WEF

The World Economic Forum is to host a 'Summit on The Global Agenda' in Dubai in November. The event, set to be addressed by leading thinkers and thinking leaders, will propose ten breakthrough ideas for improving the state of the world. 700 high minded achievers from business, government and academia will attend.

I'm sure that there are better ways to find ten ideas for improving the world... another laproscopy for George would be a start...

Dosh

Many years ago I had occasion to interview Andrew Hearn, then the boss of Bahrain Telecommunications Company (Batelco to you, mate). He was a great interview, speaking precisely and pretty much laying it on the line.

One thing he said that really stuck in my mind, and has done up until the present day, was: "Alexander, you have to understand. Only a complete fool can lose money in telecommunications."

Someone hasn't told this lot that...

So they announced they've got 1.75 million users, of which 1.4 million are 'active'. This is the first we've seen the distinction made: certainly not a distinction made when they announced they'd crossed the million (which prompted me to invent The Du test, if you will recall). If you take the 1.4 million figure, that's a loss of Dhs 44 per subscriber in the quarter, or a little over 8%.

Given that Du reached 850,000 subscribers in September last year, Du's result in the last quarter of 2007, a revenue of some Dhs639mn, was achieved with half the number of subscribers. In other words, Du has achieved revenue growth of 18% on subscriber growth of 50%.

Interestingly, and to be fair to poor old Du, their ARPU (Average Revenue Per User, a telecom industry performance benchmark, although not the most accurate but certainly the first figure everyone looks at) would appear to be reasonable - dividing revenue by users, we're looking at an ARPU of something like $49, which ain't too bad - particularly not for a predominantly pre-paid user base.

But I still only know one person who uses a Du mobile...

Meanwhile, Gulf News has been spanking Etisalat over its customer service... and Dubai Sunshine has been spanking Du over theirs!!!

Birthday

I am a man of my word. I said I'd post more extracts from 1111 Letters For Every Occasion, that indispensable and encyclopaedic guide to every letter you will ever have to write. For anyone that missed earlier examples of the genius of this book, or the explanation of quite why New Light Publishers of Delhi came to be the proud promulgators of this peerless epistolic peregrination, the original post is here and more examples are here, here and here.

Today, we celebrate the boss's birthday. And then, just as a bonus, we seek a recommendation for a suitable groom. Both are of the usual high standard. Please do not forget, as you read them, that these have been earnestly suggested as templates for serious correspondence. For therein lies their charm...

Greetings to Boss

Dear Sir/Madam

Dear Honourable...

May I have the honour to send you my heartiest greetings on the celebration of your birthday this month? I know that you are far above these mundane matters and flowery tributes mean nothing to you but your birthday is a great and golden occasion for your friends and admirers who owe so much to you for your earnestness and sincerity in your crusade to promote public causes.

You have invested the better part of your life in selfless causes which the future generations cannot forget and the historians will write with genuine appreciation about the objectives you have realised against the heaviest odds in the most crucial days of history and a leader should be judged not merely by what he achieves but the circumstances in which he accomplishes the dim objectives beyond the blue horizon because he might well be sowing the seeds of better karma for a bumper harvest to be finally reaped by others who are not yet even born.

Congrulating you once again on your birthday,

Yours faithfully...

Confidential Report

What do you think of Mr. J.S. Stuart, the proprietor of Stuart Agriculture Company?

I am planning to marry my daughter with him.

Positive Reply

Mr. Stuart is an excellent young man belonging to a very respectable family of Hongkong.

I strongly recommend him for marriage.

Negative Reply

Mr. Stuart is a sharp-fingered man who has failed in business because of false pretence.

It is better to keep your daughter away from him.

Hunter

“This may be the year that we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it – that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.”

Hunter S. Thompson

I’ve just finished re-reading ‘Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72’ and I’d commend it most highly to all and sundry. It’s pretty much the ideal time to immerse yourself in Thompson’s masterful account of what it’s like to struggle through the primaries, the caucuses and the conventions before butting up against your opponent for the job of being The Most Powerful Man in the World. Or even Woman, for all that.

