Abu Dhabi
-
Ya Tair al-Tayer (Oh Bird in Flight)
It’s plane…No, it’s a bird…No, it’s a bird on a plane… At the Amman airport yesterday, I ran into an old childhood friend and her family. Coincidence as neither one of us lives in Amman. Then we all ran into Arab Idol winner Mohammad Assaf and posed for a photo with him. Small world that Continue reading
-
Go Ahead and Film Me—Nothing Changes
“So what are you here to film?” he asked from his battered bamboo chair, as he exhaled from the stub of the cigarette in his hand, the smoke blending in with the dust sweeping through the camp. He was about 40, and had been sitting in that dark alley his entire life. One of my Continue reading
-
Not So Much Like a Virgin
Madonna’s self-proclaimed world peace tour arrived in Abu Dhabi via Tel Aviv and opened with the Material Girl mowing down with her assault rifle as many minimally dressed, mostly black men with well-oiled muscles as possible while repeating for at least five minutes, “Bang, bang, I shot my lover dead.” Fake blood included. Peace. It’s Continue reading
-
Where are the Actors?
Every year I ask this, and here I go again for the third time, “Know any enthusiastic student filmmakers living in the Middle East?” If so, please let them know about the Zayed University Middle East Film Festival, which brings together student films from across the Middle East to reveal an industry in rebirth, as Continue reading
-
The Most Joyous Time of the Year to be a Muslim
When I was a child in Minnesota, I used to get worked up into a Christmas nightmare over the fact that my family’s house wasn’t decorated and festooned, that we had no huge Christmas plans, no big gathering with our relatives planned. All the merry was not for us, the secular Muslims who never seemed Continue reading
-
How To Behave in the UAE
Today I read on the regular old Internet that the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed, is making his website available as an iPhone application. It’s pretty cool to be an iPhone application. At least it may be my only public appearance that impressed my Apple-a-day-keeps-the-meltdown-away nephews. On these International Herald Tribune apps, I share Apple Continue reading
-
The Right To Drive Well
I support jailed Saudi Manal Al Sharif’s right to drive. I support her right to join the men on the roads in her country, a country that has one of the highest car accident fatalities in the world, like most of the countries in the region. See, having spent big chunks of my life in Continue reading
Alia Yunis 