As her profile grew, her experience and connections earned her a post as the first female member of the management team of Dubai Ports Authority, which in the early 1990s was starting to emerge as a global leader in seaport operations. The men, she says, dismissed her as a secretary and used the salty language of the docks to throw her off stride. But she silenced the bigots by coming up with a computerized manifest system that cut the time it took to handle loose cargo from one hour to 10 minutes.

That success helped her win a $5 mil­lion government grant to set up a new company, Tejari.com, to develop government and business-to-business e-commerce. Within three years, it had broken even and become the biggest e-commerce player in the Middle East. In 2004, she became the first woman to serve in the U.A.E. cabinet, as minister of economy and planning, and then, earlier this year, she was named its first-ever minister of foreign trade.

Today, Sheika Lubna splits her time between Abu Dhabi, the U.A.E.'s seat of government, and Dubai, its financial powerhouse. A few days after our meeting in her Abu Dhabi office, I catch up with her on the top floor of Dubai's Emirates Towers, where Sheik Mohammed has his executive office. From that vantage point, I can see through the windows the future she is selling. Straight ahead is the Dubai International Financial Centre, home to the nascent Bourse Dubai, where just about every major Western bank now has an office. To the left rises the Burj Dubai, the world’s tallest building. To the right, through the heat haze, I can make out the bikini-clad tourists swimming in the Persian Gulf and local businesswomen on mobile phones. Looking at the view with me, Sheika Lubna too is astounded. 'This country is only 36 years old," she says. "I think we’ve achieved a great deal in a generation."

True enough. But there's still a ways to go before the U.A.E.—and, at times, the sheika herself—can be considered genuinely modern. The U.A.E. has no meaningful elections or minimum wage, workers have no right to strike, and abuse of female domestic workers is a serious problem. But when a friend in the government calls to say he'll be late for a meeting because he's dealing with a complaint from the U.S.-based Human Rights Watch, the sheika mocks him: "Don’t talk to me about domestic abuse! I am abusing myself as my own maid, moving all the boxes into my new house." It makes her sound like the princess she is.

I ask her what she thinks would happen if a Saudi woman wanted to launch a perfume in the Riyadh branch of Saks. Uncharacteristically, she ducks the question. "What you see is a different pace of development for women. I cannot impose the pace at which we are going on any other country." Call it mix-and-match morality, or diplomacy, or something else, but Sheika Lubna's approach has allowed her to avoid falling afoul of conservative social and religious forces in the region.

Sheika Lubna's success has come at a heavy personal price. When she was 19, she became engaged to her cousin, and a marriage was arranged. But the relationship fizzled. Since then, she has devoted herself to her career, but she regrets never having married. "I like men. I like kids. I always thought, I am going to do this job, build my career, and the marriage will come along in time. But it never did."

Sheika Lubna is split not just between East and West but also between her roles as a socioeconomic radical and a traditional Arab woman. But she says she has made peace with her past and is happy with her lot. If the first woman to break the mold of Middle Eastern business cannot have it all, so be it. "My proudest achievement is that I am a bridge. Women are following my example. I am changing the mind-set of young girls, saying, 'It’s okay. Look, I'm here. I'm on the other side, and you can breeze through.'"

The first lady of the Gulf pauses and smiles. "Not bad for a geek with a perfume."