Thompson draws the power struggles, the backroom deals, the lust for it all that makes men put themselves through the agonising pressure, the insane, insincere grasping for primacy, for the people, for votes at any cost. Like his cartoonist friend Steadman, Thompson draws his scenarios savagely, imaginatively and incisively. It’s a roller-coaster read, a real road-trip through a drawn-out and wickedly cynical political power game.

He does so as America tries to manage its straggling, disastrous and bloody involvement in Vietnam, the conflict that wouldn’t go away and let Nixon pull out as quickly as he’d like to. And the White House is teetering on the edge of Watergate as Nixon, cynical and calculating, mashes the ‘decent’ Democratic hopeful George McGovern into smithereens ('hamburger' is a favourite Thompson phrase) as McGovern, trying to repair some of the damage done after the long and closely-run campaign for nomination tears the Democrats apart, makes the awful mistake of selecting a running mate who turns out to have had a history of serious mental illness.

Nixon, the foul-mouthed liar whose thugs carried out a midnight raid on the Democrat headquarters, wins the votes of the vast majority of America. It's an exercise in calculated political manipulation that includes leveraging the cosy, controlling relationship which the president has with a political media that Thompson exposes as utterly dependent on the President’s Men for the information, breaks and access that underpin their careers.

Like I say. It’s a timely re-read. Hunter Thompson wasn't necessarily a nice person, particularly as he got older and the bitterness started to eat away at him, but he was a truly great writer. And his voice remains the voice of American Reason.

Tragically, it's a voice that is no longer to be heard...

Arabic

In the early days of this silly little blog, I put up a post that was essentially a crib from an experiment in Wiki creation that I was playing around with. ‘Ten Word Arabic’ was picked up by GN and a couple of big American blogs and has consequently turned out to be one of the most popular things I’ve written here in the past year. I’ve long meant to get around to doing a ‘proper’ singular version that doesn’t link out to the Wiki, which can be awfully annoying, and so here it is.

Some people think I’ve wasted 20 years in the Arab World, but I can prove ‘em all wrong. The following is the synthesis of everything insightful and useful I have learned about the Arabic language. Well, almost everything.

Arabic is not an easy language for speakers of the Romance languages. It’s not impossible, but it’s not easy. Worse, pretty much everyone speaks English and people are often more keen to use their English than listen to you mangling their language.

The following ten words will allow you to get by, have meaningful sounding conversations and serve you well in any number of situations and scrapes. The investment required to get from this to speaking proper Arabic is so great, and the commensurate rewards so small, that you’ll probably never progress beyond Ten Word Arabic.

1) UGH

Ugh is the most important word in the Arab World. It's also pretty useful further east as well, although I have only personally tried it in Sri Lanka and not the subcontinent.

Ugh is used in Arabic to denote agreement, denial, affirmation, condescension, surprise, pain, acrimony, patrimony and, for advanced users, pleasure at a serendipitous encounter (Eu'gh!).

Note also its close cousin, the Lebanese expression of disgust, surprise, resignation, irritation and wonderment: 'Euft'.

TE Lawrence (Thomas Edward 'Ned' Chapman, AKA TE Lawrence, AKA TE Shaw. He's always fascinated me, has 'little Lawrence'.) once entered the town of Deraa disguised as a Circassian and using only the word 'Ugh' to get by. He was captured and comprehensively buggered, so this just shows the importance of properly practicing 'Ugh'. It is also argued that it shows how daft it is to use an Arabic 'Ugh' when talking to Turks.

2) SHOU

Lebanese/Palestinian (or Lebistinian if you prefer) slang for 'shinoo' which translates as 'what?'. Jordanian slang version is 'Aish'. In Egyptian it's 'Eida'. You start to see why the Arab world is quite as much fun as it is, no?

Belongs with 'hada' which isn't a component of Ten Word Arabic, but which is useful nonetheless and means 'that'.

So shou hada means 'what's that?'

Shou also is used to denote general query, as in 'what's happening, guys?' ('Shou?') or 'What's the stock market looking like this morning?' ('Shou?').

Shou can also be used in place of any query, from 'Why are you in pain?' to 'Where are you going?'

