The five-star palace hotels are in full swing, the sound of music drifts across the beach and after a "horrible" year blighted by coronavirus, Cannes is buzzing again for its international film festival.
"We can't wait," admits Pierrick Cizeron, executive chef at the Majestic hotel that overlooks the Mediterranean and the festival convention centre.
In 2020, the festival that draws stars from across the world, had to be cancelled because of the pandemic.
With France under a partial lockdown in Spring, the 2021 iteration has been delayed from the usual May date to July 6 to July 17.
The festival pulled in 40,000 people a day pre-Covid – only about half that number are expected this year – and provided 20 per cent of annual hotel turnover.
"It's more than just the excitement, we are in the middle of recruiting 250 people for the season," says Yann Gillet, director of the Hotel Martinez, which was full for the late May bank holiday weekend.
Last year's cancellation, he says, left staff "heartbroken" at a hotel that usually fills with celebrities for the festival.
The movie extravaganza, "is a real driving force and punctuates our year," Gillet says.
"Often clients come to see us and ask if it really was Brad Pitt's room."
On the seventh floor of the Martinez, which was totally renovated in 2019, the final touches are being made to a double penthouse suite booked by Chopard jewellers for the duration of the festival.
The Riviera resort had lived well off tourism and conventions, but the hotels and restaurants that provided most of the local jobs have been shut for long periods and had to rely on government handouts to try to keep mounting debt under control.
Despite high hopes for the festival, the hotels, which had been shut since September-October, are far from fully booked.
"We are only 10 per cent full in June and 25 per cent in July," says Cannes hotel union leader Christine Welter.
"It's an unexpected opportunity for people to come to the festival because in normal times it would be complicated," with hotel rooms at a premium and all booked out.
It's an unexpected opportunity for people to come to the festival because in normal times it would be complicated
"And that's a good thing this year," she says. "We have two-star hotels in the middle of town starting at €100 ($122) a night where normally there would be no rooms available during the festival."
In previous years, the cheapest hotel rooms that start at €40 a night could fetch €260 during the festival.
The authorities are trying to vaccinate as many people as quickly as possible and health protocols are firmly in place, says Welter, as business builds up again.
On the Croisette, that runs along the seafront, a flower delivery man zigzags through the crowd carrying a display in each hand. Out at sea, a speedboat pulls a parachute covered with advertising.
In the expensive shop windows, handbags, dresses and shoes await visitors with money to spend.
The festival "puts a rocket under our sales, we have magnificent clients," says Olivier Zambrana, 42, who works at a Jimmy Choo boutique.
He would usually buy in double stocks for cashed-up festival-goers, but for now, he says, the shop will wait and see how things go.
At Giry Traiteur, the caterer to Cannes for 50 years, business is slowly picking up.
In his office, with most of the staff still on furlough, Luc Guibout is recording his first orders in a year.
"There's no big bang but it feels like things are starting to kick off again," he says,smiling, after what he describes as a "horrible" year.
On the other side of town, in the La Bocca quarter, workers are busy finishing a new multiplex Cineum with 2,400 seats. The festival will inaugurate four of the 12 auditoriums.
The Cineum backs on to a new audiovisual studies campus that will take in its first 900 students in September, as city hall looks to capitalise on the global reputation of the festival.
Real estate tokenisation project
Dubai launched the pilot phase of its real estate tokenisation project last month.
The initiative focuses on converting real estate assets into digital tokens recorded on blockchain technology and helps in streamlining the process of buying, selling and investing, the Dubai Land Department said.
Dubai’s real estate tokenisation market is projected to reach Dh60 billion ($16.33 billion) by 2033, representing 7 per cent of the emirate’s total property transactions, according to the DLD.
MATCH INFO
Fixture: Ukraine v Portugal, Monday, 10.45pm (UAE)
TV: BeIN Sports
BIOSAFETY LABS SECURITY LEVELS
Biosafety Level 1
The lowest safety level. These labs work with viruses that are minimal risk to humans.
Hand washing is required on entry and exit and potentially infectious material decontaminated with bleach before thrown away.
Must have a lock. Access limited. Lab does not need to be isolated from other buildings.
Used as teaching spaces.
Study microorganisms such as Staphylococcus which causes food poisoning.
Biosafety Level 2
These labs deal with pathogens that can be harmful to people and the environment such as Hepatitis, HIV and salmonella.
Working in Level 2 requires special training in handling pathogenic agents.
