Karen Andrews can't speak. Every time she starts to tell her story, she puts her head down and crumples. She is slim and angular and has the faded radiance of the once-rich, even though her clothes are as creased as her forehead. I find her in the car park of one of Dubai's finest international hotels, where she is living, in her Range Rover. She has been sleeping here for months, thanks to the kindness of the Bangladeshi car park attendants who don't have the heart to move her on. This is not where she thought her Dubai dream would end.
Her story comes out in stutters, over four hours. At times, her old voice - witty and warm - breaks through. Karen came here from Canada when her husband was offered a job in the senior division of a famous multinational. "When he said Dubai, I said - if you want me to wear black and quit booze, baby, you've got the wrong girl. But he asked me to give it a chance. And I loved him."
All her worries melted when she touched down in Dubai in 2005. "It was an adult Disneyland, where Sheikh Mohammed is the mouse," she says. "Life was fantastic. You had these amazing big apartments, you had a whole army of your own staff, you pay no taxes at all. It seemed like everyone was a CEO. We were partying the whole time."
Her husband, Daniel, bought two properties. "We were drunk on Dubai," she says. But for the first time in his life, he was beginning to mismanage their finances. "We're not talking huge sums, but he was getting confused. It was so unlike Daniel, I was surprised. We got into a little bit of debt." After a year, she found out why: Daniel was diagnosed with a brain tumour.
One doctor told him he had a year to live; another said it was benign and he'd be okay. But the debts were growing. "Before I came here, I didn't know anything about Dubai law. I assumed if all these big companies come here, it must be pretty like Canada's or any other liberal democracy's," she says. Nobody told her there is no concept of bankruptcy. If you get into debt and you can't pay, you go to prison.
"When we realised that, I sat Daniel down and told him: listen, we need to get out of here. He knew he was guaranteed a pay-off when he resigned, so we said - right, let's take the pay-off, clear the debt, and go." So Daniel resigned - but he was given a lower pay-off than his contract suggested. The debt remained. As soon as you quit your job in Dubai, your employer has to inform your bank. If you have any outstanding debts that aren't covered by your savings, then all your accounts are frozen, and you are forbidden to leave the country.
"Suddenly our cards stopped working. We had nothing. We were thrown out of our apartment." Karen can't speak about what happened next for a long time; she is shaking.
Daniel was arrested and taken away on the day of their eviction. It was six days before she could talk to him. "He told me he was put in a cell with another debtor, a Sri Lankan guy who was only 27, who said he couldn't face the shame to his family. Daniel woke up and the boy had swallowed razor-blades. He banged for help, but nobody came, and the boy died in front of him."
Karen managed to beg from her friends for a few weeks, "but it was so humiliating. I've never lived like this. I worked in the fashion industry. I had my own shops. I've never..." She peters out.
Daniel was sentenced to six months' imprisonment at a trial he couldn't understand. It was in Arabic, and there was no translation. "Now I'm here illegally, too," Karen says I've got no money, nothing. I have to last nine months until he's out, somehow." Looking away, almost paralysed with embarrassment, she asks if I could buy her a meal.
She is not alone. All over the city, there are maxed-out expats sleeping secretly in the sand-dunes or the airport or in their cars.
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Puhleeze.
I caught that article last weekend. A good read, although a bit sensationalistic. The lead-in Megan quotes was actually the part I found least interesting, though. The plight of the low-skill immigrants working as domestic servants and construction workers is far more tragic.
The fact that the whole enterprise is entirely environmentally unsustainable makes me wonder if this place will end up looking like Detroit in fifty years. Easy come, easy go.
Perhaps it's my self-interest talking, but this strikes me as a story about "why hiring a good lawyer matters."
Or perhaps why "the grass isn't always greener." Or maybe, even, "why living in a predominantly Muslim country is a really bad idea for Westerners".
Or “why living within your means rather than partying like a rock star” matters.
Or “why living in a country where you can read and speak the language” matters.
Or, "Why Being Born Without A Trust Fund Is Irresponsible"- subtitled, "Let Them Eat Cake!" puhleezee... you two clearly have never had anything truly bad happen in your sheltered lives. You should be grateful to God for your good fortune instead of condescending and snide towards others' suffering.
If you send your kid to a private school, they can be kicked out without the same right to legal process they'll receive in a public school. Most parents who opt for private schools don't give this a second thought until it's their kid getting kicked out, then they want their rights.
I can understand not understanding the limits of your rights when you opt for a private school in this country.
