Gliding away from life's daily stresses

Laszlo Toth, the general manager of Khaled Saddiq Mohammed Samea's private office, likes to paraglide in his spare time.

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He speaks about how he got into the sport and how he has turned another one of his hobbies into a business.

q&a

q How did you get into paragliding?

a I have been into flying since 1984. At that time I was 16, so I went to a sports club in my country, Hungary. Then I got recruited for the air force, so I was flying in the air force from 1985 until 1989. I was flying the jets, MiGs. I was a test pilot in Italy for some time, then I came to the Middle East and became a flight instructor. I established the first Saudi aviation club in Jeddah.

q Is paragliding as dangerous as it looks?

a It's one of the safest sports in the world if you do it properly. You just need to have the right instructions. It's much more safe than driving from Abu Dhabi to Dubai on Sheikh Zayed Road.

q What do you like about it?

a The excitement, and I love to be in the air. It gives you a feeling of freedom. And it's like meditation. When you're in the air you don't think about your everyday problems because you don't have time to think about them. You are focusing on the flying. It's like yoga. It's just switching your mind off a little bit.

q And you train other people to do it?

a Yes, I love training people. I recently had four or five students to fill the weekends. I was also training a couple of members from the Royal Family, both from Dubai and Abu Dhabi … and other emirates. I was their trainer for paragliding and paramotoring [which is like paragliding, but with a motor providing propulsion].

q And you have turned another of your hobbies into a business called Real Expeditions. Tell me about it.

a After my first expedition, I realised that we have forgotten how to live. I do my everyday job and paying the bills, but it's not real life. I saw all these natural people, tribes, who really live. They hunt, they go out, they socialise, they don't have televisions. It really changed my life. We are trying to build an expedition club where people can build their own expeditions with our guidance. We are promoting areas and locations we have already tried ourselves.

q So how does it all work?

a We don't organise their travel in the sense of tickets and these things, only the expedition itself. We are gathering groups of eight to 12 people, for let's say a Mongolian expedition, where the people themselves will decide when they will go and how many days they will spend there.

q Do you offer paragliding?

a No, some areas we make expeditions where we take paramotoring equipment.

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Tax authority targets shisha levy evasion

The Federal Tax Authority will track shisha imports with electronic markers to protect customers and ensure levies have been paid.

Khalid Ali Al Bustani, director of the tax authority, on Sunday said the move is to "prevent tax evasion and support the authority’s tax collection efforts".

The scheme’s first phase, which came into effect on 1st January, 2019, covers all types of imported and domestically produced and distributed cigarettes. As of May 1, importing any type of cigarettes without the digital marks will be prohibited.

He said the latest phase will see imported and locally produced shisha tobacco tracked by the final quarter of this year.

"The FTA also maintains ongoing communication with concerned companies, to help them adapt their systems to meet our requirements and coordinate between all parties involved," he said.

As with cigarettes, shisha was hit with a 100 per cent tax in October 2017, though manufacturers and cafes absorbed some of the costs to prevent prices doubling.

Sole survivors

Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.