It was a sidewalk coffee shop at a busy intersection in the city of Dubai. I was sipping a cup of cappuccino while waiting for a late friend. Next to the coffee shop was a metro station with an exceptional architectural design.

Dubai today is a bona fide, worldwide cosmopolitan city. While many may associate the city with oil, in fact, crude accounts for very little of the Emirate’s balance sheet. Its low-tax economy consists mostly of trade, banking, services, and iconic real estate projects, typified by environmentally disastrous reclaimed islands and the tallest building in the world.

In some ways, Dubai resembles Singapore, especially in the efficiency of its metro and the collection of public parking fees. But unlike Singapore, it depends heavily on imported labor.

The metro station’s architectural design resembled a large ship. Riders coming in and out of the station looked like seafarers embarking and disembarking. And like typical travelers, they came in all shapes, colors, and races from the four corners of the earth.

It was around 9 pm. The weather was lovely, mildly warm, and the street was bustling with people, all in a hurry to get somewhere. I couldn’t help but watch and listen to the people around me. At the table next to me, a couple spoke in two different languages, each on a mobile phone: he in Italian, she in English.

Whenever I have quiet time to myself, I contemplate the life that brought me to this place. Where did I come from? Where is life taking me?

I went back to my early youth in Tripoli, Lebanon, when I attended high school there, or even before, when I only visited Tripoli during Eid,* and passed by sidewalk coffee shops that, unlike today’s franchise coffee shops, served only coffee and tea.

I always wanted to sit down and enjoy a “real” cup of coffee at one of those sidewalk shops. But I neither had the opportunity nor could I afford one. In Iraq, I remember once taking two or three public buses with a friend to visit a famous coffee shop on Al Rasheed Street in Baghdad. I never went back; it was an out-of-place experience.

In the US, before coffee shops mushroomed on every corner, Denny’s was our favorite hangout during school years. To the chagrin of the hostess, we sat for hours, drinking coffee, studying, or socializing over free refills most of the night.

In Dubai, as in most of the GCC countries, the vast majority of foreign expatriates are low-paid laborers from East Asia. They work 48 hours a week and are paid in the range of $200 to $300 a month. Employers typically provide lodging and food. Freelance blue-collar workers may earn a little more, but they cover their own housing and food. Both groups try to save and send as much of their little income as possible back to their families, to make the migration worth life’s struggles.

Remembering my own experience, I wondered how many of the people walking by would have been eager to take a break from their busy schedule and sit down for a cup of coffee, at least once, before continuing on to their destinations. But maybe like me then, they can’t afford it.

My friend finally arrived, and we set off to discover other parts of Dubai’s nightlife.

*Eid is a three-day celebration marking the end of the fasting month of Ramadan, or the four-day period coinciding with the Muslim pilgrimage (Hajj).