Various themes of progression have come forward in our five years in the Gulf. More people, more towers, more traffic, more sophistication … And more elite soccer players. The Arabian Gulf League, or Pro League, as it was known for four seasons, has seen a steady climb in the number of good players choosing to […]

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This is not a pair I would have chosen for purposes of “compare and contrast”. It was our colleague, Osman Samiuddin who did it for me. Novak Djokovic and Ned Flanders. In a comment piece that will appear in the Tuesday editions of The National, Osman suggests the two personalities — one real, one a […]

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I saw the final three quarters of the Super Bowl, missing none of the scoring, after coming out of an AC-induced coma at about 4 a.m. UAE time. I never once thought Seattle would win, not until they got to the 1-yard line with 26 seconds left to play in a 28-24 game, and even […]

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Over the years, it has been noted that the NFL’s Super Bowl is perhaps the last significant reminder, in the United States, anyway, of the ancient counting system created by the Romans about 2,500 years ago. Roman numerals under the value of 20 still pop up, here and there, in modern American usage. In books. […]

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Many soccer countries have a distinctive sound. Their own chants and cheers. Their own national anthem, too, of course. And we have some of both, thanks to The National’s correspondent at the AFC Asian Cup, in Australia, Ali Khaled, who got two bits of video before kickoff at the UAE’s semifinal match with Australia. First, […]

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If this is sports, and we are talking about the UAE’s biggest victory, we can be talking only about soccer. And this was a big victory, indeed. UAE a 5-4 winner in a quarterfinal shootout over defending continental champion Japan in the 2015 Asian Cup in Australia. If you are a team in Asia, the […]

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Rain here produces a reaction rather like snow does in Southern California. “Oh, cool! Come over and look at this! Wow! … Hey, wait. … This is not comfortable to be walking around in. I don’t have the right clothes. And it might even be dangerous to drive in …” It rained real rain today […]

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First, the irony. World soccer governing body Fifa won’t tell you how its two-dozen executive committee members voted after they hand out the World Cup … But Fifa gives us chapter and verse on how the voting goes for the Ballon d’Or, the player-of-the-year award. Which Cristiano Ronaldo won tonight, as he should have, for […]

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Lorem ipsum is a famous dummy text. Random words, Latin-looking, that designers use in page mockups. (Not to get too wonky about it, but “studies show” that when designers are creating new looks, real text often distracts non-designers who are looking at a page. They begin reading real stories, instead of looking at how marvelous […]

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An appealing aspect of the UAE is how compact it is. Both in terms of area and population. The country is the 116th biggest in the world, in size, just behind Austria; if it were a U.S. state it would rank 40th, behind Maine). And the population is maybe 9 million, putting it 91st in […]

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