Children of the Seven Sands: the Reveal.

The simple life of the Trucial States in the 1950s - A display at Ajman Museum...

As those of you that know me will by now have realised, there may be some book promoting going on around here for a while.

Suffer.

The good news is that this book is a bit, well, different. I try and make all my books different, but this one is differenter.

For a start, it's not a novel, a work of fiction, like the last six. It's 140,000 words of total fact. It's a very big book that tells a very big story indeed.

It's a roller-coaster ride of a tale that has never been told before in one place. And I kid you not.

Everything in it is not only true, but 100% verifiably so. It's meticulously researched and draws from archaeology, academic papers, ancient manuscripts, rare and forgotten books, archives aplenty and reputable, published (and many unpublished) sources. It draws together a story that tells of incredible innovation, of daring and courage - and of human perseverance.

If it doesn't make you draw breath and gasp at the sheer, blinding hugeness of what you didn't know, I'll refund you without quibble. Many of you are aware of my 'no refunds' policy. I'm willing to waive it for this one.

Children of the Seven Sands, set to be published in February next year by UAE-based publisher Motivate Publishing, is the human history of the United Arab Emirates. It's a 130,000 year-old tale that has, quite literally, never been shared before. And I guarantee you, it'll blow you away.

Bloody, gruesome, dramatic, vicious, honourable, glorious, brilliant, deceitful, noble, brave, bonkers and just plain splendorous, the history of the UAE is a wide-screen panorama of a narrative which has carried me away like a bewildered ant clinging to a log adrift in a winter wadi in spate - and I am going to delight in sharing it with you - here on the blog, but also in the book itself. You'd never believe the half of it - you'll never believe it's sitting here right under your noses. And it's all around you, even today.

It's a story I've set out to share with all its depth and vigour, charm and brio - it's a series of remarkable ups and downs, upsets and triumphs. It will challenge everything you thought you knew about UAE history but also quite a few unusual and unknown snippets of European and Indian history, too.

I kid you not - and I'm not overdoing it. I sent the final manuscript off to the publishers today and I can tell you that every single page contains something you didn't know, something that will challenge what you thought about this place and something that'll make you think about here in a totally new light.

Am I over promising? Let's see - but this, ladies and gentlemen, is what has been keeping me so very quiet as of late...

The Vicariousness Of Self

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I'm constantly battling the urge to beat people to death with their own selfie sticks. I know it's their life and they can do with it what they will, but for some reason the whole performance irks me in a deep and profound way.

We nipped up to Hatta a while ago for two days of mountain air and Martinis in my favourite bar anywhere in the world ever (the luxuriantly '70s brown velour and walnut charm of Hatta Fort's Roumoul Bar) and I sat, aghast - interrupted in my mission to lie sunning myself by the pool and consuming as many books as a Kindle Voyage can carry - as a couple swooshed around in the water gurning at a GoPro hoisted on the end of a selfie stick.

They were filming themselves so that in 20 years time they can look back at that time in Hatta when they didn't enjoy the pool because they were too busy filming themselves not having fun so they could capture their strange, onanistic non-fun pool filming for posterity.

They probably shared the moment they never really had. Up on Facebook it goes, that time we walked around a pool filming ourselves so our friends could see what wonderful lives we're leading together and experience the moments we never got around to having because we were so busy making sure everyone else had a glimpse of what it is we haven't got.

I stopped taking pictures of food for Instagram quite quickly. I realised I had started to eat excellent food that had gone cold. I have since come up with the brilliant scheme of Instagramming empty plates. Those smears I'm sharing are the meal I enjoyed all the more because I didn't share the moment of epiphany when a plate of really good food leaves a kitchen and is slid noiselessly under your nose with a murmured 'Bon appetit'. There I said it. I care more about food than you.

This is not new behaviour, just in case you're tempted to think it is. It's more aggressive because of the Internet, but I remember walking the bounds of Chester a decade or so ago because Sarah was attending a course there and I was left to spend my days fossicking around the city's ancient ruins and medieval buildings. The city was full of chattering groups of excited Japanese people who thought the world was square, their view of anything of even the slightest significance being captured from behind a viewfinder.

By the way, apropos nothing really very much, this tumblr blog is rather brilliant: Pictures of Asians taking pictures of food.

We're constantly being egged on to share, seek the approval of our peers, our 'friends' and 'followers'. But sharing a moment doesn't signify enjoyment: it means you've denied yourself that moment. And approval isn't experience.

Live it. And just be aware, as you raise that selfie stick to capture yourself and your pimply moon-faced girlfriend framed by the Burj Khalifa, you might be the ones that make me finally snap.

Yes, yes, I do feel better now, thanks for asking...

Book Review: Beyond Dubai: Seeking Lost Cities In The Emirates

"Dubai has nothing. No culture, no history, no character. It has no heart, no spirit, no traditions... It's not a real city, it's just a mirage, all spin and no substance, a city built on sand."

This book starts on that statement and then sets out to prove it wrong. Its triumph is that it does just that and it's a read anyone setting out to explore the Emirates will enjoy.

David Millar lived and worked in the UAE and decided to write a book about the place. He's by no means the only one, we have a small but growing coterie of books left behind by expats like animal spoor, from Desperate Dubai Diaries through to Glittering City Wonders.

I usually avoid these books on the grounds they will almost invariably irritate me. I've spent the past 26-odd years travelling to and living in the Emirates and I've seen enough of it with my own eyes to know I'm not particularly interested in seeing it through someone else's. Having said which, Jim Krane's Dubai: The Story of the World's Fastest City is the Dubai book.

