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EDITOR’S LETTER

S
omeone once said that if the world is a
book, those who don’t travel have only
read the first page. That’s a sentiment
we subscribe to here at Open Skies,
where we aim to bring you the best of
the world — the best writers, designers, photographers
and artists. And as with the rest of the inflight
experience, quality is everything.
Of course, for us mere mortals, the wonder of flight
is that it is possible at all. For others, flight is a physics
equation, albeit one that brings them closer to the heavens. One
such man is Mike Mullane, an astronaut who has spent — in total
— almost two weeks in space. In In The Shadow of the Space Shuttle,
his daughter Laura recounts what is was like to have a parent ride a rocket
ship into the sky. Closer to Earth, Chuck Thompson wonders if the era of the
expatriate is over — with smart-phones, Skype and Doritos now a
global phenomenon, has the expatriate experience lost much of its lustre?
You will, hopefully, have noticed a literary theme to this month’s issue,
unsurprisingly, given March sees the Emirates Airline International
Festival of Literature taking place in Dubai from March 8 to 12. We take a
look at the current state of Arab literature, and our literary theme continues
as we trace Ernest Hemingway’s footsteps through Paris.
We are also proud of our cover – a specially commissioned
piece by the Iranian artist, Reza Abedini. His work is striking,
thoughtful and original, all the things we hope to be each issue.
Emirates has been flying people to some of the world’s most exciting places
for more than a quarter of a century. We aim to celebrate these places in
every issue. Travel is still exciting, discovery will never grow old, and if the
world is a book, then it is one with an infinite amount of pages. Enjoy the ride.

CONOR@OPENSKIESMAGAZINE.COM

Emirates takes care to ensure that all facts published herein are correct. In the event of any
inaccuracy please contact The Editor. Any opinion expressed is the honest belief of the
author based on all available facts. Comments and facts should not be relied upon by the
reader in taking commercial, legal, financial or other decisions. Articles are by their nature
general and specialist advice should always be consulted before any actions are taken.
PO Box 2331, Dubai, UAE Telephone: (+971 4) 282 4060
Fax:(+971 4) 282 4436 Email: emirates@motivate.ae
84,649
COPIES
Promoting
Printed by Emirates Printing Press, Dubai, UAE Sustainable Forestry
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Obaid Humaid Al Tayer GROUP EDITOR & MANAGING PARTNER Ian Fairservice GROUP SENIOR EDITOR(JOB+PIOTPOş
gina@motivate.ae SENIOR EDITOR .BSL&WBOTşNBSLF!NPUJWBUFBF EDITOR$POPS1VSDFMMşDPOPS!NPUJWBUFBF SENIOR ART DIRECTOR
5JB4FJGFSUşUJB!NPUJWBUFBF CHIEF SUB EDITOR *BJO4NJUIşJBJOT!NPUJWBUFBFGENERAL MANAGER PRODUCTION & CIRCULATION
S Sasidharan PRODUCTION MANAGER C Sudhakar GENERAL MANAGER, GROUP SALES"OUIPOZ.JMOFşBOUIPOZ!NPUJWBUFBF BUSINESS
DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Nicola Hudson nicola@motivate.ae SENIOR ADVERTISEMENT MANAGER Jaya Balakrishnan jaya@motivate ae;
DEPUTY ADVERTISEMENT MANAGER Murali Narayanan ADVERTISEMENT MANAGER Shruti Srivastava EDITORIAL CONSULTANTS FOR
EMIRATES: Editor: Siobhan Bardet Arabic Editor: Hatem Omar Deputy Editor: Stephanie Byrne Website ş emirates.com.
CONTRIBUTORS: Jason Rezaian, Stefanie Posavec, Fabienne Dupuis, Richard Luck, Neil Andrew, Wael-Al Sayegh, Gemma Correll, Phil Oh,
Pedro Kok, Nour Samaha, James Montague, Chuck Thompson, Laura Mullane, Mark Tungate, Pico Iyer, Mark Twain, Greg Girard, Baldovino
Barani, Holly Suan Gray, Nick Rice, Axis Maps, Victor Besa, Farooq Saliq, Vikram Gawde, Andrea Gruneberg & Louise Browne
COVER ILLUSTRATION by Reza Abedini MASTHEAD DESIGNCZ2VJOUşXXXRVJOUEVCBJDPN
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA REPRESENTATIVES
AUSTRALIA Okeeffe Media; Tel +61 89 381 7425, Fax +61 89 382 4850, okeeffekev@bigpond.com.au CHINA/HONG KONG Emphasis Media Limited; Tel +85 22 516 1048, Fax +85 22 561
3349, advertising@emphasis.net CYPRUS Epistle Communications & Media; Tel +35 72 246 6555, Fax +35 72 276 9999, nasreenk@epistlemedia.com FRANCE/SWITZERLAND Intermedia
Europe Ltd; Tel +33 15 534 9550, Fax +33 15 534 9549, administration@intermedia.europe.com GERMANY IMV Internationale Medien Vermarktung GmbH, Phone: 0049 8151 550 8959,
Fax: 0049 8151 550 9180 w.jaeger@imv-media.com INDIA Media Star; Tel +91 22 281 5538/39/40, Fax +91 22 283 9619, ravi@mediastar.co.in ITALY IMM Italia; Tel +39 023 653 4433, Fax
+39 029 998 1376, lucia.colucci@fastwebnet.it JAPAN Skynet Media Inc.; Tel/Fax +81 43 278 6977, skynetmedia@y2.dion.ne.jp TURKEY Media Ltd; Tel +90 212 275 8433, Fax +90 212 275
9228, mediamarketingtr@medialtd.com.tr UK Spafax Inflight Media; Tel +44 207 906 2001, Fax +44 207 906 2022, nhopkins@spafax.com USA Redwood Custom Communications Inc.;
Tel 212-473-5679 x 313 , Fax 212-260-3509, brigitte.baron@redwoodcc.com

20
CONTENTS

TEHRAN AND ITS TRAFFIC ARE EXPLAINED BY JASON REZAIAN (P29)… FIND
THE BEST COFFEE SHOPS IN NEW YORK VIA TWITTER (P33)… WE TAKE A
SHORT WALK IN THE HINDU KUSH WITH ERIC NEWBY (P35)… WE ALSO
MAP DAMASCUS AND DISCOVER A VIBRANT SOCIAL SCENE (P36)… GET
THE PERFECT SOUNDTRACK FOR 30,000FT COURTESY OF DUBAI'S DJ SOLO
(P42)… MICHAEL PALIN LETS US IN ON HIS TRAVEL SECRETS (P49)… WHILE
WE GET A STREET-EYE VIEW OF MELBOURNE’S FINEST FASHIONISTAS
(P50)… SALUTE ONE OF SAO PAULO’S MOST UNDERSTATED PIECES OF
ARCHITECTURE (P53)… A BEIRUT BOOK STORE WITH A DIFFERENCE IS
GIVEN THE ONCE OVER BY NOUR SAMAHA (P54)… ENGAGE IN SOME RETAIL
THERAPY ON THE STREETS OF BANGKOK (P56)… JAMES MONTAGUE LOOKS
AT THE CURRENT STATE OF ARAB LITERATURE (P62)… PULITZER PRIZE
NOMINEE LAURA MULLANE HEADS TO THE STARS AND BACK (OR AT
LEAST HER FATHER DOES) (P70)… WHILE MARK TUNGATE GOES IN SEARCH
OF ERNEST HEMINGWAY’S PARIS (P78)… CHUCK THOMPSON CHARTS
THE DEMISE OF THE EXPATRIATE (P86)… PICO IYER TRIES TO UNRAVEL
THE MYSTERY OF MAURITIUS (P96)…WE LIST A FEW OF OUR FAVOURITE
TRAVEL BOOKS (P106)… AND THE LEGENDARY MARK TWAIN TAKES US
ON A TOUR OF EUROPE AND THE MIDDLE EAST (P116)… WHILE GREG GIRARD
CELEBRATES 1,000 YEARS OF HANOI (P124)…

22
CONTRIBUTORS

WAEL AL�SAYEGH: An Edinburgh-born Emirati poet and essayist, Wael is author of three books of contemporary poetry and writes in
both English and Arabic. He is currently translating the motivational works of BAFTA winning writer Geoff Thompson into classical Arabic.

GEMMA CORRELL: A freelance illustrator originally from England, Gemma’s work has been described as “the perfect combination of
ugly and cute” and her influences range from overheard conversations to books and music. She currently lives in Berlin, Germany, with her trusty
sidekick Mr Pickles the Pug, where she enjoys drinking coffee and buying kitschy ornaments from flea markets.

JASON REZAIAN: An American journalist based in Tehran. Jason has written for numerous publications including TIME, The San
Francisco Chronicle, Slate and Global Post. He is also the writer narrator of a feature length documentary on Iran called A World Between.

LAURA MULLANE: A freelance writer whose work has been published in The Washington Post, Laura co-authored God Sleeps in Rwanda,
the memoir of Joseph Sebarenzi, a genocide survivor and former speaker of Rwanda’s parliament. The book was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize
and National Book Award.

MARK TUNGATE: A British journalist and author who moved to Paris for a year – 10 years ago, Mark has written articles about media,
travel and popular culture that have appeared in The Times, The Telegraph, The Independent and CNN Traveller.

CHUCK THOMPSON: Author of the comic travel memoirs Smile When You’re Lying and To Hellholes and Back, Chuck is currently
editorial director for Hong Kong-based CNNGo.com. His writing and photography have appeared in numerous publications including Outside,
Men’s Journal, Maxim and The Los Angeles Times. His book on the American Deep South will be published in 2012.

24
 CHLOÉ BOUTIQUES
BOULEVARD AT JUMEIRAH EMIRATES TOWERS
THE DUBAI MALL
DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
WWW.CHLOE.COM
© 2011 chloé. all rights reserved.
Mediterranean Sea, 1940s. "Gamma" men in training.
The diver emerging from the water is wearing a Panerai compass on his wrist.

HISTORY ALWAYS LEAVES A TRACE.

LUMINOR SUBMERSIBLE
Automatic mechanical movement
OP III calibre, COSC certified.
Water-resistance 300 metres.
Unidirectional rotating bezel.
Steel case 44 mm Ø.
Steel adjustable buckle.

+971 4 307 4653 www.panerai.com

Available exclusively at Panerai boutiques and select authorized watch specialists.

UAE: Dubai, Panerai Boutique, Dubai Mall, Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons, Wafi City, Mall of the Emirates, Emirates Towers - Abu Dhabi, Al Manara Jewellery, Hamdan Street
- Abu Dhabi Mall - KSA: Riyadh, Panerai Boutique, Mohamed Bin Abdul Aziz Street, Platinum Sands - BAHRAIN: Manama, Asia Jewellers, Sheraton Complex
- IRAN: Tehran, Sarman Co. - KUWAIT: Morad Yousuf Behbehani, Salhiya Complex, Marina Mall - QATAR: Doha, Panerai Boutique, Villagio Mall,
Ali Bin Ali Watches & Jewellery, Al Sadd Street, Royal Plaza - JORDAN: Amman, Abu Shakra Trading, Abdoun Mall, Gardens Showroom - LEBANON: Beirut,
Panerai Boutique, Beirut Souks, Weygand St, Wadih Mrad, Dbayeh Highway, Quantum Tower, Achrafieh - EGYPT: Giza, Felopateer Palace, First Mall,
Cairo, Felopateer Palace, Four Seasons Hotel, Beyman - OMAN: Muscat, Oman Jewellery - MOROCCO: Casablanca, Mystere Montre,12 Avenue Hain Harrouda,
Residence Yasmine II, Marrakech, Riad Mogador Boulevard Mohammed VI
INTRO
×Þº 

 33 ºGYQTMYGGVU ØÛºFCOCUEWUOCRRGF ÚÕºVTGGVGGRGT

B OOT Y
WE TRAWL T
HE BEST
K’S FLEA
OF BANGKO AND
ARK ETS, STREET STALLS
M RING
STORES TO B
BOUTIQUE EST
BACK THE B
AINS
BAHT BARG
P56
 OUR MAN IN TEHRAN
AFTER NEARLY 60 YEARS OF IMPOSSIBLY CHEAP PETROL, IRAN IS ONE OF THE LEAST ENERGY-CONSCIOUS PLACES ON EARTH.
A
JASON REZAIAN WONDERS IF TEHRAN CAN EVER GIVE UP ITS LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIP WITH THE CAR
nyone who has
spent time in
Tehran quickly
realises that
traffic is a colossal
problem for Iran’s capital. Not
only does the gridlock often make
it impossible to move around the
city, car exhausts are the main
reason Tehran’s air is amongst the
world’s most polluted.
An ever rising population of cars
and motorbikes flood the streets of
the city centre, creating an almost
lawless chaos. Witnessing cars that
have missed a turn-off reversing
down the motorway, for example, is
a regular occurrence.
For more than four decades the
vast majority of cars on Tehran’s
roads have been Peykans, a
domestically produced version
of the 1967 Hillman Hunter.
Production was stopped in 2005
as the cars were considered
hazardous petrol guzzlers.
In recent years Peugeot and
Korean car maker Kia have been
manufacturing cars inside Iran,
and there are an increasing
number of them jockeying for
position in the avenues and alleys
Jason Rezaian is a writer based in Tehran. You can follow him at www.twitter.com/iransolo
of Tehran. Oblivious to traffic
rules and content to risk life and
limb each time they get behind the
wheel, Iranian drivers have some of
the highest death rates in the world.
A big part of the problem is the
longstanding unofficial policy
of Iran’s leadership to use cheap
petrol as a symbol of national
pride. Coupled with restrictions
on what citizens are allowed to do
for fun, driving aimlessly has long
been a national pastime.
What has resulted from the
nearly 60 years of impossibly
cheap gasoline is perhaps the least
energy-conscious society on earth.
The situation has become so
bad of late that Tehran has had
to declare public holidays in
consecutive weeks due to the high
toxicity in the air.
Although the situation is bleak,
and it will require a change in
habits on the part of Iranian
drivers, there are signs that this is
happening, albeit reluctantly.
In recent years seatbelt laws
have been passed and, crucially,
are being enforced. The majority
of Iranian drivers now follow these
laws as they don’t want to pay the
fine. Drivers have already been
restricted from key commercial
zones of the city, only being allowed
to drive in these areas on odd or
even days, depending on the last
digit of their licence plate. Those
limitations were extended to the
entire city late last year.
Furthermore, an end to the
subsidies that have kept petrol
prices so low is expected to be lifted
in the coming months, which will
force many drivers to be more
conservative in their car use.
One positive result of the
traffic problem is the expansion
of Tehran’s bus services and the
public’s willingness to adapt to it.
Tehran now claims to have more
bus stops than any other Asian city.
Tehran’s metro has also proven to
be an essential component of urban
living. Clean and cheap (a one-way
ticket costs less than $1), guests to
Tehran are consistently impressed
by the metro experience.
Together, Tehran’s buses and
metro have had a big effect
on reducing traffic, and those
accustomed to using it are amazed
that anyone is still willing to sit in a
car, especially during rush hour.
29
GRAPH

S
tefanie Posavec took the A CLOCKWORK ORANGE
first chapters of some Anthony Burgess, 1962
modern classics and
mapped out their authors’ writing
styles based on the number of
words they used, the length of
the sentences and the number
of sentences contained in each
chapter. The result is a fascinating
mix of literature and data analysis.
www.itsbeenreal.co.uk

INTERPRETATION
SMALL CLUSTERS OF LINES ARE AN
INDICATION OF SHORT SENTENCES:

A LOOSE DRAWING WITH LONGER LINES

INDICATES A CHAPTER WITH MANY INTRUDER IN THE DUST
LONG SENTENCES: William Faulkner, 1948

A DRAWING THAT MOVES CONSISTENTLY

AROUND THE SAME AREA MEANS THAT
ALL THE SENTENCES HAVE A SIMILAR
WORD COUNT:

