A Qatar-based business web portal known as bqdoha has published what it purports to be fairly accurate statistics on the population breakdown, by nationalities, of the UAE.

This is a fascinating batch of numbers to look at, for those of us who live here. To see some assumptions validated, but also to find numbers we never expected. Low or high.

We start with the three at the top, which line up in the order we expected. And Emiratis, as we all knew, are not the most populous group in their own country. Not even close.

Top of the heap?

Indians. According to their embassy in Abu Dhabi, the UAE has 2.6 million Indians among the country’s total population of about 10 million.

We knew lots and lots of Indians were here, but the shorthand I have been using for most of the 5.5 years we have lived here is … 2 million Indians.

According to the embassy, that’s 600,000 short.

Second, are Pakistanis, at 1.2 million. I thought there were more. The number I’ve been promulgating — 1.5 million.

Indians run many of the small businesses in the country, and more than a few of the larger ones, too. Of the expats, they seem most likely to be here in family groups, which lends itself to higher numbers — spouse and children, too, along with primary wage-earner.

Pakistanis are more likely to be men who are here alone. They are thought to be heavily represented in construction, but to the average Westerner here, most of the Pakistanis they interact with are cab drivers. Pakistanis make up — and this is an educated guess — well more than half of all taxi drivers. Maybe 60 percent? More?

Coming in third? UAE citizens, all 1.08 million of them. This is a stat we have pretty much nailed, though (as the magazine notes) the UAE does not provide breakdowns of nationalities in the country.

The rule of thumb has been “a million Emiratis” for the past few years, and that is very close to accurate, according to bqdoha.com.

Let’s go down the upper half of the list, the part that includes nationalities with at least 40,000 — and that includes no fewer than 25 countries.

The biggest surprises, for me?

–We have 400,000 to 500,000 Iranians here? Iran is just across the Gulf, and it is assumed they are the ancestors of more than a few UAE families, particularly in the northern emirates. But as many as 500,000 citizens of Iran are here? When Iran is considered the No. 1 political headache for the UAE? Maybe some of them were supporters of the Shah, who was overthrown back in 1979, and most of the 500,000 were political refugees who retain Iranian citizenship? I don’t know. Anyway, that’s way, way more Iranian passport holders here than I would have expected.

–Nepal, with 300,000? When we arrived, in 2009, Nepalese were not thought to be here in big numbers. But apparently they have been arriving in droves in recent years — or we had it wrong at the start. Before I saw this list, I would have said the UAE has far more Sri Lankans than Nepalese. But apparently, the groups are about the same size.

–China has 200,000 nationals here? Really? This may be the single biggest surprise on the whole list. Where are these 200,000 people? What are they doing? How is it we rarely see them?

–Jordan and Palestine, with 200,000 and 150,000. We knew we had folks from both countries, and some of those with Jordanian passports may be of Palestinian origin. The UAE is a destination for both nationalities. A better life is assumed.

–South Africa, with 100,000 citizens here? Another stunner. The UAE has more South Africans than Americans (50,000) and Canadians (40,000) combined. I’ve known a few South Africans. A handful. Nowhere near enough to have suggested to me 100,000 of them are here. It does make you wonder if a majority of these are South Africans of European origin, perhaps not quite comfortable with the nation of their birth, on a bunch of levels, but starting with “economically”.

–Indonesia with only 85,000? I thought there were many times that. I probably have included them, with Filipinos, in the “500,000, more or less” category. Indonesians may seem more numerous than they are because they seem to make up a significant fraction of the household help in the country — because we see them handling the kids behind the Emirati parents. But, perhaps, domestic work may be all that Indonesians do. It makes sense of a sort: Unlike Filipinos, Indonesians rarely speak English, the lingua franca of the country.

Some non-surprises: 90,000 Yemenis, 52,000 Iraqis. Sure. Their homelands are a mess, and anyone who can get out but stay in the neighborhood, will. (Syria, not on the list at all. Very interesting, because we have interacted directly with several Syrians. Their country, until Yemen’s collapse, was the biggest mess of all.)

The biggest group of Westerners? The UK, as we expected, at 120,000. They also have the most influence, going back to the decades when the “Trucial States” — the forerunner of the UAE — was a British colony. Brits are by far the most likely of the Western groups to figure they are going to stay here a long time.

Adding up the native-English-speaking Westerners (UK, US, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand) thought to be in the country, we arrive at a modest total of 330,500, or about 3 percent of the total.

The takeaway for those living outside the region? The clear plurality (27 percent) of the UAE population who are Indians, the fact that 55 percent of everyone here comes from the subcontinent (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal) …

And the never-can-get-quite-used-to-it reality that Emiratis, just about the only people here with citizenship, make up barely 10 percent of everyone in the United Arab Emirates.

Note: bqdoha also has done breakdowns of nationalities in Qatar, which is just up the Gulf from the UAE. Some similarities: locals massively outnumbered by foreigners, Indians the most populous group. But Nepal second on the population list and far fewer Pakistanis, as a percentage, in Qatar.