It's a long way from the University of Pennsylvania Law School to Dubai, once a sleepy fishing village in the United Arab Emirates, to what a New York Times Magazine supplement recently called "...The fastest growing city on earth...a mix of Singapore and Las Vegas."

It's almost impossible to fathom the transformation from the Dubai of just a decade ago to the one that now has $100 billion worth of projects already underway, or on the launching pad, and an economy that grew at a gallop of 16 percent in 2005.

This is a journey that David Richter, ENG'87, W'87, L'92 has taken with his company, Hill International, Inc., a partner in Dubai's astonishing growth spurt. And therein lies a tale.

When David was 10 years old, he used to wait for his father to come home from work so he could make a beeline for his dad's briefcase, pop it open and look for his construction drawings and papers.