Extra safety and security precautions are taken in addition to those at Level 1
Biosafety Level 3
These labs contain material that can be lethal if inhaled. This includes SARS coronavirus, MERS, and yellow fever.
Significant extra precautions are taken with staff given specific immunisations when dealing with certain diseases.
Infectious material is examined in a biological safety cabinet.
Personnel must wear protective gowns that must be discarded or decontaminated after use.
Strict safety and handling procedures are in place. There must be double entrances to the building and they must contain self-closing doors to reduce risk of pathogen aerosols escaping.
Windows must be sealed. Air from must be filtered before it can be recirculated.
Biosafety Level 4
The highest level for biosafety precautions. Scientist work with highly dangerous diseases that have no vaccine or cure.
All material must be decontaminated.
Personnel must wear a positive pressure suit for protection. On leaving the lab this must pass through decontamination shower before they have a personal shower.
Entry is severely restricted to trained and authorised personnel. All entries are recorded.
Entrance must be via airlocks.
The specs: 2018 Volkswagen Teramont
Price, base / as tested Dh137,000 / Dh189,950
Engine 3.6-litre V6
Gearbox Eight-speed automatic
Power 280hp @ 6,200rpm
Torque 360Nm @ 2,750rpm
Fuel economy, combined 11.7L / 100km
The specs: 2018 Infiniti QX80
Price: base / as tested: Dh335,000
Engine: 5.6-litre V8
Gearbox: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 400hp @ 5,800rpm
Torque: 560Nm @ 4,000rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 12.1L / 100km
Jetour T1 specs
Engine: 2-litre turbocharged
Power: 254hp
Torque: 390Nm
Price: From Dh126,000
Available: Now
The biog
Siblings: five brothers and one sister
Education: Bachelors in Political Science at the University of Minnesota
Interests: Swimming, tennis and the gym
Favourite place: UAE
Favourite packet food on the trip: pasta primavera
What he did to pass the time during the trip: listen to audio books
It's up to you to go green
Nils El Accad, chief executive and owner of Organic Foods and Café, says going green is about “lifestyle and attitude” rather than a “money change”; people need to plan ahead to fill water bottles in advance and take their own bags to the supermarket, he says.
“People always want someone else to do the work; it doesn’t work like that,” he adds. “The first step: you have to consciously make that decision and change.”
When he gets a takeaway, says Mr El Accad, he takes his own glass jars instead of accepting disposable aluminium containers, paper napkins and plastic tubs, cutlery and bags from restaurants.
He also plants his own crops and herbs at home and at the Sheikh Zayed store, from basil and rosemary to beans, squashes and papayas. “If you’re going to water anything, better it be tomatoes and cucumbers, something edible, than grass,” he says.
“All this throwaway plastic - cups, bottles, forks - has to go first,” says Mr El Accad, who has banned all disposable straws, whether plastic or even paper, from the café chain.
One of the latest changes he has implemented at his stores is to offer refills of liquid laundry detergent, to save plastic. The two brands Organic Foods stocks, Organic Larder and Sonnett, are both “triple-certified - you could eat the product”.
The Organic Larder detergent will soon be delivered in 200-litre metal oil drums before being decanted into 20-litre containers in-store.
Customers can refill their bottles at least 30 times before they start to degrade, he says. Organic Larder costs Dh35.75 for one litre and Dh62 for 2.75 litres and refills will cost 15 to 20 per cent less, Mr El Accad says.
But while there are savings to be had, going green tends to come with upfront costs and extra work and planning. Are we ready to refill bottles rather than throw them away? “You have to change,” says Mr El Accad. “I can only make it available.”
Pad Man
Dir: R Balki
Starring: Akshay Kumar, Sonam Kapoor, Radhika Apte
Three-and-a-half stars
Sheer grandeur
The Owo building is 14 storeys high, seven of which are below ground, with the 30,000 square feet of amenities located subterranean, including a 16-seat private cinema, seven lounges, a gym, games room, treatment suites and bicycle storage.
A clear distinction between the residences and the Raffles hotel with the amenities operated separately.
RESULT
Bayer Leverkusen 2 Bayern Munich 4
Leverkusen: Alario (9'), Wirtz (89')
Bayern: Coman (27'), Goretzka (42'), Gnabry (45'), Lewandowski (66')
Batti Gul Meter Chalu
Producers: KRTI Productions, T-Series
Director: Sree Narayan Singh
Cast: Shahid Kapoor, Shraddha Kapoor, Divyenndu Sharma, Yami Gautam
Rating: 2/5
More from Neighbourhood Watch:
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
