Madiha Abaida came to Dubai for a holiday. She ended up buying a property, opening a factory and never leaving. That was in 2018. She had been living in Monaco for a decade before that – a resident for tax reasons, as she puts it plainly – but after her marriage ended, she wanted a fresh start somewhere new. It was not straightforward, though. She launched a fashion brand in Dubai in 2020 and then the pandemic cancelled everything. So, she opened her own textile factory instead.