SYDNEY // Australia's oldest museum has invited schoolchildren to a giant sleepover at its new dinosaur exhibition, where the prehistoric world has been brought to life in an array of skeletons, life-size models, skulls, teeth and claws as well as hundreds of fossils and interactive displays.
The Australian Museum in Sydney, founded in 1827, is giving youngsters the chance to camp among the stars of a lost age, including the armour-plated stegosaurus; the "tyrant lizard" tyrannosaurus rex; the 228-million-year-old eoraptor; the bird-like bambiraptor and the incredible jobaria, a monstrous plant eater that was 22 metres long.
"They are colossal and make us feel really small," observed Eugene Gibson, 13.
His friend, Hector Titterton, also 13, had been eagerly anticipating his night with some of the most ferocious creatures the earth has ever seen. "I know that dinosaurs were around a long time ago," Hector said. "They controlled everything and the carnivores were the main species."
As he prepared his sleeping bag beneath a full-sized model of a meat-eating afrovenator, Alfie, 10, had something of a troubled look as he stared up at rows of savage flesh-tearing teeth."Sleeping out here will be scary," he said quietly.
His aunt, Fleur Dickinson, from Sydney, was not expecting to get much sleep in a spacious hall crammed with excitable children and weary adults but said that a bit of fatigue was a price worth paying. "I'm always looking for interesting and fun things for them to do and I really like dinosaurs." she said.
The so-called "Dinosnore" nights at the Australian Museum have been a marketing success and have encouraged children to take an interest in science and history.
"We do get a lot of kids coming in who do want to be palaeontologists," said Fran Dorey, the co-ordinator of the dinosaur exhibition, who, like many young visitors, found herself captivated by this ancient world.
"I was one of those dinosaur nerd kids," she said.
One of the young "Dinosnore" participants, Tristan Levanic, has a similarly precocious interest.
"I do know that there was the Jurassic, Triassic and Cretaceous periods," the nine-year-old said. "All of those periods had different dinosaurs."
The Sydney exhibition charts the dinosaurs' journey through many millions of years as they evolved through the Triassic period, became more diverse in the Jurassic period before fading into extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period.
"Actually, from a scientific point of view, dinosaurs are still alive today. Birds are now classified as a type of dinosaur," said Ms Dorey, who studied archaeology and palaeontology.
The superstar of the big dinosaur sleepover was a large plant-eating beast, muttaburrasaurus - or rather a life-sized puppet of a juvenile that once lived in open woodlands and probably travelled in a herd.
Museum staff can operate the life-like 30kg model that can walk, move its arms, open its mouth and growl.
"The kids absolutely love it," Ms Dorey said. "And even when they see your legs out the bottom, you still get some of them thinking it is real."
The night at the museum lured about 85 children and adults. There was pizza and cake, as well as arts and crafts and a torchlight trip around other exhibits that drew regular squeals of delight and fright.
"Everyone wants to sleep with the dinosaurs, which are still these mystical, magical things. They're just exciting," said Kate Murray, the event organiser, as swarms of eager children rushed past chasing a clearly exhausted muttaburrasaurus.
John Steer had travelled with his family from Port Macquarie and said the five-hour drive was well worth it.
"I think part of the appeal for them is the mystery of it that these great big creatures roamed around and that they were so much bigger than the fauna we see now and why did they die out? I think to capture their imagination is the key to learning."
As the evening wore on, there were few signs that the younger brigade was tiring. Kimberly Tonkin, seven, was keen to stay up as long as possible. But did she find the muttaburrasaurus puppet scary?
"Not really," she said casually. "It's a herbivore and it's playful and sometimes it walks on two legs, sometimes it walks on four legs and it's very big for just a baby dinosaur."
Her mother, Karen Kwok, was equally enthralled, proving perhaps that the grown-ups were just as keen as their youngsters to experience this nocturnal treat.
"I think I'm more excited than my daughter," Mrs Kwok said.
As proceedings drew to a close, the crowd settled down to watch a movie. It was an appropriate choice, the 2006 film Night at the Museum that starred Ben Stiller and Dick Van Dyke.
pmercer@thenational.ae
Mia Man’s tips for fermentation
- Start with a simple recipe such as yogurt or sauerkraut
- Keep your hands and kitchen tools clean. Sanitize knives, cutting boards, tongs and storage jars with boiling water before you start.
- Mold is bad: the colour pink is a sign of mold. If yogurt turns pink as it ferments, you need to discard it and start again. For kraut, if you remove the top leaves and see any sign of mold, you should discard the batch.
