He loves the cultural diversity here, digs the souks and thinks our taxi drivers might be F1 drivers in disguise…

The South African comedian just can’t get enough of Dubai – he was here late last year for the inaugural Dubai Comedy Festival, and was back in the city this week to mark the launch of Comedy Central HD on OSN.

The charming and dapper chap is most famous for taking over The Daily Show after Jon Stewart hung up his well-read hat, but has been at the stand up game for around a decade. We caught up with the 32-year-old to talk all things Dubai. Here’s what he had to say about the emirate…

On why he loves the diversity of Dubai…

“There’s the old saying that travel is the antidote to ignorance, and for me every time I come to Dubai I see and learn something new. I think it’s always important to understand that difference doesn’t mean wrong. And that’s something we struggle with in the world for the most part; when someone has a different culture, we assume it’s the wrong culture. But the truth is, it’s just different. What shocks me about Dubai, is the cultural diversity. Being in a world where one day you can walk past someone from Dubai, you can walk past a Filipino, you can walk past someone from Iran, you can walk past… those orange, what are they called… British people. That’s it. That’s the most enjoyable thing is seeing how all of those cultures interact together, and seeing how well it can work. Because it seems contrary to what you think would happen, but it works so well in Dubai.”

On his favourite thing to do in Dubai…

“I love to visit the old parts of town. I love going to the souks. It’s an area of Dubai that I didn’t discover the first time I came. It’s easy to see the glitz and glam of the city, when you start discovering old Dubai, it’s a different world. I saw the Spice Souk and the Gold Souk, and I really enjoyed that.”

On the taxi drivers here…

“The thing that probably shocks me the most, and I think there’s an untapped talent in Dubai here, is the taxi-slash-F1 drivers. I think they’re some of the most amazing drivers in the world. I didn’t know Toyotas could go that fast! So that’s probably been my most fun experience here.”

On bringing Comedy Central to the Middle East…

“This is just the beginning. Making the world a smaller place, strangely enough, is what’s exciting to me. It’s also exciting because the Daily Show was created, and is situated in the US, in New York City, so it’s exciting for me to bring the world to that. For a long time, people have assumed that Americans have no interest in the wider world, and I think that situation is changing all the time. So if we can get as many influencers from the world into the Daily Show, into the US, and vice versa… once we’re laughing at the same things, we realise that there’s more that brings us together than separates us. And that is my favourite thing.”