North Carolina delegate Hiawatha Foster at the Democratic National Convention.
North Carolina delegate Hiawatha Foster at the Democratic National Convention.
North Carolina delegate Hiawatha Foster at the Democratic National Convention.
North Carolina delegate Hiawatha Foster at the Democratic National Convention.

Party people


  • English
  • Arabic

Peter C Baker at the first meeting of Abu Dhabi's American Democrats.
On May 21, 1832, delegates of the US Democratic party met in Baltimore, Maryland for the party's first national convention. Their purpose was two-fold: to officially renominate the incumbent president, Andrew Jackson, as their presidential candidate; and to select Jackson's running mate (John Calhoun, his first-term vice president, had resigned after realising that he probably disagreed with Jackson over just about everything). Something about the practice stuck, and Democratic voting delegations, one from each American state, have been convening every four years since.

Since 1976, they have been joined by a delegation representing US Democrats living overseas. Today, Democrats Abroad is recognised by the Democratic National Committee as the practical equivalent of a state party with 11 convention votes. Six delegates, each armed with half a vote, represent a sprawling "Europe - Middle East - Africa" regional caucus. These delegates are typically high-ranking members of national Democrats Abroad chapters. The UAE does not yet have such a chapter.

About a month ago, US citizens who had identified themselves as UAE residents when registering for democratsabroad.org received an e-mail inviting them to the inaugural meeting of UAE Democrats Abroad, to be held simultaneously at the Après Restaurant in the Mall of the Emirates in Dubai and the Zyara Cafe next to the Hilton Residence in Abu Dhabi. It takes 50 signatures to start an official chapter. When I walked into Zyara - an abstract art-strewn coffee shop much like one where eager democrats might meet in New York or Los Angeles - I didn't see 50 Democrats. In fact, had there not been a handwritten "Democrats Abroad" sign taped to the door, I would have assumed I'd come to the wrong place, and left. Reading the look on my face, a waiter asked me, "Democrat?" I nodded nervously, and he pointed me to a back table where two women were sitting.

One of the women was Jumana Nabti, the meeting's organiser."When we booked the restaurant, we told the restaurant to expect between five and 50 people," she explained. "No one really knows who is on that e-mail list, or if they even still live here." Nabti moved to Abu Dhabi just over a year ago to work for the Department of Transport. She had previously lived in Lebanon (she is half Lebanese), where she started the Democrats Abroad chapter. During our meeting, her brother David was sleeping after four days of representing US Democrats who live in Lebanon at the party's convention in Denver, Colorado.

After half an hour, a married couple who had just moved to Abu Dhabi from New York showed up. "What's the point of Democrats abroad?" the man wanted to know. Nabti talked about registering voters, watching debates and meeting other Americans. "But this is definitely the very first meeting," she admitted. "We can do whatever you guys are interested in doing. We can do happy hours if you want." Another couple - two professors at Sheikh Zayed University - showed up and apologised for being late. "Its OK," Nabti reassured them. "We're in the Middle East. 4pm means whenever."

People kept trickling in. By 5pm, almost a dozen had showed up. People traded stories of waking up early to watch primary results and convention speeches live on CNN. They talked about how a debate party might work, given the US-UAE time difference: should someone tape the debates? Who even has a VCR these days? Maybe they could be downloaded? Someone tried to use their Blackberry to look up the debate schedule on barackobama.com. Everyone started wondering aloud when their ballots were due; Jumana reminded them that the date varied by state, and directed them to a website.

"And when do they count them, anyway?" someone asked. No one knew. Talk turned to Obama and his convention speech. "What did he say about the Palestinians?" the man from New York wanted to know (he hadn't seen the speech yet). "Nothing,"everyone agreed. A tiny debate started over whether this was, as one man put it, "part of the plan, part of towing the line until he's in." By the meeting's end, the couple from Sheikh Zayed had tentatively agreed to host an election night party, though everyone remained unclear how it would work. Would it be an early breakfast party? Or a long, long evening party?

"I'm wondering -" hesitated the woman. "We want to have people over for celebrations. What if we're not celebrating? We'll just be crying in our drinks."
@email:pbaker@thenational.ae

F1 The Movie

Starring: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Javier Bardem

Director: Joseph Kosinski

Rating: 4/5

ESSENTIALS

The flights

Emirates flies from Dubai to Phnom Penh via Yangon from Dh2,700 return including taxes. Cambodia Bayon Airlines and Cambodia Angkor Air offer return flights from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap from Dh250 return including taxes. The flight takes about 45 minutes.