- Always use clean, closed, airtight lids and containers such as mason jars when fermenting yogurt and kraut. Keep the lid closed to prevent insects and contaminants from getting in.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Volunteers offer workers a lifeline
Community volunteers have swung into action delivering food packages and toiletries to the men.
When provisions are distributed, the men line up in long queues for packets of rice, flour, sugar, salt, pulses, milk, biscuits, shaving kits, soap and telecom cards.
Volunteers from St Mary’s Catholic Church said some workers came to the church to pray for their families and ask for assistance.
Boxes packed with essential food items were distributed to workers in the Dubai Investments Park and Ras Al Khaimah camps last week. Workers at the Sonapur camp asked for Dh1,600 towards their gas bill.
“Especially in this year of tolerance we consider ourselves privileged to be able to lend a helping hand to our needy brothers in the Actco camp," Father Lennie Connully, parish priest of St Mary’s.
Workers spoke of their helplessness, seeing children’s marriages cancelled because of lack of money going home. Others told of their misery of being unable to return home when a parent died.
“More than daily food, they are worried about not sending money home for their family,” said Kusum Dutta, a volunteer who works with the Indian consulate.
The specs: 2017 Porsche 718 Cayman
Price, base / as tested Dh222,500 / Dh296,870
Engine 2.0L, flat four-cylinder
Transmission Seven-speed PDK
Power 300hp @ 6,500rpm
Torque 380hp @ 1,950rpm
Fuel economy, combined 6.9L / 100km
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Company profile
Company: Verity
Date started: May 2021
Founders: Kamal Al-Samarrai, Dina Shoman and Omar Al Sharif
Based: Dubai
Sector: FinTech
Size: four team members
Stage: Intially bootstrapped but recently closed its first pre-seed round of $800,000
Investors: Wamda, VentureSouq, Beyond Capital and regional angel investors
MATCH RESULT
Liverpool 4 Brighton and Hove Albion 0
Liverpool: Salah (26'), Lovren (40'), Solanke (53'), Robertson (85')
Petrarch: Everywhere a Wanderer
Christopher Celenza,
Reaktion Books
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%20name%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Revibe%20%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202022%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounders%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Hamza%20Iraqui%20and%20Abdessamad%20Ben%20Zakour%20%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20UAE%20%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Refurbished%20electronics%20%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunds%20raised%20so%20far%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%2410m%20%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EFlat6Labs%2C%20Resonance%20and%20various%20others%0D%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Brief scores:
Liverpool 3
Mane 24', Shaqiri 73', 80'
Manchester United 1
Lingard 33'
Man of the Match: Fabinho (Liverpool)
Formula Middle East Calendar (Formula Regional and Formula 4)
Round 1: January 17-19, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 2: January 22-23, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 3: February 7-9, Dubai Autodrome – Dubai
Round 4: February 14-16, Yas Marina Circuit – Abu Dhabi
Round 5: February 25-27, Jeddah Corniche Circuit – Saudi Arabia
More coverage from the Future Forum
The Good Liar
Starring: Helen Mirren, Ian McKellen
Directed by: Bill Condon
Three out of five stars
A State of Passion
Directors: Carol Mansour and Muna Khalidi
Stars: Dr Ghassan Abu-Sittah
Rating: 4/5
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)
RESULT
RS Leipzig 3
Marcel Sabitzer 10', 21'
Emil Forsberg 87'
Tottenham 0
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
The%20specs
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EEngine%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E2.3-litre%204cyl%20turbo%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EPower%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E299hp%20at%205%2C500rpm%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETorque%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E420Nm%20at%202%2C750rpm%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETransmission%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E10-speed%20auto%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFuel%20consumption%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E12.4L%2F100km%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EOn%20sale%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ENow%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EPrice%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EFrom%20Dh157%2C395%20(XLS)%3B%20Dh199%2C395%20(Limited)%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Company profile
Date started: Founded in May 2017 and operational since April 2018
Founders: co-founder and chief executive, Doaa Aref; Dr Rasha Rady, co-founder and chief operating officer.
Based: Cairo, Egypt
Sector: Health-tech
Size: 22 employees
Funding: Seed funding
Investors: Flat6labs, 500 Falcons, three angel investors
The biog
Name: Gul Raziq
From: Charsadda, Pakistan
Family: Wife and six children
Favourite holes at Al Ghazal: 15 and 8
Golf Handicap: 6
Childhood sport: cricket
