Children's books can be scary. Roald Dahl's The Minpins, with its nasty creatures, such as the Spittler and the Gruncher, lurking in the forest, terrified me. It still does, really. For other people, perhaps it was Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are or Mercer Mayer's There's a Nightmare in My Closet.
Syrian author Nadine Kaadan's Tomorrow is unsettling for entirely different reasons. Her words and illustrations do not conjure up elaborate monsters or spooky goings-on; instead, they depict the very real concerns of a young Syrian boy called Yazan, who is no longer allowed to go to the park. He's not quite sure why but, as Kaadan writes, "Everything around him was changing."
'Children’s books are the best way to introduce any sensitive topic'
In a note on the final page of Tomorrow, which was published in 2012 but translated from Arabic into English earlier this year, Kaadan adds: "The situation continues to worsen for Syrian children, especially those who are living away from their homes and who have missed years of school. Today, we wait for a time when 'tomorrow' can be a better day for all Syrian children."
Tomorrow represented a significant departure for Kaadan, 33, who has published more than 15 children's books. The dreamy, rainbow-like watercolours that smudge the pages of her other books were here replaced by a grey, foreboding palette. This shift was unexpected. "I didn't think that a style [of painting] could change so quickly," she says. "The war in Syria proved me wrong. The shock of what was going on must really have affected my personality and infected my mood."
Tomorrow does have a happy ending of sorts. Yazan's mother paints a park on the walls of her son's bedroom featuring "everything you've ever dreamed of". The book, for all its ominous implications, will still delight young children – there are bicycles and paper planes and annoying parents. But the impact of the war is what stays with you, the broken buildings, the falling debris, the worried faces. It is a radical, courageous thing for Kaadan to have created.
"I've always believed that children are smart enough and curious enough to not hide anything from them," she says. "Children's books are the best way to introduce any sensitive topic. It is important for [Syrian] children to see their story in a book, to open up the conversation. It helps them to know that many children are going through what they are going through and that they are not alone."
What children can learn from in the English translation
But what about the children reading Tomorrow in English? How have they responded to a war they may know nothing about? "The first time I read it aloud in the UK, I was very nervous," says Kaadan. "What was interesting, though, was that they were able to relate on a personal level. The sadness and the anxiety of the little boy [in Tomorrow] is something all kids can learn from."
Kaadan then tells me a story about a little girl who came up to her after the reading and announced that she, too, had been through the same thing as Yazan. “I said, ‘Really? How come, you live in the UK?’ She replied, ‘Well, we wanted to go to the park and it was raining and I got stuck at home all day and I felt so sad, just like him in the story.’ It was really beautiful to see this connection.”
'Damascus is just a magical city'
Kaadan was born in Paris in 1985, but grew up in Damascus. Her mother taught French literature and Kaadan and her sister, who is now a filmmaker, were raised in a liberal environment, encouraged by their parents to have a go at everything.
When Kaadan was eight years old, her mother bought her a set of paints. The shopkeeper kept telling her: "[Those are] for professional artists, not children." To which Kaadan's mother replied, "Well, that's what she'll be one day." The author wrote and illustrated her first story soon after and began producing a children's magazine, which she photocopied and distributed at her school.
She went on to study fine art at university in Damascus and in 2012, following the start of the war, moved to London. There, she studied for an MA in illustration at Kingston University and an MA in Art and Politics at Goldsmiths.
Kaadan still lives in London today, but it is her memories of growing up in Damascus that have inspired her books, including the irresistible tale, The Jasmine Sneeze. Published in English in 2016, it follows Haroun, "the happiest cat in the world", who has one problem: the smell of jasmine makes him sneeze so much that he can't sleep. The colours are rich – inky blues and sunrise pinks offset great puffy balls of white – and the tone is bouncy and joyous. It is a love letter, really, to her home country.
“Damascus is just a magical city,” says Kaadan. “I would be surprised if an artist lived there and wasn’t inspired. I spent my childhood playing in the courtyards, running after pigeons or enjoying the magnificent architecture.”