David's taken a different tack, however. Unlike so many commentators on the Emirates, he's decided that below the surface - the half inch of champagne - is a more interesting place to be. Employing the charming little conceit that his visiting girlfriend, Freya, is mulling whether to come to the UAE to join him but won't live somewhere without history, David looks beneath the vavavoom and wawawoo of Dubai and explores the history of the place in a series of road trips. We go up to the East Coast, taking in Fujeirah, Kalba, Northern Oman and the Wadi Bih track; we snake around the fjords of Kasab and the concrete-crushing sprawl of Ras Al Khaimah and we generally do Al Ain, the Rub Al Khali, the Liwa crescent and, finally, Sir Bani Yas.

Each of the book's destinations is treated as a trip to the modern location but the object of the excursion is to unearth its history, the lost cities of the UAE. And David, clearly relishing his subject, mixes observations of the modern and ancient aplenty.

Let me be honest. I fully expected to hate the whole thing. There were times when I felt the discomfort of someone else's view of the place I live in. Having yourself discovered a thing, it's hard to feel a vicarious thrill on behalf of someone else discovering a thing. This is why running up to me and babbling excitedly that whales have belly buttons cutteth not the mustard. Reading Beyond Dubai, I had to fight quite a bit to stop being a dog in the manger all the time and yet - once I'd settled down - I found myself enjoying the journey. Given I have lived here for donkey's, spent quite a lot of time working as a features writer (and so been paid to unearth stuff and write about it) and generally made something of a habit of travelling around and poking things to see if they squeak, there was much in the book I already knew or had experienced myself. Having said that, I've taken a damn sight longer to do it than it takes to read a book: David's efforts have by no means been in vain.

This is a book that will appeal hugely to expats in the UAE or holiday makers interested in going beyond the beaches and taking a look at the rich heritage and culture the country has to offer. If you think that very statement sounds odd, then you need to buy this book. Beyond Dubai is a well written book, a light read that makes its subject accessible and enjoyable. It's sort of Bill Bryson meets Leonard Woolley.

From Jumeirah to Umm Al Qawain's millenia-old city of Tell Abraq, from RAK's lost Julphar and Ibn Majid the famous navigator (whose art eclipsed that of the Europeans whose navies were only then beginning to explore the world systematically while the Arabs had long mastered the arts of astronomy and navigation), Beyond Dubai takes us to the Emirates behind the new roads and skyscrapers and often does so with wit and charm. Brio, even.

Don't get me wrong - I has my quibbles, I does. For a start the big plane parked up in Umm Al Qawain's airstrip isn't a 'bomber', it's an IL76 - a commercial freighter. It hasn't been there since the fifties, either - it was landed in the nineties. I didn't like the reference to the Jumeirah Mosque as the only one in Dubai that welcomes 'infidels', but then that's just me. Jazirat Al Hamra was not abandoned because its inhabitants were lured to Abu Dhabi's oil industry, they fell out with the ruler of RAK and Sheikh Zayed offered them resettlement. Wahhabis are Sunnis, so you can't be 'Wahhabi rather than Sunni'. The drive through Wadi Bih is glorious, majestic and great fun, I'm not sure quite why he makes such a fuss about how hard and precipitous a mission it was. It was always a pleasant day trip and a doddle of a drive (it's closed now, tragically). Strangely, for a couple so interested in finding the history of the place, David and Freya don't visit the many museums strewn around the Emirates. There's no mention of the megalithic tomb or fort at Bitnah, a vital ancient trade route through the mountains to the East Coast (originally the only passage through the mountains) and, indeed, a number of other sites. And so on.

But you get the point here - I'm caviling because I Think I Know Better and that sucks as an attitude when reading a book like this. And yes, I accept that Mr ITIKB is likely just fooling himself much of, if not all of, the time. The point is, anyone with less 'I was here when it was all sand' issues and an interest in the wider UAE will enjoy this book and I reckon will profit greatly from it. And yes, I learned things from this book, so I'm not quite as omniscient as I'd like to think.

If you've just arrived in the Emirates, want to live or holiday there or want to scratch around below the surface a little, Beyond Dubai will give you much pleasure.

I was provided a copy of the book by the author (whom I do not know personally and who approached me seeking a review). You can buy your own copy right here and if you've got a Kindle, you'll only be parting with £2.95!

Gerald Lynch Short Story In Time Out Dubai Shock Horror

Would I like to write a 1,000 word short story for Time Out Dubai as part of their Emirates Airline Festival of Literature coverage? Sure, no problem. The story idea was in my head as I pressed 'end call'. 1,000 words (and a lot of slicing and dicing) later it was done and shared with the shadowy and feared 'Grey Havens Gang' of globally based writers I hang out with, for their comments. And a bunch of my favourite beta readers pitched in. And some Tagalog speakers were recruited from Twitter (I love Twitter) to help with one small, but important piece of dialogue. It's more like flash fiction than a 'short' - just 1,000 words to play with means you have to make pretty much every word count. Edited, polished and angsted over, 1,000 words of prose was popped off to the PRs to share with the TOD team.

And then word came back. It's 'too racy' to run in the magazine because it contains references to sex and adultery. Have they READ my books? Anyway, by now the magazine was at deadline and I had an hour to deliver that thousand words so I resorted to an old friend. If, by any chance, you've been living in the International Space Station over the past three years, Gerald Lynch is the evil Northern Irish spy in Olives - A Violent Romance and a slightly less evil spy in Beirut - An Explosive Thriller and the positively benign spy with a heart of gold who's nice to small furry animals in Shemlan: A Deadly Tragedy.

Of course he just tumbled off the keyboard into Dubai. And of course he didn't approve of the place one jot... The story's below, or you can go here to Time Out Dubai to read it. Or you can hand over Dhs9 to any newsagent or Spinneys and have your very own 'curl up on the sofa' hardcopy!

                                  Death In Dubai                                   

Gerald Lynch strode through the Park Hyatt’s cool Arabesque reception, ignoring the ‘good morning’ offered up by the doorman, the girl in the long beige kandoura, the receptionist and the dark-uniformed staffer who passed him in the glass corridor. Blue-eyed, his dark hair a widow’s peak, Lynch hefted his leather jacket over his shoulder, his other hand in the pocket of his jeans.

