Grapeshisha News

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Toot Blogs

  • newFlickr – Refreshed
    A years late but never too late, Flickr has finally gotten a real make over, now it feels like Flickr loves pictures again. A lot of people have left Flickr, when it was the go to place for pictures in 2006/7/8 it fell back on the support for mobile…
    - 4 hours ago, 25 May 13, 7:51am -
  • newThree failed approaches to change the mindset of people
    Changing the mindset of people about something they already have an opinion about is not easy; it takes lots of money and time. Even for some businesses their well studied advertisements do not help when they try to promote something new. In many cas…
    - 6 hours ago, 25 May 13, 5:38am -
  • newOld Jeddah Souk
    Baskets colorful, every size, every color, every shape!  Available at the Turkish-Afghani souk in Old Jeddah.  CLICK HERE FOR A MAP to this souk where you can find baskets, carpets, furniture, clothing, handicrafts,jewelry, and many other tradition…
    - 8 hours ago, 25 May 13, 3:51am -
  • newFollow Up : Mohamed Ali Palace in Shubra El Kheima
    This is a follow up post for the Mohamed Ali Palace in Shubra El Kheima and what I wrote about earlier regarding the palace. Tweep @Ronna56 works in the ministry of culture and she told me on twitter that the engineers and experts in the ministry…
    - 9 hours ago, 25 May 13, 2:39am -
  • newYoda Theory
    At the fourth annual conference of the Project on Middle East Political Science here at GW, I was discussant for an outstanding paper which in part explored how and why protestors "broke the barrier of fear" in hyper-repressive states such as Syria…
    - 11 hours ago, 25 May 13, 12:09am -
  • newYoda Theory
    At the fourth annual conference of the Project on Middle East Political Science here at GW, I was discussant for an outstanding paper which in part explored how and why protestors "broke the barrier of fear" in hyper-repressive states such as Syria…
    - 11 hours ago, 25 May 13, 12:09am -
  • newCheck out this Fattouch!
    via reddit
    - 14 hours ago, 24 May 13, 9:54pm -
  • newUpdate on Carol/American Bedu
    Carol Fleming/American Bedu's condition is rapidly deteriorating. Please keep her in your thoughts and prayers as she leaves this world to join her beloved Abdullah.
    - 17 hours ago, 24 May 13, 6:20pm -
  • newSaudi Arabia’s Secret Cinema
    Cinema is forbidden in Saudi Arabia, The Secret Cinema initiative is a form of cultural and civil resistance.Saudi director Haifaa Al-Mansour (2nd from left) and young Saudi actress Waad Mohamed (2nd from right) are presented by Sheikh Mansour (lef…
    - 19 hours ago, 24 May 13, 4:07pm -
  • newSaudi Arabia’s Secret Cinema
    Cinema is forbidden in Saudi Arabia, The Secret Cinema initiative is a form of cultural and civil resistance.Saudi director Haifaa Al-Mansour (2nd from left) and young Saudi actress Waad Mohamed (2nd from right) are presented by Sheikh Mansour (lef…
    - 19 hours ago, 24 May 13, 4:07pm -