The hotels

Rooms at the Raffles Le Royal in Phnom Penh cost from $225 (Dh826) per night including taxes. Rooms at the Grand Hotel d'Angkor cost from $261 (Dh960) per night including taxes.

The tours

A cyclo architecture tour of Phnom Penh costs from $20 (Dh75) per person for about three hours, with Khmer Architecture Tours. Tailor-made tours of all of Cambodia, or sites like Angkor alone, can be arranged by About Asia Travel. Emirates Holidays also offers packages. 

The specs

Engine: 6.2-litre V8

Transmission: ten-speed

Power: 420bhp

Torque: 624Nm

Price: Dh325,125

On sale: Now

Mountain%20Boy
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MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW

Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman

Director: Jesse Armstrong

Rating: 3.5/5

Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
  • Priority access to new homes from participating developers
  • Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
  • Flexible payment plans from developers
  • Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
  • DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
TECH%20SPECS%3A%20APPLE%20WATCH%20SE%20(second%20generation)
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If you go
Where to stay: Courtyard by Marriott Titusville Kennedy Space Centre has unparalleled views of the Indian River. Alligators can be spotted from hotel room balconies, as can several rocket launch sites. The hotel also boasts cool space-themed decor.

When to go: Florida is best experienced during the winter months, from November to May, before the humidity kicks in.

How to get there: Emirates currently flies from Dubai to Orlando five times a week.
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
 
Started: 2021
 
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
 
Based: Tunisia 
 
Sector: Water technology 
 
Number of staff: 22 
 
Investment raised: $4 million 
Day 2, Dubai Test: At a glance

Moment of the day Pakistan’s effort in the field had hints of shambles about it. The wheels were officially off when Wahab Riaz lost his run up and aborted the delivery four times in a row. He re-measured his run, jogged in for two practice goes. Then, when he was finally ready to go, he bailed out again. It was a total cringefest.

Stat of the day – 139.5 Yasir Shah has bowled 139.5 overs in three innings so far in this Test series. Judged by his returns, the workload has not withered him. He has 14 wickets so far, and became history’s first spinner to take five-wickets in an innings in five consecutive Tests. Not bad for someone whose fitness was in question before the series.

The verdict Stranger things have happened, but it is going to take something extraordinary for Pakistan to keep their undefeated record in Test series in the UAE in tact from this position. At least Shan Masood and Sami Aslam have made a positive start to the salvage effort.

THE CLOWN OF GAZA

Director: Abdulrahman Sabbah 

Starring: Alaa Meqdad

Rating: 4/5

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Wicked
Director: Jon M Chu
Stars: Cynthia Erivo, Ariana Grande, Jonathan Bailey
Rating: 4/5
The specs

AT4 Ultimate, as tested

Engine: 6.2-litre V8

Power: 420hp

Torque: 623Nm

Transmission: 10-speed automatic

Price: From Dh330,800 (Elevation: Dh236,400; AT4: Dh286,800; Denali: Dh345,800)

On sale: Now

Dr Graham's three goals

Short term

Establish logistics and systems needed to globally deploy vaccines


Intermediate term

Build biomedical workforces in low- and middle-income nations


Long term

A prototype pathogen approach for pandemic preparedness  

Day 1 results:

Open Men (bonus points in brackets)
New Zealand 125 (1) beat UAE 111 (3)
India 111 (4) beat Singapore 75 (0)
South Africa 66 (2) beat Sri Lanka 57 (2)
Australia 126 (4) beat Malaysia -16 (0)

Open Women
New Zealand 64 (2) beat South Africa 57 (2)
England 69 (3) beat UAE 63 (1)
Australia 124 (4) beat UAE 23 (0)
New Zealand 74 (2) beat England 55 (2)

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Conflict, drought, famine

Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.

Band Aid

Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.

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
MATCH INFO

Manchester United 6 (McTominay 2', 3'; Fernandes 20', 70' pen; Lindelof 37'; James 65')

Leeds United 2 (Cooper 41'; Dallas 73')

Man of the match: Scott McTominay (Manchester United)