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MMI, one of the few licensed liquor stores in the Dubai, is holding a “Monster Grape Sale” wine tasting event this Friday (27th April, 2007) hosted at The Clubhouse, Le Meridien Mina Seyahi. They are selling off over fifty five thousand bottles of red, white, and sparkling wine at überly reduced prices. They’ve got a nice little website setup where you can find out more information about the event.

You must register online to attend the tasting — but you do get something for your efforts. Anyone who registers gets a complimentary bottle of wine (or grape, as they like to call it). Note: you need to have a liquor license before purchasing any alcohol, as required by the government. There is also a place on the website to have that taken care of. Remember: while wine tasting, it is not rude to get completely plastered spit out the wine. Don’t miss it! It looks like it’s gonna be lots fun.

If you haven’t heard about the robbery of a jewelery store last night at Wafi City, you should read the news more often. Apparently, four masked men jacked two cars and moved to crash them into a jewelery store inside the mall. Within a few seconds, they drove off with the loot. The police later found the two cars abandoned and burnt in Zabeel.

Watch the video of the heist filmed on a camera phone (kudos to BuShHaB).

Where does one go to buy computers and electronics in Dubai? Well, there are a two options. The first option is “computer street” — the hundreds of little computer shops on Khalid bin Waleed Street in Bur Dubai (aka Bank Street, Burjuman Street). This option is merely mentioned as a warning, and nothing more. Trade here is extremely unprofessional, somewhat like the stores of Karama or Satwa. Stock of products is scarce and random, at best. You can also forget about customer service here — if you though returning a defective product at the mall was a pain, try getting these guys to exchange something you’ve already paid for. If you wanna save a couple of dirhams, and like this kind of thrill, then go for it!

If you like doing business in a little more respectable way, then your best bet is Option #2: a nice, large retail store in a mall with lots of somewhat-helpful staff and an exchange/return policy a bit better than “once you’re out of the door”. Of course, we at doobye.com are strict Apple fans, so most of our electronic shopping is taken care of in one location.

For the rest of the crash-loving Windows® PC shoppers, other retailers are available. Sharaf DG [Tel: 04-368-5115] in Ibn Batuta Mall offers the widest range of computer and electronic goods in Dubai, by far. They’ve got everything including laptops, desktops, hard drives, printers, computer accessories, mp3 players, TVs, audio/video products, GPS products, mobile phones, game consoles, and pretty much anything else you would possibly need. Jumbo Electronics [Tel: 04-341-0101], Virgin Megastore [Tel: 04-341-4353], and CompuMe [Tel: 04-341-4442] (shorter exchange or return policy) in Mall of the Emirates offer the same, but with a smaller range of products. Another large computer and electronics retailer is Plug-Ins [Tel: 04-351-3919] at Burjuman and it’s new location [Tel: 04-206-6777] at Dubai Festival City.

For all you shopping maniacs out there! Below is a list of the popular malls in Dubai and their opening hours. You can find a map and additional information about each mall by following the link to their website.

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Ever wanted to buy something online but gave up because the store does not ship to Dubai? There’s actually a couple of companies that let you buy almost anything from the US or the UK and have it shipped here on your behalf. They offer you a mailing address abroad, and then ship whatever arrives in that mailbox to you here, and charge you a shipping fee.

The first company is actually a division of Aramex (the courier company) — their service is called Shop & Ship. They give you a mailbox in the US and the UK for a lifetime setup fee of $35.00. The only other charges you pay are when they ship something to you. They ship the contents of your mailbox three times a week.

The second company is called U Shop We Ship. Similarly, you pay a one time membership fee of $25.00 and then for every package they ship. They give you a mailbox in the US, the UK, and Dubai (ironically). They can ship your mailbox’s contents on a pre-determined weekly, bi-monthly, or monthly basis. Additionally, they offer an immediate shipping option at a extra charge. Another nice feature these guys offer is they give you a pre-paid credit card with your US mailbox’s billing address which you can use for all those online stores that only accept credit cards with a US billing address.

So now you can get that 2007 product while it’s still 2007!