ya zaein & firaiha falafel

Two local eateries here in Abu Dhabi have been on my mind since the film festival changed offices a couple of weeks ago and I no longer have regular access to them. (In fact, I no longer have access to any restaurants or shops.) So this is both my first effort at food blogging and remembrance of things past. Strange to feel nostalgia for something when you’re living in a foreign city for only four months. But that’s the way I feel about this place: displacement, occasional amazement, and this weird comfortable homey feeling as if I’ve been here far longer.

Until the move the festival’s offices were located in the Abu Dhabi Film Centre, “opposite the Rosary School,” which is what you would have to tell a taxi driver (or a postman) as there are no numbered addresses here. Most days I would step out for lunch to the nearby shops just off Muroor Road about ten minutes away on foot.

This is not as simple as it sounds — and there’s a reason most of my colleagues didn’t do the same very often. When it’s 116° and humid, such an excursion is more like a workout. But one that I enjoyed — not only do I not mind the insane heat in Abu Dhabi, I kind of love it. Especially after being in an air-conditioned office for hours, I found the blast of heat and light most welcome. There was a sun-baked tranquility to the wide side streets, lined with low-rise schools and media agencies and dusty trees, making me feel I had them all to myself. I would take my time on the long sidewalk by the walled-off boys school, the heat of the sun intensified by the right angles of the sidewalk and wall; it felt like walking in a brick oven. Shards of green broken glass would make a musical sound under my shoes in the quiet of the afternoon. Skinny feral cats would greet me from alcoves. After a few minutes I’d feel like I was evaporating.

Both of my potential destinations were well worth the trouble. In both cases there would be AC, friendly staff, and good Middle Eastern street food waiting for me.

Ya Zaein is a sit-down shop with a big counter and a big oven behind, exactly like a New York pizzeria. They deal in a couple of different kinds of Middle Eastern pastry; I’m not even sure what they’re called. (The English text on the menu simply calls them “pastries.”) These creations are made fresh to order with many different toppings, but being a vegetarian I only considered cheese and vegetables. There are flat ones, resembling soft little pizzas (pizza is a Middle Eastern concept in the first place, of course), and filled pockets that are much like empanadas. I would get the flat pastries with feta, and usually spinach as well. Once I ordered one labelled “mixed vegetables” on the menu, and it came with a dusting of za’atar (the quintessentially Arabic blend of oregano, thyme, and other dried herbs) and fresh mint. You gotta love the Middle East, where mint is a vegetable. Though “mint pizza” is not something that’ll ever top my list, I enjoyed it.

The pocket thingeys are filled with labeneh — the creamy yogurt-cheese that is a staple here and has become one of my favorite things in life. The heat of the oven melts and then cooks the labeneh into something like really soft cream cheese. With tomatoes and spinach added they’re little pockets of heaven, so long as you don’t burn your tongue on the labeneh. I’d let them cool off, and inhale them.

I’d always order a mango juice. Fresh fruit juice is ubiquitous in Abu Dhabi and the quality is stellar across the board — gritty pomegranate juice and pulpy mango nectar that seem gourmet to western palates are made fresh even at humble little eateries like this one. I wasn’t much of a juice drinker until I lived here — but not only is it too good to pass up, I find that in this climate I crave it.

As with most such places in Abu Dhabi the food at Ya Zaein is cheap — two pastries plus a juice comes to AED 25, or about US $6 — and the staff are very accomodating. While waiting for my patries to be baked I’d check out whatever was on the TV. Usually Arabic soap operas or talk shows, but once it was an old black-and-white musical, probably Egyptian; in the scene I caught, a beautiful woman stood at a window facing a river and was serenaded by a man in a boat below. The ballad was lovely and absolutely unclassifiable to me — there’s so much I don’t know about Arabic music.

If there was nothing good on TV, I’d check out the turtle in the shallow tiled fountain out the back (note the Ya Zaein logo in the fountain’s tiles). Another reason to love Abu Dhabi: in New York (and a lot of other places), this turtle — completely open to the elements and passersby — would have been stolen or killed long ago.

