It is impossible to know whether this post at Al-Emirati.com on the victims of the recent Air India disaster is intended to be some appalling attempt at humour or satire, but by every single measure it is absolutely beyond the pale:
Not really. Not only do I not care if the victims "rest in peace" but it seems to me that they are, rather, resting in pieces!
I am of course talking about flight IX 812 from Dubai to Balglapour (or some other hell hole, they're all the same) that recently crashed (click here)
I know I know. Mean, blah blah. The way I see it is as follows. The UAE is (about) 50% Indians, Something that I, and 90% of all other Emaratis see as a bad thing.
This plane, carrying Indians who live and work here, means that 160 indians that clog up the roads, cause accidents, fail code inspections at Indian restaurants, speak like this guy, and are a general drag on the security of the UAE, wont be coming back. That is a very GOOD thing!
I can only pray that this happens every week!
Sadly, we'll probably have 160 new VISAs for 160 new Indians issued in 3 hours... And the authority in charge of this will flaunt that, as if it's a good thing.
Take a look at a month-by-month list on where to go for the rest of the year, starting next month
Novo Cinemas, the innovative and award-winning movie theatre brand, has opened its state-of-the-art flagship location at IMG Worlds of Adventure in Dubai. [Wired by: DubaiCityGuide.com - A Cyber Gear Company]
Aaargh. We've had a couple of weeks of completely unexpected delay in the production of my wonderful novel. Firstly, I thought I had uploaded the files to the printer's website. There was no obvious way to verify this, so I emailed my 'client services representative', who ignored me for a few days and finally, after a whole wasted week, said the files had not been received by them, and explained the completely impossible-to-find way to find out what the situation is on their (absolutely bloody horrible) website. Marvlious.
So I uploaded the files again, and after a three-day wait the pre-flight crew in the US complained about 'multiple missing fonts'. We're talking about PDF files here, and standard practice when creaing PDFs is to embed any unusual fonts, but not to embed things like Arial or Times New Roman which are present on every PC and have direct equivalents on Macs, Linux boxes, etc. So these #$%#$^ in the US were quibbling about the absence of Arial and Times New Roman. Arial is actually used in the headers of the bookblock, but TNR appears nowhere. Anyhow, I had to produce and upload another file for the bookblock, and force the embedding of these common-as-muck fonts, and then wait another three days while they got around to opening it. Finally: two days ago the status was 'printing'. Yesterday, the status was 'shipped'.
Hopefully I will receive the proof copy tomorrow or the day after. If it's ok I can order the initial print run and fulfill the pre-orders that we have. So those of you who have not yet ordered your copy: the special offer of a full-colour map of Xanadu-du, signed by moi, still stands, but only until the point where the book goes into production. So get thee over to the Xanadu-du website and place thy order.
It is impossible to know whether this post at Al-Emirati.com on the victims of the recent Air India disaster is intended to be some appalling attempt at humour or satire, but by every single measure it is absolutely beyond the pale:
Not really. Not only do I not care if the victims "rest in peace" but it seems to me that they are, rather, resting in pieces!
I am of course talking about flight IX 812 from Dubai to Balglapour (or some other hell hole, they're all the same) that recently crashed (click here)
I know I know. Mean, blah blah. The way I see it is as follows. The UAE is (about) 50% Indians, Something that I, and 90% of all other Emaratis see as a bad thing.
This plane, carrying Indians who live and work here, means that 160 indians that clog up the roads, cause accidents, fail code inspections at Indian restaurants, speak like this guy, and are a general drag on the security of the UAE, wont be coming back. That is a very GOOD thing!
I can only pray that this happens every week!
Sadly, we'll probably have 160 new VISAs for 160 new Indians issued in 3 hours... And the authority in charge of this will flaunt that, as if it's a good thing.
Terrorist attacks on two mosques in New Zealand which left 49 people dead yesterday have sparked horror, sorrow and revulsion around the world. The mass shooting was evidence of a rising tide of violent anti-Muslim sentiment. The details of the attack...
