Funny, Dubai LOOKS and FEELS pretty much the same as it did when I left just about three months ago for a summer romp around the world. Kinda' frozen in time as it were.

Traffic’s still here, irritatingly. Likewise, I couldn’t find a convenient place to park at Mall of the Emirates the other day, and people were shopping in reasonable numbers. Sakura, my favourite sushi bar, was doing a brisk

Svetlana hasn't seen her son in seven years, because she agreed to take a job as a waitress.

She was then was kidnapped and forced to work as a prostitute in Dubai and Abu Dhabi.

Her story is not unique. Hundreds of thousands of women are trafficked around the world for the purposes of pleasuring men who wish to pay for sex.

Being a prostitute by choice is one thing. Being a victim

This is an open letter to Mr Johann Hari in response to his article The Dark Side of Dubai, published in The Independent, Tuesday April 7, 2009, in which he describes his recent misadventures and negative impressions of Dubai, its policies, its politics and its people.

Sadly, I’m sure many of the stories you recount in your article are true, Mr. Hari.

Even more sad is the fact that

I'm not a religious person. Spiritual, yes. Religious, definitely not.

But whenever I feel sad, lonely, lost and/or unloved (as I did today :(, I take a few minutes to watch The Interview with God, the link for which was originally sent to me several years ago by my friend Harris.

The imagery is stunning.

The music is the same as the soundtrack at the start of Forrest Gump, one

A few days ago, on International Women’s Day, I joined the millions of women (and hopefully millions of men), who together celebrated the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future.

According to www.internationalwomensday.com (a very cool site which I unfortunately only visited today for the first time, and which I immediately wished I had visited BEFORE

Anyone who really knows me knows that I'm a goal orientated person. I need goals and targets to aim for at all times, personally and professionally. The targets range from big to small, long-term to short-term, but I always seem to have something to aim for. My New Year's resolution to try at least one thing new, different, unusual, challenging etc every month is one clear example of this.

I

I was a bit disappointed to find as I researched my two last blog entries (How High is High in Dubai? 818 metres ! and Talking Towers - Who's on Top and Who's Not), that the fields of architecture, engineering and construction are still mostly male dominated. Sigh.

 We’ve come a long way, but there’s still an even longer way to go.

Never mind. It just means it’s time

There’s something frightening, to me at least, about Dubai’s latest construction marvel, the world’s tallest tower, as it inches ever closer to heaven, just a kilometer or two from where I now live.

I see it daily, from various different perspectives: telescopic-like layers of concrete, rebar, steel, glass and aluminium, the apex of which pierces the sky impossbly higher than any of its

The other day I started talking about Dubai traffic, and somehow ended up on Recession Road. It’s time to backtrack. And this time, in the end, we'll end up on a Russian Road.

As I said two entries ago, driving in Dubai is a risky business. It’s been that way since I first came to the UAE in 1993.

In fact, everything associated with the roads, the drivers and driving itself were so