Her love for the Syrian capital is infectious, The Jasmine Sneeze a visual hullabaloo, which, Kaadan says, children love because "suddenly Syria is not just war and conflict". In many ways, The Jasmine Sneeze is Kaadan's counterbalance to Tomorrow. "When [western] kids meet a child who is a refugee from Syria, then their interaction will be different just from this one story," she said in an interview last year. Her next book will surely have the same effect. Due to be published in 2020, Bassel & Stella tells the story of a Syrian refugee trying to reunite with his dog.
'Have you ever seen someone in the Arab world sitting and reading a book?'
We have all experienced the hit-and-miss nature of giving a child a gift – an expensive toy discarded for the wrapping paper. How does Kaadan know if her characters will entertain children? "I always question myself during the creative process," she says. "Is it going to be interesting? Are kids going to relate to it? If I love the story and it makes me laugh, it will make children laugh."
The reading habits of people in Kaadan’s home country and across the Middle East, however, mean that a worryingly small number of children will ever experience this. “It is a catastrophe,” she says. “First of all, have you ever seen someone in the Arab world sitting and reading a book? We don’t have that culture unfortunately and children don’t grow up watching their parents read.”
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Added to this, for many people in places such as Syria, children's books are just too expensive. "How many can buy a picture book that costs $10 [Dh36]?" says Kaadan. "One of the problems is that reading is [perceived as being] for the elite." Although there are an increasing number of publishing houses specialising in Arabic children's books, Kaadan concedes that "she doesn't have the answer".
The situation is so dispiriting because it is in books such as Kaadan’s that children in the Arab world will see people and places they recognise. “When my books are distributed [for free], I see the reaction of the children,” says Kaadan. “It helps them to relate.”
They need these books now more than ever.
Tomorrow and The Jasmine Sneeze are published by Lantana
More coverage from the Future Forum
Specs
Engine: Duel electric motors
Power: 659hp
Torque: 1075Nm
On sale: Available for pre-order now
Price: On request
hall of shame
SUNDERLAND 2002-03
No one has ended a Premier League season quite like Sunderland. They lost each of their final 15 games, taking no points after January. They ended up with 19 in total, sacking managers Peter Reid and Howard Wilkinson and losing 3-1 to Charlton when they scored three own goals in eight minutes.
SUNDERLAND 2005-06
Until Derby came along, Sunderland’s total of 15 points was the Premier League’s record low. They made it until May and their final home game before winning at the Stadium of Light while they lost a joint record 29 of their 38 league games.
HUDDERSFIELD 2018-19
Joined Derby as the only team to be relegated in March. No striker scored until January, while only two players got more assists than goalkeeper Jonas Lossl. The mid-season appointment Jan Siewert was to end his time as Huddersfield manager with a 5.3 per cent win rate.
ASTON VILLA 2015-16
Perhaps the most inexplicably bad season, considering they signed Idrissa Gueye and Adama Traore and still only got 17 points. Villa won their first league game, but none of the next 19. They ended an abominable campaign by taking one point from the last 39 available.
FULHAM 2018-19
Terrible in different ways. Fulham’s total of 26 points is not among the lowest ever but they contrived to get relegated after spending over £100 million (Dh457m) in the transfer market. Much of it went on defenders but they only kept two clean sheets in their first 33 games.
LA LIGA: Sporting Gijon, 13 points in 1997-98.
BUNDESLIGA: Tasmania Berlin, 10 points in 1965-66
The five pillars of Islam
The Sand Castle
Director: Matty Brown
Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea
Rating: 2.5/5
Game Changer
Director: Shankar
Stars: Ram Charan, Kiara Advani, Anjali, S J Suryah, Jayaram
Rating: 2/5
THE BIO: Martin Van Almsick
Hometown: Cologne, Germany
Family: Wife Hanan Ahmed and their three children, Marrah (23), Tibijan (19), Amon (13)
Favourite dessert: Umm Ali with dark camel milk chocolate flakes
Favourite hobby: Football
Breakfast routine: a tall glass of camel milk
Key Points
- Protests against President Omar Al Bashir enter their sixth day
- Reports of President Bashir's resignation and arrests of senior government officials
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
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UPI facts
More than 2.2 million Indian tourists arrived in UAE in 2023
More than 3.5 million Indians reside in UAE
Indian tourists can make purchases in UAE using rupee accounts in India through QR-code-based UPI real-time payment systems
Indian residents in UAE can use their non-resident NRO and NRE accounts held in Indian banks linked to a UAE mobile number for UPI transactions
Sarfira
Director: Sudha Kongara Prasad
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Radhika Madan, Paresh Rawal
Rating: 2/5
A timeline of the Historical Dictionary of the Arabic Language
- 2018: Formal work begins
- November 2021: First 17 volumes launched
- November 2022: Additional 19 volumes released
- October 2023: Another 31 volumes released
- November 2024: All 127 volumes completed
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.
