DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — In his old life in Cairo, Rami Galal knew his place and his fate: to become a maintenance man in a hotel, just like his father. But here, in glittering, manic Dubai, he is confronting the unsettling freedom to make his own choices.
Here Mr. Galal, 24, drinks beer almost every [...]

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Without much oil under its sands, Dubai is no petro powerhouse. But you can’t beat it for being the most colorful sheikdom in the Middle East–or the most ambitious. What other desert land can claim one of the world’s largest indoor ski slopes, featuring fresh powder year round? While flying in on the stylish, state-owned [...]

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U.S. counter terrorism officials say the alerts issued this week for U.S. and British citizens in the United Arab Emirates should be taken “very seriously.”
“It’s not something to take lightly, it’s worth paying attention to,” said one U.S. official. “That doesn’t necessarily mean it will come to fruition, but do note that [the U.A.E] [...]

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Most expatriate residents of Dubai end up speaking Dinglish, the peculiar mix of broken English, Arabic and Hindi, writes Annabel Kantaria.
‘You must come over Friday night - we’re having a party in my backside,” said my new friend.
I’d only been in Dubai a couple of weeks and was over the moon to have got talking [...]

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Thirty years ago, Dubai wasn’t on the international art map. Today, Art Dubai 2008 serves up a cocktail of private equity firms and expensive art, where Land Rovers and seven-star hotels swaddle international art buyers in a simulated Arabian paradise. By R. Jay Magill, Jr. in Dubai more…

Photo Gallery: Art Dubai 2008
Global Village Dubai: Cultures [...]

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SIX years ago, Dion Mavath, an Australian D.J., flew to Dubai to take up residency at an upstart local nightclub. Dubai, a fledgling metropolis, was still mostly known as an airport hub and a shipping port, and the local night-life scene, he quickly found, was nearly as sterile and undistinguished as the flat Middle Eastern [...]

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Some of Dubai’s districts are known as “Little Tehran.” Iranians have their own clubs and Iranian restaurants do a thriving business throughout the Emirates. Little understood among those advocating tighter economic sanctions against Iran is that the United Arab Emirates is Iran’s first trading partner. Iran imports more than $10 billion from the United Arab [...]

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An unprecedented boom is changing the region—and echoing far past its borders.
Aug. 6, 2007 issue - We all know the headlines by now: the Middle East is burning, right? So it seems, as Palestinians and Iraqis wage civil war, Lebanon seethes, Syria and Israel trade barbs and Iran spits defiance. Yet beyond the smoke a [...]

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