He caught the glint of a camera, a tiny dome of smoked glass nestled up in the corner and added it to his mental audit of the devices he’d already encountered in his short stay in Dubai.

Brian Channing was spread out on a sofa in the coffee shop. He had a silver tray in front of him bearing coffee in a porcelain cup and a decorative little selection of Lebanese sweets in paper wrappers. He had chosen Wealthy Tourist In White Linen, his artfully rumpled two-piece offset by a pastel blue shirt.

Channing waved Lynch to a chair. ‘Gerald. Good to see you. Must be years since you last saw this place. Changed a bit, has it? Isn’t this an exquisite little hotel?’

‘If you like this sort of thing.’ Lynch took no pains to mask his distaste. ‘What’s the big emergency, Brian? The embassy people made so much fuss trying to pick me up the barman ended up smacking one of them because he thought they were trying to kidnap me. Half of Hamra nearly got involved.’

‘I heard. Unfortunate, but then you’re supposed to carry your secure bloody mobile at all times. Even out on the lash in Beirut.’ Channing bit off a chunk of nut brittle and finished his coffee with a flourish. ‘Come on. Walkies.’

A waitress rushed to push open the double doors out into the patio overlooking Dubai’s creek. Little boats bobbed. On the opposite shore was parkland, cable cars swinging against the vast blue sky, a creekside ride. Channing shouldered his jacket and led the way down the warm stone steps towards the decking and sounds of rope slapping against masts. Only when they were standing in the marina did Channing halt. Leaning on the railing, he addressed the creek.

‘In the hotel behind us, at noon, a high-ranking Russian intelligence official called Sergei Anasenko is going to hand you the complete technical specification and blueprint of a new technology they have developed for jamming ultra-fast, frequency-hopping radio signals. If it works, clearly it has the potential to render every drone programme NATO has redundant.’

‘I don’t get it. Why me?’

‘He asked for you by name. We have been very careful indeed with our Sergei and gone to great lengths to establish he’s as pure as snow. He checks out at every level. But we’re damned if we can work out why he’s so in love with you, to be honest Gerald. I rather thought you might have an idea.’

‘None at all. Anasenko? He ever work the Middle East? Come to Beirut?’

‘Never. No connection with Dmitri or Jaan Kallas, no relationship with The General and no time served in the region. Desk boy, Moscow-bound all his life. More a politician than a field man, an espiocrat. Technology is his thing. Hardly your type, is he? Yet after two years’ work bringing him in, we get to the end game and, right at the last minute, he insists on a handover in Dubai and to Lynch and nothing but the Lynch, so help him God.’

‘So a handover in the most surveillance rich city in the world to a man he doesn’t know from Adam. That makes no sense whatsoever, Brian.’

Channing squinted and rooted in his pockets for a pair of Ray Bans, which he settled onto his fleshy nose. ‘You can ask him why yourself, you’re due to knock on the door of room 211 in,’ Channing peered at his watch, ‘one hour, twenty minutes.’

* * * 

Lynch waited for the door to open, playing with the key card in his pocket. He’d taken a room himself, ensuring his camera tracks were linked to the fake ID he’d flown in on. He also took the precaution of waiting a while after checking in then returning to a different receptionist and having his key card re-swiped, claiming it wasn’t working properly. ‘No problem, it happens,’ he told her. ‘Room 211.’

He knocked again and then used the key card. Pulling the door closed behind him, Lynch swore softly. Anasenko was lying on the floor in a bathrobe. There were signs of a struggle, a chair pushed over, a table lamp on the floor beside the sprawled body. Lynch crossed the room and pulled a paper tissue from the box on the desk. He knelt, feeling for a pulse, pushed back the curly brown hair from the corpse’s ear, checking the pale skin for any needle marks. The lamp was close to Anasenko’s right hand. Lynch noted the hand was still wet, the switch on the wall set on but the lamp off.

He pulled the robe up from each wrist, but the cause of death looked obvious. Lynch scanned the room. On the bed was a manila envelope. Lynch untucked the flap and slid the documents out. Blueprints, a slide-bound sheaf of papers. A memory key. He tucked the envelope into the small of his back and left the room without a backward glance.

* * * 

Channing was peevish. ‘Electrocuted himself? Balderdash. Don’t believe it. A waste of bloody time. With Anasenko dead, we can’t tell if this was supposed to land in our hands or if it was just a stupid accident.’

‘Forensics, surely—’

‘You really think we’re going to declare an interest in this to the Emiratis? Come on, Gerald. No, we’ll just have to proceed on the assumption this is all bunkum until proven otherwise by the analysts. You can go home, Gerald. Go back to your bar in Hamra and drown yourself. Take your mobile.’

For which small mercy Lynch was, at least, profoundly grateful.

______________________________________________________________________

Meanwhile, I spent this morning horrifying everyone over at The American School of Dubai. Only they refused to be horrified and were very lovely indeed. Even when I started hurling myself at the walls, speaking in tongues, throwing things at the kids and generally terrorising the class. I love the LitFest. Love it.

Don't forget Saturday's session on Spies, Conspiracy and Censorship! We're going for Martinis at Vista afterwards and you're more than welcome to join us!!!

Fake Plastic Souks - The Fear Returns

I've gone and done it again. I couldn't help myself. I've published another collection of 'best of' posts from years passim of this marginal, silly little blog. At the time I did the first volume as a test file for a self-publishing workshop, I joked that if I sold more than ten copies I'd do a second volume. And the first volume has, amazingly, sold significantly more than ten copies. It might even run into the twenties.