MATCH INFO
Everton 2 (Tosun 9', Doucoure 93')
Rotherham United 1 (Olosunde 56')
Man of the Match Olosunde (Rotherham)
NO OTHER LAND
Director: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor, Hamdan Ballal
Stars: Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham
Rating: 3.5/5
Roger Federer's 2018 record
Australian Open Champion
Rotterdam Champion
Indian Wells Runner-up
Miami Second round
Stuttgart Champion
Halle Runner-up
Wimbledon Quarter-finals
Cincinnati Runner-up
US Open Fourth round
Shanghai Semi-finals
Basel Champion
Paris Masters Semi-finals
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The specs
- Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
- Power: 640hp
- Torque: 760nm
- On sale: 2026
- Price: Not announced yet
The%20specs
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Rock in a Hard Place: Music and Mayhem in the Middle East
Orlando Crowcroft
Zed Books
Lexus LX700h specs
Engine: 3.4-litre twin-turbo V6 plus supplementary electric motor
Power: 464hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 790Nm from 2,000-3,600rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 11.7L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh590,000
Where to donate in the UAE
The Emirates Charity Portal
You can donate to several registered charities through a “donation catalogue”. The use of the donation is quite specific, such as buying a fan for a poor family in Niger for Dh130.
The General Authority of Islamic Affairs & Endowments
The site has an e-donation service accepting debit card, credit card or e-Dirham, an electronic payment tool developed by the Ministry of Finance and First Abu Dhabi Bank.
Al Noor Special Needs Centre
You can donate online or order Smiles n’ Stuff products handcrafted by Al Noor students. The centre publishes a wish list of extras needed, starting at Dh500.
Beit Al Khair Society
Beit Al Khair Society has the motto “From – and to – the UAE,” with donations going towards the neediest in the country. Its website has a list of physical donation sites, but people can also contribute money by SMS, bank transfer and through the hotline 800-22554.
Dar Al Ber Society
Dar Al Ber Society, which has charity projects in 39 countries, accept cash payments, money transfers or SMS donations. Its donation hotline is 800-79.
Dubai Cares
Dubai Cares provides several options for individuals and companies to donate, including online, through banks, at retail outlets, via phone and by purchasing Dubai Cares branded merchandise. It is currently running a campaign called Bookings 2030, which allows people to help change the future of six underprivileged children and young people.
Emirates Airline Foundation
Those who travel on Emirates have undoubtedly seen the little donation envelopes in the seat pockets. But the foundation also accepts donations online and in the form of Skywards Miles. Donated miles are used to sponsor travel for doctors, surgeons, engineers and other professionals volunteering on humanitarian missions around the world.
Emirates Red Crescent
On the Emirates Red Crescent website you can choose between 35 different purposes for your donation, such as providing food for fasters, supporting debtors and contributing to a refugee women fund. It also has a list of bank accounts for each donation type.
Gulf for Good
Gulf for Good raises funds for partner charity projects through challenges, like climbing Kilimanjaro and cycling through Thailand. This year’s projects are in partnership with Street Child Nepal, Larchfield Kids, the Foundation for African Empowerment and SOS Children's Villages. Since 2001, the organisation has raised more than $3.5 million (Dh12.8m) in support of over 50 children’s charities.
Noor Dubai Foundation
Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum launched the Noor Dubai Foundation a decade ago with the aim of eliminating all forms of preventable blindness globally. You can donate Dh50 to support mobile eye camps by texting the word “Noor” to 4565 (Etisalat) or 4849 (du).
Blackpink World Tour [Born Pink] In Cinemas
Starring: Rose, Jisoo, Jennie, Lisa
Directors: Min Geun, Oh Yoon-Dong
Rating: 3/5
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