A former colleague at The National, here in the UAE, posted a somewhat curious freelance item for the English-language Express Tribune of Pakistan.

Entitled “10 things I hate about expatriates in the Gulf.”

I guess the author is talking about me. And some (many? most?) of her former coworkers.

How does a Gulf expat react to that?

First, let’s stipulate her right to her opinion. Making generalizations about “expatriates in the Gulf” … well, some of us have made plenty of generalizations in blogs or on Facebook.

Let’s just go down her list.

1. The blogging? If you find breathless expat blogs distasteful, why are you reading them? Blogs generally are about the author, his or her friends/relatives back home and a handful of readers. To be offended by them you have to search them out. If this is your No. 1 complaint, it’s easy to fix.

2. The hypocrisy? I don’t know with whom she used to hang out at The National (well, I sorta do), but the number of occasions when I have seen expats in our newsroom “pity the brown man” and “then bark at him” … are barely north of statistical zero.

3. The identity crisis? The author has hit upon something here. When arriving in the Gulf from … wherever … arrivistes have a chance to reinvent themselves. This is true. We are separated by time and distance from our origins, and no one here knows much (if anything) about us and is unlikely to bump into someone who does. So, some tale-spinning, some revisionist history? I’m sure it happens, just as it has throughout human history when people relocate far from home. I imagine the United State has had millions upon millions of people who arrived at Ellis Island and changed their history just as quickly as they changed their names.

4. The Indian/Pakistani driver stories? “Driver stories” can be about any driver from anywhere. Including Bangladeshis, Filipinos, Nepalese, Ethiopians, Egyptians … Mostly, these stories are about the rare instance in a day when expats find themselves in close quarters with someone from another distant land, some of whom initiate conversations, some of whom drive badly …

5. The dating? I defer to her expertise on this topic.

6. The failure to interact? An accurate observation but one that shouldn’t raise hackles. It is very difficult for expats to interact, and not just for Western expats — who seem to be the author’s target. When encountering barriers of language, culture and religion, most people (from anywhere) will fall back to hanging out with people from their region. This appears to be true across the ethnic spectrum here in Abu Dhabi. Indians with Indians, Pakistanis with Pakistanis, Emiratis with Emiratis, Brits with Brits …

7. Heightened nationalism? Can’t say I’ve seen a lot of that. When you are outside your country of origin, certainly you have a heightened sense of “otherness” and you make comparisons and draw conclusions based on what you know. But, if anything, I have seen more episodes of “country of origin self-loathing,” especially among American expats.

8.  The inability to save money? Maybe it applies to the people she spent time with. But the expats I know live frugally and send home a significant portion of their earnings. Some of the Western kids might be burning through their cash, but they are a subset of a subset.

9.  The mourning at living in a fake city? She appears to have been running out of ideas. She apparently is talking about Dubai, the only city in the region with a reputation for being “fake.” (I’ve never heard anyone say that about Abu Dhabi, about Riyadh, about Manama, about Kuwait City and only rarely Doha.) In fact, those expats (Westerners) who are blowing through their money and dating badly … pretty much love Dubai.

10. The voice? She is correct in that this happens. Native English-speakers eventually simplify their language and try to speak distinctly when communicating with someone for whom English is a second or third language. I don’t see it as objectionable. At all. If the employee of the laundry or the bakery speaks 100 words of English, shouldn’t you try to make sure you stay within those 100 words and speak clearly?

Anyway, about the author: She is an ethnic Pakistani who, I believe, is in her late 20s and grew up in Britain and now lives in Qatar. Yes, she is an expat, too.