The cover image of Fake Plastic Souks - The Fear Returns is taken, as the blog's header and the cover shot of the first volume are, in the Aleppo souk. If you ever doubted Jarvis Cocker's wisdom - everybody hates a tourist - you can see it reflected in the faces of these gentlemen, interrupted in their centuries-old ritual of making fatayer by me and my trusty EOS. I wondered, working on the cover file, what had happened to them and whether they had survived the destruction of that glorious old souk. If you want to get a taste of the timeless alleyways of the C14th Ottoman labyrinth, you have to go no further than buying a copy of that most excellent Middle Eastern spy thriller, Shemlan: A Deadly Tragedy.

The book starts off well, with the story of an Irish building worker whose mobile falls into the hands of police. Trouble was, he'd forgotten taking some spoof shots of him and his mates hooning around with a replica AK47. So plod had him followed around Europe for two weeks as they waged war on terror and our hero just went on an adventurous and boozy holiday. It's a true story, too!

2009-2011 sees us finally realising there's a crisis and the British press ganging up to sling mud at Dubai while it's good and down. Shiny posts crop up as everyone starts to realise the difference between usufruct and freehold, while various inane pronunciations are made then inevitably clarified. I share more of my love for banks and call centres, including a most amusing spoof of 'ten tips for call centres' which the bloke I was parodying was kind enough to not only acknowledge but link to! There's quite a lot of Gulf News slappery, more than I remembered doling out, including the results of deploying my rather fetching Dhs19 weighing scales bought from Lals when I realised GN was looking decidedly Kate Moss these days.

All in all I found it a great deal more amusing than I can remember it being at the time - certainly funnier than the rot I'm posting these days. If you fancy a trip down memory lane and the odd laugh, you can part with £0.77 at this handy link here and have it on your Kindle or your Kindle for iPad app within seconds. If you're in the US and would rather spend $0.99, it's linked here.

If you're in love with paperbacks, that's coming but it takes a few days to populate the Amazon paperback story. Similarly B&N, Kobo and iBooks.

And, yes, if this does over ten copies (making me a princely £3.50) I'll do volume three...

Emirates Airline Festival Of Literature Fun

(Photo credit: IsaacMao)

Saturday the 8th March will see me once again pretending to be an author at the LitFest. As well as my usual moderatin' and likely some radio stuff as well, I'm on a panel, "Of Spies, Conspiracy and Censorship", which promises to be a fascinating experience.

There are three inky-fingered teasers of prose in all - myself, Rewa Zeinati and Ibrahim Nasrallah. And we are being joined by Juma Alleem, who is director of media content at the National Media Council. It is he wot is responsible for the people responsible for reading my books and passing them 'suitable for printing' in the United Arab Emirates.

This is going to be particularly interesting for me as I have now faced two instances of censorship in regard to my participation in the festival - both utterly trivial, but then all the more perplexing for it. I have never had any of my writing knocked back in the UAE for moral, social or cultural reasons before. So I'm going to enjoy exploring the nature and purpose of censorship with my fellow panellists. You never know, we might even get around to some spies and conspiracy too!

Here's the session blurb:

Are there specific challenges associated with the context in which an author lives? As writers, are we guilty of self-censorship or are there real obstacles to writing about certain topics and people? What responsibilities do writers have and what role might central guidelines play?

I must confess to being particularly fascinated at the idea writers have responsibilities in regard to censorship. Is a 'responsible' writer merely subservient and compliant? I'm minded of Bulgakov's wicked, hilarious revenge on the fat cats of the Moscow writers' union.

The session's linked here if you want to sign up for it. The LitFest will relieve you of Dhs65, but that's the price of a scrambled egg on toast and coffee at The Archive, so you'll just have to skip breakfast one day this week.

I'm also moderating the session with Simon Kernick & Deon Meyer, 'Criminally thrilling' which looks at techniques for keeping readers glued to the page as your novel flashes around the world like a careening, mad and out of control juggernauty thing. That one's linked here.

Final GeekFest Dubai REUNION Lineup Confirmed. Shock Horror.

JAY WUD PLAYS GEEKFEST

The Red Bull team is coming to GeekFest Duabi REUNION and they're bringing Jay Wud to play a free gig from 9pm. For those of you who haven't heard of Jay, his band opened for Guns And Roses in Abu Dhabi last year and you can hear his music using this here handy link.

The Red Bull Wings team will be at GeekFest too. Geeks with wings! Whatever next?

UBER

The Limo That Comes To You app company Uber is giving away the first Dhs100 of your trip to GeekFest Dubai REUNION! Deets linked here!

GEEKTALKS

From 8-9pm we have four talks and they'll be kept to a tight time schedule by a bunch of metalheads waiting to come on stage, so we've at last found an appropriate replacement to the timekeeping discipline introduced by Monsignor R. Bumfrey!

The talks are:

8pm Money For Nothing: EUREECA
So you've got nothing but a great idea. How are you going to raise the cash you need to make it work? Not the banks, they're useless. We all know that. From VCs? They'll take all your equity for pennies. What about crowdfunding? Or better, what about crowdfunding backed by equity participation? Eureeca.com is the first equity crowdfunding platform offering a global solution. People give you money, you give them equity. Eureeca's speaker explains how it works - and how it's already worked for young UAE startups who needed cash to make that idea a reality.

8.15pm How Google broke search. And what that means to you. SEKARI
Getting ranked by search engine Google is about the right keywords and building lots of links, right? Wrong. That used to work, but now it's last year's thing - because Google just broke search - the giant's new hummingbird search algorithm changes the game and means engagement and quality content matter more than links from loads of sites. Lee Mancini is CEO of search consultancy Sekari and he'll be explaining what's going on and how you can fix your broken search results.

8.30pm Social change and sameness SAMENESS PROJECT
The [sameness] project is a Dubai-based social initiative that facilitates moments of sameness. The "sameness" is in understanding that we are all worth the same amount in our humanity, and the "project" comes through the on-the-ground initiatives like Water for Workers, The Conversation Chair, and We've Got Your Back, that bring the sameness to life. Jonny and Fiona from the sameness project will be explaining what it is, how it works and why diversity backwards is the way forwards.

