Fierce Creatures

Cover of Fierce CreaturesStaying at Emirates' Al Maha Desert Resort and Spa has long been a treat for us. The lavish little 42-room hotel nestles on the side of a large bowl out in the sands between Dubai and Al Ain, every room a suite with its own little infinity pool looking out over a plain edged by rolling dunes. We usually cash in Emirates' Skywards air miles rather than dig deep for the Dhs 4,000-odd you'd have to dole out for a night of bliss in the desert, but this stay was compliments of Skywards after their customer service people unearthed the little disaster that was our attempt to make a booking in August (thank you, chaps).

Al Maha was the first of the UAE's desert resorts - Bab Al Shams, Al Sahra and Qasr Al Sarab have all followed in the wake of the resort's success but none have ever had the appeal of Maha for us. It wasn't, of course, the first 'desert hotel' in the UAE - that honour belongs to the now dowdy but yet still delightful Liwa Hotel. But it was the first place to transform the pleasures of camping in the deep dunes into a world-class luxury bliss-out experience - the suites are all tent-themed and the stiff room rate does include a variety of desert activities as well as breakfast, lunch and dinner. There are few chilled weekend experiences to rival it. It's so good, TripAdvisor (the website that makes hotel GM's break into cold sweats) does nothing but gush about the place. and they're all right about it, too. My own raving about the place has been going on for a good long while now, so you can forget the accusation that I'm only being nice because of the Skywards comp.

One of the most delightful aspects of this delightful hotel is that it's set in the middle of a massive game reserve made up of something like a third of Dubai's total landmass and dedicated to the preservation of the Arabian Oryx - or Al Maha. Camels are banned (they're not actually indigenous to the region, dontcha know?) but a thriving herd of oryx, gazelles and an increasingly rich variety of desert life are not only welcomed,  but assiduously protected. Starting at something like 90 head when it opened, Al Maha's herd of endangered pointy-horned ruminants has grown to over 300 now.

But there's trouble in paradise. Someone, somewhere has decided to remake the John Cleese comedy Fierce Creatures and locate it in the desert outside Dubai.Only this time it's for real.

The globe-spanning Starwood Hotels and Resorts, which is responsible for brands such as Le Meridien, Sheraton and Westin, is to take over the management of Al Maha from tomorrow. I can find no trace of an official announcement,  but the news has led to a number of staff, including some of the hotels' complement of South African guides, chucking in the towel and moving elsewhere. Others are presumably waiting to see what happens when the new bosses turn up with their sleeves rolled up and briefcases bursting with formulas for increased efficiency and resource management.

(Fierce Creatures, BTW, revolved around 'big business' taking over an ailing zoo and the new director deciding to increase the place's popularity by making its large-eyed, furry inmates seem more dangerous and therefore more attractive to the general public.)

Starwood already manages one Emirates-owned property, the Le Meridien Al Aqha  Beach Resort. And there's a lot of sense to an airline focusing on doing what it does best (running the world's largest demonstration of the effectiveness of the 'long tail' principle) rather than running hotels. What's more, the Starwood network would have a huge benefit to Al Maha which, we understand, does tend to suffer from low mid-week occupancy and rammed weekends. But part of what made Al Maha so unique was how very focused everyone there was on customer service and creating a wholly memorable experience that went beyond reason. The million dollar question is whether that experience will survive once the 'under new management' sign has been taken down and the place settles into its new routines and the task of making that management contract thoroughly profitable.

In the meantime, when you read in Gulf News of people being disemboweled by Arabian Oryx or gored by vicious gazelles, remember Fierce Creatures. You saw it here first...

Sara's Ussa

The plan was to use cams to bring Sara from Nablus to GeekFest Dubai last week. We tested the thing earlier in the day and perfection (well, a slightly Charlie Chaplinesque perfection) was achieved. Setting up at The Shelter, it quickly became apparent that the wireless connection was deeply broken. With creaky infrastructure and the lack of a Saadia becoming painfully apparent, we managed nothing better than a freeze frame and a squawk before it all came tumbling down again. Even Gerald Donovan's brilliant cludge of a Samsung Galaxy tablet and my 3G SIM to make an Android-driven 384kpbs wireless hotspot failed because the 3G signal in the cinema at Shelter was rocky.

I have to record that the entire issue was with the Dubai-side infrastructure. Nablus was just dandy all along.

