Sophie’s World

It’s 18:30 and I’m in Moda Mall, Bahrain World Trade Centre, wondering where all the people are.

Moda is a huge shopping centre with high-end boutiques. Just from where I now sit, I see Louis Vuitton, Dior, Emporio Armani, Versace and Fendi. And where I sit is in a purple velvet chair; one of many comfortable, yet elegant chairs and sofas in a large hall. From the high ceiling posters encourage me to “shop to win weekly vouchers up to BD 45,000″. In the middle of the hall are displayed two smart Boxster sports cars, one blue and one white, all tied up in red ribbons.

Occasionally, a group of two or three veiled black-clad women walk by. Bahraini women can be very striking. Slender, with high heels and hair piled high under their head gear, they look mysterious and beautiful, gliding across the shining marble floors.

Shopkeepers hang about in their doorways, happy to see me. They invite me in, smiling hopefully but not being pushy. How do they survive in these large, dazzling, empty halls? Earlier today, I was in Harbour Mall for a while to get out of the heat. Free wifi and being waited on hand and foot was nice - but it was a bit boring being the only one about. Too early, I was told. Everyone goes to the malls at six. Well, it’s past six now. I ask a guard - the one who just told me I couldn’t take pictures inside the mall - if Tuesday perhaps is a slow day.

“No,” he replies. “It’s always like this. Not many people.” And yet Cartier is just about to open a shop here. As is South African diamond giant De Beers. They must see potential that I don’t.

Another group walks by, comprising a well-fed man in white garb and Yassir Arafat head gear - and four women. Well inside, one of the women rips off her head scarf, revealing a face that is 12 at most. They all enter Versace.

Next to my plush velvet chairs is a red and black bedouin tent, with a Persian carpet, pretty lanterns, large cushions and sofas. A man dressed in a white dishdasha has taken off his shoes and is having a lie-down on one of the sofas. For a few minutes, he and I are the only ones in sight. He snores lightly, disturbing the melancholic French song playing on the surround system.

I’m eager to snap some pix of the snoring man in the tent, but the guard must have read my mind. He keeps looking at me, smiling knowingly. Not that there is much else for him to look at. Nothing that breathes anyway.

Another family walks by. A man, four women in black with faces uncovered and two young children. They look like brothers and sisters, all chatting and laughing. The women look pretty and gay, but in this group, the man is the striking one: tall, slim, with a strong nose, a beard, warm brown eyes and extraordinarily beautiful features. Shamelessly, I try to sneak a photo, but who looks around the corner just then but the omnipresent guard, tut-tutting and shaking his head. I consider following them into Burberry instead, then stop myself before I become a stalker.

Les feuilles mortes is now playing. The large empty hall creates a slightly surreal echoing effect. It’s a haunting, beautiful song: my father’s favourite, I’ve been told - last popular in the 60s, right before he died. Left. For a long time, I’m lost in thought; in another world.

A woman in black comes up to my neighbour in the tent, his wife presumably, and shakes him gently. He wakes, stretches and farts, bringing me back to earth.

Time to go out into the hot Bahraini night.

The Isle of Man is famous for two – maybe three – things: petrol heads, film locations and tax evaders. The petrol heads come for the annual Isle of Man TT motorcycle race, when crazy hotheads drive along the coast like maniacs. Every year, it seems someone dies crashing or driving off a cliff. Actually, for years, this was the most famous motorcycle race in the world. Arcade games are named after it.

Man attracts the film industry because of its great locations (and, I assume, tax-breaks). More than 80 films have been filmed on the island, incl. I Capture the Castle, Keeping Mum, Waking Ned and Lassie. The tourism authorities advertise the fact just a wee bit: “On the Isle of Man, you can expect Patrick Swayze to pop down in the seat next to you in the cinema, or spot Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGregor jogging along the promenade in Douglas.” For interested readers, here’s more info about filming locations on the Isle of Man.

And true: some, quite a few, probably, are here because of the low (or no) taxes. Man has no capital gains tax, wealth tax, death duty (inheritance tax) or stamp duty (document tax). Top income tax rate is 18 %, but capped at 100 000 pounds per person. Corporate tax is, with a few exceptions, nothing, 0 %, nil!

To the economist and the social democrat in me, there’s something a bit unsavoury in wishing to attract people who prefer to contribute as little as possible to the common good. I discussed this plenty, sometimes heatedly, and often over copious GTs, with other tourists and Man residents who had moved over for tax purposes. Sadly, I hadn’t really found any true locals to talk it over with.

Waiting for the Viking to take me back to Liverpool, I spent my last morning at the Manx Museum. During lunch in the attractive, airy museum café, the Bay Room, an elderly lady approached me. “You’re on your own, aren’t you,” she said. “I see you in here quite often.”

“I’m afraid not,” I replied. “This is my first visit, both to this café and to the Isle of Man”. I asked her to join me, and as luck would have it, there was my local. She was a kind and thoughtful lady, recently widowed, who came in here for lunch quite often herself. We talked about the island, its people and the reason people move here. When I asked her about Isle of Man’s reputation for attracting financial fixers, she became very sad.

“Some come here for all the wrong reasons,” she said quietly. “The island has so much to offer.” She herself had married a Manx farmer, moved here 50 years ago and had enjoyed every one of those years. She loved the island; it had been good to her and her family. “Schools and health care are good and it’s a secure, healthy place for children to grow up”, she said before we parted. I was glad to talk to her.

Leaving the Bay Room, I wondered who she was, the one who came here quite often, all on her own and looking like me; my Manx double.