Having spent the better part of the last three years in the UAE supporting aerospace projects, I can say that their leadership has a vision and also the money to have others implement it. They need the “West” to make their country work.
Beem there more than once and can’t for the life of me understand why anyone would pay to go there at all. It is precariously artificial and is maintained in its state only by massive expense.
I found much of the construction to be empty with only the facade finished.
But they seem to have been able to successfully merge islam and the west, whereas the rest of the world has not.
It may come to pass that the answer to the culture war between the west and islam will be found in the Emirates.
Since you’ve been there for three years, how did they do it? What part of Islam did they keep and what part of the west did they adopt? Can that be transferred to the west?
Also on a more personal note, how did you find life there. What did you like and didn’t like?