Dubai: a capitalist’s dream. Pity, it’s time to wake up.

There is no denying Dubai's appeal to the people of its less prosperous neighbouring countries. It beckoned aspiring capitalists to its shores with its enchanting skyline and promises of fast and easy money.

Easy money it wasn’t. But it was fast. Daily flights from Dubai into India flooded airports with serpentine lines of tired looking faces seemingly afloat in a sea of trolleys loaded with flat screen TVs, washing machines, and transparent bags filled with clothes.

Dubai’s skyline was literally built on the aspirations of these men. A large majority of them were construction workers. And these trophies would take years for their construction worker counterparts to earn in either India or Pakistan.

So, when there is much hue and cry over hopes being shattered following the financial crisis in Dubai, I am a bit sceptical. It is not the end of the Middle East as we know it. I am no economist but, as an observer of financial trends, it would seem as America had their Lehman Brothers, the Middle East has its Dubai World.

Bearing in mind the plight of the global economy this past year, it is fascinating to see the shock and horror that ripples across the globe when the next (rather predictable) domino falls. Why wouldn't it fall? I would be surprised if it didn't.

Especially, when it was clearly displaying all the symptoms of the malaise that had brought down the previous ailing economies - mainly - spending money they don’t have.

That said, I don’t believe as Simon Jenkins says in The Guardian that Dubai is a city built on sand. Well, geographically, yes. Metaphorically - no.

It is a city built on huge capitalistic dreams. And some, like the dreaming migrant construction worker, have realised theirs’.