30
BELOVED A BRAVE NEW WORLD
Toni Morrison, 1987 Aldous Huxley, 1932

BRIGHTON ROCK THE GREAT GATSBY

Graham Greene, 1938 F Scott Fitzgerald, 1925

31

New
York
Cafes
Every month we profile a number of venues in
a different city. The catch? The venues must be
on Twitter and must tell us in their own words
what makes them so special. This month we
kick off with New York's coffee shops. If you
want to get involved, follow us at:
www.twitter.com/openskiesmag
TWITTER PITCH
RBC NYC
RBC NYC is the place to geek out
over coffee. We use multiple roasters,
seasonal coffees and feature a
Slayer espresso machine.
www.twitter.com/rbcnyc
cafe
grumpy
Innovative coffee shop roasts its own
beans and offers seasonal single-origin
coffee selections brewed by the cup and
delicious espresso drinks.
www.twitter.com/cafegrumpy
Buttercup
Bake shop
Buttercup Bake Shop is the perfect
place for old-fashioned, home-made
goodies from red velvet cupcakes to
banana pudding. And we deliver!
www.twitter.com/buttercupNY
33
 M A R Q U I S E BY PA S PA L E Y

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- *

9°
" 
BOOKED
ERIC NEWBY
A SHORT WALK
IN THE HINDU KUSH
A
classic of its genre, Eric
Newby’s book manages
to combine traditional
British understatement, exquisite
comic timing and a narrative that
takes in the wilds of Nuristan.
Newby, who was working as a
fashion assistant in London at
the time, only had four days of
mountaineering experience before
he tackled one of Afghanistan’s
highest peaks, which adds a layer
of absurdity to the narrative.
The joy of Newby’s writing lies
in the dialogue between him and
his travelling companion Hugh
Carless, a Foreign Service official,
who was as clueless as Newby
when it came to climbing.
Newby’s descriptions of the
passing scenery and nomads are
wonderful — he captures the area’s
stunning beauty without resorting
to travel brochure clichés and
paints a realistic picture of the
hardships they face. The fact
that he never reached his goal
does not diminish the narrative
— if anything it encapsulates the
farcical, yet endearing, nature of
his journey. Picador, 1937
ROOM
INTERNET SPEED: 24MB, free
PILLOW THREAD COUNT: 300
PILLOWS: Four
TV CHANNELS: 65
IPOD DOCK: None. Alarm clock with
MP3 player
ROOM SERVICE: None
COMPLIMENTARY SNACKS: Freshly
brewed coffee
TOILETRY BRAND: Honey Pie
DAILY NEWSPAPER: None, Globe &
Mail in downstairs bar
MAGAZINES: Design Lines,
Where, Walrus
EXTRAS: Travel iron and board,
hairdryer, safe, earplugs
BUSINESS CENTRE: None
VIEW: 2/5
RATE: $165 per night
www.gladstonehotel.com
NO.416
THE GLADSTONE
TORONTO
Set in the centre of Toronto’s
cultural district, the Gladstone at
first looks to be a typical boutique
hotel. Art exhibitions? Check. Cool
downstairs bar? Check. Artist-
designed rooms? Check. Yet the
hotel manages to rise above the
boutique rabble. The room designs
are thought out — managing to
combine form and function, while
there are enough amenities to
satisfy a business traveller looking
for a change of pace. The hotel’s
simplicity — from the locally
produced toiletries to the alert staff
— sets it apart from other, cluttered
hotels in the market. While the
trendier-than-thou vibe might not
be to everyone's taste, the rooms
have facilities that match even the
best chain hotels.
35
STORE
MAPPED
PAPERCUP
DAMASCUS BEIRUT MAGAZINES / BOOKS / COFFEE

S T
TAR
K H
OU
E LM
AR
OM
O ST
HANAN
IBRAHIM
E
L AD
KAH E KA
BAR
A
MAL
IN AL
H DI B
BEIRUT R EL MA
D
SHOUKRY

W
ATH T
e thought we knew it R AL HANDASA AV
all; donkeys shuffling S OU E
N
alongside honking MA
D
YE
cars, the exhilarating smell of FA

AS ST
AB
spice hanging in the air, folkloric
OU

music twanging in the distance and

BA

B
AL AB
KR
decadent dinners wowed by belly- 17TH APRIL ST
EL

dancers between courses. But while

clichés still flavour Syria, a new
wave of contemporary venues — and
AY YAR)

accompanying style — has shaken

KHALED IB
T
things up of late. Fabienne Dupuis
S
6TH MAY (SITA

FAN
from Hg2 heads to Damascus to find
N AF

out what venues are creating a buzz

in Syria’s ever-changing capital. It
AN IB

may be one of the oldest cities in the

OT H M

world, but it can still teach us some

new tricks. WWW.HG2.COM

HOTELS HOTELS RESTAURANTS

1. Al Mamlouka 2. Al Fares 1. 3. Beit Akbik
Al Mamlouka 4. Four Seasons
5. Narinj
RESTAURANTS 2. Al Fares 6. Hanabi
�. Naranj 6. Hanabi 3. Beit7. Akbik
Elissar 8. Downtown
7.Café
Elissar
36 4. Four Season’s 8. Downton Café &
 TWITTER PITCH

ST
RI
OU
KH
AL
6TH TISHREE N ST

A KATHEEB LANE

RES
FA
MOHA
MMED
ANWA T
R KAMEL S

E
AV
B
E
AV B A G HD LA
HA
EL AD AVE

UR W
A IB
NM
ASS
AOU
AVE DA
K FAISAL L TH

RD
EL MALE A QA
FI ST

US
T

A SC
THAURAH ST

AM
SD
IM ST

HIM
AL MOUSTAQU
AL AMIN ST

AL G
HOU
TA ST
AAL AL BAIT ST
VE

ST
BN WALID A

QIS

R
KE
SA
SB

AS
EN
DA

IBN T
AS
MA

SA

IR
S

AH
IDE
SC

SOUTHERN BYPAS

Q
AL
US

HS
AIR

T
PO
RT
MO
TO
RWA
Y

S BARS/CLUBS BARS/CLUBS CULTURE/EVENTS

C
9. The
9.Dome
The Dome 10. Z Bar 11.
13.After
Art7 12. Marmar
House Gallery
10. The Z Bar
GALLERIES 14. Rafia House
13. Art
11.House Gallery
After 7 14. Rafia Gallery 15.
15.Al Kouri GalleryGallery
Al Kouri 16. Mustafa Ali Gallery
& Snack 12. Marmar or Zodiaq 16. Mustapha Ali’s Gallery 37
STORE
MAPPED
PAPERCUP
DAMASCUS BEIRUT
HOTELS
1 AL MAMLOUKA
The first boutique hotel in
Damascus, Al Mamlouka is
one of the region’s best.
Contemporary and vintage
design results in a distinctly
new-age Syrian style. Housed in a
17th century mansion with 16th
century archways.
RESTAURANTS
5 NARANJ
Catapulting the Damascus
food scene headfirst into the
21st century, Naranj offers a
mouthwatering menu that
mixes continental Europe with
the Middle East. The space is
split into a veranda and a rather
majestic courtyard.
BARS/CLUBS
9 THE DOME
The Dome has set a new
precedent for partying like a
rock star. Exclusive, decadent
and glamorous with inspiring
interiors: a large dining room
set in a converted Turkish bath,
flanked by a long bar to while
away the small hours.
GALLERIES
13 ART HOUSE GALLERY
Set inside a 16th century
building, the gallery comprises
an exhibition space and
accommodation in avant-garde
surroundings. Artists, musicians
and sculptors all exhibit their
work, while an in-house concert
hall draws the crowds.
38
MAGAZINES / BOOKS / COFFEE
2 AL FARES
Wonderful traditional interiors
of wood, silk, marble and
metal set this hotel apart. The
location is great too — just
beside the Omayad Mosque. A
heavy antique door keeps the
thronging crowds at bay. An
idyllic respite from the city.
6 HANABI
Seen as a fairly abstract concept
until a few years ago, this stylish
Japanese eatery has converted
many since opening with
lipsmackingly good sushi to
champion a new wave of cuisine
in the city and clean, modern
interiors to boot.
10 Z BAR
Set on the roof of the Omayad
Hotel, this stylish watering hole
offers lashings of modern-day
style with an oversized terrace
flanked by white Chesterfields.
It is here that razor-thin social
types can sip on cocktails in true
superstar style.
14 RAFIA GALLERY
The recently-opened Rafia
Gallery is the contemporary
art gallery Damascus has
been waiting for. Centrally
located, its small but brightly-lit
space exhibits renowned and
upcoming local talent that has
culture vultures flocking.
3 BEIT AKBIK
New to Syria’s hotel scene, the
property is situated off Straight
Street and offers eight charming
rooms that combined traditional
Syrian style with modern-day
creature comforts. It has a
wonderful roof terrace with views
of the city.
7 ELISSAR
A classic never dies, and such
is the case at Elissar. Built in
1840, restored in the 1990s, the
restaurant retains its grandeur
without being outdated; inside is
dim lighting and a fountain, with
tables flanked by the cream of
the Damascan crop.
11 AFTER 7
Perfectly balanced between
being cool and having an
attitude, it’s hardly surprising
that After 7 reigns supreme on
Damascus’ club scene. Expect
an eclectic playlist, a lengthy
cocktail list and a mixed bag of
revellers propping up the bar.
15 AL KOURI GALLERY
Although it’s been around for
years, Al Kouri Gallery is as
relevant now as it was back when
it opened. Inside visitors will
find one of the country’s best
modern art collections exhibited
in carefully considered disarray.
A must-see for art fans.
4 FOUR SEASONS
With 297 rooms over 13 floors,
the Four Seasons was the first
major chain to champion the
city’s new-found status as an
emerging business and leisure
destination. Despite the arrival
of many more global brands, this
is still the luxe leader.
8 DOWNTOWN CAFÉ
Downtown Cafe is the place for
bright young things to hang out.
Minimalist lines combined with
an Italian-inspired menu give the
place an international feel, while
excellent cups of coffee attract
the on-the-way-to-work crowd.
Packed virtually all day.
12 MARMAR
Nestled at the bottom of a long,
winding lane, Marmar retains
its position as the place to go
for local live music. Expect big
crowds, ear-splitting volume and
a dark, sweaty atmosphere. The
perfect place to let your hair
down away from the glitterati.
16 MUSTAFA ALI GALLERY
Hidden among a maze of tiny
streets, the workshop at Mustafa
Ali Gallery is an open space in
which young artists can come
to work, exhibit or sell their
wares. Fostering creativity, it is
bohemian, creative and very,
very cool.
FLICK
CELLULOID DISSECTED
H
ollywood’s never
been slow to adapt
the big books of
the day. But why
don’t best-sellers
always make for blockbusters?
And does fidelity to the text always
guarantee great films?
When he picked up his
honorary Oscar in 1999, Fiddler
On The Roof director Norman
Jewison begged Hollywood to
find more original stories to tell.
Naturally Hollywood paid no
attention and continued to do
what it’d been doing for ages —
namely, claiming to be an ideas-
based industry while basing
most of its films on whatever
happened to appear on the New
York Times best-sellers list.
40
8IBU

NPWJF

BSF
ZPV

XPSLJOH

PO
OPX
The big studios have been in the
novel-adapting industry almost
as long as they’ve been in the
film-making industry. This year
will see any number of books
reshaped for the screen. Upcoming
pictures that have undergone the
process include Never Let Me Go,
a fraught Keira Knightley picture
based on the novel by Remains Of
The Day scribe Kazuo Ishiguro,
and the Matt Damon vehicle The
Adjustment Bureau, the latest
in a long line of science-fiction
adventures adapted from the
idiosyncratic tales of Philip K Dick.
Since they’re both plot-powered
forms, it’s not that surprising
that a parasitic relationship has
developed between films and
book. Consider the subtleties of a
Even
Better
thAn
the real
Thing
RICHARD LUCK WONDERS WHY
REMAKES OF OLD FILMS ARE
SO POPULAR
favourite novel, however, and it’s
amazing to think anyone would
dream of turning so complex and
fulfilling a work into something as
obvious as a Hollywood film.
Of course, the studios are well-
equipped to overcome the obstacles
in the adaptation process. Take, for
example, The Adjustment Bureau
— if it’s a good film, the chances are
it’ll be because it will have next to
nothing to do with the source story.
Philip K Dick’s stories are brilliantly
brain-frying affairs that don’t lend
themselves to adaptation. Take, for
example his best known work Do
Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?
— that it’s a bizarre story about
people buying artificial animals as
a sign of status will no doubt come
as a shock to fans of Ridley Scott’s
 "
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L 

reimagining, the awesome yet
unrelated Blade Runner. Likewise,
when Paul Verhoeven deigned to
transfer Dick’s We Can Remember
It For Your Wholesale, he stripped
the story of everything — even
its title — and built the Arnold
Schwarzenegger juggernaut Total
Recall upon its bare bones.
Not that Hollywood is always
unsubtle. On the contrary, some
adaptations are incredibly faithful
to the original text. Such was
the case with Watchmen, Zach
Snyder’s epic take on Alan Moore’s
era-defining graphic novel. Truth
be told, it was actually a little bit
too faithful. Asked why he thought
the book was unadaptable, Terry
Gilliam — a huge fan of Moore’s
tome — said that it was such a dense
story, it'd be better suited to episodic
TV. But no doubt feeling bullet-
proof on the back of 300’s success,
Snyder set out to cram 424 pages
of graphic novel into three hours
and wound up with a picture as
beautiful as it was boring.
So, you’re damned if you do
and you’re damned if you don’t.
No, it’s not easy, this adaptation
business. What works for one is a
recipe for disaster for another. Take
the aforementioned Never Let Me
Go, which was adapted by Alex
Garland. A hit novelist before he
turned to screenwriting, Garland
took the brave step of inviting
author Kazuo Ishiguro on set.
“My writer friends thought I must
be suicidal,” says the man behind
the The Beach. “But I thought it
would really help the film, and it
did. Not that I wasn’t worrying what
he thought of my writing every
moment he was there!”
As you have to admire
Garland’s gambit, so you must
also congratulate those writers
who realise the limitations of the
book they’re hired to rework. The
transformation of Robert Ludlum’s
lumbering novels into the lean
and exciting Jason Bourne series
is a fine example of adaptation at
its most brutal. Of course, it could
have gone very wrong. Yep, turning
best-sellers into blockbusters is a
far from certain art. Indeed, such
is the process’ potential to create
havoc, maybe it’s time the business
found some of those original stories
Mr Jewison talked about in 1999.

41
SKYPOD
DJ SOLO DUBAI UNITED ARAB EMIRATES WWW.MIXCLOUD.COM/DJSOLO/SKYPOD-MIX

MIGUEL ATWOOD-FERGUSON — ANTIQUITY

An LA-based arranger, composer and classically-
trained viola player, Miguel has received praise
recently for his work Suite for Ma Dukes, which
celebrates the life of late hip hop producer J Dilla as
part of his Timeless concert series.

LETHERETTE —
DANCE BRACE
Perhaps best known
for their remixes for
artists such as Bibio,
Letherette strike out
here on their wickedly
diverse self-titled EP,
with a J Dilla-esque
production style.
Organs and chopped up
soul samples ride over
a crunchy hip hop beat.

COMPUTER JAY — DISTANCE

Already a modern classic amongst
beat heads, this is an intergalactic GIANNI ROSSI — DEATH BY 69
bass excursion over stomping Analog synths build and build over a hip hop
drums. A haunting melody style drum break and funky bassline, before
accompanied by bizarre vocals. finally giving way to a ghoulish break.

