I have known Nabil since we were kids. In fact, I once, as kids do, or at least did, threw a stone, which accidentally glanced off his head. As you can imagine, he was none too impressed and that night, probably because I felt bad, I fessed up to my mortified father, who marched me round to Nabil’s house to apologise.
It was a bad move. The next day, Nabil, who as kids do, had forgotten about the incident, told me that, instead of resolving the matter, his father later beat him for causing such a fuss.
Nabil and I still laugh about the incident and, though I doubt his late father’s belt had anything to do with it, he is a very unflappable man. Until it comes to football, that is. Once every two years, come the Fifa World Cup and European Championships, Nabil becomes rabid in his support for Germany’s national football team, and the prospect of his beloved mannschaft reaching yet another final on Sunday has left him positively foaming with excitement.
But Lebanon would not be Lebanon if there weren’t an added smidgen of anxiety in all this. You see, at the best of times, our village gets its evening power from 6pm to midnight on alternate nights. The World Cup semi-finals are scheduled to start at 11pm, so Nabil, who doesn’t have a generator, knows that unless Electricité du Liban is feeling generous, he will miss either the first or second half of the game with Brazil.
And EDL is not in a giving mood these days. The company has announced that it can no longer maintain it’s “regular” service, which in real speak is 21 hours a day in Beirut and around 10 to 15 hours a day elsewhere, depending on where you live. It needs an extra US$266 million to meet the extra demand created by the 1.5 million extra people we have welcomed from Syria and all those new homes built across the country during a rampant construction boom.
So how are we coping? Well, those who have them are making do with generators, private or communal, which of course creates an extra financial burden to end users. Generators are also hardly environmentally friendly but, more worryingly, at the communal end of the market they have become a semi-legitimate sector in their own right. (Indeed, one wonders what will happen to these now powerful cartels if and when — a very big “if” and an even bigger “when” — the country does fix its chronic power problem.
But they needn’t worry. The complacency of the state is staggering. The energy minister Arthur Nazarian, like his predecessors, is powerless to do anything meaningful, but he really shouldn’t have insulted our intelligence last week by casually prefixing a statement on the situation by saying “until we get 24-hour electricity”, as if Lebanon was experiencing a temporary blip rather than a quarter-century stain of shame on successive corrupt and inept governments.
But back to the football. I wrote that at the start of Brazil 2014 many Lebanese, my buddy Nabil included, were faced with the prospect of not being able to watch any of it, unless they signed up for a package from Sama, a local satellite provider that had the local broadcast rights.
Then, at the eleventh hour, the telecoms minister Butros Harb announced that his ministry had set aside $3 million from mobile telecom revenues to pay Sama for the right to air the games on Tele Liban, our unfashionable and underfunded state-run TV channel. It was a deal that, we thought, ensured that anyone with a TV could watch the global tournament free of charge.
But the next thing we knew was that Sama was suing TL for showing the games without permission. So what was the $3m for? It turns out, from what most of us can gather, that it was to allow Sama to distribute the rights to the many “grey” market satellite providers that serve about 75 per cent of the homes in the country.
Or looked at another way, the state used its money to perpetuate the livelihoods of what are essentially pirate operations. Talal Makdessi, a former advertising honcho and the current director general of TL, saw the insanity of the deal and is currently daring Sama to do its worst.
Meanwhile, back in the village, Nabil in his usual relaxed way has rationalised that he can’t change the madness that is Lebanon. He just wants to fire up his nightly shisha and watch a bit of football with his wife and kids. It’s not a lot to ask.
Michael Karam is a freelance journalist based in Beirut
Follow us on Twitter @Ind_Insights
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UAE v Gibraltar
What: International friendly
When: 7pm kick off
Where: Rugby Park, Dubai Sports City
Admission: Free
Online: The match will be broadcast live on Dubai Exiles’ Facebook page
UAE squad: Lucas Waddington (Dubai Exiles), Gio Fourie (Exiles), Craig Nutt (Abu Dhabi Harlequins), Phil Brady (Harlequins), Daniel Perry (Dubai Hurricanes), Esekaia Dranibota (Harlequins), Matt Mills (Exiles), Jaen Botes (Exiles), Kristian Stinson (Exiles), Murray Reason (Abu Dhabi Saracens), Dave Knight (Hurricanes), Ross Samson (Jebel Ali Dragons), DuRandt Gerber (Exiles), Saki Naisau (Dragons), Andrew Powell (Hurricanes), Emosi Vacanau (Harlequins), Niko Volavola (Dragons), Matt Richards (Dragons), Luke Stevenson (Harlequins), Josh Ives (Dubai Sports City Eagles), Sean Stevens (Saracens), Thinus Steyn (Exiles)
Company%20Profile
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COMPANY PROFILE
Founders: Alhaan Ahmed, Alyina Ahmed and Maximo Tettamanzi
Total funding: Self funded
The specs
Engine: 1.5-litre 4-cylinder petrol
Power: 154bhp
Torque: 250Nm
Transmission: 7-speed automatic with 8-speed sports option
Price: From Dh79,600
On sale: Now
Electoral College Victory
Trump has so far secured 295 Electoral College votes, according to the Associated Press, exceeding the 270 needed to win. Only Nevada and Arizona remain to be called, and both swing states are leaning Republican. Trump swept all five remaining swing states, North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, sealing his path to victory and giving him a strong mandate.
Popular Vote Tally
The count is ongoing, but Trump currently leads with nearly 51 per cent of the popular vote to Harris’s 47.6 per cent. Trump has over 72.2 million votes, while Harris trails with approximately 67.4 million.