The Arabist

  • Art in Cairo
    The radio program The World just ran a piece I did on the Cairo arts scene and particularly on how artists are taking advantage of the current chaos/freedom to use public spaces they were barred from before and to connect with new audiences.The piece…
    - 3 days ago, 22 May 13, 1:44pm -
  • Rebels without a pause
    I just wrote something for the NYTimes' Latitude blog about the Tamarrud ("Rebel") campaign -- a petition calling for early presidential elections, which according to the youth groups behind it has gained 3 million signatures. In my piece I noted tha…
    - 3 days ago, 22 May 13, 11:07am -
  • Middle Eastern Telecom Accused of Working With Saudi Arabia to Spy on Citizens
    Our occasional contributor Paul Mutter has a piece on the Mobily hacking scandal with tons of links and analysis over at Tech President. We rarely get so much detail about Middle Eastern net censorship.Permalink
    - 4 days ago, 21 May 13, 6:38pm -
  • Qatar and Syria
    From an FT editorial:However, the Qataris’ intervention in Syria, while boosting the revolt against Assad, has also created confusion. The Saudis support the handful of secular rebel factions and Salafi groups fighting the Syrian regime. The Qatari…
    - 5 days ago, 20 May 13, 6:38am -
  • Syria’s chemical weapons: The other red line
    Mr Obama’s other red line—the passing of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) into the hands of jihadist terrorists—is, according to intelligence sources, in real and possibly imminent danger of being breached. According to these sources, the past…
    - 5 days ago, 20 May 13, 6:35am -
  • Egypt’s Hunt For Stolen Assets
    Ashraf Khalil cheated on us and took part in another podcast over at Farrah Halime's Rebel Economy blog. He joins The National's Bradley Hope to discuss the recovery of assets of the Mubaraks and their cronies, something they've both investigated. C…
    - 5 days ago, 20 May 13, 6:27am -
  • Still desecrating the memory of Mohammed al-Dura
    This NYT report by Isabel Kershner is titled "Israeli Report Casts New Doubts on Shooting in Gaza", but if it were another country one suspects it might be titled "Government report spins  boy's death as trial verdict looms". The Israeli government…
    - 5 days ago, 20 May 13, 6:06am -
  • Cairo Urban Initiatives Platform
    www.cuipcairo.org is a new website that acts as a central repository of information on events, initiatives, organizations and more that have to do with Cairo's built environment. Bookmark them, there's an events calendar function that has recently be…
    - 6 days ago, 19 May 13, 8:11pm -
  • Carrothers: Egypt’s Dismal Opposition: A Second Look
    Thomas Carrothers of Carnegie had a good piece on the over-dissing of Egypt's opposition:Overly harsh views of the Egyptian opposition—combined with a lack of recognition that many once-weak opposition actors in countries emerging from authoritaria…
    - 6 days ago, 19 May 13, 4:54pm -
  • Houdaiby: The Bureaucracy Wins
    Ibrahim Houdaiby writes on the "bureaucratization of Morsi" (I prefer to use "statification" to mean the same thing), the success with which the Egyptian state has imposed its rules on the Muslim Brotherhood rather than the reverse. But he makes an e…
    - 6 days ago, 19 May 13, 4:39pm -

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Life in Dubai

  • See you in Oz?
    Just about the final piece of the moving back jigsaw has fallen into place. The shipper has e-mailed to confirm that our stuff will be delivered the day after we arrive. That couldn't be better timing, just one night camping and then we'll have the…
    - 12 Aug 11, 2:12pm -
  • Last lap
    Less than a week before we fly back to Oz, Saturday morning in fact, so this really is the last lap.Everything's done, except packing the bags and we always leave that to the last minute.The online tracking system shows that the ship with our contai…
    - 8 Aug 11, 6:11pm -
  • Solutions drivel
    I've been letting a few examples of ridiculous corporate gobbledegook pass without comment, plus a few with the use of my hate word 'solutions'.But there's such a classic combination of the two in a Gulf News report this morning that I have to shar…
    - 4 Aug 11, 2:25pm -
  • Paperwork done
    The last items of paperwork for the move back to Oz are done now, cancelling the residence visas.My cancellation was easy - my sponsor did it. A bit more involved for Mrs Seabee's though, because I was her sponsor. And I'd had to pay a deposit of Dh…
    - 1 Aug 11, 3:04pm -
  • Traffic fines discount
    It seems that Dubai police are about to follow some other emirates and offer discounts on traffic offence fines.I'm struggling to understand how that will help to improve the standard of driving.Gulf News has the report here.
    - 31 Jul 11, 11:31am -

