Impressions of Dubai
Wednesday, September 10, 2008 at 3:52AM We (Steve and I) stayed at a nice hotel right on the water (most of them are), conducting a host of meetings, planning sessions, pitches, and interviews for candidates WRT to our booming Development-in-a-Box™ work in northern Iraq (soon spreading region-wide and beyond). It was heady stuff, and I was really pleased to spend so much quality time with Steve. With my book and all, plus Steve’s very high frequency of travel to Iraq and neighboring states (the man travels non-stop), our interactions had been decreased in the last few months, and I was getting depressed about that. I feel a lot of pride of co-ownership of the DiB strategic concepts with Steve, and while I’m enormously grateful to his stunning amount of effort to actualize and flesh all this out in Kurdish Iraq, I wanted more direct inclusion in a F2F sense, so traveling with Steve on this trip and getting back into the immediate co-evangelizing role (as opposed to the virtual version where we’re both traveling non-stop and spreading the vision to different audiences) was really great. Steve’s just doing such a kick-ass job of making it happen in the real world that I’m eager to step up wherever possible to lend a more direct hand.
Still, Great Powers needed to be written, to include a big chunk on DiB naturally, but it’s nice to feel like we’re on the same field at the same time running the same plays from scrimmage. You just don’t want to feel left out of anything, and that’s virtually impossible when you’re talking a human dynamo like Steve, but it’s fun to run with that Big Dog whenever you can. He really is an uber-world-traveler, so picking up tips and best practices there is also cool.
Dubai is a weird and amazing place. Almost two million in this city-state and only about one-sixth are true citizens, the rest being a strangely close approximation of the actual mix of the world in terms of black, white, brown, olive and yellow. It feels like you’re everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I’ve been through Dubai a handful of times before, but just in terms of transit, so this was my first time to really notice that. It’s like Epcot made real, right down to the Mall of the Emirates which could pass for a Mall of America-clone, replacing the indoor amusement park with the indoor ski slope (truly bizarre given the heat but you can see what people would love it—I’ve got some video I’ll post).
You do notice the massive build-out going on. I’ve never seen so much construction so concentrated in one place—not even traveling in China. You just wonder at the municipal complexity of it all.
Interacting with local (meaning Dubai/Abu Dhabi transplants) businessmen was also fascinating. Highly educated bunch (usually U.S. and European degrees) with inordinate ambition. I’m familiar with the whole Dubai-Abu Dhabi rivalry, and it’s right on everyone’s lips. The two cities are really different in many ways, but you can’t help thinking the friendly rivalry is a good thing for everybody—especially outside businesspeople. It just seems like the very embodiment of globalization in terms of the high-speed, tight-margin transactions married to edge-of-your-seats ambition. I mean, it’s a fun place to be marching in and out of office buildings in a business suit. It feels like a serious center of gravity in terms of global connectivity.
Stunning heat, though, and one very bright, piercing sun. It’s no mystery why guys wear long white flowing robes with extensively shading headwear (still, no brims to cover the face). If you strip down or wear dark here, you simply fry. I saw some scary European skin on display here—as in, lobster red.
Walking on the beach was cool. Very tropical in terms of shells and stuff. Almost no tide though, and the water was unbelievably warm—like almost hot. I thought southern Fla. had warm water, but it doesn’t come close to this stuff. You really felt like you were in a completely different weather/climate environment.
Food was spectacular. You see a lot of Turkish and British influence, making for an intriguing mix. I got my hummus quotient for the year.
All in all, a very cool trip. Jet lag not bad, because we went back and forth from JFK direct into Dubai—a way cool and way busy airport (as in, all-day and all-night long). Top-notch interactions all throughout. It was like a mini-MBA in globalization every day. Enterra has attracted such top-flight global allies. It’s really a privilege and a pleasure to work with such people. You just feel like you can run at full speed all the time and never leave anyone behind.
Can’t wait to go back to the region, and won’t have to for long--just too many opportunities for Enterra. It’s just non-stop economic frontier integration going on there, so Steve’s definitely in his element and I’m happy to play Sundance Kid whenever the opportunities are presented.
Reader Comments (6)
The big question, though, is does it have a World of Energy pavilion, complete with 360 degree panoramic movie extolling the glory of oil, followed by a cabaret of animatronic dinosaurs?
Only guesstimating and theorizing...I have heard expats express a sneaking suspicion that AQ is paid "protection" money.Even though the UAE is full of extremely outward looking people ( remember Dubai has always been a trading rather than a nomadic dot in the desert)...I think some of the links that were made during the Taleban era ...innocent links but strong ones ( Afghanistan was a popular hawk hunting area for the rich sheikhs.. i think Kandahar airport was paid for by the arabs just for this purpose) have left some lingering respect amonsgt the former "allies".or maybe they just run a very tight ship and any attack on UAE would go down very poorly ...who knows...I don't