42
HIDDEN ORCHESTRA — FOOTSTEPS
This new jazz outfit are similar to Cinematic
Orchestra. The core four-piece band build
around the drummer, and add nature
samples to create a warm, organic sound.
JAMIE VEX’D — RADIANT INDUSTRY
A filthy bassline shakes a lazy drum break to
within an inch of its existence, while atmospheric
noises build around you. Awesome stuff.
MARCUS BELGRAVE — SPACE ODYSSEY
The Detroit jazz legend here with perhaps his
finest work. Bizarre modulated sounds give way to
background horns and a rolling bassline.
ANENON — CHIMERA
This is taken from a split release
by Anenon and fellow producer
Asura. Each track evolves and
takes you on a journey, leaving you
attempting to anticipate what will
come next. More LA gold.
GONJASUFI — ANCESTORS
This track sums up the theme
of time and travel perfectly, as
Gonjasufi drawls over a beat
produced by Gaslamp Killer into
the next world, taking you to a
place with no name.
TEEBS — ARTHUR’S BIRDS
Teebs is known for creating
unidentifiable, yet familiar
landscapes. Compressed
synths drop in and out on this
downtempo composition,
allowing the percussion to
gently punch through, allowing
the entire piece to breathe.
43
 JUMEIR AH ZABEEL SAR AY, THE PALM JUMEIR AH, DUBAI. NOW OPEN

YOU AR E THE INSPIR ATION

You are different.
That’s why Jumeirah Hotels & Resorts are opening new hotels around the world,
inspired by your individuality.

Shanghai Maldives Frankfurt

Spring 2011 Summer 2011 Fall 2011

STAY DIFFERENT™ AT JUMEIR AH HOTELS & RESORTS

FOR RESERVATIONS, PLEASE CONTACT YOUR TR AVEL PROFESSIONAL OR VISIT JUMEIR AH.COM

Dubai / London / New York & Opening Soon: Abu Dhabi / Azerbaijan / Dubai / Frankfurt / Kuwait / Maldives / Shanghai

LITERARY
SOLUTIONS
WAEL AL-SAYEGH WONDERS IF WESTERN WRITING MORES
CAN BE TRANSFERRED TO THE EMIRATI LITERARY SCENE
W
hen most Emiratis
are introduced to an
Emirati writer, we
tend to assume that they work for
a newspaper, or contribute to one
through a column. Other forms of
writing, such as poetry and novels,
are viewed to be the result of a
weekend endeavour rather than the
product of a full-time profession.
But why is this so? For a group of
people who have storytelling so
embedded in their tradition and
heritage, one would have expected
to find a writer in every household.
Sadly, this is far from the case.
From a very early age we
are raised by our parents and
community in the tradition of
ILLUSTRATION: VESNA PESIC
what inter-cultural intelligence
specialists today call a strong
sense of “honour and shame”. The
importance of maintaining honour
LOCAL VOICES
CULTURAL
CHALLENGES,
and avoiding shame is such that,
if left unchecked, it can surpass
what is morally and legally
right. Societies that are guided
by this principle tend to demand
accountability to the group rather
than the individual. In other
words, one’s honour is directly
linked to family, tribe, social
background, ethnic origin and
political and religious grouping. In
such environments information is
generally shared with caution, as it
must fall in line with the mores of
the group that may be affected.
Answers to simple questions
such as “What do you personally
think?” can cause a degree of
discomfort. An immediate answer
might be given out of politeness,
but should not be considered in
any way final, because the major
stakeholders — the tribe, the
45
political and religious groups – are
not involved. It is clear, therefore,
that if such cultural factors are
significant in what an individual
feels comfortable in expressing
in private conversation, then
those involved in public writing,
especially in today’s digital world,
face far greater implications.
The result of this is that although
our traditional way of ordering the
world produces a balanced society
where long-term relationships are
nurtured, it does not produce bold
and creative writers. There is a
very high price to pay for spilling
the nakhaj, for daring to shed light
on topics that have for years been
left in the dark. Memory runs deep
in the Arab world and the wrath of
1,000 angry tribes is not the safest
pet to keep under the writing desk.
The writers who can, and do,
get away with saying things more
bluntly are those with social and
political clout. These include
members of the elite. Social
mavericks and rebels – who are
prepared to risk everything they
hold dear for the sake of writing
what they truly feel needs to be
written – are also a source of
inspiration, however rare they are.
Having said that, the UAE,
with its open-minded policies
embracing the global economy, has
also opened its doors to change.
Its people, especially the young,
recognise that if they are to

A BRIEF HISTORY OF FLIGHT

250BC 1913 1925 1927

Icarus attempts to escape
Crete by means of two wings
made of wax and feathers.
Unfortunately, he flies too
close to the sun, the wax
melts, and he falls to his
death into the sea. Not an
encouraging beginning to
the aviation industry.
The first airliner in the
world — the Benoist XIV
— takes off on New Year’s
Eve 1913. It flies a number
of routes throughout
Florida, but only man-
ages to survive for a few
months before going bust.
A return ticket cost $5.
The first inflight movie
was shown on a Deutsche
Lufthansa flight. The single-
reel short was silent —
perfect for the extremely
noisy airliners. It also helped
take passengers’ minds of
the brutal turbulence the
early planes suffered.
Charles Lindbergh
performs the first non-stop
solo flight across the Atlan-
tic. He travels 3,600 miles
in the Spirit of St Louis
from New York to Paris. It
took him 33 hours and he
survived on five sandwiches
and two canteens of water.

46
 LOCAL VOICES

effectively contribute to discussion
and literature on the world stage,
then a far more robust individual
worldview needs to be nurtured,
not necessarily to replace the
traditional, but to promote their
good points while negating the bad.
The massive and rapid influx of
expat workers into the country to
provide the necessary manpower
and know-how to help build the
nation has produced one of the
world’s most multicultural cities.
With each group given the relative
freedom to express its art, music,
literature, religion and philosophy,
the pressure for Emiratis to
examine their own cultural identity
has never been greater.
This influx has been described
by some Emirati conservatives
as a “cultural nightmare”, but in
terms of literature, it’s an Emirati
dream come true. Events such as
the Emirates Airline Festival of
Literature expose local writers
to world-class authors. We find
ourselves face-to-face with
writers from other cultures who
have already passed through the
stages of development we are only
now experiencing.
The UAE is ready to nurture the
seeds of home-grown writing.
The question we have to ask is:
how willing are we to swap the
traditional gown of being perceived
as a writer with the prickly cloth of
actually being one?

1930 1936 1976 2011

Ellen Church becomes
the first female flight at-
tendant when she boards a
Boeing Air Transport flight.
The first ‘stewardesses’ were
actually trained nurses, a
marketing ploy aimed at
making new passengers feel
safer while onboard.
American Airlines issues
the first Air Travel Card,
which allows users to “buy
now and pay later” at a
15 per cent discount — a
precursor to the modern
credit card, making travel
more affordable and far
more tempting.
The Concorde makes its
debut — flying from
London to New York in 3.5
hours, twice the speed of
sound. The plane is dis-
continued in 2003 due to
rising costs — and making
the Concorde pilot a rarer
breed than US Astronauts.
Centuries of aviation
progress reach a zenith with
the launch of this magazine.
OK, we may be exaggerating
slightly (only just) but we
are confident that you will
enjoy this tome as much
as you will the rest of the
onboard entertainment.

47
 INTERVIEW

MY
TRAVELLED LIFE
Michael Palin, 60, is a broadcaster, writer and actor

ON TRAVEL ON TRAVEL LITERATURE

The amount of travel I do depends on what I do read other travel books — Paul Theroux’s Great Railway Bazaar was a big influence. As was
I am doing. Last year I was away for about a Eric Newby’s A Short Walk in the Hindu Kush, which was wonderful and shows you can be comic
month in total. This year it will be about three in these types of books. Bruce Chatwin is another one — he gets the essence of the places he
months, as I am filming a new series for the goes to spot on.
BBC. I still love travelling, it makes you
appreciate home, which, for me, is London.
ON WRITING
I learnt to write in my own voice and not to copy other writers. I was careful not to spend
ON INDIA too much time describing sunsets for example as there is no way I could do that as well as
I have been travelling seriously with work someone like Bruce Chatwin. I prefer to focus on people and their idiosyncracies when I travel.
for more than 20 years now, so most of the
places I want to visit, I have done so. There are
still places I want to go and places I want to go
4,:$"54
back to. I was in India last year and have been
there six or seven times. I love the country,
there is always something new to enjoy.

ON WORKING
It might be nice to relax somewhere for six
weeks, but I have a low tolerance for lying on
the beach. Travelling with the BBC is not a
bad way to experience places. I get to record
the things I do and what I see, so I don’t look
back and wonder what happened, as it’s all
there on film or in print.

49
STREET PEEP • ER
MELBOURNE WWW.STREETPEEPER.COM

MIA

�O BUYER

Pants from Comme UNKNOWN

des Garcons UNKNOWN

(FAT, +61396623332). Vintage everything.

HOSHIKA, TATSUYOSHI

DESIGNER &, COMPOSER

Both jackets from ESS

Laboratory (+61394956112,

both jeans from Comme

des Garcons (FAT, UNKNOWN

+61396623332). Her bag UNKNOWN

from Christian Paul. Vintage Everything.

50
 TILLY

ANDY ��, SHOP WORKER

��, DESIGNER Cardigan from Stella

Jacket from Yohji Yamamoto McCartney (Cactus Jam,

(Left, +61394199292), +61396540798), vest from

tanktop from American Marc Jacobs (Flinders Way,

Apparel (+61395296852), +61396543331), skirt and

trousers from Dior Homme shoes from Kinki Gerlinki

(Assin, +61396540158). (+61396500565)

KATE

��, SHOP WORKER PRISCILLA

��, STUDENT

Vintage coat. Sweater and Jumpsuit and shoes from

trousers from Alpha 60 H&M. Bag from American

(+61395102626). Apparel (+61395296852).

51
 PLACE
FIESP-CIESP-SESI BUILDING RINO LEVI ARQUITETOS ASSOCIADOS 1979 PAULISTA AVENUE, SÃO PAULO
IMAGE: PEDRO KOK//WWW.PEDROKOK.COM.BR

53
STORE
PAPERCUP BEIRUT MAGAZINES / BOOKS / COFFEE

Y
ou would be forgiven for
thinking that one of Lebanon’s
most unique stores is trying to
hide away from the public.
Located on a back street in the quiet
neighbourhood of Mar Mikhael,
Papercup has gained a reputation
for being the go-to spot for books on
design, photography and architecture.
Inconspicuous from the outside,
the store (plus coffee shop) maintains
a simple feel throughout. Books and
magazines cover the walls, and the
room is broken up by some small
well-placed tables.
The store – which opened in June
2009 – is the brainchild of Rania
Naufal, who wanted to focus on
content she felt the Lebanese market
had been missing.
“When I moved back here [in 2003]
I missed a place like this, which can
be found in many other cities around
the world,” she explained. “At the same
time, it was important to find the right
balance between niche and accessible.
“I felt there was the need for a
change, and I had been thinking
about it for such a long time, it was
either go for it or leave Lebanon
completely,” she said. With a lack
of coherent market research on the
issue, she took the plunge. “People
thought I was insane,” she laughed.
“They said I was crazy for opening in
the middle of nowhere, for opening an
WORDS: NOUR SAMAHA

54
arts-centred bookstore; that it would
never work in Lebanon.”
But a year and a half since its
launch, few can argue against its
success. Many in Mar Mikhael
credit Papercup with catapulting the
neighbourhood from a quiet, family-
oriented district to Beirut’s ‘next big
thing’. Design stores, architectural
offices, themed-bars and avant-
garde clothing boutiques have all
opened in the past year.
“People say that they want to
open stores ‘like Papercup’,” Rania
said, bashfully. “I don’t feel like I’ve
invented something, but maybe I’ve
unleashed something.”
The clientele range from industry
professionals to tourists who just
want to come and browse. “People
come to buy, come to drink coffee
and read, some even come to conduct
meetings here,” said Rania. whose
shelves currently hold approximately
1,500 books. The sections include art,
photography, fashion, design, graphic
novels and children’s books.
And if it can’t be found, it can be
ordered. “With certain publishers I know
there is a standard of quality, the only
problem is that I have to restrict myself
otherwise I’ll end up just ordering for my
personal collection!”
Papercup, Agopian Building, Pharoah Street,
Mar Mikhael, Beirut.Tel: 9611-443083,
www.papercupstore.com

55
 1 2 3

BOOTY BANGKOK
Miniature tuk-tuk, $3.
Made from chopped
Siang Pure oil, $6.
This concoction will
The Suan Lum Night
Bazaar Map, $5.
up soft drink cans, apparently remedy Nancy Chandler's
WE TRAWL THE THAI CAPITAL'S this mini tuk-tuk dizzines and insect maps are a delight,
MARKETS, MEGA-MALLS
AND BOUTIQUES pays homage to bites.Suan Lum Night and the best way to
Bangkok's iconic Bazaar, Sathorn Road. navigate the market.
form of transport. Suan Lum Night Bazaar,
Covered Market, Sathorn Road.
Sukhumvit, Soi 13.

1 2 4
4 5 6 7

Chocolate Brown 101 Thai Forms, $9. Elephant Soap, $5. Tiger Face Lamp, $11.
Notebook, $6. A record of all things Jasmine-scented Handmade lamp-
A locally-made note- Thai that are fading soap in the shape of shade perfect for
book that combines from memory, from Thailand's favourite (big) kids who want
nice design with pop guns to coconut animal. King Power, to bring a slice of
thick matt paper. crisps.Page One Books, Suvarnabhumi Airport. Thailand back home.
King Power, Central World Plaza. Suan Lum Night Bazaar,
Suvarnabhumi Airport. Sathorn Road.

5
 CALENDAR

1
2
e
Tu

3
ed
W
4 PERTH WRITERS FESTIVAL

u
Th Nearly one million people visit this
i
Fr 5 LITERATURE FEST event yearly — a must for book lovers.
t The annual www.perthfestival.com.au
Sa 6 celebration of all
n things literary takes
Su 7 place in Dubai.

on www.eaif l.com
M
8
e
Tu
9
ed
W
u 10
Th

Fri
11 DOLOMITE SKI JAZZ
Italy’s coolest music festival is

Sat
12 back for another year.
www.dolomitiskijazz.com

Sun 13
Mon 14

march Tue

Wed
15
16
Thu 17
GLASGOW COMEDY
Four hundred shows in 25
Fri
18 days across the city.
glasgowcomedy festival.com
Sat
19
Sun
20
HOLI FESTIVAL
Mon The annual festival
21 of colours’ takes
Tue place across India.

