Tens of thousands of people will flock to Expo 2020 Dubai this weekend as the countdown continues until the world fair's finale at the end of the month.
With maps in hand, tourists and residents alike will be exploring the site in search of another memorable Expo experience.
They can expect big queues at some of the event's most popular pavilions, such as Japan, Germany and Saudi Arabia, but with a whole world to explore there are plenty of other top attractions on show.
I have found new places to visit. It made me step back and think about things we take for granted, like water and greenery
Andrea Novakova,
Czech tourist
Intriguing offerings include the Hungarian pavilion that has water as its theme but has not used water in any exhibit.
A white-tiled laboratory in the Morocco pavilion is lined with dried plant extracts that promise a cure for everything from insect bites to eye infections.
The fun educational content in the Dubai Cares pavilion literally has children and adults yelling for more.
Andrea Novakova, a Czech tourist, said the pavilions made her think and want to travel more.
“I have found new places I want to visit. It’s also made me step back and think about things we take for granted, like water and greenery,” she said.
Here are five unmissable pavilions to see before Expo ends on March 31.
Morocco’s Instagram moments
The facade of the stacked rectangular block structure is built entirely of earth to depict mud-bricked homes in villages.
A sloping path links the interior exhibition spaces and people start the tour at the top of the building, making their way to the ground.
A room with a huge, slow-spinning chandelier provides one of many Instagrammable moments.
Visitors wait patiently in different corners of the room to capture the patterns the light throws on the walls and floor.
In a section on plant power, glass bottled jars of medicinal extracts detail the uses to treat ailments from pulmonary complications to arthritis.
Visitors are in for a surprise when they train their phone on a large, seemingly static artwork and the map of Africa emerges on long wooden lines.
Wave your hand over sensors in a room packed with intricate, hand-carved doors and watch each door open with details about the country’s solar plants and plans to boost energy production from renewable resources.
Hungary’s water of life
The pavilion aims to make a splash without using a single drop of water.
Instead, a continuous flowing stream of blue light winds across the floor to evoke water.
“You will have the feeling of water without water anywhere in the pavilion,” a guide said.
The landlocked country treasures its natural resource and this decision is part of its sustainability goals.
Before you take the stairs to start your tour, trail your fingers across walls blanketed with interactive moving images of water.
The walls ripple, splash and turn into waves, reacting to the movement of your hands.
Using technology and immersive experiences, the installations recreate thermal water lakes that stay warm through the winter.
Visitors learn about salt chambers, water caves, saunas and spas used by athletes for recovery, patients for physiotherapy, skin conditions and respiratory disorders.
A large ball pit under a darkened dome at the end of the tour is a favourite with adults joining children as the screen lights up with bubbles.
Finally, you can taste the mineral-rich water. Check if you can spot the difference between three kinds of liquid that vow to soothe frown lines, smooth your hair and settle your digestive tract.
A shout out for Dubai Cares
You are in for a treat with creative displays that show the path of education in the future.
Strap on virtual reality sets that allow you to drop the heart, kidneys, lungs and brains into the correct cavities in a 3D skeleton or soar over the Expo site.
A big hit with mothers and children is a cubicle in which you can scream your heart – or lungs – out.
Here children are not shushed when they shout.
Instead attendants encourage them to shout and a meter lights up the louder they yell inside an enclosed booth.
Well-crafted video messages tell the audience of the organisation’s goal of education as a building block and how funding has helped to provide a brighter future for children in countries around the world.
Enoc powers up
A helpful signboard logs the experience time as 11 minutes, with 18 people allowed inside a steel and aluminium structure that asks visitors to "reimagine energy".
Rooms come alive with vivid illustrations to show how the Dubai-based Emirates National Oil Company powers the city.
In one room, models of buildings, schools, the airport, planes and cars light up as people wave their hands over more than 30 panels on the wall.
In another space, when the audience moves the cursor on a computer screen, a central tower shoots out swirls of light that follow the movement of people standing directly in front of it.
The company aims to show how each person has a personal connection with the energy they consume.
A quick tour takes visitors through a turbo-charged description of what is energy, the connections it creates and the promise it holds for the future.
