The inaugural UAE Waze Cafe was held last Friday at Marina Mall, Dubai.

We started at 3pm, and wrapped up 8pm! Great start; we all enjoyed it.

We expected to be 6, but due to various logistics issues the final count was 3. More editors expressed interest, but were unable to attend due to the holidays.

The other editors in the attached photos are:

• moosool
• tygrin

We got to know each other, and discussed:

• how we each got started with Waze
• how to use WME plugins: toolbox, junction angle, speedlimits etc.
• method of community communication. UAE currently uses Slack, and has reached the message-count limit of the free version. I demonstrated Telegram, which has been used for years without issues in SEA.
• how to grow our local community of editors
• how better to convert Waze users into editors
• widening adoption of Waze in UAE (and the rest of Middle East)
• how we might support Waze's marketing efforts
• non-confidential aspects of what HQ shared with us in Manila
• how to handle addressing in remote parts of the country. I brought up What3Words again.

We plan to hold another official Waze Cafe in Abu Dhabi at end of this month.

There might be an informal meeting sometime this month at Belgian Cafe, Madinat, Dubai.