TUNIS // It was 9am at the office of Tunisia Live, a start-up Tunisian news website, and writer Rabii Kalboussi was halfway through his first story of the day. He was sitting at a table with five other writers, compiling news stories from other local media.
"My first story today ... is a conference on the electoral process," he said. "I read the article, then I translate from Arabic and reformulate it, considering the audience of Tunisia Live: the English-speaking world."
Kalboussi, 23, and his colleagues were young, inexperienced and operating on a shoestring budget. But fuelled by ample enthusiasm, they represented Tunisia's first generation of post-dictatorship journalists.
The brainchild of Zied Mhirsi, 33, a doctor-turned-media entrepreneur, and colleagues, Tunisia Live was the country's only news outlet offering local coverage in English to an international audience.
The fledgling enterprise needed investment, Mhirsi said. For now, a sideline in "fixing" - offering visiting foreign reporters assistance including translation, logistics and media consulting - provided cash while offering writers experience with seasoned journalists.
That business model was unthinkable under president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, whose removal in January ended decades of state censorship, coercion and corruption of media.
A fluent English-speaker, who spent four years studying and working at the University of Washington in Seattle, Mhirsi was swept up in a foreign media blitz on Tunisia that followed Mr Ben Ali's departure on January 14.
After weeks of helping foreign journalists get their bearings, Mhirsi and fellow fixers "realised that Tunisians weren't writing in English", he said. "I was sensitive to the issue of communicating in English because I'd always felt my country was isolated."
In April, Mhirsi launched Tunisia Live with co-founders Youssef Gaiji and Ramla Jaber.
Among the first recruits was Sadok Ayari, 26, who now sets the daily news agenda. Arriving each day at 7am, he scavenged the Tunisian press for articles to translate.
"For example, today's top story is on human-rights training for police," he said. "For years, they didn't even have a concept of human rights. Now they're getting a human-rights dimension. We're not used to that."
Meanwhile, Kalboussi polished off his article on the electoral process and begun pulling together news reports about Hizb Attahrir, a hard-line Islamist party.
"In the future I'd like to do what news agencies are doing," he said. "To call people, to attend conferences and events - to become a source of news."
Mhirsi was also looking forward to that day, he said. Tunisia Live's offices were decorated with inspirational sayings about journalism.
Beside the whiteboard where Mr Ayari writes the daily schedule was a quote from Burton Rascoe, a 20th-century American editor: "A news sense is really a sense of what is important, what is vital, what has colour and life - what people are interested in. That's journalism."
However, the most pressing need of Tunisia Live's 20-odd writers was practical experience, said Mhirsi.
"Skills in English, in writing, in learning to observe and analyse," he said. "They have a lot of passion, they put in a lot of hours, but they need proper training."
That need was met partly by fixing for foreign media.
"I began fixing even before I came here," said Asma Ghribi, 24, a graduate student in cultural studies who had worked for Al Jazeera English following the revolution. Since joining Tunisia Live in April, she has focused increasingly on original video reports, while continuing to fix for the foreign media who make up Tunisia Live's client base.
"When you're a fixer you have to obey and listen to what journalists want," she said. "Reporting for Tunisia Live, I'm my own master. This is the best part. You become aware of the privilege you have as a reporter."
Ghribi was seated at a table with Ayari and their colleague Malak Somai, 26, working out the trilingual text of a video urging viewers to vote on questions for a political interview show.
"Something imperative," Ayari said, as they tried out phrases in Tunisia's Arabic dialect. "How about, 'Choose the questions that you want to ask'?"
"No, that doesn't capture it," Ghribi said. "Try, 'Choose the questions you like'."
Finally they settled on, "Vote for the questions you like."
They fell to reminiscing about January 14. Ayari remembered a starry night - "A beautiful night for a revolution," he said.
For Mhirsi, Tunisia Live was positioned to document the effects of Tunisia's revolution - among them the burst of free expression that has made such enterprises possible.
However, it remained to be seen whether hard work and passion will translate to profitability.
