‘Dubai gave me a life bigger than I imagined’: Scottish resident on 23 years in the UAE

Dubai: She arrived in Dubai in her early twenties with little more than curiosity, a job offer, and no clear roadmap for the future. More than two decades later, Kelly Lundberg looks back on a life and career she says she could never have imagined when she first boarded that flight.

Having moved to the UAE in 2003, Lundberg joined Emirates airlines as cabin crew.

“When I applied for a job in Dubai, I had no idea where it even was,” Lundberg told Emirates 24|7. “It was my mum who said it was the next up-and-coming city. I had no career plans at 21, and it seemed like a wonderful opportunity to explore.”

While the sunshine was an obvious attraction for the Scottish national, Lundberg says it was Dubai’s mindset that convinced her to stay.

“You could have a business idea on Monday and be trading by Friday,” she said. “That pace is genuinely rare. Time moves quickly here and people get things done.”

Two years later, Lundberg left her job and launched her first business as an entrepreneur and stylist. She says that what helped her business grow was the city’s international mix of people.

“Every conversation at a networking event, a dinner, a gym class is potentially a collaboration, a client, a connection that changes your direction entirely. The density of ambition in one city is something else.”

Her styling career went on to grow into an international business, taking her around the world — from shopping for wedding dresses in New York to styling destination weddings in the Maldives and working with royalty.

“I’m not sure those opportunities would have happened anywhere else,” she said.

After building her styling business for more than a decade, she sold it in 2019, and in 2020, she launched a new business, where she works as a personal brand strategist and mentor.

According to Lundberg, what makes the UAE special is not always found in grand moments, but in everyday life. In 2019, while on a visit to Scotland, her mum encouraged her to join a dating app, where she soon matched with a familiar face - Graham Ross, her former school mate from Edinburgh, whom she had not seen in more than two decades. They navigated a long-distance relationship, with Lundberg based in Dubai and Ross in Scotland, before he moved to the UAE. The couple got married in 2024, and a year after relocating, she asked him how he felt about the move.

“He said how happy and light he feels, how effortless his routine is, and the life we live together,” she said. “He was so happy he made the move. So am I.”

She also spoke about how the feeling of belonging often manifested itself in simple but meaningful ways.

“[It] isn’t always dramatic — sometimes it’s the Tuesday morning that feels exactly right,” she said. “The 5am gym, the walk, the office nearby. That anchor of routine is something I don’t take for granted.”

Even during periods of regional tension, Lundberg says she never felt the urge to leave.

“At no point did I want to go. I felt safe, all things considered.”

For Lundberg, one of the most meaningful outcomes of her life in the UAE has been the ability to make an impact far beyond it.

She says her connection to charitable work with The Sparkle Foundation in Malawi grew from the platform and stability Dubai provided.

“The city gave me the platform, the network, and the stability to give back far beyond it,” she said. “That, for me, is the most powerful full-circle moment of all.”

From a young cabin crew recruit with no clear plan to an entrepreneur with a global career, Lundberg’s story mirrors what many residents say defines the UAE: the chance to build a future bigger than the one you first imagined.