Back in 2002 I was invited for AUTOSPORT's sister publication F1 Racing magazine to attend the launch ceremony for the Bahrain Grand Prix.
It wasn't a grand affair: fewer than 50 people were gathered on a scrub of desert at the bottom of the island, to watch then-FIA president Max Mosley pick up a shovel and push it gently into the perma-baked surface.
I remember thinking how shiny the the shovel was as it glinted in unforgiving sunlight; how inappropriate Max's slacks-'n'-blazer attire seemed in temperatures of more than 40C; how surreal it was to be chatting with members of the Bahraini royal family about their new project which would, they assured me, place Bahrain on the global map as it never had been before.