Lessons learned from Dubai … or not?

It might be early to assess the impact of war on Dubai, the self-declared crisis proof planet, but some lessons can be drawn from its magic well, right now.

First and foremost, I remember a saying about fairness: No, not the boomerang, and that what goes around comes around (the dark tales related to Lebanon and Gaza), but about a simple rule of thumb.

If you expect the world to be fair with you because you are fair, you’re fooling yourself: that’s like expecting the lion not to eat you because you didn’t eat it.

It applies to humans and applies to Dubai too. If you’re a peace loving region, focusing on happiness index and letting people thrive and make their own Dubai dream come true, it doesn’t mean that you might face WAR.

Preparing to war doesn’t mean going to war, but it should urge decision makers to think beyond the beautiful city line, and the pursuit of the first and the biggest.

Shelters

One shouldn’t deny that most of Dubai residents fled from conflict-torn countries, to rebuild their lives in a peaceful and promising place. They were so astonished by the glass buildings and skyscrapers that they didn’t ask a simple question: where are the shelters?

In fact, residents of high-rise building are luckier than those who opted for villas, as they could benefit from their parking space and repurpose them as Dubai shelters (it might sound like another fancy Dubai branded name).

By the way, it’s not the first time that the system fails. Of course, anyone can become defensive and speak about resilience and might steal from Lebanon (among other things) the tale of the Phoenix which is reborn from its ashes.

Helipads

During my decade in UAE, we faced a situation of a fire erupting in a skyscraper in Sharjah; people ran to the rooftop but rescuers faced one challenge: The ladders can’t reach them (the longest goes to six floors), and there are no helipads to perform mission-impossible style rescue. The vigilant leadership, and this is what really makes a difference, decided to amend the building code and make helipads mandatory in high rise buildings.

Rain

Another story was related to Climate change. As desert, Dubai didn’t plan stormwater networks, considering it cheaper to deal with the consequences of a few days of rain rather than invest in these networks. But “playing God” and creating artificial rain backfired and we all saw (as the world is always watching Dubai) hailstones damaging cars, and electric cars damaged by street lakes! Next is the leadership decision to consider stormwater networks in new road projects (and I should reveal that Qatar benefited a lot from this lesson).

The war will be over soon, hopefully, but lessons learned will not end, and the world’s eyes are on Dubai again to see how it will enhance its readiness to face war, even if it’s a peaceful planet.