Sui Dhaaga: Made in India
Director: Sharat Katariya
Starring: Varun Dhawan, Anushka Sharma, Raghubir Yadav
3.5/5
Ruwais timeline
1971 Abu Dhabi National Oil Company established
1980 Ruwais Housing Complex built, located 10 kilometres away from industrial plants
1982 120,000 bpd capacity Ruwais refinery complex officially inaugurated by the founder of the UAE Sheikh Zayed
1984 Second phase of Ruwais Housing Complex built. Today the 7,000-unit complex houses some 24,000 people.
1985 The refinery is expanded with the commissioning of a 27,000 b/d hydro cracker complex
2009 Plans announced to build $1.2 billion fertilizer plant in Ruwais, producing urea
2010 Adnoc awards $10bn contracts for expansion of Ruwais refinery, to double capacity from 415,000 bpd
2014 Ruwais 261-outlet shopping mall opens
2014 Production starts at newly expanded Ruwais refinery, providing jet fuel and diesel and allowing the UAE to be self-sufficient for petrol supplies
2014 Etihad Rail begins transportation of sulphur from Shah and Habshan to Ruwais for export
2017 Aldar Academies to operate Adnoc’s schools including in Ruwais from September. Eight schools operate in total within the housing complex.
2018 Adnoc announces plans to invest $3.1 billion on upgrading its Ruwais refinery
2018 NMC Healthcare selected to manage operations of Ruwais Hospital
2018 Adnoc announces new downstream strategy at event in Abu Dhabi on May 13
Source: The National
Quick pearls of wisdom
Focus on gratitude: And do so deeply, he says. “Think of one to three things a day that you’re grateful for. It needs to be specific, too, don’t just say ‘air.’ Really think about it. If you’re grateful for, say, what your parents have done for you, that will motivate you to do more for the world.”
Know how to fight: Shetty married his wife, Radhi, three years ago (he met her in a meditation class before he went off and became a monk). He says they’ve had to learn to respect each other’s “fighting styles” – he’s a talk it-out-immediately person, while she needs space to think. “When you’re having an argument, remember, it’s not you against each other. It’s both of you against the problem. When you win, they lose. If you’re on a team you have to win together.”
A timeline of the Historical Dictionary of the Arabic Language
- 2018: Formal work begins
- November 2021: First 17 volumes launched
- November 2022: Additional 19 volumes released
- October 2023: Another 31 volumes released
- November 2024: All 127 volumes completed
Results
2pm: Handicap (PA) Dh80,000 1,600m; Winner: AF Al Baher, Bernardo Pinheiro (jockey), Ernst Oertel (trainer).
2.30pm: Handicap (TB) Dh100,000 1,600m; Winner: Talento Puma, Xavier Ziani, Salem bin Ghadayer.
3pm: Handicap (TB) Dh90,000 1,950m; Winner: Tailor’s Row, Royston Ffrench, Salem bin Ghadayer.
3.30pm: Jebel Ali Stakes Listed (TB) Dh500,000 1,950m; Winner: Mark Of Approval, Patrick Cosgrave, Mahmood Hussain.
4pm: Conditions (TB) Dh125,000 1,400m; Winner: Dead-heat Raakez, Jim Crowley, Nicholas Bachalard/Attribution, Xavier Ziani, Salem bin Ghadayer.
4.30pm: Jebel Ali Sprint (TB) Dh500,000 1,000m; Winner: AlKaraama, Antonio Fresu, Musabah Al Muhairi.
5pm: Handicap (TB) Dh100,000 1,200m; Winner: Wafy, Richard Mullen, Satish Seemar.
5.30pm: Handicap (TB) Dh90,000 1,400m; Winner: Cachao, Tadhg O’Shea, Satish Seemar.
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COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding
THE SPECS
Engine: 3.5-litre supercharged V6
Power: 416hp at 7,000rpm
Torque: 410Nm at 3,500rpm
Transmission: 6-speed manual
Fuel consumption: 10.2 l/100km
Price: Dh375,000
On sale: now
The Case For Trump
By Victor Davis Hanson
Frankenstein in Baghdad
Ahmed Saadawi
Penguin Press
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UAE SQUAD
UAE team
1. Chris Jones-Griffiths 2. Gio Fourie 3. Craig Nutt 4. Daniel Perry 5. Isaac Porter 6. Matt Mills 7. Hamish Anderson 8. Jaen Botes 9. Barry Dwyer 10. Luke Stevenson (captain) 11. Sean Carey 12. Andrew Powell 13. Saki Naisau 14. Thinus Steyn 15. Matt Richards
Replacements
16. Lukas Waddington 17. Murray Reason 18. Ahmed Moosa 19. Stephen Ferguson 20. Sean Stevens 21. Ed Armitage 22. Kini Natuna 23. Majid Al Balooshi
Itcan profile
Founders: Mansour Althani and Abdullah Althani
Based: Business Bay, with offices in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and India
Sector: Technology, digital marketing and e-commerce
Size: 70 employees
Revenue: On track to make Dh100 million in revenue this year since its 2015 launch
Funding: Self-funded to date
The biog:
From: Wimbledon, London, UK
Education: Medical doctor
Hobbies: Travelling, meeting new people and cultures
Favourite animals: All of them
If you go
Where to stay: Courtyard by Marriott Titusville Kennedy Space Centre has unparalleled views of the Indian River. Alligators can be spotted from hotel room balconies, as can several rocket launch sites. The hotel also boasts cool space-themed decor.
When to go: Florida is best experienced during the winter months, from November to May, before the humidity kicks in.
How to get there: Emirates currently flies from Dubai to Orlando five times a week.
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