crush

CD has a huge crush on a 21 year old boy and really wants to surrender to his charms.....somebody shoot me!

Whats going on with the Kingdom of Bahrain?

I don't know about you, but to me Bahrain is kinda interesting these days:

-The King's handsome younger son, Nasser, marries the daughter of the Ruler of Dubai.

-UAE's Mubadala and Occidental Petroleum invested a huge chunk of money on a gas drilling exploration project in Bahrain!!!

Bahrain? Gas? Since when did they have any gas?
Well apparently they did unearth something last month.

-They built a bridge to connect them directly to Qatar within a 30 minute drive. More tarqeem action from qatari boys on weekends.

-ohhh one more thing...they opened up a Nikki Beach at the Ritz Carlton. (Weekend in Bahrain anybody?)

Another reason to Love Qatar

They held a doha tribeca film festival earlier this month....with attendees like Robert Deniro.

Hillary...deficient, or hungry?

Just when Obama's demand for total freeze of Israeli settlements in the West Bank restored hope in our hearts for a shot at peace.....BEHOLD, Hillary Clinton retracts and declares that a partial freeze, not including settlements in East Jerusalem (the intended capital for the palestinian state) is "unprecedented".

I'm not a fan of Hillary Clinton, especially since her position in the Dubai ports scandal a few years ago which painfully revealed her lack of character. But this declaration, bringing Obama's administration's efforts for change two steps back, suggests two things;
1- her negotiation skills wholly and unconditionally suck -which I find hard to believe considering she was a fierce and fearless lawyer.
2-She is kissing up to Netanyahu because she is power hungry for political brownie points from AIPAC and Congress. Now thats more like it!

Afterall, she did show us how much she craved power when she stood by Bill in '98....

Bye bye landan

Word on the street is that the UK is planning to charge tourists that spend more than 100 days in the UK through-out the year a 'resident tax'.

I'm sure thats gonna piss off a lot of Kuwaiti folks who own apartments in london and spend the entire summer over there, with their nannies too.

Will people still continue going to london as often as they do? ( I certainly won't, and its not because of the money its because of the principle!)
Will people still hold on to their properties or will they sell them?
Will people that have initially planned to purchase properties in london in light of low market prices change their minds?

And finally, who is the strategically ignorant crazy british bloke behind this resident tax on tourists business? I'd be interested to hear his economic vision behind this tax policy..

I prefer Paris anyway :)

The warrior that will bury the parasites

محمد الجويهل كلامك يبرد الكبد!!!!!

و ياااااريتني بالدائره الثالثه كاااااان صوتلك

FINALLY, A FEARLESS WARRIOR THAT WILL PUT msalemoo al barrak wamthaaalah TO SHAME!

Wall Street II

Hands down Gordon Gekko is my favourite character in all movie history, and nobody can do it better than Micheal Douglas. I am so thrilled to learn that there will be a Wall Street part II in light of recent market events.
I really hope they bring in some good writers for the sequel, and Gordon's character will be just as fierce, if not more than the original. Some of my favourite quotes from this fierce, sexy, unforgiving wall street hotshot:
"Greed is good"
"if you need a friend, get a dog"
"whats worth doing is worth doing for money"
"lunch is for wimps"
"ever wonder why fund managers can't beat the S&P 500? Because they're sheep and sheep get slaughtered!"

Being another Florida could save Dubai

As a very very small investor in the Dubai real estate market, I am very concerned about the falling real estate prices in the emirate. Canceled and delayed projects is one thing, but the potential large outflow of expat population who lost their jobs with the credit crisis is very worrying - and whats worse is that we are still to see that effect: Most people who lost their jobs get 6 months pay, and probably won't move out of the city until their children's school year ends in the summer. So come July in 2009, a large community of expat families will be fleeing back to their homelands, and emptying various residences in the emirate. Supply will be larger than demand, and prices will plummet down further.

That being said I do believe a city like Dubai has hope... but it all depends on the government decisions and visions for the emirate. Dubai has the potential to be the Florida of the European retirement community. It has great all year warm weather that no European country has, it has great health care and medical infrastructure that is equipped to treat elderly patients, and the social/ cultural structure that would attract the retirement age group ; golf tournaments, polo matches, tennis, museums, spas, and art galleries.

So does the Ministry of Planning in dubai have this kind of plan in mind to stabilise the now frighteningly plummeting real estate market? I don't know, but I don't see why not. Being a potential host for the elderly european retirement community will only be positive for the emirate: they are consumers, they don't earn money, they are known to be active in the cultural and arts scene which will only add value to the cultural segment of Dubai, they increase demand for medical care which will attract improved and qualified professionals into the medicine field, and they will bring in more tourism when their families and grandchildren from Europe come to visit them, magnifying the luxury image of Dubai as a vacation spot.

Ironically, that is how Florida established itself as a luxury, artsy and hip destination afterall.

  

Sultan Al-Qassemi, the rising star of the Gulf!

I don't know why, but I find intelligent men with impressive vocabularies extremely sexy, sexier than the 6 feet tall muscular buffs at the gym (their 'sexiness' wears off after 5 minutes of conversation).
But this guy over here is a bank of historical information, just read his blog! Not only does he possess eloquence and innovative ideas, with random historical factoids, he is also a generous philanthropist (double sexy points), a sponsor of the arts ( he owns meem gallery in dubai -triple sexy points), runs his own Brokerage firm, and speaks French (quadruple sexy points). When he's not busy attending to his own personal family business or writing his daring, opinionated articles for The National Newspaper in Abu Dhabi, he teaches Middle Eastern History and participates in socio-political panels and cultural museum events.
And word on the street -or around the emirate-is that despite this native royal's various accomplishments he is very nice, and very humble. I imagine he also loves going to the opera (totally an assumption).
Ladies in the U.A.E, if your men possessed half the characteristics of this eligible Emarati bachelor, I would say you're in good hands.