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You've heard about the skyscraper rising twice the height of the Empire State Building and the theme park ten times the size of Monaco with a $1.5 billion re-creation of eight world wonders all scaled larger than the originals. Outsize tourism projects keep this tiny emirate in the headlines, but the real prize is the strategic location and the mojo of Dubai's ruler and de facto C.E.O., Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, and his drive to create a financial bridge between Europe and Southeast Asia. Record oil profits, Arab capital repatriated from the West after 9/11, and new laws permitting foreign property ownership are transforming Dubai into the largest construction site outside China, luring banking, manufacturing, and media headquarters from the old Middle East locus of Beirut.

Where to Sleep
The prism-shaped Emirates Towers Hotel, on Sheikh Zayed Road, draws investment bankers and major players; key government advisers have offices in the hotel's business tower, which is close to the Dubai International Financial Center, housing tenants such as Morgan Stanley and the Dubai Stock Exchange. On its own man-made island in touristy Jumeirah Beach, the spinnaker-shaped Burj al Arab serves as a government guest palace for the likes of Bill Clinton, Nelson Mandela, and Gulf Cooperation Council heads of state. Though the Burj is near Dubai Media and Internet City (the technology park where CNN, Leo Burnett, and Microsoft are based) and Jebel Ali Free Zone's trans-shipment port, visiting execs spurn the hotel's hot-pink and leopard-print interior for more conservative digs at Al Qasr, the boutique hotel of Madinat Jumeirah, an adjacent resort modeled after an Islamic walled city. Recently refurbished and located between the original business district on Dubai Creek and the gold souk, the Radisson SAS Deira Creek (formerly the InterContinental) has balconies overlooking the dhow wharfs, and it houses Shabestan, the city's best Iranian restaurant.

Where to Eat
A desert land whose population is 85 percent foreign and where virtually everything is imported, Dubai is, not surprisingly, the place to eat just about anything. The multiethnic restaurant scene revolves around hotels and shopping malls, virtually the only entities allowed to have liquor licenses. The Emirates Towers Hotel's elegant Al Nafoorah serves Lebanese specialties, while at Madinat Jumeirah, Zheng He, a Chinese-Arab fusion restaurant, has a black and red minimalist Shanghai interior and a hushed atmosphere suited to quiet evening business discussions. At the Grosvenor House Hotel at Dubai Marina City, Mezzanine has a soundproof glassed-in VIP table overlooking the kitchen of Prince Charles's former head chef, Scotsman Gary Robinson. Indego, serving modern Indian cuisine by Mumbai-born star Vineet Bhatia, is reliably sedate.