So we missed her talk. Now you can sit back and relax in the privacy of your own home (or office) and catch it, because I got her to record it for us.  She uploaded the files from Nablus and I stitched 'em together before adding the film to the GeekFest collection over at Vimeo. This file took EIGHT HOURS to upload thanks to Etisalat's appalling DSL. Using a 2mbps DSL line, I could at no point get better than 50kpbs upload speed. I tried at home, but watched in horror as a 36kbps upload degraded to 14kpbs before crawling back up to 36kbps. It's truly unbelievable that this quality of service is tolerated by the TRA.

Anyway. Here, at last, is Sara's Ussa. We apologise for the delay and assure you that normal service will be resumed when we have a properly competitive telecommunications market in the UAE.


Sara's Ussa from Geek Fest on Vimeo.

Please do feel free to pop over to Vimeo and embed this video in your own blog/site/corner of the web.
By the way, we're still waiting for an official update on Ola's fund, but it looks like we've raised the $18,000 needed for her life-saving operation in Italy.

UPDATE. Ola flies to Italy November 5th! We did it, folks. It looks like the fund will close over, in fact!

Sad Day

It's a sad day for the United Arab Emirates - the Ruler of Ras Al Khaimah, His Highness Sheikh Saqr bin Mohammed Al Qassimi, died this morning.

The world's oldest reigning monarch and the last of the UAE's 'founding fathers', Sheikh Saqr was 92 and had been in ill health for some time. The newspapers lagged Twitter this morning and struggled to get stories together, but the immediate flood of interest brought down WAM, the UAE's news agency and the source of any 'official' news.
 
Which is why we have the headline, body copy and 'news summary' from The National above.

Ras Al Khaimah means, literally, 'headland of the tent'. The khaimah is the traditional barasti (palm frond) dwelling of the mountain people of the UAE. Typically khaimahs are dug into the ground, lined with stone and then the barasti walls and roof are built above. Sheikh Saqr would remember when these were the majority of buildings in RAK - he had ruled the country since 1948.

RAK joined the UAE a year later than the other emirates, the Federation was founded in 1971 and RAK joined in 1972. I never did find out the precise reasons for the delay, which has always intrigued me.

This really is the passing of an era rather than one man. It's a sad day for Sheikh Saqr's family and the people of Ras Al Khaimah, but it's also sad to see the passing of the last of the men who brought this country from a scattered land of tribal peoples to become a modern nation.

When Words Fail

Image by thismanslife via FlickrToday's soaraway 7Days reports on the American swimmer, Francis Crippen, who died on Saturday during the Fina swimming competition held in Fujeirah. A world class swimmer and an experienced athlete, Crippen had reportedly told his doctor he wasn't feeling well but had decided to continue his swim. He didn't finish the race and his body was found in the water.

The response of the executive director of the UAE Swimming Association, as reported by 7Days, seems almost incredibly unfeeling. "We are sorry that the guy died but what can we do. This guy was tired and he pushed himself a lot." are the words the paper attributes to Aymen Saad.

I have to confess the callousness of the response to an event that the President of Fina called "A terrible tragedy" amazed me. Then I read Gulf News' report of the same official's response to the tragedy. GN quotes Saad as saying: ""The medical report from the doctor corroborates the fact that the swimmer was extremely tired and that is the reason why he lost control during the competition. He died due to the effort he made to finish the race."

The difference in tone is remarkable. From callous, offhand and unfeeling to appropriately factual and sober in the face of tragedy. We have two stark choices here - and I am deeply concerned that two papers can report one man's words so differently. So which one is wrong?

And what DID the official say?

Tired

Image by Moha' Al-Bastaki via FlickrWhen taxi fares went up in Sharjah earlier this month, none of the newspaper stories covering the event made mention of the fact that drivers’ targets went up as well. Drivers now have to earn Dhs 10,000 in a month to gain a 35% commission.

We’re still paying the Dhs20 inter-Emirate surcharge between Sharjah and Dubai (and vice-versa), which was introduced, if we remember, because of the heavy traffic between the two. That traffic’s no longer a problem, but the taxi companies are never going to let an easy Dhs15 go. (Dhs 5 goes to the driver, at least that was the idea). It’s expensive stuff, this taking a taxi. And yet the drivers seem to be worse off than ever – although I don’t see the large numbers of middlemen at the taxi companies and regulators suffering.

The drivers are under enormous pressure, with a series of iniquitous fines that includes a Dhs100 fine if they lodge the day’s takings after 6pm. If a driver doesn’t make his daily target of Dhs 275 for three days running, that’s it. Out. The cap on daily petrol expenditure and a requirement that 50% of all travel should be passenger-carrying, means that drivers won’t pick up in certain areas, taxi ‘black holes’. Sharjah’s University City, for instance, is highly unpopular with drivers. Many drivers have private customer lists (like Mr G, who runs a massive network of customers and is more frequently on the phone than off it) but resist University jobs. Their least favourite is University to airport – a 10 minute ride that entails travelling 30 minutes out of the city and back again.

