Unwritten Rules of a Dubai cinemagoer

There's nothing more aggravating than queuing up for coke and popcorn at the Mercato cinemas on a Wednesday behind a large family who irritatingly enough only start deciding what they would like to order when they reach the front of the line. And it seems every person in front has to take all the time in the world to carry away their order after paying for it. These are the unwritten rules for the Dubai cinemagoer.

After much deliberation amongst themselves - which was so long you would have thought they were debating international politics - they decided to go for coke and popcorn. The mum's phone then began ringing, at which point she dived into her handbag to answer it, for her snacks and kids were no longer as important.

Meanwhile the queue gets larger and larger, and the mother becomes more and more oblivious to the crowd's evil stares while she chats rapidly and animatedly into her phone, completely ignoring the cups of coke and buckets of popcorn now laying in front of her, ready to be taken away.

After an Arab couple behind get fed up, emit loud explosive snorts and hurl a torrent of loud words, the chatting mum looks round, offended as though she had just been wrongfully accused, grabs her order and stomps off.

Forget Dubai Media City, Motor City or Internet City. Perhaps what we really need is a Manners City.