Jeffrey Black | Middle East Diaries

The mechanical orgy that is the sound of an ancient Mercedes tipper truck being loaded by an equally ancient JCB was the dawn alarm this morning. A cold, brown sky. Out in the ghost town, I spotted some people. A Filipina maid. A South Asian gardener, pedalling around the compound on his Chinese bicycle. I never actually got close to him. I only saw him disappearing around a corner, having stealthily emerged from a herbaceous border. There is silence – like a holiday resort in the dead of off-season.