Shou can also be used to comprehensively diss someone. It's a difficult technique that's tied in closely to body language, which is used a lot in the Arab world, but basically you say the 'shou' in a totally dismissive way, turning the head to the left and flicking it in a sideways and downwards direction. This means 'what a heap of shit'.

The only way to respond to this is by using the same gestures but saying 'shou shou'. That outshous the shou. Or, in Arabic, that'll shou 'em.

3) YANI

One of a number of highly important key phrases in Levantine, particularly Lebanese Arabic (So not a Greek chillout musician, that's Yanni).

Yani means 'kind of' and is used frequently, also serving as a replacement for 'somehow', 'umm' and a million other syntactical spacers... It helps to pronounce the 'a' from the back of the throat, because in Arabic it's an 'ain', so written ya3ni in 'MSN Arabic'.

For instance: 'So I say to him, yani, what kind of car is that heap of shit? And he's like, yani, really pissed at me.'

Also used as a response to any given question, meaning 'Oh, you know...' where the amount of aaa in the yani is used to denote a studied indifference.

'Are you still going out with Fadi's sister?'

'Yani'

'She that hot?'

'Yaaaaani'

4) KHALAS

For a two syllable word, Khalas is certainly a complex little critter.

Pronounded khalas, halas, kalas depending on the mood, nationality and context, it means 'enough' but also 'stop' and 'I've had enough of your bullshit, get down to brass tacks or I'll do yer.'

As a term of contempt ('forget it and stop being so utterly stupid'), it can be quite nicely deployed by rolling the 'kh', a sound made at the back of the throat by the bit of the tongue that would be just before the late market if your tongue was the technology adoption lifecycle, and then lengthening the aaaaaaaalaaaaaaaas.

Like much Arabic, the words alone are not enough: it helps to use the hand in a gesture of denial and avert the head. This is also performed in a certain order for maximal impact: hand signal like policeman standing in front of speeding car, say 'Khalas' and avert head. If female, it is best to toss the head.

5) NAAM

Not to be mistaken for neem, which is a type of tree that grows in buddhist temple grounds, 'naam' is Arabic for yes. So is 'aiwa, which does tend to rather complicate things. One thing that is for certain is that 'no' is always 'la'.

Naam = yes

La = no

6) AKID

The importance of the word 'akid' (akeed) in Arabic can not be overstated: it's vital. It means 'for sure' and is the only way to test if someone's serious about a date or a promise or other undertaking.

'You will have the consignment by the 14th, ya habibi.'

'Akid?'

'Inshallah'

This conversation obviously means that you're about to be royally shafted and that the consignment has, in fact, been stolen by Papuan pirates just south of Aceh and the shipping agent knows this but isn't telling you.

7) SALAAM

Arabic for 'wotcha', it actually means 'peace'. The more formal 'Salaam Aleykum' is used for a proper greeting, salaam is used to a familiar or generally mumbled to all present when getting into a lift or arriving within a gathering. The response is 'Aleykum al Salaam'.

It's important because by using it you can be polite. So few people bother with these little pleasantries, but a smile and a little politeness don't half go a long way in the Arab World.

'Tara' is 'ma'salaama'

8) FIE

Fie (pronounced 'fee') is another powerfully multipurpose word. It means 'enough' or 'sufficient' or 'plenty' or 'too much' depending on how it's used. The only certainty is its antonym, 'ma fie' which always means 'none'.

I suppose its most accurate translation would be 'a plentiful sufficiency'.

9) MUSHKILA

Mushkila means 'problem' and, given that you spend half your time here flagging up, dealing with or avoiding problems, then it gets used a lot. So you have 'fie mushkila' (a great big problem with grindy, gnarly teeth and warts and things' or the debased assurance 'mafie mushkila' (no problem. This is ALWAYS, and please don't get me wrong here, ALWAYS not the case).

You'll sometimes hear 'mish mushkila' or 'mu mushkila'. These are dialect and both mean 'mafie mushkila' and so should be ignored.