22 www.holifestival.org

We ART DUBAI
d
Th
23 The art fair returns
for its fifth edition,
u bringing more than
24 75 galleries from
Fr across the world for
i
Sa
25 the four-day event.
www.artdubai.ae
t
Su 26 THE HONG KONG
SEVENS
n Rugby action and
M
on 27 fun galore.
www.hksevens.com
28
Tu
e
W

29
ed
Th
u

30

59
31
MAIN
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HANOI
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GREG G
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CAPTURES T
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BEAUTY OF
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61
62
PRESENT
NS E
TETURE
TH
F
E
AC
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E
HA
O
N
F
GING

A B
A R
FURFECT? LITERATURE
N THE

PE
R L D I S O
L I T E R ARY WO NITIES ALLOW
B U
AT I O N, THE ARA EATIVE OPPORT MONTAGUE
N R S
C A D E S OF STAG NOLOGY AND C TIAL? BY JAME
E H N
AFTER D T CAN NEW TEC EALISE ITS POTE
RISE. BURE TO FINALLY R
THE GEN

63
 Even Nobel Laureate
Naguib Mahfouz worked as
a civil servant while he wrote

O
nce damned by some as the treatise of
a traitor, it now reads like a prophecy
— a warning of the trappings of
absolute power and the corruption
of revolutionary zeal. When Alaa al
Aswany’s The Yacoubian Building hit the shelves in
2002, the intertwining story of the residents of a run-
down building in downtown Cairo was a runaway
hit, becoming a worldwide smash in Arabic whilst
spawning a film and a TV series. More importantly, it
got a rare platform and an international audience –
it was translated into close to a dozen languages.
But the story of Aswany’s novel is almost as
revealing as the book’s plot; a thinly veiled metaphor
for the cultural and political stagnation of Egypt since
the 1952 revolution. It almost didn’t make it thanks to
a mixture of money, censorship and indifference.
“One [Egyptian publisher] told me, ‘It is a good novel
but I am going to lose my job if I publish it,’” Aswany
recalled in a 2006 interview. Even after the book had
been published, he kept working as a dentist at his
surgery in the same building he had based his novel
on. It wasn’t until his novel caught the imaginations of
readers outside of Egypt that his life began to change.
“Before HarperCollins, what I got from The Yacoubian
Building I considered as covering the price of the
cigarettes and coffee I bought while I was writing it,”
he said. That novelists struggle to make ends meet
isn’t surprising — that problem bedevils writers
from Khartoum to London. But the fact that Aswany

64
 couldn’t make a living from his writing until it
reached a wider audience highlighted one of the
major difficulties inherent in Arab literature.
Even Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz, whose
masterful Cairo Trilogy is perhaps the best, and
best-known, collection of Arab fiction outside the
Middle East, worked as a civil servant whilst he
wrote. But since 2002, the game has changed, and
not just on the streets of Cairo. The advent of a major
international literary prize for Arabic novels, the Abu
Dhabi Book Fair, and this month’s Emirates Festival
of Literature in Dubai means that Arab literature
now has a platform that it has never enjoyed before.
“Arabic fiction, particularly the novel, has achieved
greater technical maturity,” explained Professor Yasir
Suleiman, founding director of the Prince Alwaleed
Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies at Cambridge
University. “That new voices from different regions of
the Arab world, both men and, most notably, women,
have entered the Arab literary scene indicates a
growing recognition that the novel is on its way to
becoming a major literary genre on par with poetry.”
The gilded, earnest corridors of institutions such
as Cambridge University have, in the past, been the
sole entry point for Arab literature to reach a wider

66
audience. But now Professor Suleiman believes it is the
International Prize for Arabic Fiction, known as the
‘Arab Booker’ that is opening doors for Arab writers to
achieve the international audience they deserve.
Set up in 2007 by the Booker Prize Foundation in
London, it chooses the best in Arabic fiction, awarding
$50,000 to the winner and guaranteeing an English
translation of the book. The first two prizes were won by
Egyptians — Sunset Oasis by Bahaa Taher and Azazel
by Youssef Ziedan — while Spewing Sparks as Big as
Castles by Saudi writer Abdo Khal won the third.
Khal’s book will shortly be released in English, but
there will be one market where his books won’t be read
— in his native Saudi Arabia. The issue of censorship
is the elephant in the room for Arab literature, a
EGYPT WRITES,
IRAQ READS AND
LEBANON PUBLISHES
point brought into sharp relief by the spontaneous
street-level protests across the Middle East by people
demanding the kind of freedom that would allow them
to read whatever they want.
“Censorship is always damaging to the full flowering
of the various forms of cultural production; I am talking
here about institutional censorship which often leads
to self-censorship,” agrees Professor Suleiman, before
adding a caveat. “I would contend that censorship can be
beneficial in an odd and counterintuitive kind of way, in
that it can sharpen the ingenuity of the writer in trying
to get round the censor. This has actually led to some
of the most exquisite titles we have seen in the last two
decades in different regions of the Arab world.”
Given the facts on the ground, and the new feeling
of political awakening on the streets of some of the
region’s capitals, this month’s Emirates Airline Festival
of Literature will be a fascinating place to take the
pulse of the Middle East’s literary scene.
The festival has brought together a collection
of renowned Western and Arab writers to run
workshops, give lectures or read passages from their
works; everything from a talk by Kamal Abdel Malek
on Arab travel literature to the BBC’s Gavin Esler
presenting a lecture on the prescience of George
Orwell. According to Tunisian poet Ines Abbasi,
who will be appearing at the festival, the issue of
censorship will loom large.
“The [actions] of some Arab rulers killed freedom
of speech for everybody – and of poets first – so they
stopped being examples and leaders for people,” she
explained when asked of the difficulties in getting her
work read in the past.
“I believe that there are many intellectual and
cultivated people in Arabic cities from the Atlantic to
the Gulf... a festival of literature can be held in Abu
Dhabi, Dubai, Sana’a, Tunis, Beirut or Cairo.”
In many respects, the festival is taking place as the
game is changing. Who knows what the political and
cultural make up of countries like Egypt, Lebanon
and Iraq will be in 12 months time? Traditionally the
three countries have been the intellectual beating
heart of the Arab world. As the popular Arab maxim
points out: “Egypt writes, Lebanon publishes, Iraq
reads”. Egypt thanks to its history of incubating Arab
ideas and writing, Iraq for its high levels of literacy
and Lebanon for his historic publishing freedoms.
Can the white heat of revolution finally unlock the
latent Arab talent that has been criminally under-
tapped so far? There has certainly never been more of
an interest in the culture of the Middle East from the
international community, nor outlets for its works.
“There has been a significant expansion of
Arab literature outside the Middle East,” agrees
Professor Suleiman.
“Arabic literature is translated into many more
languages than was the case in the past... there is
greater demand than two decades ago for Arabic
literary works in university courses in the West.
However, there are obstacles that face the spread
of Arabic literature in the West. Some people refer
to ‘prejudice’. This might be a factor, but the greater
factor in my estimation is the translation norms that
exist in host societies.”
The statistics reflect this. Arabic is the official
language of 22 countries and is spoken by five per
cent of the world’s population, but fewer than 10,000
books have been translated into Arabic since the 9th
century. That’s less than the average yearly output for
Spanish books translated into English, according to
the Arab Human Development Report.
The lack of new Arabic writers is another factor.
Pick up a copy of Anchor Books’ Anthology of Modern
Arabic Fiction, a book that features short stories and
excerpts from 79 Arab writers. The sole Emirati writer
on the list is Muhammad Al Murr, who is described as
the best-known writer from the UAE.
The book also turns up another startling fact: the
average age of the 79 living writers (10 have died)
featured is 67. And this is a book of ‘modern’ fiction.
So where are the young writers? And why aren’t they
being published?
According to Fadhil Al Azzawi, the renowned
Iraqi poet and author, the publishing market in the
region is “below zero”. “Most of the Arab publishing
houses are publishing houses in name only. Instead
of paying authors in advance, as is customary in
the west, they usually ask the author to pay the
publishing costs upfront.”
The Egyptian novelist, Ahmed Alaidy told the
Guardian that he believed that younger Arab novelists
would find their own way around the decrepit
publishing system. “Facebook pages are being created
and publishers such as Malamih have published books
James Montague writes for CNN, is an associate editor of Delayed Gratification and author of When Friday Comes: Football in the War Zone (Mainstream)
68
from blogs.” There will be more to come. Over the
past months, the power of Arab fiction and poetry
has been highlighted. Verses of To the Tyrants of
the World , by the early 20th century Tunisian poet
Abul-Qasim Al-Shabi, were chanted on the streets
of Tunis and have become something of an anthem
in Egypt, too.
Copies of Aswany’s early novel, the banned The
Isam Abd el-Ati Papers, are being swapped and
eagerly devoured in Egypt. The novelist has even
become a prominent figure in the protests. Like
the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, the winds have
changed, as much culturally as politically.
But according to a recent study, an Arab cultural
renaissance is already in full swing. A 2010 Ipsos
survey found that the UAE now has the most well-read
population in the Middle East. 54.2 per cent of those
surveyed said they read books regularly, as opposed to
just 10.6 per cent of Egyptians.
The cannon of Gulf literature is small, but a huge
injection of money into the region’s cultural fabric – the
Emirates Airline International Festival of Literature
being a case in point — means that the “Golden Triangle”
of Egypt, Lebanon and Iraq is likely to be challenged
in the future. “This would nominate these [oil and gas-
rich Gulf] countries, known for their big investments
in culture and education, to become the new cultural
leaders in the region,” the survey concluded. Revolution
and oil-funded hyper-capitalism might seem unusual
bedfellows, but both might be needed to build on the
legacy of Mahfouz and Aswany.
“I am optimistic by nature,” says Professor Suleiman.
“I think Arabs do a lot of self-flagellation in their acts
of cultural stock-taking. I prefer to light candles rather
than to curse the dark. Yes there is darkness in the
Arab literary scene, but there is also light and there are
promising shoots.”
the
LONG SHADOW
of the SPACE SHUTTLE
Growing up as an astronaut’s daughter
By Laura Ann Mullane

70

I
walk into the apartment
parking lot on a sweltering
July afternoon in east
central Florida. There I see
a large bus with the NASA
logo on it. I’m in Cape Canaveral
for a family vacation that happens
to coincide with a space shuttle
launch. Lift-off is scheduled in a
few days, and I know without asking
that the families of the astronauts
are staying at the apartment block
too, and that the bus will take the
family to watch the launch. The
thought of it makes my stomach
sink back against my spine and a
wave of nausea roll up to my throat.
Although it has been 20 years
since I’ve been the one boarding
that bus to go watch the shuttle
STORIES
ferry my father into space three
separate times, I might as well be a
teenager again. All of a sudden I can
feel the fatigue from the sleepless
nights and early mornings. I can
feel my dry throat and the nerves
that tangled my stomach. All of a
sudden, it is once again my father
who will ride a plume of smoke and
fire into outer space.
71
 When I was seven years old, my
father, Mike Mullane, was selected
to be an astronaut. It was 1978
and NASA had just announced
the beginning of a new space
programme: the space shuttle
It’s hard to describe the feeling of waiting to watch
a person you love about to blast-off into space.
— a reusable orbiter that would
be used to launch satellites and
conduct research and, ultimately,
help construct and supply the
International Space Station. They
needed astronauts and put out the
call for applicants. My father, who
was 33, had spent his career in the
US Air Force flying in the backseat
of fighter jets.
He had dreamt of flying in space
since he saw the dot of light that was
Sputnik arc across the sky as a young
boy. So when NASA announced that
it was accepting applications, he
submitted his and held his breath.
When he was selected, I was too
young to realise what this career
change meant. To me, it was just
another move (as the daughter of a
military officer, I was used to moving
a lot), this time to Houston, Texas,
where NASA was headquartered.
Although my father was an
astronaut in name beginning in
1978, his first trip on the space
shuttle didn’t come until six years
later, when I was 13. I was old
enough to know his new job meant
more than a cross-country move.
It was the 12th shuttle mission
and the first flight of the orbiter
Discovery. The NASA bus picked
us up at the condominium in the
pre-dawn hours to drive us to
Kennedy Space Center. I boarded
the bus with my mother, brother
and sister, joining the other
families. As we drove, the June sky
turned pink and the marshlands
that lined the road tried to shrug
off the thick haze that had settled
on them overnight.
The roads were lined with the
parked cars and beach chairs of
spectators who had camped out
overnight to witness the launch.
Many cheered as we passed.
American flags flew from car
antennas. Our bus bypassed the
traffic and was waved through
security checkpoints. All of it
made me feel for a moment like a
celebrity. Of course, I wasn’t. No
one knew who I was. No one even
knew who my dad was.
Astronauts had long lost the
celebrity status they enjoyed
during the early years of the space
programme and the moon landings.
The star of this show was the space
shuttle itself. We were all just props.
This was the second time we’d
made the drive. The day before,
the launch had been scrubbed at
20 minutes to lift-off because of a
mechanical problem. This day, we
all tried to keep our optimism in
check, but still the bus vibrated with
the same excitement and anxiety
of a busload of children on the first
day of school. Once we arrived at the
space centre, we were taken to the
launch director’s office on the top
floor of the Launch Control Centre.
A wall of windows looked
out onto the launch pad three
miles away. We waited there
and listened to the drone of the
countdown play over speakers.
At nine minutes to lift off, we
were escorted down a hall
and up steps to the roof of the
building, from which we would
watch the launch.
Nine minutes had never taken
so long. I stood with my arms
locked through my mother’s,
who was practically shaking.
It’s hard to describe the feeling of
waiting to watch a person you love
about to blast-off into space. First,
there’s the sheer, unadulterated
excitement of witnessing an event
that feels larger than life itself.
The shuttle, even from three miles
away, loomed over everything,
dwarfing the landscape around
it. Vapours swirled at its base.
On the roof, speakers amplified
the countdown, which echoed
between the buildings. You sensed
that something big was about to
happen, something that couldn’t be
contained, that didn’t subscribe to
the laws of the universe.
But in addition to the
excitement, there’s a paralysing
fear. I wasn’t fully aware of this at
the age of 13, when mortality was
still abstract and death seemed
like something that happened to
other people. I didn’t worry that
my dad would be killed on the
shuttle mission, even though my
father had told us repeatedly about
the dangers. Strapping oneself
to the equivalent of a bomb
and being catapulted to a place
with no atmosphere was a risky
proposition. Still, I didn’t believe
that anything bad would happen
to him — not on a conscious level.
But on a subconscious one, I was
terrified. It’s what had kept me
up the night before the launch,
pulling me into the bathroom with
75
dry heaves that brought tears to
my eyes. It’s what made me now
hold onto my mom’s arm so tightly
that she had to say, “Laura, honey,
you’re hurting me.” It’s what made
me sometimes imagine a future
without my father, with whom I
would swim and hike and stare up
at the stars. My father, who would
bring home flowers for my mom
and chocolates for my brother,
sister and me. This was the man I
might lose forever.
The countdown continued. Less
than one minute to lift-off. Things
were happening quickly now. The
announcer ticked off the status of
systems and the passing seconds in
quick succession. He’s really going,
I thought. This is really happening.
The final countdown: “T minus 10,
nine, eight — we have a go for main
engine start — seven, six, five — we few terrifying seconds while they
have main engine start…” A slight wondered whether their rocket
rumbling. Smoke billowed at the would explode. All I knew was that
bottom of the orbiter. He’s really I wouldn’t see my fatner fly into
going. He’s really going. space that day. It would be two
But then, nothing. Four seconds more months and more sleepless
to lift off and the engines shut nights before I would once again
down. “We have a cut off,” the stand on the roof with my family
announcer said. “We have an abort and squeeze my mom’s arm and
by the onboard computers.” hold my breath until the I heard
I looked at my mother and then at the words, “We have lift-off,” boom
the rest of the people on the roof— to hear what the announcer was across the loudspeakers. I would
the other families and a handful of saying over the loudspeaker. I just feel the ground shake and hear
NASA brass and other astronauts. stood there — at a complete loss of the deafening roar that rattled
Everyone was staring in disbelief. what to make of everything that my chest, and I would watch
“What happened?” I asked my was happening. The fact was, I the shuttle rise past the tower
mom. “I don’t know.” A loud boom didn’t know. No one did. Even my dragging its fire behind it. The
rumbled across the distance. What dad sitting in the cockpit didn’t shuttle Discovery would carry my
was it? An explosion? know. The computers had sensed father into space and bring him
No, the shuttle was still there. It a problem and shut down the home safely again — just as I’d
was just the sound from the initial engines. It wasn’t until later that always expected.
main engine start finally reaching we learnt about the fire on the I didn’t know then that coming
us. My mom and sister broke launch pad, how my father and home safely wasn’t a foregone
down crying. My brother strained the other astronauts had sat for a conclusion. A year and a half later
— as my dad trained for another
mission — the shuttle Challenger
would begin its ascent into space,
only to be ripped apart when it
exploded 73 seconds after lift-off.
The shuttle carried family friends,
including Judy Resnik, who had
flown with my father on Discovery.
It also carried the fathers of several
of my high school classmates, one
of whom was in my year. We had
mutual friends but I didn’t know
her beyond that. After her father’s
funeral and her return to school, I
would avert my eyes when I would
pass her in the hallway. Every time
I would see her I was reminded
that I got to go home after school
and eat dinner with my dad. I was
reminded that my father would see
me graduate from high school and
college and eventually marry and
have children. Her father never
would. How could we possibly live
in a world that was so unfair?
Our fathers took the exact same
risks, yet mine survived and
hers didn’t. It was an unbearably
painful awakening for a 15-year-
old girl — this realisation that
death is random and heartache is
delivered with no regard for logic.
It also came with the awareness
that my father would risk death
again. He didn’t quit the shuttle
programme after Challenger. In
fact, he would fly again twice. I
never wanted him to quit, nor did
my mom or brother or sister. We all
knew flying was in his blood.
He could abandon his desire to
fly no more than a racehorse could
abandon its desire to run. It was the
essence of who he was. Yet each
time, I stood on that roof wondering
if I’d see my father again.
Today, my father is 65 and an
author. He no longer flies, instead
sating his ambition by climbing
mountains. He often says he would
never believe he flew in space if he
didn’t have the pictures to prove it
— the memories seem so distant. I
know how he feels. I, too, look back
on those years in disbelief.
My dad joined NASA
He could abandon his desire to fly no more than a
racehorse could abandon its desire to run.
when I was seven and left when
I was 19 after his third shuttle
mission. My formative years was
spent in the shadow of the space
shuttle. Yet when people ask me
what it was like to grow up as the
daughter of an astronaut, I never
know what to say. It was amazing
and terrifying. But mostly, it was
just my childhood.
As I near 40, I’m beginning to
understand how my dad’s career
shaped me. It’s only now that I’ve
realised how rare that focus is. I
was raised by a man who knew
from an early age what he wanted
to be. That is what makes my
upbringing unique: not that my
father flew into space, but that he
was able to achieve his dream.
I wonder now what paths my
childrens’ lives will take. Will
they have the same ambition that
defined my father? I don’t know.
But I do know whatever they do,
they can look up to the stars and
know nothing is out of reach.
Laura Ann Mullane is a writer who lives
in northern New Mexico. She is co-author
of God Sleeps in Rwanda: A Journey of
Transformation. Her father, Mike Mullane,
is author of the memoir Riding Rockets.
Following in the footsteps of the legendary writer — who died 50 years ago this year —
is a popular pastime for devotees. But even casual visitors to Paris can’t avoid bumping
into Hemingway’s ghost. Long-term resident Mark Tungate goes in search of Papa’s Paris