Apparently the land that the Hard Rock Café stands on has been sold to somebody who wants to build a skyscraper, and we know how desperately Dubai needs more of those. So yet another Dubai landmark will be pulled down. There's a Facebook Group. As I remarked on there:
What a shock! I remember when HRC was first built, and I thought 'what a crap location'. Now it's in the heart of New Dubai. I think I left Dubai at the right time: the powers that be have no idea how to build a city: they only know how to build buildings (well, some of them know how to build buildings). But cities are about much more than the buildings that they are made of: they're about soul and culture and character. Dammit.
Anyone can join this group: I wouldn't expect it to make a difference, but it would be nice to think that the authorities do take a bit of notice. Not that the evidence bears this out, of course: the Exiles and Country Club gone, Satwa and Safa Park under threat. Surely there must come a point where you stop throwing away the good stuff that you have and replacing it with tacky and soulless rubbish? Oh, sorry, this is Dubai.
US Special Representative Zalmay Khalilzad accused by Afghan official of not 'knowing how to negotiate' with Taliban.
Tesla introduced a new electric sports utility vehicle slightly bigger and more expensive than its Model 3, pitched as More...
It is impossible to know whether this post at Al-Emirati.com on the victims of the recent Air India disaster is intended to be some appalling attempt at humour or satire, but by every single measure it is absolutely beyond the pale:
Not really. Not only do I not care if the victims "rest in peace" but it seems to me that they are, rather, resting in pieces!
I am of course talking about flight IX 812 from Dubai to Balglapour (or some other hell hole, they're all the same) that recently crashed (click here)
I know I know. Mean, blah blah. The way I see it is as follows. The UAE is (about) 50% Indians, Something that I, and 90% of all other Emaratis see as a bad thing.
This plane, carrying Indians who live and work here, means that 160 indians that clog up the roads, cause accidents, fail code inspections at Indian restaurants, speak like this guy, and are a general drag on the security of the UAE, wont be coming back. That is a very GOOD thing!
I can only pray that this happens every week!
Sadly, we'll probably have 160 new VISAs for 160 new Indians issued in 3 hours... And the authority in charge of this will flaunt that, as if it's a good thing.
The UAE has condemned the mass shooting at two Christchurch mosques, in New Zealand, which left a number of people dead More...
I know most of you are desperate to know about the progress of my novel, Travels in Xanadu-du. Not least because some of you have actually paid good, hard cash money to get a hold of a copy. Only a month late, I am pleased to announce that it is shipping! Not without glitches, of course. Life would be so boring if everything went to plan, now wouldn't it? The plan was that the printers would make a big pile of books. The bulk of these would be shipped to Liverpool where my publisher is based, and ten copies would be delivered to me in sunny Madrid to do with whatever I like. Hmm. Some bugger got it wrong. The doorbell rang at about noon today, and the nice (but sweaty) young man from UPS delivered box upon box of books into our micro-piso (if you've been following the plot, you'll know that we live in the world's smallest flat, but we love it because it's right in the middle of Madrid).
I've seen my name in print many times. But to stack up a bunch of books like this, well; it's a bit unusual.
So, I spent the afternoon printing shipping notes and address labels, printing and signing maps of Xanadu-du, signing the books themselves, and then packing up the pre-ordered books and taking them to the Post Office to wave goodbye to them. Please take note: no author that you've ever heard of went to such great lengths to keep his punters happy!
Actually, this cock-up didn't work out too badly: we saved a good old British pound on postage to the UAE. But we gained an extra one on postage to the UK.
Until the current stock is exhausted, you can get your book signed and personally taken to the Post Office by the author, and a signed colour map if I feel like it. So get on over to Xanadu-du, and place your order NOW!!!
I love you all.
Staff and students say new campus lacks safeguards against strict local laws
Staff and students at the University of Birmingham have warned that LGBT rights are not adequately protected at its new campus in Dubai where being gay or transgender risks imprisonment, flogging and execution.
They have called on the university to make clear what safeguards staff and students have in the Gulf emirate given that same-sex behaviour, identifying as transgender, and LGBT advocacy are illegal on the campus, which is classified as a public space subject to Dubai laws.
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