At The National, one of the ways in which we mark the holiday season … is to run stories reminding everyone it is not legal to slaughter animals in your home. Health concerns are cited, as well as the 500-dirham fine (about $130). If the campaigns were entirely successful, presumably the government wouldn’t issue announcements […]

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No, not the Uefa Champions League. You thought I was going to go there, right? Not the Asian Champions League … not anyone’s champions league. My favorite annual soccer competition is … the Europa League! And here is why:

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This is one of those “I wish I had thought of that!” situations. Well, aside from the fact that I am not a cartoonist, and all. Clark Kent quits the Daily Planet is the headline on the Jim Romenesko site, and includes the outline of an actual edition of the DC Comic.

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Down here around Abu Dhabi and Dubai, approaching the outer edge of the Empty Quarter, nature is boring. What we have is hard-baked sand and miles and miles of flatlands. On some of that, buildings have been constructed. The whole country is not like that, however. The northern emirates, especially, have hills and mountains and […]

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The Euros winning the Ryder Cup was very big over here. “Massive!”, as the Brits like to say. Seems as if half the sports department (the British half) stayed up into the wee hours of Sunday night/Monday morning to watch the big comeback by Europe against the U.S.  “I couldn’t turn it off!” one said. […]

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Have I written this before? Probably. But I am thinking of it now and will restate it. I love losing streaks. In life. But especially in sports. It gives us something to talk about. Something to focus on. A running subplot. Sometimes the plot. We lost some great losing streaks in the past decade. Four […]

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When we arrived in the UAE, in October of 2009, I can tell you exactly how long we thought we would stay: Eighteen months. Two notions led us to come up with that number.

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I believe we did a good bit of sports journalism earlier this week when we reported on the practice of UAE soccer clubs paying fans to attend their games. It seems fantastical, at first blush, but if a person has a sense of how things work here, and traditions and history, it is less bizarre. […]

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The UAE has some of the world’s tallest buildings (including the tallest, the Burj Khalifa) but also some of the world’s oddest-shaped tall buildings. Few of us think much about how the thousands of windows in those skyscrapers are cleaned, but a member of The National’s business staff explained the process in a piece today. […]

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I was watching the end of the Monday Night Football game. Actually, it was Tuesday morning, here in Abu Dhabi, which is 11 hours ahead of Pacific Daylight Time. I saw the final play, the controversial touchdown pass from Russell Wilson to Golden Tate … which won the game for Seattle, 14-12. And I was […]

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