Fake Plastic Souks

  • The Cost Of Being An Expat
    (Photo credit: Wikipedia)First things first: I'm not complaining. We've lived here a long time because we like it here. I won't bore you with all our 'reasons to be cheerful' but suffice to say they are legion.But there's a report in today's Gulf New…
    - 2 days ago, 23 May 13, 11:37am -
  • Arabtec Strike - An Inconvenient Truth
    (Photo credit: Wikipedia)Dubai's largest construction company, Arabtec, has faced a relatively well co-ordinated labour dispute over the past few days, with UAE media reporting on the affair being somewhat patchy to say the least.Gulf News in its sto…
    - 3 days ago, 22 May 13, 11:34am -
  • Indian Lecturer Held By Dubai Police For Defamation
    (Photo credit: Wikipedia)Gulf News' Bassma Al Jandaly reports today on the case of an Indian university lecturer who has been held by Dubai police, while on a visit to the country, for defamation. Arrested on the 5th May, two weeks later he's still i…
    - 5 days ago, 20 May 13, 10:53am -
  • Careful What You Tweet For
     (Photo credit: Wikipedia)Gulf News today carries a roundup of recent cases of bloggers and tweeters in trouble around the Gulf and it's an extensive and growing list.Flagged as being 'with inputs from AFP', 60% of the story is lifted directly from…
    - 9 days ago, 16 May 13, 11:49am -
  • From Bangladesh To The UAE - Labour Conditions To Come Under The Microscope?
    (Photo credit: Wikipedia)It's not going to be long now before news media work out Bangladesh isn't the only place cheap clothes are being manufactured to stoke the insatiable appetite of the developed world's high streets. And the heat is most defini…
    - 10 days ago, 15 May 13, 11:13am -

The Emirates Economist

  • Stateless in the UAE; Bidoun
    Financial Times:In the UAE, the bidoun’s difficulties have surfaced in the curious case of the Comoros passports. At least a thousand stateless residents have taken the documents, says Zoubert A Soufiane Al Ahdal, Comoros ambassador to the UAE. …
    - 4 Jun 12, 10:02pm -
  • The Culture that is the UAE
    BlackBerry cuts made roads safer, police sayA dramatic fall in traffic accidents this week has been directly linked to the three-day disruption in BlackBerry services.In Dubai, traffic accidents fell 20 per cent from average rates on the days BlackBe…
    - 18 Oct 11, 6:21am -
  • WaPo covers wackynomics of Dubai
    Washington PostWhen its gasoline pumps started going dry in the United Arab Emirates’ poorer northern states earlier this year, Dubai’s oil company blamed mysterious service upgrades. Few believed that at the time, and now the company is dropping…
    - 17 Oct 11, 1:22am -
  • Paragraph of note
    In 2005, a company called CyberTrust—which has since been purchased by Verizon— gave Etisalat, the government-connected mobile company in the UAE, the right to verify that a site is valid. Here's why this is trouble: Since browsers now automatica…
    - 5 Sep 11, 6:47am -
  • Shouting in the Dark
    Al Jazeera's documentary on the Bahraini revolution can be seen here.
    - 6 Aug 11, 4:46pm -

Abu Dhabi Daily Photo

A Canadian in Abu Dhabi

ME Finance and Investment News

  • newKuwait: Joining the shale rush | Energy | Kuwait | Oxford Business Group
    "Kuwait has announced it is conducting studies into the viability of extracting shale gas from recently identified reserves, although any commercial operation will likely be many years off.Despite its extensive natural gas reserves – estimated to…
    - 12 hours ago, 24 May 13, 11:51pm -
  • newEurope's sclerosis: Sleepwalking to disaster

    - 16 hours ago, 24 May 13, 7:17pm -
  • newQatar ‘FDI outflow falls 29% in 2012’
    "The outward foreign direct investments (FDI) from Qatar fell 29%; while those from the Middle East and Africa (MEA) region grew 9% in 2012, according to fDi Report 2013.“Qatar saw a decrease in outward FDI in 2012, with FDI projects overseas fa…
    - 19 hours ago, 24 May 13, 4:29pm -
  • newDubai Hotels Struggle to Fill Jobs - NYTimes.com
    "Before graduating in June from Emirates Academy of Hospitality Management, a school in Dubai that is in academic association with the renowned École Hôtelière de Lausanne and part of the Jumeirah Group, Samuel Moult is busy filing applications to…
    - 21 hours ago, 24 May 13, 2:25pm -
  • newDubai's striking workers in their own words - Features - Al Jazeera English
    "A strike by low-wage workers at Arabtec - the construction giant building the Louvre museum in Abu Dhabi, a branch campus of New York University and a series of other megaprojects - has ended after police entered labour camps and immigration service…
    - 21 hours ago, 24 May 13, 2:22pm -