8.45pm Make money at home doing what you like NABBESH
It's the perennial promise of freelancing, isn't it? And while there's undoubtedly opportunity and need out there, we've also got unprofessional clients, rip-off merchants and the like. So how can you promote a freelance community of talented people willing to exchange skills with employers who need resources and talent now - and keep that community protected and the wheels of commerce in smooth motion? It's a big ask and Nabbesh CEO LouLou Khazen is doing the asking - backed by winning du's The Entrepreneur and a $100,000 investment round using none other than eureeca.

TECHNOCASES

3D Printers UNLEASHED
The wild men from Jackys will be showing LIVE and IN THE FLESH the sexiest printers since someone said 'Can we print Hovis?' and someone else said, 'Sure'...

Green Gadgets
Heard of The Change Initiative? They're green. They're so green you'd be greenly envious of their greenness if you were a Martian. And they've got gadgets. Oh yeah. Fancy the idea of a recycled cardboard boombox, say? This is something you wouldn't want to miss, then...

GAMEFEST

We've got an Oculus Rift and we're gonna use it! This is a hyper-cool virtual reality headset the drooling gamer goons lovely chaps from t-break are bringing to GameFest. It's apparently the latest in puke-inducing immersive gaming gadgets. Apparently there are not only brain-spinning demos to play with but also @MrNexyMedia will be demoing his game in-development, so we're talking cutting edge beta type experience things here!!!

There'll also be a PS3 multiplayer area where people can make complete goons of themselves - always a popular element of GeekFest.

COLLECTING OLD NOTEBOOK PCs

You got an old laptop you don't use any more? Clean it up and bring it along and we'll make sure it gets sent to Sri Lanka where poor young medical students from rural areas simply don't have access to their own machines to use in studying for their exams. I got involved in this after finding out about one such student, then we uncovered another four. Now we have a distribution system set up thanks to a philanthropically minded doctor in Kandy and we can use more machines. So bring that old PC down to GeekFest and we'll make sure it gets a useful - and potentially life-saving - second life. Alternatively, you can always bring those old machines to The Archive and ask for Bethany or Sarah.

FOOD, DRINK, ARRANGEMENTS. STUFF.

There are cafés, there is seating, there is a soundstage (hence Jay and the boys) and stuff aplenty. There is a hospitality area we're not quite sure what to do with yet, but rest assured someone will come up with something.

My books will be on sale there. Clearly.

WEBSITE

Thanks to @AqeelFikree, GeekFest now has a website! Check out GeekFestME.com!

GETTING THERE

Here's the PDF map or you can use Google Maps like so. GeekFest will start, as usual, when you get there (if you come!) but about 7pmish is a guideline if you want to know what time to arrive late after. The talks will start around 8ish.

There's no registration, no age limit, no height restriction or any other form of organisation. If you'd like to come along, you're splendidly welcome. 

If you'd like to perform a plate spinning act, share your collection of left-handed Manga comics or old Adobe Acrobat SKUs or just have a question get in touch with @GeekFestDubai, @alexandermcnabb or @saadia and we'll give you some space and power or whatever you need.

Dubai Traffic On The Increase. Whoopee.

 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The car dealers are rubbing their hands, gleefully cackling and singing 'happy days are here again' in their broken, wheezing voices. As miserable a bunch of avaricious hunchbacks as you'll find, the saggy-skinned troglodytes in suits are hearing the sound of tills ringing and they have pronounced the sound To Be Good.

It is within the pages of the mighty Gulf News today we are told that Dubai has increased new vehicle registrations by 10% year on year. That's presumably a sign that we're seeing a 10% increase in vehicles on the road - a total of 1,240,931 vehicles were registered with the RTA this year. Car dealers in Dubai and Sharjah have apparently told the newspaper of increases in new car sales of up to 40% and anticipate a continued strong growth trend.

Even Gulf News made the connection. That means more cars on the road which means more traffic which means more congestion which means more jostling with aggressive dolts in lines of glittering metal blowing out billowing clouds of choking fumes and general bloody misery.

One place there are less cars to be found than last year, incidentally, is the Sharjah/Dubai highway. Although it still gets gummy here and there, the traffic volumes are undoubtedly down as traffic concentrates instead on choking Al Wahda street because everyone's trying to leave at Al Khan and hoy off over to the 311 (The road formerly known as the Emirates Road but now renamed the Mohammed Bin Zayed Road) to avoid shelling out Dhs4. I am constantly amazed at what lengths people will go to in order to save Dhs4 - including spending Dhs5 in extra petrol.

So Salik (the name of Dubai's traffic toll system and Arabic for 'clear') has lived up to its name. Who knew?

The question is whether the expansion of the UAE's road infrastructure will keep pace with the expansion in traffic. There's a new arterial motorway planned to link the 311 down to Abu Dhabi, while a new road system around the Trade Centre Roundabout - started before the bust and now completed by Italian company Salini, which has somehow managed to ride out the recession and its significant exposure to Dubai - is opening this week. The conversion of the National Paints Car Park into a functional road appears to be nearing completion, too - it'll be interesting to see if any number of new lanes can bring clarity to what was the UAE's most notorious traffic bottleneck.

Meanwhile, property prices in Dubai rose by more than anywhere else in the world, according to a piece in The National, which identifies a 28.5% rise in the first nine months of the year.

Oh, joy. Groundhog day.

Expo 2020: Dubai's 'Social Bid'

(Photo credit: @cpe)

This is the week Dubai goes Expo 2020 bonkers and if you thought the noise level was already high, you ain't seen nothing yet.