My other choice for lunch was a falafel shop around the corner. I didn’t know its name, Firaiha Falafel, until I took this picture of the façade. This place is a little more rundown than Ya Zaein — there’s a small, untidy counter with only one guy working behind it; boxes of supplies are piled haphazardly in every corner; there’s only room for one small table. Invariably the TV hanging in the corner is tuned to a religious channel — I’d always hear a few verses of the Koran recited melodically (with accompanying English subtitles) while I was waiting for my falafel.

And honestly it isn’t the best falafel in Abu Dhabi. But falafel here is like pizza in New York: you really can’t go wrong. And these will do. I would always order one regular and one Arabic falafel. Regular means Lebanese style — note the Cedar of Lebanon on the sign. The falafel balls are smashed up and rolled in soft flatbread like a burrito. (I’ve never seen falafel served whole in a pita here, so I’m not sure if that hails from another Middle Eastern region, or if it’s just a New York thing.) Lettuce, tomato, a bit of tahini sauce, and a bit of hot sauce are the spartan accompaniments. Honestly I found them a bit dry, but I would usually wash them down with laban (buttermilk). The important thing is that the falafel balls, the stars of the show, are served fresh and fresh — often I’d have to wait for the guy to make them — and mixed with sesame seeds, which is something else I never saw until I came here. It makes such a difference.

The Arabic-style falafel (“Arabic” in this case referring to people of the Gulf region, as opposed to Levantine or Mediterranean folk) is pressed flat and fried in something that looks like a Foreman grill. The “Arabic” or Gulf style of anything is to fry it to death. (And serve it with French fries; in fact, I’m pretty sure they serve a French-fry falafel sandwich at this shop). But I like the flat shape and unique texture it gives to the whole package.

Two hearty falafel (with accompanying mixed pickles) and a little carton of laban at Firaiha will run you AED 16 — that’s just over US $4.

Often after I made my order, the counter guy — who didn’t have much English — would smile and offer me a complimentary piece of falafel. This kind of generosity and courtesy is common at Middle Eastern restaurants and cafés in my experience. Along with the bowl of free pickles to munch on while enjoying the oasis of cool air and listening to the ringing, insistent recital on the TV, that’s why I would come here, and that’s what made it so satisfying above and beyond the dry, average falafel. I’ll miss these places.

UAE tilt shift

Fun with the TiltShiftGen app I just got for my iPhone.

inception gold class

I just published a review of Inception over at my other page, Feral Kid. I’m linking it here since there’s a bit of overlap between film writing and the travel and observational stuff — the piece includes a description of the nutty Gold Class cinema experience here in Abu Dhabi.

the freest city

A few days ago, a New York City commission cleared the way for the construction of a mosque and Muslim community center not far from the World Trade Center. The question of whether the city’s government should have let that happen has sparked an intense local and national debate about freedom of religion. Does the painful memory of 9/11 somehow override Muslim Americans’ right to worship in that neighborhood?

This story grabbed my attention not only because I lived in New York for such a long time, but because I’m currently living and working seasonally in the Muslim world — in the United Arab Emirates. I work closely with Muslims. But this is nothing new; I was working closely with Muslims for years in New York. I remember one of my Muslim colleagues telling me about how he was working across the street from the World Trade Center on 9/11. He said it’s still hard to talk about it, but the anniversary is a very important day for him every year. This was a guy who only wanted to talk about football — American football that is; a steak-and-potatoes kind of guy from Brooklyn, about as New York as you get.

What about this paranoid rhetoric about Islam from these sneering, divisive politicians and pundits, who seem to be getting bolder the less sense they make? In a recent entry about turmoil in the Australian government, I claimed I’m not interested in politics. Here I am getting into it again I guess. But can freedom of religion be considered “politics”? Isn’t it more important?

Honestly I don’t know why this is even a conversation. Last I checked, Americans are free to worship as they choose. Period. Well, aren’t they? George Orwell wrote, “In times of crisis repeat the obvious.”

If any Americans are worried about one particular religion and whether it supposedly stands in contrast to all of their ideals — well, that’s probably a trickier issue than most people are willing to admit. If you look closely and read the fine print, every religion is opposed to American consumerism and imperialism, or should be. Like, maybe every Christian should declare a holy war against Halliburton? So maybe we don’t want to go there.

