My drive to work isn’t long – 25 minutes or so – but negotiating Dubai traffic can be an adrenalin-fuelled way to start the day.

I hate being ‘extreme tailgated’ – a rude and all-too-common gesture where a car tails you at speed with a 5cm gap, sometimes flashing its lights until you’re intimidated enough to move over. Or tries to sneak round on the hard shoulder like it’s another lane.

Since my route to work is on a two-lane speedway, I’ve had several motoring menaces ‘up my bumper’ over the past few weeks – including a wannabe stuntman today who I was still honking long after he’d disappeared over the horizon. The %@*{xy£x&z!

I mean, if I was walking along, would he come sprinting up behind me, breathe down my neck, jostle me until I fell sideways into the path of a Lycra-clad jogger, then run away at speed? No, he wouldn’t! He wouldn’t dream of it. He might think the metal box he’s sitting in means he’ll get away with it, but it’ll catch up with him, I thought to myself.

My other pet peeves are ‘the weavers’, who hurtle in front of you if you leave more than a five-foot gap, ‘the wrong turners’, who reverse back down exits if they’ve left the highway too soon, and ‘the idiots’ who make right turns from the left lane.

I probably should add that bad driving encompasses all social groups in Dubai and women certainly aren’t exempt. Cup-cake-wielding mums in frilly dresses sometimes start gnashing their teeth with aggression once they’re behind the wheel of the family 4×4. I’m constantly amazed at the honking, the pushing and shoving and the inconsiderate parking that takes place on the school run.

But back to my commute: my other worry is a new speed camera on my route that I keep hearing about. Apparently, it’s causing a lot of controversy for being set at a really low speed, but I don’t know where it is – which means I’m suspicious of every lamp post or road sign I pass. And it’s not always easy to keep to such a low speed when you’re being shunted along from behind.