79
 N E T T O N
B E

TURKEY
N E T T O N
B E
“Turkey can count on solid know-how and a strong tradition in apparel
manufacturing: this is why we have invested here for over twenty years.
Being here today means focusing on the energy, dynamism and
determination of a young and modern country that is growing
rapidly and looking to the future.”

Biagio Chiarolanza, CEO

• A population of 73 million, half of which is under
the age of 28.8
• Approximately 450,000 students graduated from
around 150 universities and other higher education
institutions in 2009
• Over 25 million young, well-educated and motivated
labor force
• Highly competitive investment conditions
• A country that offers 100% and more tax deductions
on R&D expenditures
• Access to Europe, Caucasus, Central Asia, the Middle
East and North Africa
• 16th largest economy of the world and the 6th largest
economy as compared to the EU countries in 2009
(IMF-WEO)
• 15th most attractive FDI destination for 2008-2010
(UNCTAD World Investment Prospects Survey)
• Fastest growing economy in Europe in 2010
H
emingway came to Paris for the exchange rate, the
bohemian crowd and the booze. While in America
prohibition had turned drinking into a crime, Paris was
one long party, bookended by aperitifs and champagne.
“Exchange is a wonderful thing,” wrote the young Ernest
in a column for the Toronto Star. “Red wine is sixty centimes a bottle and
beer is forty centimes a glass.” He observed that he and his wife Hadley
were able to eat “an excellent meal” for the equivalent of fifty cents each.
The article is headlined Living in Paris on $1,000 a year.
And yet in A Moveable Feast, his wonderful memoir of Paris in the
1920s, Hemingway insists that he was often poor. He describes loitering
by the Seine or in the Luxembourg Gardens in order to avoid the cooking
aromas drifting from restaurants.
Even his first address was a poor one: a cramped apartment at 74 rue
du Cardinal Lemoine, just off the “wonderful narrow crowded market
street” of rue Mouffetard. There is a plaque outside the building now, just
as there is outside another building around the corner, in rue Descartes.
Hemingway rented a tiny office here “in the hotel where [the poet Paul]
Verlaine died”.
Rue Mouffetard is an ideal first stop for Hemingway hunters. Leave the
metro at Place Monge, where the aromas snaking from under the striped
 awnings of the market stalls
would have set the author’s
stomach rumbling. A left turn
brings you into rue Mouffetard,
which is still pleasingly narrow
and cobbled, although rather too
conscious of its place on the tourist
map. It is lined with souvenir shops,
crêperies and cheap restaurants
serving “Spécialités Libanaises”.
But next door to Hemingway’s
former home is a delightful
bookshop called Les Alizés.
“Naturally, we’re a magnet
for Hemingway fans,” confirms
its proprietor, Christine
Dubosson, indicating a shelf
crammed with Hemingway titles
in French and English.
Hemingway noted that rue
Mouffetard emptied into a
“cesspool” called the Café des The Closerie des Lilas, at the far end of boulevard du Montparnasse,
Amateurs in the Place de la was an intellectual haunt long before the young writer took a seat here
Contrescarpe. The café no longer to scratch out some of his best stories. Since opening in 1874, the café
exists, and the comfortable Café had served Zola, Cézanne and Lenin, among others. It is perhaps no
Delmas in the same location is by coincidence that Hemingway was an admirer of Cézanne’s paintings,
no means noisome. It has pleasantly whose deceptive simplicity he hoped to imitate in his writing.
scuffed floorboards, leather- He came here during the second half of his Paris stint, when he was
upholstered club chairs, burgundy living above a sawmill in the nearby rue Notre Dame des Champs (at
wallpaper, laconic waiters and tiny number 113, to be exact). The café’s green-shaded terrace still lends
cups of overpriced coffee. It is, in it a bucolic air; in the 1920s it must have seemed positively rural.
other words, utterly Parisian. Hemingway liked it not just because it was convenient, but also because
After a jolt of caffeine, explore it was a brisk walk from the more fashionable Montparnasse bars, such
the cramped medieval streets as the La Rotonde, Le Select and Le Dôme. Although he occasionally
with their evocative names: dropped in to those places to catch up with gossip and friends — notably
rue de l’Arbalète (Street of the the artist Jules Pascin — he needed the calm of the Lilas to work.
Crossbow), rue de Pot de Fer Today, its softly lit piano bar, urbane service and daunting menu –
(Street of the Iron Cauldron) and expect to pay more than 20 euros for a main course – make it more of a
rue de l’Epée de Bois (Street of the treat than an everyday haunt.
Wooden Sword). You’ll need to To walk off lunch, cut through the Luxembourg Gardens, where the author
work up an appetite, because it’s spent many hours strolling and thinking. And there is indeed something
IMAGE: PAUL BIRIS

almost lunchtime. meditative about its well-tended gravel paths and watchful statues.

If your aim is true, you should
emerge at rue de Fleurus, where
Gertrude Stein lived at number 27
with her partner Alice B Toklas. A
writer and art collector (Picasso
painted her portrait), Stein invited
Hemingway to her Saturday
evening salons and taught him
much about modern art. She coined
the phrase “The Lost Generation” to
describe those who had survived
the First World War. Having
developed her own experimental –
some might say eccentric – writing
style, she had a strong influence
on Hemingway’s work. Inevitably,
given the size of the egos involved,
they later fell out.
This would be an excellent
moment to make your way to
Shakespeare and Company,
the bookstore and lending
library run by Hemingway’s
friend Sylvia Beach, at 12 rue de
l’Odéon. Unfortunately, it closed
in 1941. The good news is that
another bookstore of the same
name opened 10 years later.
You can experience its tattered
charm at 37 rue de la Bûcherie,
overlooking the Seine.
Nearby, take a break at the Place
Saint Michel, where Hemingway
drank St James rum and lusted
after a young French woman while
trying to write in an unnamed café.
84
HEMINGWAY: A LIFE LESS ORDINARY
Hemingway is a global
brand. His rugged persona
and sharply defined universe
— good food and drink, war
and passion — are as easy
to grasp as his diamond-
clear writing. His colourful,
restless life has proved so
inspiring that restaurateurs
and hoteliers the world over
delight in informing tourists
that ‘Papa’ Hemingway ate,
stayed or lived ‘here’.
Born in a Chicago suburb,
Ernest Miller Hemingway
began his career as a
reporter on the Kansas City
Star. In 1918 — at the age of
18 — he left for the Italian
front to serve as a volunteer
ambulance driver for the
Red Cross. For much of the
1920s he lived in Paris, where
he honed the stripped-down
writing style that was to
make him famous. His first
novel, The Sun Also Rises,
about a group of young
Americans in Paris and
Spain, captured the spirit of
“The Lost Generation” when
it was published in 1924.
Hemingway remained a
reporter at heart. A Farewell
to Arms was inspired by his
experiences in Italy, while For
Whom the Bell Tolls captures
the Spanish Civil War, which
he covered as a journalist.
He wrote with great relish
of bars, bullfighting, boxing,
fishing and big game hunt-
ing. His world embraced
France, Spain, Italy, Key West,
Cuba and Africa. The Old
Man and the Sea won a
Pulitzer Prize in 1952; two
years later Hemingway won
the Nobel Prize for
Literature. It was only
when his health began to
deteriorate that he sank into
depression. No longer able
to satisfy his lust for life, he
shot himself with a 12-gauge
shotgun on July 2, 1961.
 When Hemingway felt flush, he would go for dinner at a buzzing
brasserie called Michaud’s in Saint Germain. The well-preserved space
is now occupied by an equally lively establishment called Le Comptoir
des Saints Pères. Expect a well-off, fashionable crowd.
After dining, the classic Hemingway nightlife option would have been
the Dingo Bar, at 10 rue Delambre, where he first met Scott Fitzgerald.
Hemingway paints a teasing portrait of his fellow Lost Generation
author in A Moveable Feast. Sadly, this important literary landmark
is now an Italian restaurant.
For a more authentic Hemingway experience, take the metro to Opéra and
TYPE DESIGN BY: JAKOB NYLUND

seek out Harry’s New York Bar, at 5 rue Daunou. Barely changed since its
opening in 1911, it features white-coated barmen, dark wood, walls decorated
with faded university pennants, and the reassuring rattle of the cocktail shaker.
Finally, it is a short walk from here to the Ritz, in Place Vendôme. Legend
has it that Hemingway “liberated” the hotel’s bar when he arrived in Paris
with the allied troops in 1944. (He took the concept of the “embedded”
IMAGE: RICHARD GILLANDERS

journalist rather too far and recruited a band of resistance fighters on the
outskirts of the city.) He was certainly a regular customer – and today this
cosy, unexpectedly gentlemanly enclave is called The Bar Hemingway.
Take a seat, crack open one of the great man’s novels, and enjoy.
86
 THE
DISAPPEARING
EXPAT
Think Skype and iPods make life abroad better?
You don’t know what you’re missing

By Chuck Thompson

87
W
e rioted for
Doritos.I
don’t say
this proudly.
It was just
something all of us had to do.
This was Japan, 1991. There
were 12 of us living in an obscure
burg called Kojima, a bland-
as-tofu bedroom community
unofficially known as the parking
lot of southern Honshu.
We were foreign English
teachers — mostly Americans,
with a few scattered Brits and
the usual landless drifters the
ESL trade attracts — but our real
job was surviving the loneliness
and want of 20th century rural
Japan. Believe me, no matter how
much you think you like sushi,
no matter how healthy you think
dried seaweed flakes are, you
really don’t want to see them on
your plate everyday.
Rumours of the Dorito miracle
began trickling into the faculty
office around lunchtime. Some
sort of “American Day” promotion
going on at Happy Town, Kojima’s
ironically named shopping
complex. When Shanghai Bob
brought confirmation to me
he spoke nervously, like a guy
telling you about the tunnel he’s
been digging beneath his cell for
88
the past nine years. “I got word
from Glasser,” Shanghai Bob
half-whispered. “He’s calling the
display ‘smallish’. Twenty bags,
30 tops. No one else has
discovered it yet.”
“Can we get there before the
others find out?” I asked, casting
a wary eye at my comrades, just
then curiously slinking out of the
room. “Only if we skip our one
o’ clock classes.”
By the time Bob and I reached
Happy Town, of course, the
carefully arranged grocery-
aisle display featuring the exotic
American snack treat had been
decimated. You think Target the
day after Thanksgiving is a knife
fight? At Happy Town, the entire
foreign staff of our school was
staging a minor insurrection
around the Doritos pyramid,
scrambling for the last of the
hallowed yellow bags, issuing
ultimatums and elbowing each
other like NBA power forwards,
while a dozen bewildered Japanese
housewives looked on in mute awe.
Within minutes, Kojima’s expat
brigade had made off with every
known tortilla chip in the prefecture.
Whatever local appetites might
have been stimulated for this
prized American delicacy would
have to wait a year or two for
the next shipment to arrive.
Japan is where I learned to be an
expat. Aside from a few unique
details — sumo Saturdays, the
incomprehensibly repulsive dough
ball known as “manju” which tastes
like decomposing toenail clippings
encased in vulcanized halibut flesh
— the experience was typical of
life abroad. Which is to say, a hard,
hungry, pathological existence out
of which one scratches and claws
for a few dramatic rewards; a world
in which minor disappointments
are elevated to Greek tragedy
and meagre fortunes (“Doritos
in Kojima? Are we dreaming?”)
assume levels of heroic conquest.
Whether it’s goggle-eyed
Americans explaining the words
“Peace Corps” to warlords in
Uzbekistan, wary Germans sizing
up hand-scrawled signs outside of
dentist offices in Africa or eager
Aussies lying to their Argentine
hosts that theirs is indeed
perfectly correct and
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90
acceptable English pronunciation,
it is upon the twin anvils of
privation and isolation that for
centuries the expat experience has
been forged.
Or so I’ve always believed.
Having left the expat milieu behind
in the mid-90s, I’ve continued to
assume that, like the sun, stars
and Ichiro dribbling out 200 infield
hits a year, the trials of residency
abroad had remained a reliable
constant in an ever-shifting world.
This notion began crumbling for
me a couple of years ago, when I
went to work in an office in Hong
Kong. Initially, the team of expats
I was working with appeared
to be a familiar lot — youngish
Brits, Yanks, Aussies, Canucks,
Filipinos, Singaporeans and a few
unidentifiable others.
After a few months, however, I
began to realise that a fundamental
shift in the expat universe had
occurred during my years
away; a change that makes the
modern avatars of international
adventurism profoundly different
than the ones I’d slogged alongside
The level of assimilation
expats around the world enjoy
today was unthinkable 20
years ago
in the 80s and 90s.
In a book called Smile When
You’re Lying, I wrote, “All expat
life is limbo. Lurking behind every
discussion, the Return Home,
whether it’s one or two or 10 years
away, provides the fundamental
tension to every moment you live
abroad.” The expats I was drinking
beer with in Hong Kong and other
parts of Asia, however, never
talked about going home. Ever.
They didn’t avoid the subject
of home merely because they
were content where they were —
though most seemed to be that
— but because, even as foreigners,
they had become an integral
part of the places in which they
lived. This was startling to me.
The level of assimilation expats
around the world enjoy today —
and not only in Brit-influenced
Hong Kong — would have been
unimaginable 20 years ago.
Three fundamental changes
appear to account for the
disruption in the tectonics
of expat citizenry.
The first is obvious, though no
less important for it. As it has
everything else, the Internet has
dramatically altered the rules of
the overseas game. By this I don’t
simply mean a reliance on the
comforting immediacy of daily
Skype chats with the peeps back
in Leeds or the ability to conduct
91
seamless bank transactions
with the home branch in Topeka.
Far more revolutionary is that
the Internet has eliminated the
primary horror that once damaged
so many lives abroad.
I speak, of course, of the
extended separation from beloved
organisations bearing such manly
appellations as Cornhuskers,
The flattened world economy
has mostly eliminated the
need for Doritos riots
Cottagers and Magpies. In Japan
in the 1980s and 90s, I used to
watch month-old VHS tapes of
Los Angeles Lakers games kindly
shipped to me by sympathetic
friends back home. Today in
Hong Kong, I sometimes sit next
to a California native and rabid
San Francisco Giants fan who
not only didn’t miss an inning of
the team’s God-appointed World
Series triumph in 2010, but who,
thanks to Slingbox and MLB.com,
followed the entire season live
92
from his apartment in Sheung
Wan. And with the familiar drawl
of Jon Miller providing the play-
by-play, to boot.
In addition to round-the-clock
hometown connectivity (“Uncle
Paul finally had that boil lanced
– send pics!”), the flattened world
economy has mostly eliminated
the need for Doritos riots. Not only
can the resourceful expat find
pretty much any chip or pizza
topping anywhere in the world
— from personal experience I’m
including the Congo in
this claim — but he can choose
between synthetic ranch, roasted
chipotle, creamy spinach, spicy
habañero, rosemary and basil,
toasted camel droppings and yak
butter flavourings.
In other words, the market for
canned tortillas we expats in
Kojima single-handedly kept alive
in 1991 has pretty much collapsed.
More significant than either of
these two developments, however,
is that the exhausted world seems
finally to have given in to, or at
least gotten used to, the flood
of expats that began spreading
across the globe en masse in the
post-colonial era. Once an exotic
creature at which benighted locals
could not shout “Hello!” at often
enough, the expatriate nowadays
is a common enough specimen in
most countries that he or she can
pedal a bicycle to local markets
or country schoolrooms without
inciting more than one or two
shrieks from disbelieving rubes
among the hoi polloi.
The most astonishing evidence
of the growing international status
of the foreign resident comes from
Japan, perhaps the most defiantly
homogenous society on earth.
According to David Askew,
associate professor of law at
Kyoto’s Ritsumeikan University, in
1965 a mere one in 250 marriages
in Japan were between couples of
mixed ethnicity.
By the mid-2000s, the number
of mixed-race marriages had
surged to one in 15 nationwide, and
one in 10 in Tokyo. Between 1987
and 2004, more than half a million
children were born in Japan with
at least one foreign parent.
You don’t need to be John
93
Blackthorne to read the writing on
the scroll. If the world can’t count on
Japan to keep its foreign population
at arm’s length, it’s pointless to
expect anyone else to do so.
One can easily argue in favour of
these developments—life is plainly
less troublesome for today’s expats
— but before the experience of
living among strangers in strange
lands disappears for good, I think
it’s worth pointing out the dimmer
side of all this progress.
Whether in Tokyo, Hong Kong,
Sydney, Mumbai or Cape Town,
it’s nice being accepted by the
crowd — I hated being poked and
prodded everywhere I went in
rural Japan 20 years ago — but
to me there seems little point in
leaving one place for another if,
just like back home, you end up
with the same old TV, same old
food, same old blasé neighbours.
94
Some of the baggage that comes
with human migration, of course,
will always remain. In the midst
of my worried ruminations on the
passing of yet another touchstone
of the international travel
experience, I met an American
in Tokyo who spent 20 minutes
Nothing spoils and expat's
day like running into a tourist
from his or her home country
lambasting the poor attitudes
of linguistically challenged
foreigners who had yet to master
the Tokyo subway system and
who complained incessantly
about the peculiarities of
Japanese cuisine. Nothing spoils
an expat’s day like running into
a tourist from his home country.
“Why do these people even
bother coming here?” the
American wondered aloud,
adopting the unmistakably uppity
air of the besieged local. “If they
don’t like it, stay home.”
For a second, I nodded in Old
Asia Hand empathy. Then I
realised he might just as easily
have been describing me, circa
1991. Or, for that matter, 2011.
The malcontent who, for all the
appreciation of instant video chatting,
smart phoning and on-demand
Doritos snarfing, still recognises the
value of cultural isolation, and who
understands that the scars it leaves
behind are almost always worth the
trouble it takes to earn them.
Chuck Thompson is the author of Smile When
You Are Lying and To Hellholes and Back. He
currently lives in Hong Kong and his latest
book about the American Deep South will be
released in 2012.
 LAND OF THE