Five cities originally launched bids to host Expo 2020 - the latest in a long string of 'World Fairs' that started with the original World's Fair, the 1851 Great Exhibition in London's Hyde Park. The bids are evaluated by the body governing Expo, the BIE (Bureau of International Expositions) and voted on by the 167 member states. This vote, as anyone in Dubai except the most dedicated of ostriches will know, takes place Wednesday 27th November and will pick a winner from Dubai, Sao Paolo, Yekaterinburg and Izmir. Thailand's bid, the city of Ayutthaya, was withdrawn earlier this year.

Dubai has been pretty hardcore with its bid. The city's made no secret of the fact it wants this and intends to get it - and a remarkable package of infrastructure and a relentless tide of promotional activity have been flung into the fray. The stakes are high - expo sites typically span hundreds of acres and the events attract tens of millions of visitors. Has Dubai got what it takes?

If social media is anything to go by, yes it has. Because its competition doesn't seem to have got the hang of the whole 'inclusion' concept.

Let's take Turkey's Izmir. The city has a website with all the right buttons, as well as quite an annoying interstitial that promotes its Facebook page. With over 73,000 likes, there's precious little sign of engagement but a high octane broadcast of 'support our bid' type messages rather than any attempt to foster or encourage a debate around the Izmir bid's theme of improving healthcare. Izmir's YouTube Channel is also on broadcast with a lot of 'talking heads' garnering typical views in the low tens and a couple of slick ads with higher views. Again, it's all about mememe.  It's hardly any better over on Twitter, where a tad over 6,000 followers receive broadcasts on supporting the bid. The Izmir Twitter profile does suggest you might like to sign the 'Health For All Manifesto', which on cursory inspection appears to reason that if you support Izmir's bid, it would be good for global health. Hosted on WeSignIt, the manifesto has attracted 522 signatures.

It's hardly compelling, is it?

Yekaterinburg is arguably Dubai's toughest competitor. It's Russia's fourth largest city and has a complex and diverse history, including being the site of the murder of the Romanovs. The vanilla template website doesn't really sparkle and isn't even particularly informative. Facebook offers 1,459 likes and again is more of a tourist board broadcast than any attempt to foster engagement around the bid's theme of The Global Mind. There is, for some odd reason, a picture of a squirrel. With under 500 followers, the city's Twitter account is just posting the same images as Facebook. YouTube hasn't really sparked inspiration, not even the slickly produced 'Global Mind Adventure'. There's certainly no sign of community involvement - or any invitation to involvement.

As far as I can tell, Sao Paolo's website is down or dead and its Facebook page, with a tad over 4,000 likes, hasn't seen a post since June. YouTube hasn't been fed a new video in five months, either. And its 162 Twitter followers have also lacked companionship since June. If you just saw Sao Paolo's online presence, you'd be forgiven for thinking they've given up and gone home for a Feijoada.

And so on to The City That Gave The World Modhesh. How's Dubai shaping up in the online stakes - and, more importantly, is there any sign that the city actually wants to talk about its theme rather than just nag people to support its bid?

Over 58,000 followers on Twitter and 721,000 likes on Facebook appear to be saying something. Yes, we know it's not all about the numbers, but there's a question of scale here. Uniquely, Dubai's using Instagram, with over 9,000 followers. There's participation, community and engagement going on over at the Twitter account, including a couple of cheeky tweets from 'Our Dave'. Facebook's similarly lively, with community events, stunts (the inevitable Guinness book of records stunt) and widespread public participation very much in evidence. The Dubai bid's theme is 'Connecting Minds, Creating the Future', with sustainability, mobility and opportunity as sub-themes. The website features a number of thinkers talking about these themes. YouTube hasn't seen an upload in a while, but the content there again goes beyond tourist board images and 'back our bid' calls.

In fact, of all four bids, it has to be said that Dubai Expo 2020 online has the strongest sense of community and broad public participation of any of 'em. It's by far the most active and popular campaign on social platforms by a huge margin. It could do more and be a great deal slicker, without doubt. There is a huge opportunity to build further on what has already been established. But what's there is streets ahead of its rivals.

From its online presence alone, Dubai's the only Expo 2020 bidder that has clear evidence of coming together as a community in support of the city's bid - and a genuine interest in fostering discussion, debate and thought around its theme.

I must have mislaid my cynicism pills. Where did I put those blasted things?

The ExpatWoman Festive Family Fair. Oh Yeah.

UPDATE

With rain forecast for Dubai tomorrow (Saturday) and no indoor venue available, the ExpatWoman Family Fair has been rescheduled to Jan 25th (the next sensible date to hold it). So I won't be signing books and refusing to wear a Santa hat, but will provide more info nearer the rescheduled date.

UPDATE 2 
(Saturday evening)
Unbelievable. Not a drop of rain fell all day. Some fluffy clouds, a couple of darker ones, but no rain at all or even realistic chance of rain. EW took the right decision - given the forecast - for sure, but how could the forecast have been so signally wrong? Damn the weatherman!

Trips off the old tongue, don't it? This Saturday - the 23rd November - will see ExpatWoman.com hosting their annual festive shindig at Dubai's Polo & Equestrian Club, opposite Arabian Ranches. Not normally something I'd be burbling about on the blog, but there's something special in store for visitors this year.

Oh yes.

From 10.30am to 4.30pm, you have the opportunity to visit Santa's Grotto, get the kids face painted and visit various stalls selling festive femed crafts and goodies. There's a petting zoo, so little Johnny has the chance to get savagely mauled by a Chinchilla. In short, it's the usual Craggy Island deal including, we can only hope, a goat stuck in the Ferris wheel. Except, of course, it's on a Dubai scale, with nigh on a hundred stalls and a polo match thrown in.

But that's not all by any means. Because this year you can make your way over to the golden podium upon which shall rest copies of Olives - A Violent Romance and Beirut - An Explosive Thriller. These shall be signed and given over to unsuspecting members of the general public in return for Reasonable Emolument. They make, needless to say, perfect Christmas presents, ideal gifts for friends and family and fabulously combustible material for igniting the Yule log.