But on a more day-to-day level, it’s not even worth fussing over. All of the hate and panic is not only harmful, it’s silly. Of the 1.5 billion or so Muslims in the world, most of them are just like us — duh. Or they would like to be just like us if they had the economic opportunity. (But maybe that’s another place we don’t want to go.) I’ve spent time in a Muslim country that has a good economy and is at peace — and surely the two go hand in hand. To those who think they hate Muslims without having met any, and assume they’ve all signed up for a jihad against America, I have to say: I’ve met your enemy, and he’s driving a Dodge and pumping Jay-Z on his way to McDonald’s. He wouldn’t want to do away with America — America is where his iPhone was designed and where Inception was produced. (He’s very keen on seeing it this weekend if it’s not sold out again).

Mike Bloomberg, the mayor of New York, staunchly defended the rights of the building’s owners for months against the hurt feelings of some 9/11 victims’ families — as well as some very unsavory characters from the right wing who didn’t care about New York before it became a queasy symbol of terror (and the War on Terror). Considering the emotion in play this might have been considered brave or politically risky. But he stubbornly phrased the debate in the simplest terms of private property and individual liberty — rights that it would be disastrous to compromise no matter how momentous the circumstances, rights that are as American as Mamoun’s Falafel. He also rightly and winningly cited New York as a traditional outpost of tolerance — “the freest city on Earth.” As if to say, “Hey, this is New York. This is how we do things. You don’t like it, get outta here.”

I like Mike. I’ve always been fine with him as mayor. One reason for this is he’s often fought hammer and tong for things I happen to care about. A couple of years ago he pushed hard for a proposal that would have limited private cars on the island of Manhattan — it would have been a bold step forward in making New York more sustainable and pedestrian-friendly. Unfortunately the bill was shot down by shortsighted politicos from upstate who were afraid of offending their fat, SUV-driving constituents. Bloomberg was so furious about this betrayal he couldn’t speak to the media that day. I liked that human touch. It showed again in the debate over the mosque. According to observers he was very passionate and involved, and eagerly sought an opportunity to address the public on the issue.

He got his chance on the day of the commission’s unanimous vote in favor of the mosque. Mayor Mike is often considered an awkward and prickly fellow, and no great orator, but this is widely being hailed as a great speech, probably the finest he’s ever delivered. Apparently he wrote a lot of it himself. It’s not long, not very grandiloquent. It’s beautifully direct, even forceful, but astute; and frames its argument with a sense of history, plenty of emotion, and the noble and urgent concept of unity between faiths.

(You can also read the speech here.)

For those genuinely concerned about how the mosque and those who will worship there fit in with American values, it’s all here, with the Statue of Liberty playing backup. If the Mayor of New York’s reverence for the sacrifice of the policemen and firemen who died that day for the freedom of all won’t convince you, what will?

On September 11, 2001, thousands of first responders heroically rushed to the scene and saved tens of thousands of lives. More than four hundred of those first responders did not make it out alive. In rushing into those burning buildings, not one of them asked “What God do you pray to? What beliefs do you hold?”

The attack was an act of war — and our first responders defended not only our City but also our country and our Constitution. We do not honor their lives by denying the very Constitutional rights they died protecting. We honor their lives by defending those rights — and the freedoms that the terrorists attacked.

Of course, it is fair to ask the organizers of the mosque to show some special sensitivity to the situation — and in fact, their plan envisions reaching beyond their walls and building an interfaith community. By doing so, it is my hope that the mosque will help to bring our city even closer together and help repudiate the false and repugnant idea that the attacks of 9/11 were in any way consistent with Islam. Muslims are as much a part of our city and our country as the people of any faith and they are as welcome to worship in Lower Manhattan as any other group.

For those who are simply bigoted and will remain so anyway, you’ve only got one argument, and it’s not a very good one: Islam = terror.

I’m reading a book about Abraham Lincoln right now — all right, so it’s Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, but still — and this speech recalls old Abe’s spirit. Not only because of its brevity, deceptive simplicity, and power. This is not a very popular stance Bloomberg is taking; a majority of New Yorkers are opposed to it. But it’s the right stance. Occasionally it’s necessary for politicians and other leaders to make unpopular decisions to uphold the greater good. Lincoln’s whole presidency was defined by this. As Larry Flynt of all people said, “Majority rule only works if you’re also considering individual rights. Because you can’t have five wolves and one sheep voting on what to have for supper.”