10) INSHALLAH

Broadcaster and lobbyist Isa Khalil Sabbagh tells the story of the American businessman who was closing a deal in the Middle East and was told the contract would be signed tomorrow, 'inshallah'.

'What's God got to do with this?' asked our man, angrily.

Lots, of course. Because, as a consequence of his comment, his deal never got signed.

Inshallah means 'God willing' and is a phrase fundamental in so many ways to Islamic thought. A thing will occur in the future only if it is the will of God. An expression born of piety, it is also used pragmatically as a universal get out clause and avoids an absolute undertaking.

Avoiding an absolute undertaking is seen as a good thing, at least in part because it cuts down the likelihood that you'll have to be offended by being told 'No'. This concept that the answer 'no' is offensive and should be avoided is quite a simple one, but has been known to drive callow Westerners insane.

Incidentally...

You have now mastered Ten Word Arabic and can hold entire conversations without anyone realising that you are in fact not a native of deepest Arabia.

'Salaam'
'Ugh'
'Mushkila?'
'Fie mushkila'
'Yanni, shou?'
'Shou? Shou? Yanni, shou fie.'
'Akid, akid. Mushkila fie.'

All shake heads and tut a lot. All depart.

Amaze your friends! Stun business contacts! Speak Ten Word Arabic!

Fake

I get quite a lot of searches that end up here because someone looked for fake stuff. Fake chicken is one such example. There are a number of others, some quite worrying. Fake Plastic Women, for instance. Well, here's a post that is definitely 100% fake focused!

Pal Carrington just got an email from a gentleman calling himself Jamal Jumeirah. It's the Nigerian Fake Letter Scam, only in Dubai form:

Dear Friend,

It is indeed my pleasure to write to you this letter, which I believe will be a suprise, as we are both complete strangers.

As you read this, I don't want you to feel sorry for me, because I believe everyone will die someday. My name is Jamal Jumeirah, a former merchant in Dubai, in the U.A.E. I have been diagnosed with Esophageal cancer which was discovered very late, due to my laxity in caring for my health.

It goes on at great length - the payoff being the usual deposit money in bank account 5% could be yours kind of thing.

It's not terribly creative, which is a shame. There are so many more interesting ways that Jamal Jumeirah could make you rich... or take everything you've got to give...

Fart

It’s a constant fight to avoid sounding like an old fart. You know: “I can remember when that was all sand!” and all that. You drive past the airport that you once flew into when it was a small white moulded concrete terminal building with a single (appalling) restaurant that used to offer ‘Foul Madams’ highlighted with magic-marker lettering on a dayglo green star hanging off the buffet and the duty free that was down the escalator left of the pink marble-topped information desk, staffed by Indian girls in grey uniforms fussing under portraits of Sheikh Zayed and Sheikh Rashid hung in incredibly heavy gilt frames. Back in the days when you had to fill in pink immigration cards: when men were men and women were interested.

And now it’s smoked glass and impersonal efficiency: all stainless steel, escalators, travelators and elevators, ubiquitous Dubai-beige and red. More on the way with new terminals springing up like springing up things.

And it’s so very boring.

Marriage

Last week I promised some more extracts from that most compendious guide to every letter you'd ever have to write, 1111 Letters For All Occasions, published by New Light Publishers of New Delhi. I might have forgotten to tell you that I paid Dhs 12 for it, but I'm sure it's cheaper if you fly to Delhi and buy it. If you buy a number of copies, the savings will only increase. The ISBN is 81-85018-57-X and no, Amazon doesn't sell it.

Chapter 28 deals with matters marital and I am sure that if you only put some of this sensible, good advice into your own marriage, harmony will rule your home. Do not under any circumstances contact me as a consequence of this guidance. I shall deny everything.

I don't know about you lot, but I was crying by the end of the introduction...

Anyway. Here goes:

Mighty Marriage Matters
Marriage is not a bed of roses. Many thorny problems crop up between the husband and wife which need to be carefully tackled. If angry, the wife often goes away to her parents and can only be approached through correspondence.

Staying with parents
Dear Subhash
It is now three months that I have been staying with my parents and expecting you to come and take me home.
Is there anything in the matter?
Yours
Lilly

Positive Response
I regret that I could not go over to Calcutta to take you home because of pressing business problems.
I am coming next Sunday and will return home the same evening by air.

