The best time to kick a person is when he is down. This is the beating that Dubai has taken. While I am not a fan of life in Dubai, as seen from my few visits and stories I have heard, I have always been baffled by the velocity of their growth.
Look at it from the other end. A person buys a car and the payments are financed. A year down the line, he falls into dire financial straits. He sells the car or gets the loan to be refinanced and reschedules the payment, if that is acceptable. This is normal.
So what is different in Dubai? They have assets, and they have only proposed a rescheduling of the payment of a bond. In what has been, clear over reaction, by the media and rating agencies which have now downgraded the status of investments in Dubai, its reputation and goodwill has taken a serious beating.
A reputation of sanguine courage fuelled by ambition. You cannot put a limit on resources or time for ambition. Then it becomes a project. Ambition is fuelled bythe inner force of leaders with a vision and as long as that force does not fade, Dubai will continue its growth. The city has come a long way from “humidity & flies’ to a become a metropolis of steel and glass.
The current correction may slow it down, but the show will go on… For those of you who thought that Dubai was over priced, now might be the time to pick up some good buys!
A whole decade is passing by and a new one is starting. The one that is passing by was marred by life changing events around the globe. Conflict, strife, financial crises. This decade would be certainly remembered. But what to call it is the question.
Mentabolism 