LOST
PICO IYER REVELS IN THE COMPLICATIONS OF LIFE
IN MAURITIUS, A PLACE WHERE NOTHING IS CERTAIN

IMAGES: JANA VUJTKOVA

I
was walking, almost
alone it seemed, with
two lion-cubs through
a wilderness evocative
of Africa. The feral
creatures were trotting along
beside me, completely free,
turning round every now and
then to snap, or whipping their
heads back if I touched them too
close to their necks.
“You’ve got to be vigilant,”
whispered their young
Zimbabwean manager, Ben.
Three other visitors also kept their
distance as we walked for an hour
through the wild.
Not many minutes later, a
cheetah was running his rough
tongue up and down my palm,
again and again, three others
languidly stretched out beside him,
and an electrified fence five feet
away from us. “You see that?” said
Ben suddenly. “I took my mind off
him for a second and he bit me!”
Indeed. And yet it’s the prospect of
a bite that gives a pretty face its life
and character; it’s the edge in any
seeming paradise that brings it out of
the domain of fantasy and into a place
you can touch and interact with.
I’ve seen the most gorgeous
beaches of my life in the Gulf of
Thailand, but both Sri Lanka and
Cuba (and Mauritius sometimes
seems to be the love-child of the two)
deepen their beauties with the power

99
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of social complication. Bali becomes
interesting to me only when you
recall that it has been the site of mass
slaughter and people “running amok.”
So travelling across Mauritius
felt at many moments like that
memorable walk with the eight-
month-old cubs, brought over from
Africa, who were as engagingly
photogenic and as domestic
seeming as their names, Kimba
and Kiara. I knew things could
turn at any moment. As you drive
around the small country roads of
Mauritius, under billowing cotton-
candy clouds and over rolling
grassy hills, you see Ali Coiffeur
give way to Chan Tek Keng Store
(“So delicious, so Mauritius”), and
then a scrappy shack offering
“Samoussa” and “Gateaux.”
The Trinidad of the Indian Ocean,
in fact, takes its name from a Dutch
prince, has a capital city (Port
Louis) that was rechristened by the
British after a French monarch,
and features a population that is
mostly of Indian Hindu descent,
though nearly every town has some
Chinese as well. The billboards
along the island’s single highway
offer slogans in French, with “A PLACE FULL
additional sentences in English. OF GODS IS
LIKELY TO
As soon as you land in Mauritius
HAVE DEMONS,
— a friendly dodo is stamped into TOO”
your passport in a town called
Plaisance — you catch glimpses of
the blue-green waters and palmy
beaches that must have captured
every newcomer who sailed in.
The sharp green hills that rise
up between the empty white-sand
strips and over the high sugarcane
fields make you wonder if you’ve
arrived in Rio, though shrunk to the
size of a postage stamp.
Vivid cardinals dart down onto
your table to pick at papayas, and
mynahs sing from the trees. The
faces are Indian, but the voices
sound like Catherine Deneuve
after a spell in Jamaica, and the
Creole they utter is a melange of
several different tongues.
So Mauritius quickly becomes
much more interesting and
textured than its parasailing
options and massage oils. It first
appeared on Europe’s map in
1507 through the Portuguese,
but they soon moved on from an
uninhabited place that the Arabs
had called the “Isle of Desolation.”
The Dutch landed in 1598, after
three of their ships were blown off-
course by a cyclone, to find birds so
tame you could catch them (hence
the end of the poor, too-trusting dodo)
and turtles so aged they could carry
ten men on their backs, it was said.
The Dutch brought in slaves,
Javanese deer and sugarcane, but
they too were driven away — by
cyclones — in the early 18th century,
so the French came in, followed
by pirates. When the British took
over in 1810, during the Napoleonic
Wars, they allowed the locals to
retain their land, their language
and their legal code, with the result
that green British road-signs now
point to Flic-a-Flac and Domaine de
l’Etoile. They also brought in Indians
and Chinese to replace the slaves.
Mauritius gained independence in
1968 but it has never quite decided
who or what it is. The brochures
proudly tell you that it’s the home
of seggae music, the fusion of sega
and reggae, and in the upmarket
hotels you can hear sitars and tablas
accompanied by rhythm guitars.
But the headlines tell you that
in 1999 the island was paralysed
by four days of rioting after the
Creole inventor of seggae, Kaya,
an outspoken champion of Creole
rights, was found dead in his prison
cell, perhaps the victim of Hindu
policemen. A statue of Queen
Victoria stands near the thriving
street market in Port Louis, but
on one bus-stand someone has
scribbled, in black, “NO RACISM.”
I had expected, when I arrived last
winter, to find myself surrounded by
hedge-fund managers from London
and investment bankers from
Hong Kong. Yet landing just after
a cyclone hit the global economy,
I found myself in a luxury resort
made for people unaccustomed to
luxury. Brawny Russians sauntered
through the gardens, taking pictures
of their platinum-card companions
under every tree.
A pair of slightly dotty, imperial
Brits swam silently through a pool
with snorkels on. Hip Indian couples “THIS IS A
from London circled the Business PLACE WHERE
NOTHING
Centre computers at dawn — and,
IS UNMIXED”
in an entire week on the island, for
the first time in my life I heard not a
single American or Japanese voice.
 You can walk with the lions in
Mauritius or stroll along the ocean
floor; you can kayak or waterski
or pad around colonial houses
such as Eureka. You can eat bat
curry and visit the small museum
in Port Louis that shows off the
island’s most famous possession,
the Mauritius “Blue Penny” stamp.
Yet at the same time you’re advised
not to walk around Port Louis
after dark, and at some of the most
lyrical beaches, told not to swim.
Mauritius seemed to me a place
where nothing, delightfully, is
certain or unmixed. And if its sights
are often just its faces, its most
remarkable events seem to be its
skies. Never have I been to a place
with heavens so large that they
seem to be made for triptyches.
Over and over in Turtle Bay, I’d
look to the left and see a grey-black
sky angry with storm clouds. To the
right was the depthless blue calm of
a sunlit day in midsummer. Three,
four times a day the skies broke and
the water came down in torrents,
stopping as abruptly as it had
begun. To walk down the beach was
to step from April to November.
And then into April again.
Mauritians will point out to you
with excitement their gleaming new
high-rises saying HSBC, Accenture,
Ernst and Young, and the call-
centres and “Cyber City” that are
beginning to loom over the “Hare
Krishna Land” centre and the Birla
Institute of Technology. Yet for a
typical visitor from the city, its most
stunning sight may be its botanical
gardens, You can see cashew nut
trees and Cuba royal palms and 35
kinds of mango there.
You can eat lotus-seeds, smell
cashews in the raw, watch 200-year-
old turtles and African carp. There
are 80 kinds of palm, nutmeg plants,
torch ginger and Bodhi trees.
“Mauritius is the Garden of Eden,”
announced Premanand Parmessur,
a spirited, irresistible character who
likes to entertain visitors around the
elephant-foot palms. “But the only
difference is, there are no snakes. No
dangerous animals at all. Nothing
poisonous.” Then, inevitably, he cited
Mark Twain’s report on the island:
“you gather the idea that Mauritius
was made first, and then heaven,
and that heaven was copied after
Mauritius.” That sounds, out of
context, like a sparkling endorsement
from one of the least impressionable
satirists around. But what is often
left out in Mauritian accounts is that
Twain was not recording his own
observations there, but, rather, those
of the local boosters who told him
that Mauritius was the greatest place
around (for those who had never
been off the island).
Just as I was thinking all this, the
palm trees began shuddering so
violently that it sounded like rain,
and then indeed the rain crashed
down again, so violently that I had
to wade through water up to my
ankles just to get back to my room.
Cyclones sweep through Mauritius
every summer, The Garden of Eden,
I recalled, is the place you leave
— only to be confronted, so the old
books say, by the Flood.
Pico Iyer is a British writer who has written
for The New York Times, National Geographic
and Time among others. He has also written
11 books, his most recent, The Open Road, is
out now on Vintage Departures.
 A Few Miles Travelled
A SELECTION OF OUR FAVOURITE TRAVEL LITERATURE

106
T
ravel writing often gets a bad rap; with images of sozzled scribes lazily typing
away, nervously eyeing the locals. Yet the genre has a number of classics;
each rooted very much in a place, some written by locals, some written by
visitors; all enthralling. The books illustrate the bravery and creativity of these
writers who travelled to deserts, mountain ranges and cities, each coming back
with something new. One of bravest was Freya Stark, whose A Winter in Arabia is a
must for anyone interested in the Middle East. We had no space for it here, but that
shouldn’t stop you from hunting down a copy. As for the rest, read, and enjoy.

107
107
HONG KONG — Jan Morris
A portrait of a city between two goliaths — caught den, through both World Wars and up to the late ‘80s.
in the dying days of the British Empire and about to Morris is a master of observation and her take on the
be swallowed up by China, Morris captures Hong city — particularly in the early years — is fascinating.
Kong brilliantly. Her prose radiates an almost kinetic She is fond of the place, but never sentimental, and
energy, reminiscent of the city itself, and her research her clear-eyed prose is wonderful. Morris, of course,
and detail bring the place to life. She tracks the has written many books, but this is one of her finest.
origins of the city, when it was an opium smuggling Vintage Departures, 1985
MAXIMUM CITY — Suketu Mehta
If ever a book captured the soul of a city, then a place as diverse as Mumbai in one book, but after
Mehta’s tome on Mumbai does. Maximum City is a reading it, one is filled with an urgent need to visit the
riveting look at the chaos, noise, people and sprawl place to see what Mehta has seen; surely the point of
that makes up Mumbai. Mehta writes beautifully, a book like this. Although Maximum City is rooted
interspersing personal accounts of his childhood with in one place, it’s as fluid and engaging as any travel
stories about fame, power, crime, poverty, money and book of the past decade.
love. Of course, it’s impossible to fully encapsulate Vintage, 2004
VIDEO NIGHT IN KATHMANDU — Pico Iyer
A striking portrait of the juxtaposition between East
and West, Iyer brought a fresh eye to Asia, travelling
everywhere from Nepal to Bali and describing the
influence of Western culture on these (once) exotic
places. Iyer’s book — published in 1988 — is prophetic,
and was one of the first treatises on globalisation’s
influence on the region. The writing is wonderful, and
Iyer’s eye for detail illuminates both the mundane
and the unusual. While this book is very much a
product of its time (these days Asia exports as
much culture as it imports) its intelligence and
humour make it indispensable nearly a quarter of a
century on. A writer of great wit and compassion.
Vintage Departures, 1988.
112
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THE ROAD TO OXIANA — Robert Byron
Robert Byron’s classic is regarded as the first
example of great travel writing. Covering Byron’s
ten-month journey to Persia and Afghanistan
in the early 1930s, the book is acerbic, eccentric
and intelligent. Byron pulls no punches and it is
his candour and wit that set this book apart from
contemporary travel journals. He weaves treatises
on the architecture he encounters around
descriptions of the more ridiculous characters he
meets on his journey. For all his barbs, Byron has a
deep love for Persia, and especially Afghanistan, and
his beautiful, sparse writing captures both countries
wonderfully. A true classic.
Vintage, 1937
TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY — John Steinbeck
Although known primarily for fiction (his 1939 novel
The Grapes of Wrath won a Pulitzer Prize), Steinbeck
wrote non-fiction all his life. Travels with Charley
is part travelogue, part treatise on what he saw as a
disappearing America. He journeys from Maine to
California with his dog Charley and records a country
on the brink of the 1960s. His writing is as elegant and
punchy as ever and is rooted in a sense of place; you
get a feel for the cycle of the seasons, the relationship
between the men he meets and the land they live in.
While Steinbeck was at the height of his fame he was
also aware he was dying, and wanted to see America
one last time. Poignant and engaging.
Penguin, 1962
A (not so )
INNOCENT
ABROAD MARK TWAIN’S EPIC VOYAGE