It wasn't my idea, honest. I was chatting with the ExpatWoman gang and they came up with the scheme in jest. Like all too many jests, it has become an horrific reality. I have made it clear: I'll sign books happily, but I'm not wearing the bloody santa hat.

See you there!

Neologist Nomenclature

(Photo credit: Frank Kehren)

If you searched 'Neologist nomenclature' and you're for real, I apologise. I just wasted your time.

Hot on the heels of the news Dubai's Roads and Transport Authority is to commence a mega-project to name some 22,000 of the city's streets comes Abu Dhabi's pledge to do the very same thing. The two cities have long had a street numbering system in place, but now we're going to get real road names.

As eny fule no, navigation in the Gulf has traditionally been a matter of using landmarks. I recall with delight the early days of my life tramping around the region and discovering I was to spend my day looking for 'the red office building to the right of French Corner, just down Talateen Street from the big Pepsi hoarding' and similar locations. I spent many a joyous hour in Riyadh's insane traffic (back then, they'd shove you from behind into a roundabout if you hesitated in joining the choking stream), perplexed and deeply lost. This is also, incidentally, frequently how I pass my time in Abu Dhabi, the words 'don't worry, it's really easy to find' instantly plunging icy shards of horror into my soul.

Those popular landmarks were to lend their names to roundabouts and roads, areas even. So Dubai, for instance, gained 'Bank Street', 'Budgie Roundabout', 'Chicago Beach', 'Fish Roundabout' and the like. Sharjah got 'Mothercat', 'Flying Saucer' and - of course - 'National Paints'.

Now they're all going to be renamed. Sharjah already renamed all its roundabouts as squares years ago, to the perplexity of many. And it already has street names, each more impenetrable than the last. This has also been the case in Riyadh, where long-standing roads such as 'Pepsi Cola' and 'Airport' have been renamed with dignitaries' full names. The joy of finding out you actually wanted Abdulaziz bin Sultan bin Abdulrahman Al Saud street when you finally made your way to Abdulaziz bin Abdulrahman bin Sultan Al Saud street was always a marvel to behold.

And so, I fear, it will be in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. The usual pandering will take place and we'll start with Prominent People With Long Names. Then great historical figures - the usual astrologers, mathematicians, travellers (hands up who wants to live in Ibn Battuta Street, then?) and transmuters of lead to gold. Then they'll get desperate and start using desert animals and the like. If I know Dubai, there'll be an auction to let companies sponsor a street name.

I can't keep up. I'm already having issues remembering what I'm supposed to call the Emirates Road these days, let alone Diyafah street and, of course, remembering it's now the Al Fahidi Cultural Neighbourhood. Like many others, I suspect, I'll likely keep directing people using the Emarat before Satwa Bus Station rather than whatever new name gets slapped on the street our office building is on.

Why they don't use the 'popular' names, I'll never know. Although I always thought 'Budgie Roundabout' disrespectful - especially with the descriptor popularly appended...

Abu Dhabi Bans Silly String

(Photo credit: mikecogh)

One of my favourite jokes of all time is that people in Dubai don't understand the Flintstones, while Abu Dhabi do.

Sorry, silly string brought that to mind. And you won't be finding much of it around on December 2nd in Abu Dhabi, because it's been banned - along with 'unofficial' car parades, car painting and a range of other popular national day activities.

The warnings come nice and early, but then reports are already tumbling in about car decoration workshops doing Dhs20,000 makeovers in preparation for the UAE's 42nd National Day which takes place on the aforementioned 2nd December. If Dubai gets Expo 2020, the result due in on November 27th, they're going to completely lose the head all across that weekend.

I've said before that the UAE is the only place in the Middle East where the people take to the streets to celebrate their country, and that they most certainly do. It's a happy time and a time to go wombat crazy and generally make like it's mardi gras, but police around the Emirates have had enough and over the past couple of years have moved to regulate a celebration that at times looks as if it could border on hysteria.

So no changing the colour of your car, obscuring your number plate, having your windscreen tinted with pictures of the UAE's leaders or the flag, no tinting the driver side windows, no hanging out of cars or over-stuffing cars and no, and I'd like to make this quite clear, no silly string.

If you breaks the rules, it's a Dhs1,000 fine and 12 black points. And Abu Dhabi police have set aside a special area for impounded cars on the day. Presumably other emirates' police forces will enforce similar rules, although I haven't seen any announcements.

Sharjah Corniche will doubtless once again be packed and there, I am sure, you will find silly string.

Posting People's Pictures Online Could Carry A Fine Or Even Jail Time

United Arab Emirates (Photo credit: saraab™)

The National newspaper today confirms what has long been an odd quirk here in the UAE has indeed been taken to its (inevitable) online conclusion - publishing (posting) pictures of people without their consent is against the law here - and, as a criminal case, could result in a hefty fine or prison time.

It's always been the case that you actually needed written consent before publishing somebody's photo in the UAE. That we often shortcut this requirement - as so many legal requirements are shortcut in a society which rubs along very nicely with a mainly 'laissez faire' attitude - does not mean it does not exist. As with so many aspects of life here, when things go wrong, the law comes into play and suddenly what seemed a forgotten piece of legislation becomes very real indeed.

Now it's been confirmed in words of one syllable that the online equivalent of the offline phrase 'publish' which is, of course, 'post' also carries the same weight. In short, you post an image on Facebook, Twitter or the like and you are open to criminal prosecution. Not a civil case, you understand, a criminal one.

Lt Col Salah Al Ghoul, Head of the bureau for law respect at the Ministry told The National: "Article 24 of the cybercrimes law stipulates that anyone who uses an information network to infringe upon someone else’s privacy shall be punished by a minimum prison sentence of six months and/or a fine of between Dh150,000 and Dh500,000."