I can't understand not even taking the time to find out what your rights and laws might be when going to live in a foreign nation. Because in any land, I believe ignorance of the law isn't an excuse.
Ignorance of the law seems to be a perfectly acceptable excuse in America, doesn't it? How many of Obama's cabinet appointees would have been confirmed if it weren't.
I agree with your general point though. You can't expect to go into a third-world country and enjoy first-world legal protections.
Stan - Seriously? Obama nominees = story about debtor's prison in Dubai? Come on, man.
Oh, come on, it was a joke. And it's not untrue either, no? "Turbotax" Geithner claimed ignorance after all, and we let him off the hook, right?
Those cabinet picks paid their taxes and the punishment -- fines -- they didn't get away with breaking the law because "didn't understand the tax code."
Bull - they paid taxes and interest, no penalties that I have heard of, no past year audits, nothing that you or I would have been hit with. And I'm not saying this is a democrat problem -- it's a connected politician problem, a symbol of continued and worsening corruption.
I agree with the notion that debtors prisons are a bad idea; that restricting someone's right to travel based on their debt is unjust; that trying someone for a crime in a language they don't understand without a translator is anything but justice. All that being said, I don't know why the only solution is a mechanism for someone to escape legitimate debts (bankruptcy). Surely a system can be devised where the debtors are still expected to pay their debt with disincentives short of prison.
Garnish their wages for the rest of their natural lives? I can't think of anything else that would do it.
That is a great way to incentivize people to seek "off the books" income. Put undischargeable creditors into people's lives and more people will engage in tax fraud by working for cash to keep the income off their w-2/1040. That would be middle class people, not the wealthy, mind you.
See also the current system for child support and alimony. Any guy with friends above a certain age knows at least few who have ways of keeping income from reaching the ex-wife's palm.
Never go to a country with boxes and squiggles in their alphabet.
This is certainly a heart-rending story on one level, but it certainly took a series of spectacularly bad decisions to get them there, didn't it? Not knowing the laws of the country you live in is #1, but how about when they didn't read their contract closely enough to realize that the 'bonus' her husband would receive wasn't enough to cover their debts.
Plus, there's something a little strange about the progression. She says they were partying like rock stars, but that Daniel was starting to mis-manage their finances in small ways. Well, what was the source of the debt? Maybe all the partying should have stopped at some point before he got hauled off the prison?
Look, clearly this is a tragic story, and clearly there are some pretty draconian and crazy laws in Muslim countries, but how much are we going to excuse people for their own pro-active behavior?
I don't think the article, or Megan, or the commenters are making excuses. At the same time, I'd like to think we could all agree that debtor's prison is pretty lamentable. At the very least, it seems extremely counterproductive to repaying the debt.
Stupid's worse than bad.
I kind of suspected something would turn out wrong when the wife said that her first concern about moving to Dubai was that she might have to give up drinking booze. Not “I don’t know how to speak or read the language” or “what happens if we get in trouble, who can we turn to.” I can't be the only person who sees something wrong with this couple's priorities and how that lead to their current situation.
clearly there are some pretty draconian and crazy laws in Muslim countries
In a clan-based society, imprisoning the debtor is nothing more than a way to get his brothers and uncles and cousins to pony up the cash. It's not so crazy from that perspective; the law is merely following the pre-existing social structure in the same way our credit-reporting laws follow our fragmented and geographically mobile social structure.
If that is the case, what is the point of incarcerating foreigners?
The same reason we don't imprision people from tribal cultures in the U.S. when they run into financial trouble: that's not how our laws work.
They're not explicitly trying to blackmail somebody's relatives, it's just that way back in the mists of history they started imprisioning debtors to squeeze their tribe and it became "this is what we do to people who don't pay their bills." Due to different cultural background, we have a different conception of what constitutes "justice" for unpaid debts.
(Mandatory disclaimer: I don't think that Dubai's system is just, I'm merely acknowledging that they may think it is.)
It's also one of the reasons Shariah (like many archaic legal systems) forbids charging interest. If the legal response to a failure to pay debts is imprisonment or worse, demanding more than the debt to reflect the time value of money can seem unjust.
Continuing along the lines of my exchange with Original Gangsta Wiseman, isn't the Miranda warning an attempt to address the "excuse" of ignorance about a locality's laws? Is this a uniquely American phenomenon?
