Altogether, the mood is good in the Emirate, this much nobody can doubt. What a difference a year makes, I can only exclaim! But apparently, it is more than just atmospheric: Abu Dhabi is expected to undergo economic growth of more than four per cent in 2010. And ever since Abu Dhabi stepped in for the bail-out, the two, Abu and Dubai, have become a lot closer than at any time since the foundation of the United Arab Emirates. The most important part probably is that the leadership of our neighbouring Emirate know perfectly well that they need Dubai. It has been called the Las Vegas of the Middle East, but it is so much more than that: It is in fact, besides oil, the only real growth engine the economy of the UAE has.

One indicator for the future of Dubai is tourism – as within the last five years it has become a major pillar of its GDP. In this department things do look quite rosy: Because international travelling has completely rediscovered the shining city upon a hill.

So the B is for building, and you all know where the tallest building is, right? Yes, it is of course the Burj Khalifa, and it is, as I must have mentioned before, not just the tallest building, but actually the tallest man-made structure on the planet, which means that it as well beats all those creepy radio masts and so on that don’t even stand up by themselves. Only due to the the Khalifa does the title tallest structure go to a BUILDING, where it damn well belongs. We should all be grateful for this…

Anyway, Nasr Al Niyadi and Omar Al Hegelan, to cool local dudes, set a new world record on 8th January 2010. I saw it with my own eyes, but I still can’t believe it. So they were no less than 220 meters high and jumped from that building (actually from a platform held by a crane on the building)… And they waited a whole TEN seconds before they opened their parachutes. I can tell you: Just watching this, this was the longest ten seconds in my life. So I cannot imagine how they themselves could have felt. Then, with their parachutes open, it took them another 80 seconds to come down, where they were celebrated as modern-day heroes.

Dubai is the new Rome, the city of superlatives. I have been saying this for quite a while. But now more and more people start to believe me, at last. It’s all thanks to the Khalifa. It changes everything. It has won the future back for Dubai. (Well, actually they had solved their little financial crisis anyway…)

I am looking at it through my living room window this very moment. (That’s because I can type without looking.;-)) And I’m like: Oh my God! That thing is like h-u-g-e! Makes me all emotional…

Why Burj Khalifa?
Let me just mention one simple fact: The building is in the Emirate of Dubai, but it is named after the Emir of Abu Dhabi!! Amazing, huh?
Well, yes, but it is still different than the USA renaming the Washington monument “le monument de Sarkozy”… Dubai and Abu Dhabi are both semi-independent countries – while they both enjoy a great amount of autonomy, they are of course member states of the federal United Arab Emirates (UAE).

This renaming signals that the UAE has become a more unified country. That is their response to the financial crisis, and it seems to be working. Now they can say: UNITED WE STAND! Apparently not the worst idea, judging by the reactions of the financial markets.

One other thing is really important: Dubai proves by the renaming of the world’s tallest building (and this is by far its most powerful symbol for the Emirate!!) that it fully accepts the leadership of Abu Dhabi.

So in a way we could say: Now Dubai is a suburb of Abu Dhabi. But hey, it’s still the coolest place on Earth. Maybe even more so.
Well, who is this Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan?

He was born in 1945. We know that he is a devout Muslim – but at the same time he is a stark advocate of international and inter-religious understanding. Here’s just one example: The University of Wales named a building in its theology (and this is Christian theology!) after him, due to his generous donations.

Yesterday’s party was wild…but that is not what I am going to write this blog entry about. I don’t mean to give you all the sordid details, but I do want to stress that we all survived it and that there was NO Islamic morality police that arrested us. Some of us virtually drank ourselves to death yesterday, that is true, but that is our own business. The point is that we have the right to do so, and no-one is stopping us.

So, this time around New Year’s Eve was wilder than ever before. You know why? B’cause we got something more important than the beginning of this year to celebrate: THE END OF THE RECESSION! At last:-)

But I personally devoted many vodkas to the spirit of Dubai and the New Islam symbolized by it: The new and TOLERANT brand of Islam. You can’t even get it like this in Turkey or Egypt – just here.

This is something that Dubai should start to export as soon as possible. I am sure it would be a big hit in places like Iran, Yemen, Sudan, or Saudi Arabia. If only they permitted it in! But I am sure that some day they will, because reason usually prevails, and this will all be thanks to Dubai! I drink to that, cheers. Green tea, by the way…

That said, you may not be a devout Muslim, but rather a devout partyer. In fact the kind of party as described above is not your only option. A lack of booze, and of naked dancing women, for that matter, is in no way a necessity. In other words, yeah, let me just repeat it anyway: Parties where you can drink yourself to death and where spontaneous nudity is tolerated, ARE an option.

For example: The Palm Island New Year’s Party last year had people running around wild on beaches, drinking champagne, and real booze, from bottles. Some women opted for toplessness – some others decided to take it one level further. Well, so far, so good. But what really matters: There was no scandal afterwards, none whatsoever.

The reason for this lack of indignation is pure pragmatism. The Emirati know perfectly well that they have the chance to become the party capital of the world (unless they already HAVE). And there is no way they would want to blow this.

And for members of the international Arab and Muslim community it also seems to be some kind of relief, knowing that there is one place in the world which is THEIRS, but an authentic party metropolis nevertheless.

I won’t deny that there is also criticism against this from conservative forces, though they seem to be becoming weaker and weaker. Right now it clearly seems that the progressive side either will win or HAS already won. The final result, however, is yet to be seen. Let us not forget that Dubai is also a social experiment of gargantuan proportions, so no-one can be sure as to the outcome.