You can consider an image to include video and, presumably, audio. So if you see a gentleman beating a hapless-looking chap around the head with his agal, you have 500,000 great reasons to pass by rather than film the incident and post it on YouTube.

That has always been the case here - as some of the more liberally grey-haired on Twitter pointed out when that particular video was put up. You can, literally, defame someone with the truth in the UAE.

Protecting decent folks' privacy or obviating social justice? You tell me...

UAE Petrol Retailers Are Breaking The Law It Seems

(Photo credit: 401(K) 2013)

A report in today's Gulf News quotes Omar Bu Shahab, CEO of the Commercial Compliance and Consumer Protection Division (CCCP) in the Department of Economic Development in Dubai as saying that charging 2% fees on credit and debit card transactions is a violation of consumer protection law.

While he was commenting on an attempt by a GEMS school to levy a 2% processing fee on credit and debit card transactions, his clarification also applies to Emarat and EPPCO/ENOC service stations, which charge the fee on credit card transactions for fuel. This surcharge appears to have been the resolution of a spat between the credit card companies and the fuel distributors dating back to 2007 - and the early days of this here very blog. The story from way back then is suitably linked 'ere. Basically, the retailers (not ADNOC, you'll note) have always charged extra for credit card purchases, in violation of the card issuers' agreements and when the card companies kicked off, the retailers just stopped taking credit cards. They've recently started again, but with a Dhs2 'service fee' on any transaction for fuel up to Dhs100. In short, 2%...

“Retailers who are charging extra fees on the credit card or debt card payments are violating the consumer protection law and will be subject to penalties,” Mr Bu Shahab told the newspaper that tells it like it is.*

So it'll be interesting to hear what the petrol companies say when the media come calling, won't it?

*Well, sometimes.

The Citadel Of Sigiriya - Lion Rock

 "Right lads, I'll have a palace up there and some pleasure gardens please. 

Quick as you like now. Chop chop!"

Sigiriya is an ancient palace built by a king who decided that if you're going to do 'palace', then it might as well be a gigantic, sprawling moated complex topped by a 200-metre high rock with a pleasure garden, pools and harem at its top.

The guy certainly had style, I'll give him that. 

Fighting off the insistent and rather seedy-seeming gentleman who wanted to be our guide to the sight, we bought our tickets (Rs3,900 for foreigners, Rs50 for Sri Lankans). These were expensive by UK standards, let alone Sri Lankan and our Sri Lankan friends felt shamed by the difference in prices. Oddly enough they seemed more annoyed by it than we were. 

But to be honest, we were a little taken aback. Understanding we earn more than Sri Lankans do, put in a system of concessions for schoolkids and the aged then find ways of presenting the experience that wealthier European or Asian travellers would pay premiums for rather than out-and-out gouging. There was no guidebook to the site and no audio guide on offer. There were no official guides and little evidence of any attempt to structure the experience as a value-added one beyond 'pay up and go up'. 

In some ways, this adds to its charm - it's not slick and over-developed. But then in others it detracts - the pestering freelance tour guide, the lack of any facilities or information. Even the availability of cold water until you get to the stalls in the drivers' car park at the exit. That apart, the site itself is splendorous.

I'm sure there was more information in the museum, but that was 500 metres the wrong way away from the site and we decided to skip it and get on with what looked to promise a hot, gruelling climb.

You travel through the ruins of glorious water gardens and what once must have been an amazing citadel towards the rock towering above you. You can see the steps stretching up to the foot of the rock, then the gantries and walkways stuck to the side of it and vertigo already cuts in. We chose a hot, sunny day and it was certainly warm going. There are delightful signs all over the place telling you to stay silent to prevent hornet attacks. Shame they weren't in Korean or Japanese. 

The hornets, presumably unable to speak Korean or Japanese themselves, let the babblers pass. 

The climb up, taken with care, is not onerous if you are relatively fit. Many choose to go as far as the 'lion's feet' and leave the final - and most vertiginous - part of the climb to more foolish folk. 

The Mirror Wall. No, it's no longer shiny. 

Not even Dubai could be shiny after 2,000 years...

On the way up you pass the Mirror Wall, a porcelain wall once apparently so burnished the king who built his palace atop this 200 meter-high boulder could see his face in it. You also get the chance to clamber up a spiral staircase to look at the remains of the frescoes some experts believe once adorned much of the rock. We passed, it was too hot, too busy and none of us much liked the look of the buttressing holding the viewing platform together. 

It's only when you're traversing rock a couple of hundred feet from the staging point below looking out over vistas of Sri Lanka's forest carpet that you realise you're standing on a flimsy structure nailed to a rock and maintained by the Sri Lankan Office of Public Works (or some such). The presence of a broken strut on the ground below doesn't add to any vestigial feelings of confidence.

It's not until you're on the way out you get to see what you've been walking on. 

Which is lucky, really...

Struggling to the top (not because of the climb, but negotiating the press of people coming down - even a section which had two walkways, clearly intended to be one for up and one for down, was crammed with people going both ways), you're rewarded by an amazing view of the lush countryside, as well as a scramble through the stepped ruins of the palace, complete with a huge cistern and water pools. 

Apparently yer one had 200 wives and liked to disport with them here. You can't blame him. If I were the King Of All I Surveyed, I'd be tempted meself...

Mind, it didn't do him much good - he was defeated and fell on his own sword in AD495. 

This is where Sri Lankans discover why their ticket only cost Rs50...

Delightfully, once you've struggled to the top and wandered around a bit, you come across a sign that says 'GOING DOWN IS DANGEROUS'. Thanks, you might have mentioned that before...

Sigiriya is a true marvel. Suck it up, cough and pay the inflated fee. Give this at least half a day. Do not, under any circumstance, pass it by.