"This is what a world without it looks like:"
Well, a world. It's not clear from the article, but her husband seems to have been sentenced to debtors' prison with a defined sentence (Six months? Nine months?) rather than just until his family pays off the debts. I'm not sure I understand the situation correctly, though. Their accounts are joint, I'd guess, which is would be why all of them have been frozen. But only the man is in debtors' prison, rather than both of them (what I would have expected, for joint debtors). Doesn't that suggest that the woman can leave Dubai, if she can get family members to arrange for a ticket for her (e.g. calling collect, etc.)? Or do they only imprison men for debts, not women? Or is he in prison for something like fraud, distinct from his debts? I guess since she doesn't understand the language, she really has no idea what's going on.
Anyhow, I think this all really reinforces the necessity of learning the local language when you relocate somewhere.
The article suggests that since she is there illegally, she is not only permitted to leave, but required to do so. She could presumably leave using the method of walking. If she needs operating funds for travel she could sell her Range Rover...
It's possible for any educated person to earn at least $15/hr doing crowdsourced work anywhere in the world at any time, and she implies she would have no tax liability doing so. Since there is no limit to the number of hours and few costs, it is possible to maintain a very reasonable standard of living, and probably pay down the debt rather quickly.
In short, they appear to be behaving irrationally and could stand to be more resourceful. While I support bankruptcy as an important common law tradition, this narrative doesn't present a particularly persuasive reason to apply it to jurisdictions based on religious or civil law.
Wow Liberty, I dodged a bullet not marrying you. Did it ever occur to you that maybe she should shoulder some of the responsibility for their situation? Maybe sticking around until her husband gets out of jail is maybe something she should be applauded for doing?
I don’t think she’s doing either of them much good by just “sticking around” and Liberty’s point that she could instead be behaving more productively by earning money to support herself and pay down their debts is a fair one. I’m not sure whether his assessment of her ability to do that might be a tad bit optimistic though. Even if she just left Dubai, it’s possible she might be in a better position to help her husband if she has access to family, friends and other support than just by living on the streets with next to no resources.
It's possible for any educated person to earn at least $15/hr doing crowdsourced work anywhere in the world at any time
It is? Where would you suggest one look for such work? Are there more profitable venues than Mechanical Turk?
WTF? Can't the Canadian embassy offer any help?
I vaguely remember reading about some Gulf statelet -- I don't remember if it was Dubai -- setting up a Western-style legal system in a bid to woo business. I think they were going to recruit retired British judges. Ah, looks like it was Dubai and I wasn't imagining this: "British law is oasis of reassurance in Dubai". Excerpt:
Considering that this woman's husband's trial was in Arabic, I'm guessing it didn't take place inside the DIFC.
OT Megan, but two comments re this blog and the Atlantic's Business Channel:
1) You ought to drop the "Ask the Editors" posts if you are only going to answer about one out of thirty questions asked, a and wait a week or more to answer that many.
2) Not to beat this to death, but you ought to be reading John Hussman's weekly commentaries. I get it that you're busy, but you can find a surprising amount of time by going on a Matthew Yglesias fast. Just skip a few of his usually tendentious, but occasionally interesting posts and read Hussman's weekly column. Whether or not you agree with it (which would be interesting to find out), what Hussman writes is more relevant to the current economic crisis than anecdotal items like this article from Dubai.
I agree with those who think one should learn the local language when moving to a foreign country. But from what I've gathered, it's easy to ignore this advice in Dubai because there are so many English speakers there. I know someone in Abu Dhabi who wants to learn Arabic and actually has a hard time finding any locals with whom he can converse. They are so rich they hire lots of people from places like India to do all the work, and those are the people the average American will run into.
By the way, thanks for the observation, Thorley W., about her not wanting to give up drinking booze.
I would like to point out that her husband apparently managed their finances quite successfully before his brain tumor. It's possible that his brain tumor caused him to mismanage their finances in such a way that the wife was not aware of the magnitude of the problem.
She should probably go to the Canadian embassy and ask for help, though. Once her husband gets out of jail, they might be able to get a loan in Canada to pay their debts in Dubai so they can at least be broke in Canada instead of broke in Dubai.
If I ever find myself in Dubai, remind me NOT to use credit cards at all. At least not local ones.
They came from Canada.
What did you expect?
She had her own shops?
You think she would have at least minimal skills and business sense to track the family finances and know where they stood.
But no, they were busy being drunk on Dubai and living like rock stars.
Sometimes people forget we live in a cause and effect world.
She needs to report to the embassy.
Bleh - note to self: Never go to an Arab country. I'd rather visit someplace more civilized, cultured and full of less violent, more rational persons, like South-Central Los Angeles at the height of the crack epidemic - or parts of Detroit.