Tafline in Dubai shark market: “Sharks piled up in the back of a truck along with a spade and rebar.” The locals are proud to pose with their dead sharks, rays, and barracudas. Many of them will even open the shark’s mouth for dramatic effect. “Picture, picture,” they said repeatedly as Jacques Van Wyk, a […]
This urban center may look normal, if having lunch on a roof of a mall is normal. Sadly replacing the traditional Arab Souqs or markets that tourists flock to see, malls are becoming as much an urban Middle Eastern phenomenon as any American city. But if there must be malls, let them be more like […]
Will Abu Dhabi’s municipal plan to “beautify” old souqs forever alter its cultural flair? Not long ago I described my hometown in Virginia, where humble wooden houses were replaced with giant McMansions. In that same town, there was an old woman who sold ice-cream out of a tiny little house on the outskirts of Great […]