Magical Peru
From the moment you step inside the eye-catching, textile-cloaked pavilion and on to a handwoven rope bridge, the country invites you on a magical journey through rugged terrain.
You will learn more about age-old ruins of the Inca empire and watch panoramic footage of snow-capped Andes mountains.
Short lessons are shared on how more than 2,500 varieties of quinoa originate in the Andes and superfoods such as purple corn are ground and boiled to create a drink filled with antioxidants.
The visually-rich site takes visitors past tall panels showing majestic waterfalls.
Walk past images of lush rainforests where jaguars and giant anacondas lurk. It is also home to endangered turtles and bright-coloured macaws that have tourists reaching for their cameras.
In the final room guests are invited to dance around a symbolic tree decorated with ribbons as part of an age-old ritual.
NBA FINALS SO FAR
(Toronto lead 3-2 in best-of-seven series)
Game 1 Raptors 118 Warriors 109
Game 2 Raptors 104 Warriors 109
Game 3 Warriors 109 Raptors 123
Game 4 Warriors 92 Raptors 105
Game 5 Raptors 105 Warriors 106
Game 6 Thursday, at Oakland
Game 7 Sunday, at Toronto (if needed)
Desert Warrior
Starring: Anthony Mackie, Aiysha Hart, Ben Kingsley
Director: Rupert Wyatt
Rating: 3/5
Squads
India (for first three ODIs) Kohli (capt), Rohit, Rahul, Pandey, Jadhav, Rahane, Dhoni, Pandya, Axar, Kuldeep, Chahal, Bumrah, Bhuvneshwar, Umesh, Shami.
Australia Smith (capt), Warner, Agar, Cartwright, Coulter-Nile, Cummins, Faulkner, Finch, Head, Maxwell, Richardson, Stoinis, Wade, Zampa.
Sreesanth's India bowling career
Tests 27, Wickets 87, Average 37.59, Best 5-40
ODIs 53, Wickets 75, Average 33.44, Best 6-55
T20Is 10, Wickets 7, Average 41.14, Best 2-12
The Florida Project
Director: Sean Baker
Starring: Bria Vinaite, Brooklynn Prince, Willem Dafoe
Four stars
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Golden Shoe top five (as of March 1):
Harry Kane, Tottenham, Premier League, 24 goals, 48 points
Edinson Cavani, PSG, Ligue 1, 24 goals, 48 points
Ciro Immobile, Lazio, Serie A, 23 goals, 46 points
Mohamed Salah, Liverpool, Premier League, 23 goals, 46 points
Lionel Messi, Barcelona, La Liga, 22 goals, 44 points
Race%20card
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Another way to earn air miles
In addition to the Emirates and Etihad programmes, there is the Air Miles Middle East card, which offers members the ability to choose any airline, has no black-out dates and no restrictions on seat availability. Air Miles is linked up to HSBC credit cards and can also be earned through retail partners such as Spinneys, Sharaf DG and The Toy Store.
An Emirates Dubai-London round-trip ticket costs 180,000 miles on the Air Miles website. But customers earn these ‘miles’ at a much faster rate than airline miles. Adidas offers two air miles per Dh1 spent. Air Miles has partnerships with websites as well, so booking.com and agoda.com offer three miles per Dh1 spent.
“If you use your HSBC credit card when shopping at our partners, you are able to earn Air Miles twice which will mean you can get that flight reward faster and for less spend,” says Paul Lacey, the managing director for Europe, Middle East and India for Aimia, which owns and operates Air Miles Middle East.
UK’s AI plan
- AI ambassadors such as MIT economist Simon Johnson, Monzo cofounder Tom Blomfield and Google DeepMind’s Raia Hadsell
- £10bn AI growth zone in South Wales to create 5,000 jobs
- £100m of government support for startups building AI hardware products
- £250m to train new AI models
Dunki
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THE BIO
Bio Box
Role Model: Sheikh Zayed, God bless his soul
Favorite book: Zayed Biography of the leader
Favorite quote: To be or not to be, that is the question, from William Shakespeare's Hamlet
Favorite food: seafood
Favorite place to travel: Lebanon
Favorite movie: Braveheart
The%C2%A0specs%20
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The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
The struggle is on for active managers
David Einhorn closed out 2018 with his biggest annual loss ever for the 22-year-old Greenlight Capital.
