Umm Al Emarat park is the venue for this year's Festival in the Park in Abu Dhabi
Umm Al Emarat park is the venue for this year's Festival in the Park in Abu Dhabi
Umm Al Emarat park is the venue for this year's Festival in the Park in Abu Dhabi
Umm Al Emarat park is the venue for this year's Festival in the Park in Abu Dhabi

Abu Dhabi's Festival in the Park: all you need to know


  • English
  • Arabic

Umm Al Emarat park is one of Abu Dhabi's most beautiful spots, a patch of green tranquility amid the hubbub of the city centre. And later this month, it will provide the backdrop for Festival in the Park, a two-day celebration of the arts from across the seven emirates, featuring music, comedy and performance arts.

Here is everything you need to know

What: Festival in the Park

When: Thursday February 28-Friday March 1
Tickets: Free

Information: www.abudhabifestival.ae

Festival in the Park line-up

Day one

10am Ministry of Science – Show 1 (Arabic)

12 noon Ministry of Science – Show 2 (English)

4pm-6pm Reading club with Emirati authors, and a selection of Korean crafts workshops in collaboration with the Korean Cultural Centre

5.45pm-7pm Marching drums and drumming workshops

7-8pm Elite Music Institute performance

7-8pm Cinema Club film screening of Amal's Cloud, directed and produced by Rawia Abdullah

8-9pm Comedy performance with Aly Al Sayed and friends

Day two

4pm-6pm

Reading club with Emirati writers, children crafts workshops, The Garden of Strengths sculpture-making workshop, selection of Korean crafts in collaboration with the Korean Cultural Centre, The Sound of Hope instruments-making workshop

5.45pm-7 pm

Marching drums and drumming workshop

7pm-8pm

Mirrors of Creativity, UAE Theatre Circle performance by children of determination

8pm-9.30pm

Cinema Club screening of Going to Heaven, directed by Emirati Saeed Salmeen

8pm-9pm

Stand-up comedy by Wonho Chung (Arabic)

Across both days there is also a crafts market, where you can sample and buy local handicrafts.

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Read more:

An exhibition featuring an ode to the Salvator Mundi opens in London

Renowned New York photographer Andrew Moore returns to Abu Dhabi to find a changed city

Film review: Gully Boy is a wonderful underdog story about India’s nascent hip-hop culture

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Understand What Black Is

The Last Poets

(Studio Rockers)

Our legal columnist

Name: Yousef Al Bahar

Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994

Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers

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Groom and Two Brides

Director: Elie Semaan

Starring: Abdullah Boushehri, Laila Abdallah, Lulwa Almulla

Rating: 3/5

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The more serious side of specialty coffee

While the taste of beans and freshness of roast is paramount to the specialty coffee scene, so is sustainability and workers’ rights.

The bulk of genuine specialty coffee companies aim to improve on these elements in every stage of production via direct relationships with farmers. For instance, Mokha 1450 on Al Wasl Road strives to work predominantly with women-owned and -operated coffee organisations, including female farmers in the Sabree mountains of Yemen.

Because, as the boutique’s owner, Garfield Kerr, points out: “women represent over 90 per cent of the coffee value chain, but are woefully underrepresented in less than 10 per cent of ownership and management throughout the global coffee industry.”

One of the UAE’s largest suppliers of green (meaning not-yet-roasted) beans, Raw Coffee, is a founding member of the Partnership of Gender Equity, which aims to empower female coffee farmers and harvesters.

Also, globally, many companies have found the perfect way to recycle old coffee grounds: they create the perfect fertile soil in which to grow mushrooms. 

Naga
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Tenet

Director: Christopher Nolan

Stars: John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Dimple Kapadia, Michael Caine, Kenneth Branagh 

Rating: 5/5

Fines for littering

In Dubai:

Dh200 for littering or spitting in the Dubai Metro

Dh500 for throwing cigarette butts or chewing gum on the floor, or littering from a vehicle. 
Dh1,000 for littering on a beach, spitting in public places, throwing a cigarette butt from a vehicle

In Sharjah and other emirates
Dh500 for littering - including cigarette butts and chewing gum - in public places and beaches in Sharjah
Dh2,000 for littering in Sharjah deserts
Dh500 for littering from a vehicle in Ras Al Khaimah
Dh1,000 for littering from a car in Abu Dhabi
Dh1,000 to Dh100,000 for dumping waste in residential or public areas in Al Ain
Dh10,000 for littering at Ajman's beaches 

Explainer: Tanween Design Programme

Non-profit arts studio Tashkeel launched this annual initiative with the intention of supporting budding designers in the UAE. This year, three talents were chosen from hundreds of applicants to be a part of the sixth creative development programme. These are architect Abdulla Al Mulla, interior designer Lana El Samman and graphic designer Yara Habib.

The trio have been guided by experts from the industry over the course of nine months, as they developed their own products that merge their unique styles with traditional elements of Emirati design. This includes laboratory sessions, experimental and collaborative practice, investigation of new business models and evaluation.

It is led by British contemporary design project specialist Helen Voce and mentor Kevin Badni, and offers participants access to experts from across the world, including the likes of UK designer Gareth Neal and multidisciplinary designer and entrepreneur, Sheikh Salem Al Qassimi.

The final pieces are being revealed in a worldwide limited-edition release on the first day of Downtown Designs at Dubai Design Week 2019. Tashkeel will be at stand E31 at the exhibition.

Lisa Ball-Lechgar, deputy director of Tashkeel, said: “The diversity and calibre of the applicants this year … is reflective of the dynamic change that the UAE art and design industry is witnessing, with young creators resolute in making their bold design ideas a reality.”

What are the main cyber security threats?

Cyber crime - This includes fraud, impersonation, scams and deepfake technology, tactics that are increasingly targeting infrastructure and exploiting human vulnerabilities.
Cyber terrorism - Social media platforms are used to spread radical ideologies, misinformation and disinformation, often with the aim of disrupting critical infrastructure such as power grids.
Cyber warfare - Shaped by geopolitical tension, hostile actors seek to infiltrate and compromise national infrastructure, using one country’s systems as a springboard to launch attacks on others.

What is graphene?

Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms arranged like honeycomb.

It was discovered in 2004, when Russian-born Manchester scientists Andrei Geim and Kostya Novoselov were "playing about" with sticky tape and graphite - the material used as "lead" in pencils.

Placing the tape on the graphite and peeling it, they managed to rip off thin flakes of carbon. In the beginning they got flakes consisting of many layers of graphene. But as they repeated the process many times, the flakes got thinner.

By separating the graphite fragments repeatedly, they managed to create flakes that were just one atom thick. Their experiment had led to graphene being isolated for the very first time.

At the time, many believed it was impossible for such thin crystalline materials to be stable. But examined under a microscope, the material remained stable, and when tested was found to have incredible properties.

It is many times times stronger than steel, yet incredibly lightweight and flexible. It is electrically and thermally conductive but also transparent. The world's first 2D material, it is one million times thinner than the diameter of a single human hair.

But the 'sticky tape' method would not work on an industrial scale. Since then, scientists have been working on manufacturing graphene, to make use of its incredible properties.

In 2010, Geim and Novoselov were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. Their discovery meant physicists could study a new class of two-dimensional materials with unique properties.