I was more than happy to go back to my lovely $160-a-night hotel, the Arabian Courtyard, which had no gold leaf, but no tourists ogling the lobby, either; it did have appealing rooms with hardwood floors and richly colored upholstery.

Even if I were staying at the Burj, I wouldn't want to spend my entire time in Dubai cocooned in a five-star hotel. After all, luxury in Dubai doesn't feel very different from luxury in Bali or Paris or Cabo San Lucas. Better to get out on the streets of Deira or Bur Dubai, the two neighborhoods that flank Dubai Creek, to experience the rush of a dozen cultures at once. Indian women jostle each other for sidewalk space at the Covered Souk, where bejeweled saris tempt them from the store windows. Men in white dishdashas and checkered head scarves lounge on the banks of Dubai Creek at the end of the day, sandals shed. Emirati teenagers gather at the local sheesha café, Blue Barjeel, the boys in baggy jeans, the girls in tight ones, all sipping Turkish coffee and smoking apple tobacco and flirting. Forget the malls: At the marketplaces along the creek, you'll find rose water from Iran, tea sets from China, and lapis lazuli from Afghanistan.

At Ski Dubai, two hours of indoor skiing, including the clothing and gear, costs only $38 (Sue Parkhill) [enlarge photo] FEBRUARY 2007 ISSUE • Table of Contents • Secret Hotels of the Riviera Maya • James Turrell: Sky High • Dubai: Just Add Money • Eat Like a Local: Melbourne • Five Hotels: What 99 Pounds Buys in London • Road Trip: Hawaii • 40 Best Vacations

But Dubai's heady brew of cultures is best experienced through your taste buds. Within its 22 square miles, I encountered tuna sashimi, enchiladas, tiramisu, tandoori chicken, flan, chili fries, pain au chocolat, and lots and lots of shish kebab and hummus. Much of it was improbably hidden away in hotels, which I typically associate with generic Euro-cuisine.

At the Park Hyatt, I approached The Thai Kitchen via lighted walkways graced by palm trees and candlelit staircases. The restaurant studiously emulates the casual openness of a Thai marketplace: In the three open kitchens, sous-chefs steam rice in bamboo baskets and grind herbs and spices into pastes with wooden mortars and pestles. No simple pad thai served here: The menu features odd and intriguing combinations of ingredients, such as spicy pomelo salad: segments of grapefruit-like pomelo and steamed prawns accented by sweet, crunchy shallots and tamarind sauce.

At the Hyatt Regency, also in Deira, Shahrzad serves Iranian food in a shamelessly opulent atmosphere of heavy silver cutlery and brocade-upholstered chairs. I ordered only one dish, something called a polo--saffron rice cooked with chicken or lamb and a blend of fragrant, subtly merged spices. But after the waiter discovered that I was new to Iranian cuisine, food and drink began materializing at my table every few minutes as if I were an honored guest: olives and yogurt dip and a basket of delicious warm flatbread; sparkling water and lemons; a woodsy amber tea presented on a gold tray; and finally, for dessert, iced vermicelli flavored with rose water, which tasted like I imagine perfume might taste, only sweeter and less acidic. During the meal, I watched a keyboardist play a sinuous melody over the insistent beat of a dumbek drum, while a singer in a series of ever-slinkier evening gowns crooned what I presumed were Persian standards, moving her nimble pelvis in a manner that challenged all of my preconceptions of Muslim modesty.

As exciting as I found the cultural smorgasbord, at a certain point I began craving something indigenous to Dubai. One afternoon, I set off for the Bastakia, Dubai's oldest neighborhood. I started with a cappuccino at Basta Art Café, a lovely old house with a tent-shaded courtyard. Then I wandered the quarter's narrow alleyways, brushing my fingertips across the cool walls of the coral-and-gypsum houses. I wandered a few hundred feet, anyway, until my reverie was foiled by a rudeconfrontation with an asphalt parking lot. I turned around and headed down another alley, but that one, too, ended abruptly, cut short by a boulevard heaving with traffic.

Hoping a trip to the sand dunes would provide me with a glimpse of the real Dubai, I signed up for a desert safari with Lama Desert Tours. I piled into a Land Cruiser with a posse of oil com-pany executives, and 60 minutes later we pulled up to the edge of the dunes, which glowed pink in the late-afternoon sun. I had dreamed of something simple: a camel ride at sunset, dinner cooked over a fire and eaten under the stars. But you don't go to Dubai to commune with nature--or to enjoy something simple, for that matter.

The safari started with dune bashing, which involves careening along the sides of the 100-foot-high dunes and feels a lot like riding an improvised roller coaster. (Our driver pointed out that there were barf bags in the seat pockets.) An hour or so later, we were deposited at the desert camp, which featured small booths where people in bedouin costumes gave demonstrations of Arabic culture. A man in bedouin costume offered five-minute camel rides, and another taught curious tourists how to smoke a sheesha. One woman painted henna tattoos on the freckled shoulders of Germans and Americans and Brits, while another cooked traditional flatbread over an open fire. Nearby, a man served (yet again) traditional Arabic coffee. I could have been in the Arabian pavilion at a World Expo.

We ate at low tables, and after dinner, a creamy-white Russian woman performed a belly dance, pulling shyly eager middle-aged men off their cushions and taunting them with her gyrations before inviting the whole audience to join her.

The next day, I gave up my quest for authenticity and decided to go to another mall. On the way, I passed long rows of billboards advertising gated "lifestyle communities" that promised days filled with yachts and tennis and poolside mai tais. The horizon was cluttered with construction cranes as far as the eye could see, like outsized dragonflies hovering between columns of scaffolding. More than 100 major development projects are to be completed within the next three years, each one bigger or wider or more luxurious than the last.

The mall I visited, Ibn Battuta, is divided into countries, like Epcot. The Persia section has faux-faience domes and Ibn Battuta, a puffy Ali Baba--like character who entertains children; the China area features pagodas and a massive sculpture of a wooden junk keeling to one side; the Tunisian wing is designed to resemble a 14th-century outdoor market, sky and all.

While I was roaming through the Egyptian wing, I came upon a kiddie attraction called the Magic Carpet Ride. A British woman deposited her toddler atop a mechanical Persian rug undulating a few feet off the ground. The little girl, perfectly adorable with her blonde braids and rosy complexion, was dressed in a short velvet coat and an Aladdin--style cap. An Arabic melody began to play, and the attendant turned on a video camera to capture the moment.