My wife and I were recommended to watch this three-part BBC series on the rich-person's paradise Dubai, by two sister-friends of my wife, both of whom experienced this lifestyle for some time until recently. Both these ladies won't mind me saying they and their respective husbands were comfortably well-off financially at the time although neither was in the super-league that so many of the participants here clearly inhabit.
The story is told of the rise and rise of this new-millionaires', often billionaires' playground, which effectively began some 50 years ago when the then much younger Sheikh used the fortune derived from striking oil in the land to build an almost fairy-tale Magic Kingdom to attract foreigners to live, work and play, attracted by the fabulous properties, hot, sunny weather and perhaps most significantly, a regime where earnings can be astronomical with no income tax to pay. Unsurprisingly, this attracts a particular type of permanent western resident, pretty much all of whom appear to be shallow, self-indulgent narcissists who completely fail to see themselves as others might see them, as Robert Burns once sagely wrote.
Episode one concentrated on a virtual parade of bored housewives living their incredibly cosseted and indulgent lifestyles waited on hand and foot by low-paid hired help, often of Philippino origin. One particular bimbo has a bag collection worth some £2 million but can't remember what each is worth while another seeks to ameliorate any feelings of guilt on her part in exploiting the cheap labour by saying she pays above the normal wage rates, which still equates to only a tiny fraction of what she herself lives on and on which her mini-army of nanny, gardener, cook and cleaners can barely support themselves.
Over the three episodes, we get to see a cross-section of those who've either made it, hope to make it or worry about no longer making it in this fantasy world. Those falling into the former category we observe travelling around by private jet, driving in supercars and boasting of their ultra-luxurious houses. I detested all of them, bar maybe the recently-arrived Newcastle divorcee who's landed a dream job running a music store for which he's given up a job back home, as he says himself, stacking a supermarket shelf.
Naturally, there's some price to pay for this idyll and it's apparent in the number of billboards bearing the image of the now much older sheikh who rules his kingdom strictly with a law in place meaning you can be arrested for simply badmouthing his royal highness. Not that you'll see any of the interviewees here even remotely criticising the country's human rights record or comment adversely on the draconian rule subsisting here, indeed you even see them buying the self-promoting books written and issued by his majesty or bedecking their walls with his portrait.
I get that this Monaco or Vegas of the Middle East will attract many, but I personally found it very distasteful and look-away embarrassing to see these people flaunting their Ancient Rome-type lifestyles on us when there is so much poverty, strife and waste in the world.
If this is how the other half lives, you can keep it and I personally doubt that many of the contributors here cast any kind of shadow, even under the unremitting desert sun...