I
n 1867 Mark Twain set sail on the Quaker City for a months-long
expedition to Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Twain
uses biting satire, both to highlight the pomposity of his travelling
companions and the absurd claims of the travelogues of the time.
Originally conceived as a series of newspaper articles for The Alta
California (which paid the $2,000 cost of the trip), the book was released in
1869 and remains one of the best-selling travel books of all time.
FRANCE
We have come five hundred miles
by rail through the heart of France.
What a bewitching land it is! —
What a garden! Surely the leagues
of bright green lawns are swept
and brushed and watered every
day and their grasses trimmed by
the barber. Surely the hedges are
shaped and measured and their
symmetry preserved by the most
architectural of gardeners. Surely
the long straight rows of stately
poplars that divide the beautiful
landscape like the squares of a
checker-board are set with line and
plummet, and their uniform height
determined with a spirit level.
All is orderly and beautiful —
EVERY THING IS
charming to the eye
Surely the straight, smooth, pure
white turnpikes are jack-paned and
sand-papered every day. How else
are these marvels of symmetry,
cleanliness and order attained? It is
wonderful. There are no unsightly
stone walls, and never a fence of
any kind. There is no dirt, no decay,
no rubbish anywhere — nothing
that even hints at untidiness —
nothing that ever suggests neglect.
All is orderly and beautiful — every
thing is charming to the eye.
We have seen every thing and
tomorrow we go to Versailles. We
shall see Paris only for a little
while as we come back to take up
our line of march for the ship, and
so I may as well bid the beautiful
city a regretful farewell. We shall
travel many thousands of miles
after we leave here, and visit
many great cities, but we shall see
none so enchanting as this.
I will conclude this chapter
with a remark that I am sincerely
proud to be able to make — and
glad, as well, that my comrades
cordially endorse it, to wit; by far
the handsomest women we have
seen in France were born and
reared in America. I feel, now, like
a man who has redeemed a failing
reputation and shed lustre upon a
dimmed escutcheon, by a single
just deed done at the eleventh
hour. Let the curtain fall, to
slow music.
117
MILAN
We have had a bath in Milan, in a
public bath-house. They were going to
put all three of us in one bath-tub, but
we objected. Each of us had an Italian
The English know how to
farm on his back. We could have travel comfortably, and they carry
felt affluent if we had been officially
surveyed and fenced in. We chose to
have three bath-tubs, and large ones —
tubs suited to the dignity of aristocrats
SOAP WITH THEM
you that these foreigners can not once, but there was good reason for it.
who had real estate, and brought it understand English? Why will you There was not such an article about
with them. After we were stripped not depend on us? Why will you not the establishment. It is my belief that
and had taken the first chilly dash, we tell us what you want, and let us ask there never had been. They had to send
discovered that haunting atrocity that for it in the language of the country? far up town, and to several different
has embittered our lives in so many It would save us a great deal of the places before they finally got it, so they
cities and villages of Italy and France humiliation your reprehensible said. We had to wait twenty or thirty
— there was no soap. I called. A woman ignorance causes us. I will address minutes. The same things occurred
answered, and I barely had time to this person in his mother tongue: the evening before, at the hotel. I think
throw myself against the door — she ‘Here, cospetto! Corpo di Bacco! I have divined the reason for this state
would have been in, in another second. Sacramento! Solferino! — Soap, you of things at last. The English know how
I said: “Beware woman! Go away from son of a gun!’ Dan, if you would let us to travel comfortably, and they carry
here — go away, now, or it will be the talk for you, you would never expose soap with them; other foreigners do
worse for you. I am an unprotected your ignorant vulgarity.” not use the article.
male, but I will preserve my honor at Even this fluent discharge of Italian
the peril of my life!” did not bring the soap at
These words must have
frightened her for she scurried
away very fast.
Dan’s voice rose on the air
“Oh bring some soap, why don’t you!”
The reply was Italian. Dan resumed:
“Soap, you know — soap. That is what
I want — soap. S-o-a-p, soap; s-o-
p-e, soap; s-o-u-p, soap. Hurry up! I
don’t know how you Irish spell it, but
I want it. Spell it to suit yourself, but
fetch it. I’m freezing.”
I heard the doctor say, impressively:
“Dan, how often have we told

118
VENICE
What a funny old city this Queen of
the Adriatic is! Narrow streets, vast
gloomy marble palaces, black with
the corroding damps of centuries,
and all partly submerged; no dry
land visible any where, and no
sidewalks worth mentioning; if you
want to go to church, to the theatre,
or to the restaurant, you must call
a gondola. It must be a paradise for
cripples, for verily a man has no use
for legs here.
For a day or two the place looked
seen, in these old churches,
a profusion of costly and elaborate
sepulchre ornamentation such
as we never dreamt of before. We
have stood in the dim religious
light of these hoary sanctuaries,
in the midst of long ranks of dusty
monuments and effigies of the great
dead of Venice, until we seemed
drifting back, back, back, into the
solemn past, and looking upon
the scenes and mingling with the
peoples of a remote antiquity. We
have been in a half-waking sort of
dream all the time. I do not know
how else to describe the feeling. A
part of our being has remained still
in the nineteenth century while
another part of it has seemed in
some unaccountable way walking
among the phantoms of the tenth.

NARROW STREETS,
like an overflowed Arkansas town,
because of its currentless waters
laving the very doorsteps of all the
houses, and the cluster of boats vast gloomy marble palaces, black with
made fast under the windows, or
skimming in and out of the alleys and the corroding damps of centuries
byways, that I could not get rid of the
impression that there was nothing
the matter here but a spring freshet,
and that the river would fall in a few
weeks and leave a dirty high-water
mark on the houses and the streets
full of mud and rubbish.
Yes, I think we have seen
all of Venice. We have

119
CONSTANTINOPLE
When I think about how I have
been swindled by books of Oriental
travel, I want a tourist for breakfast.
For years and years I have dreamed
of the wonders of the Turkish
bath; for years and years I have
promised myself that I would yet
enjoy one. Many and many a time,
in fancy, I have lain in the marble
bath, and breathed the slumberous
fragrance of Eastern spices that
filled the air; then passed through
a weird and complicated system of
pulling and hauling, and drenching
and scrubbing, by a gang... who
loomed vast and vaguely through
the steaming mists, like demons;
then rested for a while on a divan
fit for a King; then passed through
another complex ordeal, and each
one more fearful than the first; and,
finally, swathed in soft fabrics, been
conveyed to a princely saloon and
laid on a bed of eider down, where
Persian tobacco, and by the music
of fountains that counterfeited the
pattering of summer rain.
That was the picture, just as I
got it from incendiary books of
travel. It was a poor, miserable
imposture. The reality is no more
like it than the Five Points are like
the Garden of Eden. They received
me in a great court, paved with
marble slabs; around it were broad
galleries, one above another,
carpeted with seedy matting,
railed with unpainted balustrades,
and furnished with huge rickety
chairs, cushioned with rusty
old mattresses, indented with
For years and years I have
dreamed of the wonders of the
impressions left by the forms of
nine successive generations of men
who had reposed upon them. The
place was vast, naked, dreary; its
court a barn, its galleries stalls for
human horses. The cadaverous,
half-nude varlets that served in
the establishment had nothing of
poetry in their appearance, nothing
of romance, nothing of Oriental
splendour. They shed no entrancing
odours — just the contrary. Their
hungry eyes and their lank forms
continually suggested one glaring,
unsentimental fact — they wanted
what they term in California
“a square meal.”

TURKISH BATH
eunuchs, gorgeous of costume,
fanned me while I drowsed and
dreamed, or contentedly gazed at
the rich hangings of the apartment,
the soft carpets, the sumptuous
furniture, the pictures, and drank
delicious coffee, smoked the soothing
narghili, and dropped, at the last, into
tranquil repose, lulled by sensuous
odors from unseen censers, by the
gentle influence of the narghili’s

120
BEIRUT
The rest of us had nothing to do
but look at the beautiful city of
Beirut, with its bright, new houses
nestled among a wilderness of
green shrubbery spread abroad
over an upland that sloped gently
down to the sea; and also at the
mountains of Lebanon that environ
it; and likewise to bathe in the
transparent blue water that rolled
its billows about the ship (we did
not know there were sharks there.)
We also had to range up and down
the town and look at the costumes.
These are picturesque and fanciful,
but no so varied as Constantinople
and Smyrna. A young gentleman
(I believe he was a Greek)
volunteered to show us around
the city, and said it would afford
him great pleasure, because he
was studying English and wanted
practice in that language. When we
had finished the rounds, however,
he called for renumeraton — said
he hoped the gentlemen would give
him a few piastres (equivalent to
a few five cent pieces). We did so.
The Consul was surprised when
he heard it, and said he knew the
young fellow’s family very well,
and that they were an old and
highly respectable family and
worth a hundred and fifty thousand
dollars! Some people, so situated,
would have been ashamed of
the berth he had with us and his
manner of crawling into it.
122
EGYPT
The Sphynx: a hundred and twenty-
five feet long, sixty feet high, and a
hundred and two feet around the
head, if I remember rightly — carved
out of one solid block of stone harder
than any iron. The block must have
been as large as the Fifth Avenue
Hotel before the usual waste (by the
necessities of sculpture) of a fourth
or a half of the original mass was
begun. I only set down these figures
and these remarks to suggest the
prodigious labor the carving of it
so elegantly, so symmetrically, so
faultlessly, must have cost. This
species of stone is so hard that
figures cut in it remain sharp and
unmarred after exposure to the
weather for two or three thousand
years. Now did it take a hundred
We were glad to have seen
that land which had glass
THREE THOUSAND
YEARS BEFORE
England had it
years of patient toil to carve the
Sphynx? It seems probable.
We were glad to have seen the land
which was the mother of civilization
— which taught Greece her letters,
and through Greece Rome, and
through Rome the world. We were
glad to have seen that land which had
an enlightened religion with future
eternal rewards and punishment in it,
while even Israel’s religion contained
no promise of a hereafter.
We were glad to have seen that
land which had glass three thousand
years before England had it, and
could paint upon it as none of us
could paint now; that land which
knew, three thousand years ago, well
nigh all of science and surgery which

science has discovered lately; which
had in high excellence a thousand
luxuries and necessities of an
advanced civilization which we have
gradually contrived and accumulated
in modern times and claimed as
things that were new under the sun;
that paper untold centuries before
we dreamt of it — and waterfalls
before our women thought of them;
that had a perfect system of common
schools so long before we boasted of
our achievements in that direction
that it seems forever and forever
ago; that so embalmed the dead that
flesh was made almost immortal
— which we can not do; that built
temples which mock at destroying
time and smile grimly upon our
lauded little prodigies of architecture;
that old land that knew all which
we know now, perchance and more;
that walked in the broad highway
of civilization in the gray dawn of
creation, ages and ages before we
were born; that left the impress of
exalted Mind upon the eternal front
of the Sphynx to confound all, who,
might seek to persuade the world
that imperial Egypt, in the days of her
high renown, had groped in darkness.
EPILOGUE
Wherever we went in Europe, Asia,
or Africa, we made a sensation,
and, I suppose I may add, created a
famine. None of us had ever been any
where before; we all hailed from the
interior; travel was a wild novelty to
us, and we conducted ourselves in
accordance to the natural instincts
that were in us, and trammelled
ourselves with no ceremonies, no
conventionalities. We always took
care to make it understood that we
were Americans — Americans! When
we found that a good many foreigners
had hardly ever heard of America,
and that a good many more knew it
only as a barbarous province away
off somewhere, that had lately been
at war with somebody, we pitied
the ignorance of the Old World, but
abated no jot of our importance.
Many and many a simple community
in the Eastern hemisphere will
remember for years the incursion of
the strange horde in the year of our
Lord 1867, that called themselves
Americans, and seemed to imagine
in some unaccountable way that they
had a right to be proud of it.
The people of those foreign
countries are very, very ignorant.
They looked curiously at the
costumes we had brought from the
wilds of America. They observed
that we talked loudly at table
sometimes. They noticed that we
looked out for expenses, and got
what we conveniently could out of
a franc, and wondered where in the
mischief we came from. In Paris
they just simply opened their eyes
and stared when we spoke to them
in French! We never did succeed
in making those idiots understand
their own language.
The people stared at us every
where, and we stared at them. We
generally made them feel rather
small, too, because we bore down
on them with America’s greatness
until we crushed them. And yet
we took kindly to the manners and
customs, and to the fashions of the
various peoples we visited.
The grand pilgrimage is over.
Good-bye to it, and a pleasant
memory to it, I am able to say in
kindness. I bear no malice toward
any individual that was connected
with it, either as passenger or
officer. Things I did not like
yesterday I like very well today, now
that I am at home, and always I shall
be able to poke fun at the whole gang
if the spirit so moves me, without
ever saying a malicious word. The
expedition accomplished all that its
programme promised and we ought
to be satisfied with the management
of the matter,
certainly. Bye-bye!
The Innocents Abroad is
published by Penguin
123
 INTERRUPTED

Vietnam’s capital is 1,000 years old

and as enchanting as ever. Greg Girard
captures Hanoi’s hidden charms
125
126
A family altar in the backyard of a
home in the old city (left). This was
only discovered after knocking on the
door of someone’s house and asking to
get up to their second floor balcony to
photograph a street scene. The elderly
gentleman who let me into his home
asked if we’d like to see more of the
house and, showing us his backyard,
revealed this altar. A barber’s chair in
an open-fronted shop (below). Scenes
like this are not uncommon, although
they are becoming rarer.

