Old passports, faded photographs, travel permits and vintage televisions fill the rooms of Shaukat Ali Rana's Dubai home, offering a glimpse of life in the UAE before the country's rapid transformation.
When Shaukat Rana arrived in what is now the UAE as a young boy in 1968, Dubai was very different. Roads were scarce, travel between emirates required permits and television was limited to a handful of channels.
Mr Rana joined his father, Rafi, in the Trucial States after his father took up an operations role with Pakistan International Airlines. At that time, the territory was under British protection, which lasted from 1820 until the UAE's formation in 1971.
Since then, he has amassed a collection of memorabilia documenting the country’s early years and its rapid development into an economic powerhouse.
Nearly six decades later, he has turned part of his family home in Mirdif into a museum, preserving photographs, official documents and everyday objects that chart the country’s transformation.
He began organising the archive during the Covid-19 pandemic, turning part of the kitchen into a display space and arranging the material chronologically to tell Dubai's story across seven decades.
Legal documents, currencies and other unique items were posted to the US for official verification in the public record, while other items were organised and sorted in chronological order for a chronology displaying Dubai’s growth.
Black-and-white photographs line the walls, many taken by Mr Rana himself, alongside vintage cameras, radios, record players and televisions. Old currency and official papers offer a glimpse into the practicalities of daily life before and after the formation of the UAE.
“We have kept this for the next generation. I have so many other things to add, but I am running out of space,” Mr Rana told The National during a walk-through of his mini museum. “I try to select the best ones, which have a story to tell, that people can relate to, they can see it and they can touch it.”
Varied collection
The memorabilia on display includes water bills from the 1970s, old passports, driving licences, and permits required to cross into different emirates before unification.
Among the documents is an original trade licence issued in 1958, establishing the family business with Mr Rana’s uncle, Mohammed Sadiq. The licence carries the same PO box number, 504504, that the business still uses today.
The family business once served as a link between foreign resident workers building the country and their families abroad, offering postal services and telegrams. It later became a photography and printing operation, importing cameras, photographic chemicals, printing paper and film. Today, the business provides digital printing services and exports digital art.
“Nowadays, the camera and photograph are almost finished,” Mr Rana said. “In those days we used to have imported photographs and photographic chemicals. Then we used to import papers for printing and film rolls; it was a complete photography and printing business.”
Drawers are packed with bills and other legal notices, carefully labelled and displayed to show the administrative requirements of the UAE's early years. They also include Indian rupees, once the recognised currency in the Trucial States, followed by the Qatari rial for a time, and then the UAE dirham.
Commemorative medals, coins, and stamps fill display cases, marking events from the Apollo 14 mission in 1971 to milestones in space exploration history, including the UAE's own missions.
The collection has also brought Mr Rana recognition. In April, he received a community award at the Erth Awards ceremony, presented by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, and Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, Crown Prince of Dubai, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defence. He was recognised for "best contribution by a resident, highlighting Dubai’s cultural diversity".
One striking photo inside the museum shows Mr Rana standing on top of the family Volkswagen after a five-hour journey to Abu Dhabi across the desert to watch the air show that marked the UAE's first National Day in 1972.
“There were no roads then, and we had to drive along the beach and wait for the tide to go out so we could pass through safely,” Mr Rana recalled.
“We also needed permission from Dubai Police to leave the emirate, and another permission slip from Abu Dhabi to enter. All of those permits we have kept and are here in the museum.” Those documents are now part of the archive.
Radio contact
The family’s first 12-inch television, purchased in 1968, sits alongside radios in a corner of the museum, showing how residents kept in touch with the outside world.
“We used to listen to the BBC World Service, and Radio Ceylon from Sri Lanka and watch occasional films on the only station we could receive, which was from Kuwait,” said Mr Rana. “When there was a football World Cup on, we could also watch games from West Germany and Argentina.
“The community then was a majority of Indians and Pakistanis, but there were a lot of European expatriates also. British workers were developing the Port Rashid and the early stages of Dubai Airport and the Trade Centre. Back then, nobody could imagine that this country would grow as fast as it has.”
Preserving the archive
Mr Rana's three sons, Ayub, Taimur and Asad, hope to continue collecting for the museum and to add to the exhibits on show.
They said anyone is welcome to visit if they book in advance via their Instagram page, @shaukat.rafi. Asad said he hoped new arrivals in the UAE, in particular, would benefit from learning more about the nation’s heritage.
“We have sent away almost 100 documents for authentication in the US,” he said. “There is a lot more we could send, but it is expensive, and of course there is a risk of them getting lost, and many are unique. For some reason, dad never threw anything away, and that has helped us to create this archive.
“We’ve added an extension to the living room to accommodate all this, and we took over mum’s kitchen for another area. She has a bigger one now, so she is happy.”