Negative Reply
I do not find you happy in my house with my parents. Therefore, I have no option but to let you stay with your parents as long as possible.

Reply to the above
That is no solution of the problem. We have to find a house of our own where we can live peacefully away from people's problems.


Coming of a Baby
You will be pleased to hear that I now carry a baby in my womb.
What provisions should we make for him?

Positive Reply
I am coming to bring you to Delhi and take you to the Jeevan Nursing Home on the Pusa Road for proper advice and care.
We shall reserve accommodation in the maternity ward.

Negative Reply
Since you are now pregnant, I suggest that you should continue to live with your father and mother till the new arrival.

Illness of the New Baby
I regret to inform you that Enu is ill and needs your immediate presence.
Come immediately.

Positive Reply
(Telegram)
ARRIVING ELEVENTH. SHAM KUMAR.

Negative Reply
If the baby is ill, let the doctors take care of her.
I am no doctor.


More next week...

Birthday

A year ago, with this post about the Arab Media Forum, I started this blog.

I think a celebration at the Thai Kitchen is in order!

Kuwait

I stayed at the Sheraton Kuwait the other week. It’s the first time, oddly, that I’ve stayed in that particular hotel and I would recommend it most heartily as the best business hotel I’ve ever stayed in: everything you need is there where you want it, from a printer in your room to free, high speed wireless Internet throughout the whole hotel. It’s truly excellent.

I do remember seeing it as a burned out hulk. Together with the Ramada Salaam, which was a boat, the Sheraton was one of two hotels, and in fact very few buildings, destroyed by the Iraqis as they legged it out of Kuwait. Apparently what they found scariest was the pinpoint accuracy of the cruise missiles and smart bombs, which is one reason why they didn't have the time or inclination to set off more of the explosives they'd wired up across the city. The speed of the US pincer-movement advance was the other reason, of course. I can attest to the accuracy claim, having seen the neat hole punched in the 9^th floor of the telecommunications Ministry building that led to the vapourisation of the Ericsson-made international switch. The operator positions on the other half of the floor were untouched. I have the photo to prove it. (well, actually I don’t. I lent it to Motivate for their Gulf Business 10^th anniversary of the invasion issue and forgot to get it back, but you know what I mean).

I had a minder for the week, provided by the Ministry of Telecommunications, because I was working on a supplement about the remediation of telecoms in Kuwait following the occupation. His name was Jaafar and he was a nice bloke, although one of life’s natural victims. Stuff just happened to Jaafar and it was never good stuff. He never expected good stuff and so was rarely disappointed. He went to university in the States and the kids thought it would be real fun to put a tab of acid in the Kuwaiti guy’s tea. He tried to describe the consequences to me, but I felt he fell far short of the reality – all those years of repression and trammelled thought suddenly bursting into a horrifying technicolour unleashing of everything, everywhere altogether.

He must have been a complete wreck for months afterwards.

It was thanks to Jaafar that I got a tour of the national museum, the other damaged building, which was closed to the public. The Iraqis had made a tremendous mess of it, taking most of the exhibits and burning the rest. The lady that showed me around was at great pains to show me the fireproof carpets that hadn’t burned. These were made in the UK, she kept telling me, as if this built an association between us of some sort. British people were in vogue right then, everywhere you went kids would shout out ‘Boosh good, Thatcher good!” at you.

The worst thing was the big hall in the museum. The soldiers had hanged pigeons by piano wire from the rafters as a sign that peace was dead. They couldn’t find doves, you see.

As we were driving to some telephone exchange or another from the museum visit, Jaafar took a wrong turning and ended up in a narrow dead end. There was no way he was going to be able to turn his enormous American car and I watched him just slump at the wheel. As he dejectedly surveyed the latest evidence that God had it in for him, it started to rain. He turned to me, his face a picture of misery, as the fat drops started to spatter on the windscreen.

“You see, Alex?” He said. “Zis is ze story of my fcuking life.”

I did like Jaafer.