"We're jumping into the unknown," Mhirsi said. "We're doing this as long as it can sustain itself. And if it can't, it will still have been a good adventure."
jthorne@thenational.ae
Farasan Boat: 128km Away from Anchorage
Director: Mowaffaq Alobaid
Stars: Abdulaziz Almadhi, Mohammed Al Akkasi, Ali Al Suhaibani
Rating: 4/5
The five pillars of Islam
1. Fasting
2. Prayer
3. Hajj
4. Shahada
5. Zakat
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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
Austrian Grand Prix race timings
Weekend schedule for Austrian Grand Prix - all timings UAE
Friday
Noon-1.30pm First practice
4-5.30pm Second practice
Saturday
1-2pm Final practice
4pm Qualifying
Sunday
4pm Austrian Grand Prix (71 laps)
Suggested picnic spots
Abu Dhabi
Umm Al Emarat Park
Yas Gateway Park
Delma Park
Al Bateen beach
Saadiyaat beach
The Corniche
Zayed Sports City
Dubai
Kite Beach
Zabeel Park
Al Nahda Pond Park
Mushrif Park
Safa Park
Al Mamzar Beach Park
Al Qudrah Lakes
How to protect yourself when air quality drops
Install an air filter in your home.
Close your windows and turn on the AC.
Shower or bath after being outside.
Wear a face mask.
Stay indoors when conditions are particularly poor.
If driving, turn your engine off when stationary.
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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Ticket prices
- Golden circle - Dh995
- Floor Standing - Dh495
- Lower Bowl Platinum - Dh95
- Lower Bowl premium - Dh795
- Lower Bowl Plus - Dh695
- Lower Bowl Standard- Dh595
- Upper Bowl Premium - Dh395
- Upper Bowl standard - Dh295
Why are you, you?
Why are you, you?
From this question, a new beginning.
From this question, a new destiny.
For you are a world, and a meeting of worlds.
Our dream is to unite that which has been
separated by history.
To return the many to the one.
A great story unites us all,
beyond colour and creed and gender.
The lightning flash of art
And the music of the heart.
We reflect all cultures, all ways.
We are a twenty first century wonder.
Universal ideals, visions of art and truth.
Now is the turning point of cultures and hopes.
Come with questions, leave with visions.
We are the link between the past and the future.
Here, through art, new possibilities are born. And
new answers are given wings.
Why are you, you?
Because we are mirrors of each other.
Because together we create new worlds.
Together we are more powerful than we know.
We connect, we inspire, we multiply illuminations
with the unique light of art.
Ben Okri,
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The specs
Engine: 2-litre or 3-litre 4Motion all-wheel-drive Power: 250Nm (2-litre); 340 (3-litre) Torque: 450Nm Transmission: 8-speed automatic Starting price: From Dh212,000 On sale: Now
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Squid Game season two
Director: Hwang Dong-hyuk
Stars: Lee Jung-jae, Wi Ha-joon and Lee Byung-hun
Rating: 4.5/5
UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The specs
Engine: Direct injection 4-cylinder 1.4-litre
Power: 150hp
Torque: 250Nm
Price: From Dh139,000
On sale: Now
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Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Almnssa
Started: August 2020
Founder: Areej Selmi
Based: Gaza
Sectors: Internet, e-commerce
Investments: Grants/private funding
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
BORDERLANDS
Starring: Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis
Director: Eli Roth
Rating: 0/5
COMPANY%20PROFILE
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In numbers
1,000 tonnes of waste collected daily:
- 800 tonnes converted into alternative fuel
- 150 tonnes to landfill
- 50 tonnes sold as scrap metal
800 tonnes of RDF replaces 500 tonnes of coal
Two conveyor lines treat more than 350,000 tonnes of waste per year
25 staff on site
Company%20Profile
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Company profile
Company: Rent Your Wardrobe
Date started: May 2021
Founder: Mamta Arora
Based: Dubai
Sector: Clothes rental subscription
Stage: Bootstrapped, self-funded
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.
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Earth under attack: Cosmic impacts throughout history
- 4.5 billion years ago: Mars-sized object smashes into the newly-formed Earth, creating debris that coalesces to form the Moon
- 66 million years ago: 10km-wide asteroid crashes into the Gulf of Mexico, wiping out over 70 per cent of living species – including the dinosaurs.
- 50,000 years ago: 50m-wide iron meteor crashes in Arizona with the violence of 10 megatonne hydrogen bomb, creating the famous 1.2km-wide Barringer Crater
- 1490: Meteor storm over Shansi Province, north-east China when large stones “fell like rain”, reportedly leading to thousands of deaths.
- 1908: 100-metre meteor from the Taurid Complex explodes near the Tunguska river in Siberia with the force of 1,000 Hiroshima-type bombs, devastating 2,000 square kilometres of forest.
- 1998: Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 breaks apart and crashes into Jupiter in series of impacts that would have annihilated life on Earth.
-2013: 10,000-tonne meteor burns up over the southern Urals region of Russia, releasing a pressure blast and flash that left over 1600 people injured.
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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.