One of the villains opposing the mosque repeated the refrain that the World Trade Center is “sacred ground.” Yes, and so is every mosque. And so is Wounded Knee. And so is my grandma’s backyard. All ground is sacred. As Bloomberg says to conclude his speech, “There is no neighborhood in this city that is off limits to God’s love and mercy.” It’s an astonishingly direct affirmation from a modern politician and, along with the way he chokes up while he’s speaking, shows his passion and determination for this “critically important test” of religious tolerance. Good on ya Mike. Blessed are the peacemakers.

AD as it is

This blog’s about to change. It has to. I don’t have time to work on it anymore.

My habit thus far has been to have a good idea for a post, then ponder it for days, wondering how to start. Then write 2000 words. Then agonize over the draft for a few days or even weeks, editing, revising, polishing, more often than not adding instead of cutting. Then finally, when I have the nerve, publish. Then go on reading over it obsessively and revising a little at a time, while other ideas circulate in my head.

At times I’ve made lists of ideas for entries — up to ten or twelve at a time — then stared at the lists helplessly, knowing my work methods would never support such output. And I go about my day, working, running errands, trying to sleep, and the sheer number of thoughts and ideas I have and how little discipline I have in getting them out is a torment. It feels like not being able to breathe.

All the while knowing that’s not how blogs work. I should have an idea, compose a few thoughts around it, provide an interesting link and an image or two, click publish, boom. Hopefully doing this several times a week, so that my constant readers (all six of them) don’t get discouraged and forget to check for updates.

So the end result has been less like a blog, and more like a collection of essays. And I’m sort of happy with it. I’ve even gotten a number of compliments on my writing. But I’ve never been able to avoid the feeling it’s neither here nor there. I’m not a practiced enough writer (yet anyway) to indulge ambition thus. And what I would be good at — thoughts, impressions, connections — I’m not doing. (I’ve always been better at putting things together — whether cutup pictures in a collage or records in a mix — than I am at composition and raw creation.)

All of this was OK when I was between gigs in Sydney and had all day to sit around and freak out about it. But now it’s got to change; I’m in Abu Dhabi working on publications for a film festival; my free time is like water in my hands. Soon I’ll be working night and day every day. The fact that I’ll be writing for work only makes it certain I won’t have much left for me.

So sooner rather than later, this page is going to become what it always should have been — ideas, links, impressions, associations, a stream of information rather than some sculpted object. Whatever I publish I’ll to have to work fast, cut and run, live off the land, take no prisoners.

Meanwhile. I’ve been back in Abu Dhabi for  a few weeks now. Loving it. And whenever I find some free time, especially early in the morning, I’ve been taking walks. Just enjoying the place and the crazy heat. But also looking around and coming up with ideas to shoot a film. (I know — I’m complaining about how hard it is to work on a blog; meanwhile I’d like to make a film. As you can see, something’s got to give.) I’ve been carrying my iPhone with me, though I have no sim card or data plan, and getting snapshots with its built-in camera whenever I’m inspired. Which is often.

When I was here last year, I did what everyone else does when they take pictures of Abu Dhabi (including the government or any entity involved in marketing the place). I would find a nice green garden or a park, frame a cool-looking building in the background, maybe throw in the Persian Gulf, et voilà. A gleaming postmodern Arabic metropolis, an enchanting vision to make my friends and family wonder what they’re missing.

But this year for a number of reasons I’m driven to show what the UAE is really like, how it really feels. Yeah, there’s a nice-looking building or a garden or a mosque in the distance. But between the broken sidewalk where you’re standing and the thing itself is a good deal of sand and dirt. And rubble, and loose bricks, and machinery, and pieces of plastic, and other pieces of infrastructure and debris from the construction projects that are everywhere, in every direction. There might be a lawn or a garden, but right next to it is more sand. And plastic furniture sitting there for no apparent reason. All of it covered with dust. It’s a postmodern cityscape vying with a desert. Sometimes the desert wins.

