Hey guys,

I live in Dubai (Aussie expat) so I guess I'll chime in here.

First, thanks for sharing OP, great shot.

The buildings on the bottom of this shot all look the same because they were built at the same time, by the same developer. Jumeriah Beach Residence (JBR) was the original development along the beach there, then they decided to build that man-made marina along the backside, and eventually filled it in. You can see the other side of these buildings if you want to, my building is pictured in the OP (the building directly to the right of the yacht club with all the boats on the water) and I go kayaking in front of JBR every week.

The lack of greenery and "nature" is something we miss, but the light doesn't really show off much in the shot, each side of the yacht club there are grassy areas with a tiny garden, and across the road is a nice (but small) park, this was one of the draws for living in our building as we have a dog. Otherwise, as noted, you will only see the odd bit of landscaping or palms out the front of buildings.

I think an interesting point here though is there is actually some amazing "nature" in and around Dubai, it's just not what expats are used to. As I mentioned before, I love to kayak on the calm waters of the gulf, fishing is great fun and its lovely and quiet out there.

An hours drive into the "proper" desert gives a stunning landscape, with roaming camels and enormous rolling dunes. Theres the hatta mountains another 30 mins inland, and Oman (a three hour drive) is unbelievable too. Last weekend my buddy and I took the kayak down to abu dhabi (hours drive) and visited the mangroves there, caught barracuda while listening to birdsong, then got up close to a big group of flamingoes before they took flight - there is some impressive nature hidden away amongst all the sand and skyscrapers here.

The "slaves" ... yep, as someone noted, many countries around the world use migrant workers that work for a small fraction of what locals demand, this is true enough. And yes, many come from India where they could flat-out find NO work at all so its a good "opportunity" for them. Clearly we can all relate to this, with taxi drivers, waitstaff, cleaning positions commonly being low paid jobs that locals dont find value in, and are being filled by migrant workers. But the slave moniker is closer to being accurate with the building labourers.. these blokes work through summer, forget health and safety, long hours, tough work, and sometimes (from they people I talk to this is a low percentage, but still) developers will hold employee passports until their yearly vacation, so if they get here and dont like it, they are "held hostage" (im sure a developer would say they are enforcing their employment contract or something) to continue working till then.

To end on a positive, Dubai is incredibly safe, you see no drunks, fighting etc - crime is incredibly low. There is plenty of nature if you look for it, and it's really cool to mix with such a wide variety of locals and expats (my basketball team is made up of nine nationalities for instance). Nine months of the year the weather is brilliant, the other three are nightmarishly hot, and you live inside, but I'm fine with that ratio to be fair, and we are lucky enough to take our holiday in this time. I thought it would be a bit shit before I came and had no knowledge of the place, but it is actually a pretty interesting place.