Drivers who become involved in accidents have to sit around while the car is in the workshop – not earning a penny. As if that isn’t bad enough, they have to pay the insurance excess, which is Dhs1,500. That’s about two week’s earnings. At least the high excess keeps the company’s premiums down, hey.

Taxis now actively avoid picking up groups of Indian men for fear that they’d be accused of freelancing – charging multiple passengers a fare lower than the meter that amounts to more than the meter amount. However, if they’re found refusing a fare, they can be fined. It’s all a bit Catch22... Appealing the fines, which can be remarkably arbitrary because the inspectors doling them out are on commission based on the fines they award, is of course futile.

Relaying all of this, Mr. G. laughs but there’s more than a trace of bitterness in his laughter. I ask if drivers will start going back to Pakistan now the screw has tightened so much and he laughs again, shaking his head and muttering ‘Pakistan’.

With families recovering from the floods, many drivers have no option but to do all they can to stay in work and scrape together some money, any money, to send home.

Many are working 16 hour days, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year and are dangerously tired. Mr G himself is perma-tired and age is taking its toll, he’s becoming forgetful to the point where we’re having to remind him of our destination several times on a journey. He has the road sense of a suicidal hedgehog and a predisposition to awful bouts of indecision that can reduce me (not a good passenger at the best of times) to feverish gibbering as we avoid the certain consequences by hare’s whiskers each time.

With my car 'in the shop', I took a taxi from the street. I tried to bear all of these iniquities in mind and be sympathetic to the stinking, surly Peshwari oaf who sullenly drove me into town, tutting and swearing all the time under his carious breath. As I sat on his filthy, stained seats and battled the urge to tell him to pull over and just get out of my life, I did find myself wondering quite how we ended up paying so much more for a new age of regulated, company-owned taxis that offer both the customers and the drivers so much less.

Dying

Sara's UssaNabulsiyeh blog does a much better job of describing this situation than I do, so here's a link to her post.

Little Ola will die unless she gets the operation she needs. You can donate funds by going over to the Palestinian Children's Relief Fund site linked here. They take PayPal (the PayPal donation page is simple and quick and linked here),  credit cards or even wire transfers. Do mention that your donation is 'for Ola' if you do manage to get over there and make a donation.

We'll be auctioning one of Gerald Donovan's highly popular GigaPan images tonight at GeekFest Dubai in aid of Ola's appeal - a 3' x 3' ultra-high resolution image of the Sheikh Zayed Mosque in Abu Dhabi. Although GeekFest is a resolutely not for charity event, sometimes you just have to do something.

 That's it really, there's little more to say.

More Geekery

As well as a diverse and somewhat eclectic array of gargantuan GeekTalks (a tasty treat to tantalise your tastebuds!) at GeekFest Dubai (The NOTGITEX Edition) this Thursday, there will in fact be a Beanbag Workshop given by none other than Abdulla AlSuwaidi (known to the police as @Aabo0), who'll be sharing tips on how to produce professional podcasts. Abdulla produces that UAE-centric You There, Speak! podcast and will be explaining the technical requirements of podcasting (hardware, software), looking how to get to grips with the popular Audacity podcasting software package and then how you sort out the business of uploading and promoting your podcastery.

In doing this, he'll actually be recording an episode of You There, Speak! at GeekFest, so this workshop's a chance to learn the ins and outs of podcasting and become world famous.

Don't forget, if the idea of world fame appeals to you, that Dubai TV are filming at GeekFest so do feel free to break out that really, really geeky T-shirt you've been waiting for a special occasion to wear.

We'll also be joined by the lovely folks from EWS WWF (Emirates Wildlife Society and the World Wildlife Fund) who will be talking turtles and the work they're doing to preserve turtle habitats and reverse the decline in turtle populations in the Gulf and Indian Oceans. They'll also be selling their 'adopt a turtle' packs for Dhs200 each for those that want to contribute to this work as well as looking for any minted corporates that want to do something worthwhile with all that CSR budget.

GeekFest Dubai (The NOTGITEX Edition) will take place on the 21st October 2010 at The Shelter in Al Quoz. You can do the Facebook thing or follow @GeekFestDubai on Twitter (or tap me up at @alexandermcnabb) for more information.

That's all for now folks!

We can confirm that no globally ranked technology exhibitions were harmed in the preparation of this GeekFest. 

