitting at a desk on a wobbly set filled with comedy gunge and frequented by a childish man whose best disguise was to put on a traffic warden’s costume and fix a slightly bushier beard over the top of his neat beard.

But that’s a conversation for another day…

Dubai Vlogs

To cut a long story short, the tickets worked, the plane really did go to Dubai, the hotel existed and the job was real.

It was like no other gig I have ever had and was a fantastic experience. I was able to explore a country that I hadn’t even considered visiting before and made some videos of which I am very proud. The job was for Dubai Parks and Resorts who wanted to promote their four theme parks and hotel complex a little outside of the city.

Here’s my guide to Legoland Dubai:

Here’s me checking out Legoland Water Park (warning: contains toplessness from me):

And this is a desert safari I went on:

The Rollercoaster Fail

Making vlogs in Dubai wasn’t all plain sailing though. Ever since I was little, I’ve had real problems with being spun around in circles. My brain just can’t seem to handle it and it always ends up with me being violently ill. I do like to test to see if it’s still an issue every decade, which has ruined otherwise perfectly good days out at Pleasure Island in Cleethorpes and Thorpe Park before.

As I was meant to be reviewing a theme park, I felt now was the time to investigate my ongoing motion sickness further. At Motiongate Dubai, I was told the best rollercoaster was the Capitol Bullet Train Hunger Games ride. So I went on and it turns out that, yes, I still am very much unable to handle dizziness.

Here’s the evidence:

However, I did go back and take a proper look at the park afterwards:

You can have a look at all my videos from Dubai on the Jim in Dubai microsite.

Vlogging for Your Business

Video is such an important way of building your business. Videos are shared more readily than any other type of content, according to research that also says audiences remember more of what they see in a video than what they hear on an audio source or read. In addition, the majority of consumers say they will watch a video to help them make their mind up about a purchase.

Contact me to discuss videos I can make for your business, and take a look at the work I have completed previously. I promise I won’t be ill in your workplace. As long as you don’t spin me around.