127
This dense low-rise neighbourhood is near Hanoi’s
main railway station, and throughout the day
locomotives pull freight cars and passenger
carriages past kitchens, bedrooms and small
shops that line the tracks. As Hanoi modernises,
one has to wonder how long these homes and
shops, built alongside an active railway line in
the centre of the city, will last.
129
Getting onto balconies in private homes is always a
challenge, and in this case it took a couple of tries before
the occupants relented and let me photograph the view
from their balcony. Part of the home had been converted
into a workshop, and so as I photographed this scene, a
room full of young women was sewing plastic awnings
in the room behind me.
131
132
ALL IMAGES: GREG GIRARD//WWW.GREGGIRARD.COM
A view of raised train tracks curving
through the centre of the city. The building
where we took this photo is owned by a
family with a bakery business on the
ground floor, and it took several visits
before the bakery staff called a family
member. Happily they agreed to allow us
access to their rooftop, revealing a view of
the raised tracks curving through the city.
Hanoi Calling is out now on Thames & Hudson

133
134
2:30pm
LADDER ST,

July 21st, 2009

HONG KONG,
STYLE • MAPPED

IMAGE: BALDOVINO BARANI; WWW.BALDOVINOBARANI.COM; STYLING BY HOLLY SUAN GRAY; WWW.HOLLYSUANGRAY.COM

135
BRIEFING
N ERV E
CEN T RE IES:
E OF THE SK
THE SCIENC S
TES KEEPS IT
HOW EMIRA
RNE
FLEET AIRBO

P140

CA R D
ART P
RTISTS SCOO
REGIONAL A S
IN SKYWARD
TOP PRIZES
ISTS
FUTURE ART
N
COMPETITIO

P138

137
 EMIRATES NEWS
ARTISTIC REWARDS
THE FIRST THREE WINNERS OF THE ANNUAL
Skywards Future Artists competition have
the great pleasure of seeing their creations
on the highly valued personal membership
cards carried by Skywards members around
the world.
Launched in 2010, when Emirates
re-branded Skywards — the global frequent
flyer programme — Skywards Future Artists
offers an unparalleled platform for emerging
artists to showcase their art on a global scale.
The competition not only offers support
and recognition to budding artists, it also
invites Skywards members to actively
participate themselves. Members can submit
their own works of art or nominate friends
and family to take part. Members continue
being involved in the entire process, with the
ability to vote on the winning selection.
The prizes for the Blue, Silver and Gold
membership cards that represent each
tier of Skywards membership allow the
winners to gain a worldwide audience for
their work. They also receive the opportunity
to display their work at one of the leading
contemporary art fairs in the region, Art
Dubai, as well as $5,000 in prize money.
This year’s winners were vetted by six art
experts from around the world who chose
50 entries from the thousands that were
submitted. These were then broken down
into a short-list which was voted on by
thousands of Skywards members worldwide.
Iranian sculptor Kambiz Sabri created
a futuristic design for the Blue card, a
fascinating piece that featured enlarged rain
drops encased in a transparent cube. Sabri
explained his vision: “Rain is a blue message
138
from the sky to the earth, the rain of love and
peace for people all around the world.”
Fellow-Iranian sculptor Amir Vafaei
won the Silver brief to create a piece that
encapsulated sophistication and intelligence.
The Tehran-based artist’s work was inspired
by Turkman carpet motifs. He said the
competition was a great opportunity to
showcase his work internationally. “I am
pleased that my work has gained the viewer’s
attention and it’s an honour to demonstrate
my work through this exhibition.”
The Gold category was won by the
Baghdad-born artist, Nedim Kufi.
Specialising in multimedia art, he created
a computer-generated image of scattered,
shining bones, to capture the qualities of the
card: luxury, elite and precious.
Kufi, who has exhibited in both the Tate
Modern and Bonhams in London said the
award brought him “one step closer to my
dream of creating Rummana in a public
space. Thank you to all the Skywards
members who voted for me.”
The winners follow in the footsteps of
artists such as Damien Hirst, Simone
Cenedese and Christopher Ries, whose
works adorned the first series of cards. If
you would like to partcipate in the next
Skywards Future Artists competition,
please visit: www.ourfutureartists.com.
“ THE PRIZE GIVES
ARTISTS A GLOBAL
PLATFORM FOR
THEIR WORK”
 EMIRATES NEWS

8,000 ER OF BAG
S
THE NUMB D�IN
H AT CA N BE CHECKE
T IONAL
T D UB AI INTERNAT
A �
TERMINAL
AIRPORT’S

EVERY HOUR

NERVE CENTRE CHECK

LOOKING TO MOST FIRST-TIME VISITORS LIKE
a high-tech set from a film, the Emirates
Network Control Centre (NCC) is a real-life
example of state- of-the-art technology
in action. Serving as a nerve centre for
the entire Emirates Airline operation,
the importance of the NCC cannot be
exaggerated. Everything that happens across
111 destinations in 66 countries is observed
and recorded. Whether it’s a technical
glitch in Cape Town or a passenger problem
in Paris, the NCC is there 24 hours a day.
Opposite the screens and running the
length of the room are vast windows
offering an impressive panoramic view
of the airport. With 1,162 flights per week
from Dubai International Airport alone,
the logistics of such an operation is mind
boggling. Sweeping his arm across the
wall of screens, Gareth Williams, Vice
President Network Control, explains how
his team stay focused.
“Being situationally aware is key and a lot
of the equipment is to help us be precisely
that,” he explains. The central screen shows
a patchwork of aeroplane icons moving
across a map of the world as their course
is updated every few minutes. “Globally,
this is how we stand at the moment, with
around 80 planes up in the air”, Williams

140
 EMIRATES NEWS

continues. “We are a working example of
an operations management environment
and logistically this could be applied to any
network and it’s all happening live.”
Now in its fourth incarnation, the
centre has a back up facility in place for
contingencies such as an evacuation.
Overseeing the operations of the 151
aircraft in service, the team at work in the
NCC is trained to expect the unexpected.
From weather disruptions to volcano
eruptions, planning is vital and devising
strategic, time efficient solutions and
resolution is paramount to maintaining
Emirates’ schedule integrity at all times.
“There may be [a warning] or it may just
happen. It could be a weather issue or a
medical diversion, and what we are good at
here is getting a group of experts together
very quickly to discuss the problem at
hand, evaluate the options and roll out the
recovery plan.”
Connectivity is the crucial tenet of the
business, and the NCC team helps to ensure
that Emirates keeps flying day and night,
365 days a year. .
“BEING AWARE
SITUATIONALLY IS
KEY FOR WHAT
WE DO HERE ”

AD

141
 EMIRATES NEWS

THE GREEN MILE

IN A WORLD OF EVER-INCREASING ABUNDANCE
when it comes to the sheer volume
of products on the global market, it is
increasingly incumbent on the consumer
to buy responsibly. For those who are
attractive design as well as their 100 per
cent recyclable benefits has seen them
establish a permanent exhibition in the
Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
THE GLOBAL AVERAGE FOR AIRCRAFT
With polystyrene and plastic disposable

mindful of reducing their carbon footprint,
there is a growing choice available.
The market for eco-friendly products is
growing and a number of innovative and
environmentally conscious companies are
catering for consumers who want to know
where their money is going and how their
purchases are made.
One such business is enviro-cap, an
Australian company utilising a method
76%
OCCUPANCY IS AROUND ��%, COMPARED TO
��% FOR CARS AND �����% FOR TRAINS
coffee cups being another ubiquitous
environmental blight, brother and sister
team Abigail and Jamie Forsyth decided
to take responsibility and create an eco-
friendly alternative for the customers of
their local sandwich shop.
WWW.ENVIRO.AERO
Their KeepCup reusable cup was born
when Abigail found herself appalled at the
idea of giving her young daughter milk
THE AMOUNT � IN THOUSANDS OF TONNES
in a disposable cup. After two years of

438
� OF FUEL SAVED ANNUALLY PER MINUTE OF
of combining shredded post-consumer development the KeepCup now boasts a SINGLE�ENGINE TAXIING

plastic bottles with natural cotton to make global demographic of customers prepared
baseball caps. Another company to make thoughtful changes to
AIR�
combating the proliferation
AIRCRAFT their daily habits in aid of
of plastic bottles is the more ENTERING the environment.
DAY
established Swiss company FLEETS TO E
ARE 70% MIE OR WWW.KEEPCUP.COM
NT
WWW.ENVIRO.AERO
SIGG. For more than 100 years
FUEL-E FFIC WWW.ENVIRO-CAP.COM
E Y WE RE
SIGG has specialised in reusable THAN TH S AGO WWW.SIGG.COM
40 YEA R
aluminium water bottles. Their

EMIR ATES ENVIRONMENTAL INITIATIVES & VOLUNTARY CARBON OFF-SETTING

ECOLOGICALLY SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT WWW.EMIRATES.COM/AE/ENGLISH/ABOUT/EMVIRONMENT/EMVIRONMENT.ASPX

LOW EMISSION FLEET WWW.EMIRATES.COM/AE/ENGLISH/ABOUT/EMVIRONMENT/EMIRATES_A���.ASPX

RECYCLING ��� TONNES OF WASTE IS RECYCLED EACH MONTH FROM OUR AIRCRAFT IN DUBAI

WASTE MANAGEMENT FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THESE PRINCIPLES AT WWW.HEROESOFTHEUAE.AE

VOLUNTARY C OFF-SETTING WE BELIEVE THAT WE ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR REDUCING OUR EMISSIONS, NOT OUR CUSTOMERS

CARBONZERO FIND OUT MORE AT WWW.CARBONZERO.CO.NZ/INDEX.ASP

142
 CABIN
L BE
EMIRATES NEWS
CREW WIL P IF
HEL
HAPPY TO D
YOU NEE

A S S I S TA N C E
COMPLETIN G THE
FORMS
TO US CUSTOMS & IMMIGRATION FORMS
WHETHER YOU’RE TRAVELLING TO, OR THROUGH, the United States today, free as possible. The Cabin Crew will offer you two forms when you
this simple guide to completing the US customs and immigration are nearing your destination. We provide some simple guidelines
forms will help to ensure that your journey is as smooth and hassle below, so you can correctly complete the forms.

CUSTOMS DECLARATION FORM IMMIGRATION FORM

All passengers arriving into the US need to

complete a CUSTOMS DECLARATION FORM. If
you are travelling as a family this should be
completed by one member only. The form
must be completed in English, in capital letters,
and must be signed where indicated.

The IMMIGRATION FORM I-94 (Arrival/Departure

Record) should be completed if you are a non-
US citizen in possession of a valid US visa and
your final destination is the US or if you are in
transit to a country outside the US. A separate
form must be completed for each person,
including children travelling on their parents’
passport. The form includes a Departure
Record which must be kept safe and given to
your airline when you leave the US.
If you hold a US or Canadian passport,
US Alien Resident Visa (Green Card), US
Immigrant Visa or a valid ESTA (right), you are
not required to complete an immigration form.

144
 EMIRATES NEWS

ELECTRONIC SYSTEM FOR THIS MAY BE REVOKED OR

TRAVEL AUTHORISATION (ESTA) WILL EXPIRE ALONG WITH

IF YOU ARE AN INTERNATIONAL YOUR PASSPORT.

TRAVELLER WISHING TO ENTER APPLY ONLINE AT WWW.CBP.GOV/ESTA

THE UNITED STATES UNDER THE

VISA WAIVER PROGRAMME, YOU NATIONALITIES ELIGIBLE FOR

MUST APPLY FOR ELECTRONIC THE VISA WAIVER*:
AUTHORISATION �ESTA� UP ANDORRA, AUSTRALIA,

TO �� HOURS PRIOR TO YOUR AUSTRIA, BELGIUM, BRUNEI,

DEPARTURE. CZECH REPUBLIC, DENMARK,

ESTONIA, FINLAND, FRANCE,

ESTA FACTS: GERMANY, HUNGARY, ICELAND,

CHILDREN AND IRELAND, ITALY, JAPAN, LATVIA,

INFANTS REQUIRE AN LIECHTENSTEIN, LITHUANIA,

INDIVIDUAL ESTA. LUXEMBURG, MALTA, MONACO,

THE ONLINE ESTA SYSTEM THE NETHERLANDS, NEW

AD
WILL INFORM YOU WHETHER ZEALAND, NORWAY, PORTUGAL,

YOUR APPLICATION SAN MARINO, SINGAPORE,

HAS BEEN AUTHORISED, SLOVAKIA, SLOVENIA, SOUTH

NOT AUTHORISED OR IF KOREA, SPAIN, SWEDEN,

AUTHORISATION SWITZERLAND AND THE

IS PENDING. UNITED KINGDOM**.

A SUCCESSFUL ESTA * SUBJECT TO CHANGE

APPLICATION IS VALID ** ONLY BRITISH CITIZENS QUALIFY UNDER

FOR TWO YEARS, HOWEVER THE VISA WAIVER PROGRAMME.

THE NUMBER OF AIRCRAFT

202
CURRENTLY ON ORDER BY EMIRATES�
THE SIZE, IN FOOTBALL PITCHES, OF EMIRATES’ SEVEN AIR�CONDITIONED
ENGINEERING HANGERS:

17
THE AMOUNT OF BEEF TENDERLOIN IN TONNES USED ANNUALLY

192
BY EMIRATES:

145
 ROUTE MAP

146
147
 ROUTE MAP

148
 EMIRATES NEWS

irhal.pdf 2/17/11 5:35:03 PM

What are holidays without queues?

Lisbon: One of 85 cities featured on www.irhal.com

CM

MY

CY

CMY

www.irhal.com
for the outbound traveler from the Middle East
149
 THE FLEET
OUR FLEET
S ���
CONTAIN
ADE UP
PLANES, M
SENGER
OF ��� PAS
ND �
PLANES A
ANES.
CARGO PL

For more information: www.emirates.com/english/f lying/our_f leet/our_f leet.aspx

FLEET GUIDE

Airbus A330-200 Number of Aircraft: 27 Capacity: 237-278 Range: 12,200km Length: 58.8m Wingspan: 60.3m

Airbus A340-300 Number of Aircraft: 8 Capacity: 267 Range: 13,350km Length: 63.6m Wingspan: 60.3m

Airbus A340-500 Number of Aircraft: 10 Capacity: 258 Range: 16,050km Length: 67.9m Wingspan: 63.4m

Airbus A380-800 Number of Aircraft: 15 Capacity: 489-517 Range: 15,000km Length: 72.7m Wingspan: 79.8m

152
Boeing 777-200 Number of Aircraft: 9 Capacity: 274-346 Range: 9,649km Length: 63.7m Wingspan: 60.9m

Boeing 777-200LR Number of Aircraft: 10 Capacity: 266 Range: 17,446km Length: 63.7m Wingspan: 64.8m

Boeing 777-300 Number of Aircraft: 12 Capacity: 364 Range: 11,029km Length: 73.9m Wingspan: 60.9m

Boeing 777-300ER Number of Aircraft: 53 Capacity: 354-442 Range: 14,594km Length: 73.9m Wingspan: 64.8m

153
 EMIRATES NEWS

BEFORE YOUR JOURNEY

CONSULT YOUR DOCTOR BEFORE

TRAVELLING IF YOU HAVE ANY

MEDICAL CONCERNS ABOUT

MAKING A LONG JOURNEY, OR IF YOU

SUFFER FROM A RESPIRATORY OR

IN THE AIR CARDIOVASCULAR CONDITION.

PLAN FOR THE DESTINATION � WILL

TO HELP YOU ARRIVE AT YOUR DESTINATION for your holiday or be effective at achieving YOU NEED ANY VACCINATIONS OR

feeling relaxed and refreshed, Emirates has your goals on a business trip, these simple tips SPECIAL MEDICATIONS?

developed this collection of helpful travel tips. will help you to enjoy your journey and time GET A GOOD NIGHTS REST BEFORE

Regardless of whether you need to rejuvenate on board with Emirates today. THE FLIGHT.

EAT LIGHTLY AND SENSIBLY.

SMART TRAVELLER AT THE AIRPORT

ALLOW YOURSELF PLENTY OF TIME

FOR CHECK�IN.

DRINK TRAVEL AVOID CARRYING HEAVY BAGS

PLENTY LIGHTLY THROUGH THE AIRPORT AND ONTO THE

OF WATER FLIGHT AS THIS CAN PLACE THE BODY

UNDER CONSIDERABLE STRESS.

REHYDRATE WITH WATER OR JUICES FREQUENTLY. CARRY ONLY THE ESSENTIAL ITEMS THAT YOU WILL ONCE THROUGH TO DEPARTURES TRY

DRINK TEA AND COFFEE IN MODERATION. NEED DURING YOUR FLIGHT. AND RELAX AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE.

DURING THE FLIGHT

MAKE SUCKING AND SWALLOWING WILL HELP

YOURSELF KEEP EQUALISE YOUR EAR PRESSURE DURING

COMFORTABLE MOVING ASCENT AND DESCENT.

BABIES AND YOUNG PASSENGERS

LOOSEN CLOTHING, REMOVE JACKET AND AVOID EXERCISE YOUR LOWER LEGS AND CALF MUSCLES. MAY SUFFER MORE ACUTELY WITH

ANYTHING PRESSING AGAINST YOUR BODY. THIS ENCOURAGES BLOOD FLOW. POPPING EARS, THEREFORE CONSIDER

PROVIDING A DUMMY.

GET AS COMFORTABLE AS POSSIBLE

WHEN RESTING AND TURN FREQUENTLY.

WEAR USE SKIN AVOID SLEEPING FOR LONG PERIODS IN

GLASSES MOISTURISER THE SAME POSITION.

WHEN YOU ARRIVE

CABIN AIR IS DRIER THAN NORMAL THEREFORE APPLY A GOOD QUALITY MOISTURISER TO ENSURE TRY SOME LIGHT EXERCISE OR READ IF

SWAP YOUR CONTACT LENSES FOR GLASSES. YOUR SKIN DOESN’T DRY OUT. YOU CAN’T SLEEP AFTER ARRIVAL.

154
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