When Things Go Right

Image by cambiodefractal via Flickr
I have been nice about Axa Insurance before. I did think then that I was tempting providence, but it looks like Axa has done a deal with providence and ironed the thing out, because nothing awful went wrong after I posted. Now, after two years, I feel the need to post again. It's wrong of me, I know, to be so delighted, because they have simply done what it says on the box. But in the kingdom of the blind, as we know, the one eyed man is a stitch in time.

Axa's call centre staff call back when they say they're going to. They don't end every call with that tired 'Is there anything else I can do to help you?'. They think. My query yesterday was not only met with a callback, it triggered a call from a member of another team who might be able to fix me up with a discount because he was working on a promotion they're doing on my car (Axa's doing cheapies for new Pajeros at Habtoor in Dubai, folks). The original call centre guy called me back 'just quickly' to check that the other team had, indeed, called me as he had promised.

They send you texts to let you know your policy's up. They renew over the 'phone. They send you the documents. Claims are handled by text and email. They think about stuff and give considered answers rather than blurting the first half-truth or supposition that comes into their heads. They are empowered.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is best practice. It's just a shame that it stands out in such stark relief from the rest of the customer service experiences on offer around here.

X Marks The Spot

Sheikh Zayed Road, Circa 1991

It used to be called GITE, you know. It was a one-hall show, dwarfed by the much more serious Saudi Computer. Carrington, of Spot On fame, used to run the thing and swore it would grow to  be bigger than Saudi Computer, which always had me hooting gleefully in disbelief. He got the last laugh, of course.

I can't remember when some bright spark added the X to make it GITEX, thereby saving the world from the awful SEO ramifications - everyone looking for French holiday homes being presented with a Dubai-based computer show rammed full of salesgeeks in suits.

GITEX is 30 years old this year, so it just begs for another 'I can remember when this was all sand' post. I didn't get to the show until 1988, although I had been travelling a lot to Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the region since 1986.

As I've said before, I met Mrs McNabb during that first GITEX trip. That weekend, we drove out together with friends into the depths of Wadi Hatta in our hire car, which was a reasonably crazy thing to do at the time (Honda Civics and steep, rutted gatch tracks aren't really matches made in heaven) although now, of course, the track is smooth black-top all the way. We got as far as Shuwaya and back, which is pretty mad.

I went on to Jordan from there, where my publisher was speaking at an IBM regional conference. The ad agency was presenting a new regional campaign which featured nighttime footage of the Dubai World Trade Centre with all its lights out except the IBM floor, and had the tag 'Because Machines Alone Are Not Enough'. This caused much distress among the assembled distributors as it had the word 'not' in it and everyone thought that was negative.

At the time, DWTC was a real icon - at 33 floors high it was the tallest building in the Middle East. Writer of 'fly-by' Middle East memoir Arabia through the looking glass Jonathan Raban once mistook it for the Hilton, which shows just how clueless tourists can be.

IBM's ad agency had spent tens of thousands of dollars using leading edge (ha!) digital technology to paint out the lights in the Trade Centre to leave just that one floor awake. I didn't make many friends by pointing out that next time they could pay me half what they'd blown on the digital stuff and I'd turn the lights off myself.
I had dealt with all of these disties for months as a journalist, listening to them bad-mouthing and generally doing each other down. In Jordan I watched, slack-jawed, as they all chummed up and socialised together, obviously the very best of pals. It taught me an important lesson about this strange part of the world that was already working itself under my skin so thoroughly that I'd end up making it my home.

For the gala dinner, we were bussed out to a remote castle (looking back on it, I think it must have been Ajloun) where old women were making koubiz in the light of blazing torches and we ate surrounded by ancient battlements.

I had taken lots of photos of this girl I had met, snapping away while we were in Hatta. I had them developed in Amman, only to find that I had loaded the film in the wrong way and the whole lot of them were blank. I was devastated.

A year later, again on a trip out from the UK for GITEX, I drove with her up to Sharjah gold souk where we bought the engagement ring.

I tell you, that show's got an awful lot to answer for...

GeekFest – The Not Gitex Edition

We’re rolling it back a little this GeekFest and not having so much stuff going on. You can try too hard, you know and I, for one, had stopped enjoying it because of the pressure to make all the new stuff happen. The whole idea is that stuff happens because it happens so we’re going back to that a little.

It nearly didn’t happen at all – Saadia Zahid has left The Shelter and I realised that the event was more about working with Saadia than it was working with The Shelter. Her successor, Oliver, has been great but it was with Saadia that the whole scheme was co-conceived and it just seems odd without her.

