But Dubai has another face. On the outskirts of the city, where the desert begins, are the concrete barracks where the workers live, thousand upon thousand of them.

Dubai is being built virtually from scratch - 20 years ago few of these gleaming towers existed - and the men building it are migrants from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal.

They work for about $5 a day, sleep four or five to a room, and see their families once every two or three years because it's hard to raise the money to pay for a trip home.

...

There's little that workers in the United Arab Emirates can do to improve their lot. Strikes are illegal, although there have been several recently. And because there is no right of association, there are no trade unions.