What am I going to wear on New Year’s Eve? Well, I haven’t decided. If no good idea hits me soon, there will always be the possibly of choosing invisible clothes…;-)

But I realize, lately they have been making a lot of “highest buildings ever”, and it is hard to keep track of the current one. The times when the Sears Tower (now Willis Tower) in Chicago ruled from 1974 until 1998 seemed to be over. In the age of globalization, when many Asian countries became important and rich business forces, but having an insatiable hunger for prestige, the world’s tallest buildings have come and gone before one could even notice.

But with the Burj Dubai we seem to be entering into a new era: No-one knows how long its reign is going to last. That’s because it is truly in a league of its own: It is an incredible 818 meters high, while its predecessor, the Taipei 101 measures only 509 meters, while the one before that, the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, are 452 meters high. So we see: The Burj clearly opens up new dimensions, and maybe in 100 years, we or rather our great-grandchildren will all still be talking about it…or maybe not! That’s one part of the beauty: We just don’t know.
But did you know that tallest building does not necessarily mean tallest structure?
And did you know that the KVLY-TV mast in Blanchard, North Dakota, was the tallest man-made structure on Earth until…the Burj Dubai surpassed it? That means that now, for the very first time in many decades, the crown for highest building AND highest man-made structure go to the same holder: The Burj Dubai.

The Burj Dubai is in fact the tallest structure ever made by man – and we can say: ALTHOUGH it is a building. That’s because those TV masts have very unfair advantages: Not only are they extremely thin and light, they are also held by gigantic wires…and thus not free-standing. But so what, the Burj beats them all! And let me just point out that it does not do so with some silly antenna on its roof or its pinnacle – but with its very own built structure, actually WITH its roof, which is about 50 meters higher than that TV mast in North Dakota…but then, of course, the Burj also has an antenna on top to make it even higher (by about 80 meters), though for being as amazing as it is, this would have been completely not needed.
So, pretty cool, right?

Well, be that as it may, but why are all those people so surprised anyway? Why is there all that talk about “Dubai”? I find this extremely unfair. That’s because in economics we use A COUNTRY’S performance as an indicator of future developments – and not a city! Let us all not forget that Dubai is a city, set in the emirate of the same name, located in the COUNTRY of the United Arab Emirates, a.k.a. UAE.

Who talks much about the economy of Los Angeles, New York City, Paris, or Shanghai? Everywhere we read about countries, and Gross Domestic Products, etc. Of course, when you only consider Dubai a city, it will seem much weaker than when you regard it as part of something bigger, the nation it is in. I am completely convinced that this represents an unfair bias against Dubai and the UAE. The media tries to make them seem weaker than they actually are. But isn’t this just outrageous unfairness?

Dubai stands for pure capitalism, and it is not at all ashamed of it. And this is something that, for whatever reason, is no longer “politically correct” in the West. Hey media guys, be real! Dubai is an incredibly daring and audacious project. It deserves your support. – Or at least fairness. How about that?

In the world of today, one very important factor is what has been called the “clash of civilizations”. And here one major aspect is the interaction between the Islamic world and the West. Of course, these two are in close and permanent contact in various places, not just in Dubai. Paris, London, Berlin, Brussels, and Amsterdam are now multicultural cities with huge Muslim minorities. But the story is the same everywhere: The Muslims are the poor immigrants, who come not because they love the Western way of life – but only for economic reasons. They are basically migrants moving from poor countries to rich ones. But then they mostly do stay poor, relatively speaking, even the generations that have been born and raised in the West – often they are in fact less wealthy than their migrating parents and grandparents.

I’m not blaming either side for this situation, but I do wonder about the consequences. In the West it is normal to live with Muslims that form the economic underclass. (The only exception is, for now, the USA, which mostly for geographic reasons, has experienced a completely different Muslim immigration than Western Europe. There Islamic immigrants are doing remarkably well in economic terms.) But think of the psychological effect that this has: The Muslims are always the poor ones, and the Westerners always the rich people, and very often they are less than happy about their Muslim immigrants. And yes, it is always the Islamic side that does the migrating.

Dubai is writing a completely different story. First of all, it is very visibly rich. But what matters most: Here the Muslims, the Arabs are the hosts and and others are their guests. So the roles are completely reversed, though not in every respect: Here in Dubai, the Westerners and the Arabs are both wealthy. So they encounter each other on eye-level – and this happens on a very large scale. Nowhere else in the world do we have this. Westerners, however, travel a lot to the Islamic world: Turkey, Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia are very popular destinations in the Mediterranean, then there is Indonesia, which is also a mostly Islamic country and a touristic hot spot. But the Westerners are always the rich tourists, while the Muslims are waiters, shop assistants – or even, quite literally, beggars in the street.

In Dubai East and West meet as equals and in harmony. (Yes, in harmony. Of course, it isn’t a perfect harmony, but just compare it with certain other places where Americans chose to visit the Islamic world, like Iraq or Afghanistan! Dubai is a functioning, wealthy state, and even if you are not fond of it, you will have to admit that being here is basically a very pleasant experience, because the standard of living is as high as in Switzerland. You can’t say that about Morocco or Egypt!)

In Dubai, Westerners and Arabs learn about each other – while doing business, not at a bazaar, but wearing suits, in board rooms. Here they learn to trust each other. This makes Dubai one of the most valuable places on Earth.