Strangely enough, it was the other GeekFests that provided the impetus to carry on: Beirut is being driven by Lilliane Assaf (@FunkyOzzi) and the Maniachi and they’re going for it again early November. Last week the first GeekFest Damascus took place and it looks like there might be another GeekFest Amman under new UNmanagement. One thing that is becoming clear is that there is no fixed schedule to GeekFests – they’re happening as they happen and most of the UNorganisers are simply too irresponsible to do things like fix dates in advance and stick to them. Which is fine, no?

I hope we’re going to have some amazing GeekFest news for you on the 21st October, which is when the cycle closes and we finish a year of GeekFests – the sixth bi-monthly Dubai event.
So what’s planned for this GeekFest Dubai?

GEEKTALKS

We’re going to try and squeeze in five GeekTalks. I know, I think it’s mad too, but if the speakers (and they’ll be the first if they do) stick to their 15 minute slots, we’ll be fine...

To Nablus by Cam
Blogger Sara has won numerous hearts with her delightful accounts of life as a volunteer teaching in Nablus. Her blog, UssaNabulsiyeh, instantly gained a wide readership that has grown steadily day by day. We’re going to talk to Sara over videochat and listen to what she’s made of the Nablus experience so far. If this works we’ll try and do other cam link-ups in future.

The GigaPan Man
Gerald Donovan’s videos of the Dubai fountains have gained him over two million views on YouTube, while his speeded up Dubai Metro video was hosted by Gizmodo and CNN. His GigaPixel images of Dubai have been similar smash hits. How does a man who seems to have the knack of ‘going viral’ view the phenomenon and what’s he going to get up to next? One answer is a stunning Gigapixel image of Abu Dhabi’s Sheikh Zayed mosque, unveiled especially for GeekFest!

New Music Nation
DJ RoneJaxx is one of a burgeoning band of Middle East based hip-hop artists who are finding a growing audience around the region as young people take to the musical form to find expression. With catchy tunes and smart videos, he’s a leading member of a regional scene that’s finding its feet – but does the Arab World need to ape US rap and hip-hop or does it need a musical identity of its own? And how is technology affecting artists with something to say and no deal with ‘the man’ to help them say it? (A name-check here to Hass, whose Re-Volt Radio hip hop blog led to us discovering Monsieur Jaxx!)

Where are we going to go now?
Needing no introduction, Yousef Tuqan Tuqan comes from a long line of computer nerds and is one of the most respected figures in the world of Web Development in the Middle East. Online agency Flip Media have carved a niche as the go-to guys for web stuff, from sites to apps – even if they command a premium in return for a ferocious reputation for quality work. So who better to ask where the Internet is actually going next? Yousef’s promised to tell us...

The New Entrepeneurialism
There’s more talk of innovation, funding and the like these days than ever before. There’s more concrete reality taking place as well, with funds like Jordan’s Oasis500 and angel investors popping up to support new online businesses. One of the team behind the amazingly successful, and arguably first, entrepreneurial event in the region, ArabNet, Samer Karam Founder and CEO of Seeqnce, the first startup catalyst in the Arab World, will be outlining some of the initiatives in the region that are driving a new wave of online entrepreneurship – taking from similarly risk averse cultures: their challenges, opportunities, threats, solutions.


GAMEFEST - POWERED BY LOCHALARCHADE

Popular gamer site LochalArchade will once again be bringing the best in mind-numbing violence and awful heart-rending action to GeekFest. The gamers have long been a feature of the event and have generally been well behaved, haven’t bitten too many people (only two Geeks have required rabies jabs in all the months we’ve been doing GeekFest Dubai) and have generally just confined themselves to ‘fragging’ each other.
GeekFest Dubai remains the only GeekFest with a strong gamer element and I’m not quite sure why, but the LochalArchade guys are going to be ramping it up this time around and getting jiggy with the multiplayer mayhem. We deny everything.


TECHNOCASESSamsung are all over this one. They’re demoing some amazing new stuff, bringing some people, doing some other things. There’s a really, really cool preview thingy going on (only slightly ruined by the fact that they pre-previewed it but, hell, that’s the technology biz – today’s preview is tomorrow’s discounted item) and the Samsung guys, as all present at last GeekFest Dubai would likely agree, ‘get it’ and are showing some cool things to those wot is interested and leaving the rest of us pretty much alone. Which is nice!
 
DA TELLY
Dubai TV are NOT filming tonight.

That’s all folks!
The Bean Bag Workshops idea was nice but takes too much organising. The ArtStuf is a lovely idea, but not enough artists are pushing themselves. Without the community jostling for a place, it’s not worth trying to ‘drive’ stuff. GeekFest is organic – if you want it, then you make it happen!


New Look
The tear-jerkingly talented Naeema Zarif has come up with yet another funky design for GeekFest as you'll see from the above. If you want to see more of her work, it's here.