Arts and Culture
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STILL COOL ENOUGH FOR SEVENTH GRADE
When my world of sophisticated urbanite and Mother Nature friends come to Dubai, there is an inevitable rolling of the ideas and what has become a cliché to my ears, “This place is all about the malls.” Like blatant consumerism and the globalization of American brands in an air conditioned utopia is a bad thing. Continue reading
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Busted on Possession of Zaatar
I just watched a news story from Australia in which a Lebanese Australian called the confiscation of his mother-in-law’s zaatar by Sydney airport customs officials “a tragedy” and “a disaster” and when he still couldn’t convince the officials to release the vacuum packed zaatar, he told them he wanted to speak to a member of Continue reading
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A DA VINCI CODE PARIS
As a writer, there is much about the Da Vinci Code that makes me cringe, but I have to say it was the first “work of art” I thought of at the Louvre this Tuesday, that being the day of the week the Louvre is closed to the public. But it wasn’t closed to our Continue reading
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THE OTHER WINNERS OF THE ZAYED UNIVERSITY FILM FESTIVAL
With several local celebrities on hand as well as, due to remarkably good timing, the brilliant American writer and actor Anna Deveare Smith, trophies were handed out yesterday to student filmmakers from Lebanon, Jordan, and Qatar, in the closing ceremony marking the end of the first annual Zayed University Film Festival. Twelve films from the Continue reading
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RED CARPET ADVENTURE: THE STUDENT OSCARS OF THE MIDDLE EAST
Much as I love film and much as it has been such a big part of my life, I don’t often watch the Academy Awards, even when I’m invited to Oscar parties at friends’ houses. Aside from crying along with the winners on the Miss USA pageant as a kid, I’m just not that interested Continue reading
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A New Mosque in an Old Thai Village
It’s pretty hard to find a person on Thailand’s resort island of Koh Samui that isn’t waiting to pounce on tourists, promising them even more paradise for a price, guaranteeing them his prices are “same, same” as the other guys. On my recent trip there, the only place that didn’t happen was in Ha Thanon, Continue reading
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TAYEB SALIH: ARABS IN TRANSLATION
My first job out of college was working at the television station in Qatar, and one of the first things my co-worders told me was “Tayeb Salih used to run this place.” There was a reverence in their voices that I didn’t get because I will admit I had never heard of him. But I Continue reading
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Hanging Out With The Djinn
When I taught ESL at UCLA, one of my favorite students was Hideo Nakata. He was utterly charming, friendly and warm—a guy who you would imagine would appreciate Frank Capra movies. Hideo-san was in fact a director himself. But no sunny Frank Capra. He was—and still is—one of the world’s great horror film directors, almost Continue reading
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Christmas Gifts from the Holyland
For those of us have seen Palestine, there is an irony to Christmas, this celebration of the Prince of Peace born in a land that defies that very word ‘peace” with words combinations like land confiscation, separation wall, medical deprivation, malnutrition, phosphorous bombs, home demolitions. (I could also mention the poverty, crime and drug abuse Continue reading
Alia Yunis 