The firm’s main hedge fund fell 9 per cent in December, extending this year’s decline to 34 percent, according to an investor update viewed by Bloomberg.
Greenlight posted some of the industry’s best returns in its early years, but has stumbled since losing more than 20 per cent in 2015.
Other value-investing managers have also struggled, as a decade of historically low interest rates and the rise of passive investing and quant trading pushed growth stocks past their inexpensive brethren. Three Bays Capital and SPO Partners & Co., which sought to make wagers on undervalued stocks, closed in 2018. Mr Einhorn has repeatedly expressed his frustration with the poor performance this year, while remaining steadfast in his commitment to value investing.
Greenlight, which posted gains only in May and October, underperformed both the broader market and its peers in 2018. The S&P 500 Index dropped 4.4 per cent, including dividends, while the HFRX Global Hedge Fund Index, an early indicator of industry performance, fell 7 per cent through December. 28.
At the start of the year, Greenlight managed $6.3 billion in assets, according to a regulatory filing. By May, the firm was down to $5.5bn.
Company info
Company name: Entrupy
Co-founders: Vidyuth Srinivasan, co-founder/chief executive, Ashlesh Sharma, co-founder/chief technology officer, Lakshmi Subramanian, co-founder/chief scientist
Based: New York, New York
Sector/About: Entrupy is a hardware-enabled SaaS company whose mission is to protect businesses, borders and consumers from transactions involving counterfeit goods.
Initial investment/Investors: Entrupy secured a $2.6m Series A funding round in 2017. The round was led by Tokyo-based Digital Garage and Daiwa Securities Group's jointly established venture arm, DG Lab Fund I Investment Limited Partnership, along with Zach Coelius.
Total customers: Entrupy’s customers include hundreds of secondary resellers, marketplaces and other retail organisations around the world. They are also testing with shipping companies as well as customs agencies to stop fake items from reaching the market in the first place.
The Details
Kabir Singh
Produced by: Cinestaan Studios, T-Series
Directed by: Sandeep Reddy Vanga
Starring: Shahid Kapoor, Kiara Advani, Suresh Oberoi, Soham Majumdar, Arjun Pahwa
Rating: 2.5/5
ENGLAND TEAM
Alastair Cook, Mark Stoneman, James Vince, Joe Root (captain), Dawid Malan, Jonny Bairstow, Moeen Ali, Chris Woakes, Craig Overton, Stuart Broad, James Anderson
Timeline
2012-2015
The company offers payments/bribes to win key contracts in the Middle East
May 2017
The UK SFO officially opens investigation into Petrofac’s use of agents, corruption, and potential bribery to secure contracts
September 2021
Petrofac pleads guilty to seven counts of failing to prevent bribery under the UK Bribery Act
October 2021
Court fines Petrofac £77 million for bribery. Former executive receives a two-year suspended sentence
December 2024
Petrofac enters into comprehensive restructuring to strengthen the financial position of the group
May 2025
The High Court of England and Wales approves the company’s restructuring plan
July 2025
The Court of Appeal issues a judgment challenging parts of the restructuring plan
August 2025
Petrofac issues a business update to execute the restructuring and confirms it will appeal the Court of Appeal decision
October 2025
Petrofac loses a major TenneT offshore wind contract worth €13 billion. Holding company files for administration in the UK. Petrofac delisted from the London Stock Exchange
November 2025
180 Petrofac employees laid off in the UAE
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Spare
Profile
Company name: Spare
Started: March 2018
Co-founders: Dalal Alrayes and Saurabh Shah
Based: UAE
Sector: FinTech
Investment: Own savings. Going for first round of fund-raising in March 2019
Awar Qalb
Director: Jamal Salem
Starring: Abdulla Zaid, Joma Ali, Neven Madi and Khadija Sleiman
Two stars
