who am i kidding?

Dubai is a no-man's land. Local population stands at just 26% of the total number of bodies crowded up against the Persian Gulf. If Dubai stands as an example of how Islam and the West can get along, we're in deep trouble, with a capital T and that rhymes with P and that stands for

Prostitution
Public indecency
Perilous roads
Peonage

Is opening up this sliver of paradise worth the degredation of what is beautiful and right about Islam? Speaking as one who is no scholar... just as a woman who hears the rumours...

I am curious to read the Vanity Fair article from this month's issue.

150 | DUBAI'S THE LIMIT In little more than two decades, a mind-boggling metropolis has risen from the sands of Arabia—the ever expanding, hyperkinetic swirl of towers, theme parks, mega-malls, luxury hotels, and enterprise zones that is Dubai. In the swankiest restaurants and darkest corners of the tiny emirate, Nick Tosches discovers what has fueled the unparalleled growth of this Las Vegas on steroids: the royal house of Maktoum's version of the American Dream. Photographs by Robert Polidori.

A friend who pointed me to the article was quite taken aback by what it has to say -- apparently, it's a salacious little rip on our Las Vegas meets Disneyland home away from home. "You live there?" Sure, I know which Spinney's has the Russian prostitutes and which, the Asian ones. I know the hole in the wall in Ajman where you can get illegal booze at your own peril -- illegal beer and wine is just a bad idea. who knows how long it's sat in this springtime in Hell heat? I know Dubai is a key spot in illegal drug trafficking ports and strategic location offer it up as a key trafficking hub for all sorts of seamy underbelly type things, including drugs and terrorists... But look at it another way, and Dubai is a place where I can walk away from a stroller full of shopping bags, baby gear and a purse, and it won't get stolen. Where people give my child a big friendly smile and a toussle on the head. Where I am safe walking the streets at night. Where I can sleep without fear that a bullet will come crashing through the window. Yeah. Those are fears for Washington, DC, home of the brave, land of the free to remain prisoners of their own society.

I'm sure whatever Vanity Fair said, it's part of the reason why we moved from Dubai to Sharjah. There's an emptiness to Dubai that wears on you after a while. I mean, how many shopping malls do we really need? My husband and I finally had to go into an African and Eastern to find out what it was -- a liquor store. And there is little that is human to the scale of Dubai: the buildings are too 'too', the roads are terrifying, the sidewalks aren't meant for walking.

We are all of us expats; some are here as political refugees, some fled their home countries because the fighting is fierce and opportunity few. Some are vague pioneers in the capitalist Wild Wild Middle East, trading covered wagons for airplane tickets, prairie for sand. Some just woke up one morning, finally listening to a little voice inside that had been whispering, "I wonder what it's like to do something different?" Some pay for the priviledge of sweating to death to make the dream come true.

I wonder how shaky Dubai's foundation really is: if the spark of revolt jumped from work camp to work camp, we'd be engulfed in angry, abused men in a matter of hours. If the rest of the world becomes disenchanted with the oddity that is Dubai, will they stop coming? If the expats give up on skyrocketing housing costs, shrinking packages, huge school and living increases... if they give up and go home, what will be left? Can Dubai cross this dune, or will it have to recede back into the sands?