On Gulf Investors, Expatriates, Autocrats, and Mother Sun
Moi under the sun
"In February Dubai’s department of finance issued the
first $10 billion chunk of a bond totalling $20 billion to help stave off the
creditors, open new lines of credit and reschedule debt. Now, at a time when
international banks are still loth to lend, it has been reported that the
second chunk will be guaranteed by the UAE’s government. More may still be
needed.
"It is not clear who is in charge—apart from Dubai’s ruler whose big
interest is racehorses......"
About two year's ago a prominent 'thinker' from another Gulf state wrote a long article in a local periodical on the superiority of our native Gulf lifestyle. He wrote how Westerners are seeking to live our lifestyle in droves, abandoning their own. He gave the example of expatriates and investors who flock to some Gulf states, giving Dubai as an example. He said they moved because they 'preferred our values and lifestyle'. he also said that they risked buying property in places like Dubai, partly because they wanted our lifestyle.
I did not bother to tell him that the expatriates in the Gulf did not wish to live 'our' lifestyle, nor did they live it. They lived their own lifestyle, on their own terms, but on the beaches and in select suburbs of our cities. I did not bother telling him that they did not purchase property because they loved to live in our midst: they purchased the property mainly in the hope that it will appreciate and they can make a profit by selling it. They did not really live in our midst: there is hardly any interaction. Little interaction in the workplace, and almost none outside the workplace.
Others came seeking our omnipotent sun, and seeking the sun is not part of our lifestyle, it is part of their lifestyle. They are seeking the 'tan'. Even though the sun is part of our life, we are born under its hot rays, we play under it, and we die under it- it is not a chosen part of our lifestyle. Still, once we passed the childhood stage, we have always tried to avoid our burning sun. And during summer most of us, those who can afford it, leave for cooler climes where fewer things are forbidden.
I did not bother answering him, because I realized he was pandering to some local autocrat or another, perhaps to several.
Cheers
mhg
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