Everywhere you go there’s lots of leftover space no one’s sure what to do with. The awkward spaces behind and between buildings; the spaces between sidewalks. They’re like gaps between reality and whatever Abu Dhabi is. Abu Dhabi is posh hotels and perfume and Gehry’s Guggenheim and air conditioning; but it’s also rebar and orange plastic construction barriers and broken air-conditioning units sitting in the street.

And it’s a guy, probably from Pakistan, walking across a barren stretch of dirt, wearing green coveralls, with a checkered cloth tied haphazardly around his head to protect it from the sun. Walking slowly, languidly, you’re not sure if he’s ready to collapse from exhaustion or if he’s just taking his time. And where is he going? Is he on a break? Is he walking a mile to the nearest bus stop?

This is not meant to be cynical. I love this place. It’s weird, but I love it. For some reason, even where it’s awkward or ugly, I’m still psyched about it. For me it’s a visual signifier of a whole range of experiences and thoughts over the past couple of years. Not to mention inspiration for a bigger project.

The iPhone’s photographic capabilities have often been justified with the maxim, “The best camera is the one you have with you.” I wish I could claim that — I wish my photos were low-fi in a cool way on purpose. In actuality I’m not a terribly astute photographer and never have been. But I have an eye for… something. And I know it when I see it.

So, for your consideration, a few sketches of Abu Dhabi as it is.

By the way, even this entry is a fabrication, a simulacrum. This is where I was two weeks ago; these photos are from another part of town, another hotel, another state of mind. Now I’m back on the Corniche and I have a tilt-shift generator app for my phone. And I have so many more ideas I feel like smashing something.

the creek

On Friday I had a taste of authentic Gulf culture when my wife and I visited the Creek in Dubai for the first time. Or at least that’s how I was going to start this. But what does authentic mean? What’s authentic about an old Arabic souk when most of the goods come from China anyway? And what exactly is not authentic about malls and SUVs and freeways and glass towers and villas? Those things have replaced souks and camel trains and wind towers and pearl diving because they work better in the modern world for most people. They are as real as anything (or as unreal as anything). When archaeologists excavate malls a thousand years from now, they will not find them cheesy like we do.

What other misguided adjectives fit the feeling inspired by the Creek? Historic? True? Real? Whatever it is, I was gripped by an irrational, possibly arrogant, and delightfully contented feeling of being connected with something as we walked on the pavement along the Creek (which is really more like a canal) at sundown, adhans on both shores ringing cacophanously in the thick air, beat-up wooden dhows with their sky-blue cabin tops docked on the other side next to endless stacks of cargo, hundreds of abras, the pragmatical diesel-powered gondolas swarming to and fro ferrying passengers across the Creek, the forms of the souks and the mosques and the 80s apartment blocks surrounded by tawdry shops rising on both sides, so plain in contrast to the surreal gleaming image of postmodern Dubai. And people of all descriptions walking around languidly or sitting on concrete slabs at the edge of the water in the relative relief of evening.

Well, all kinds of people except for two glaring exceptions: no Emiratis. None at all. And not many Westerners: certainly none of the fat, pink, villa-dwelling bankers you see elsewhere. The reason these people stay away is this oldest part of Dubai is lately run down and considered tacky. No air conditioning, no Starbucks. No Baskin Robbins for their fat kids. The same reason it seems so authentic to misguided types like me. Indians, Pakistanis, Bengalis, Filipinos, Malaysians, Persians, Omanis, Yemenis, and Chinese make up the crowds here, each doing their own thing. It doesn’t feel like the Arab world. But it doesn’t feel like anywhere in particular. It’s a free zone, a trading zone. Which is what Dubai has always been: an interim place for people from everywhere to meet and trade, someplace temporary. It can’t have the same allure, the same culture, the same densely folded history of Bombay or Istanbul. A hundred years ago you would have seen the same kinds of people in souks that looked just the same trading some of the same things. I wonder if it was considered just as tacky then: the old-world version of a mall?

Through the Textile Souk, with its jeans, T-shirts, sports jerseys, sunglasses, sneakers, sandals, jewelry, toys, souvenirs, shisha pipes, snack vendors. Big crowd around a guy squeezing and hawking fresh orange juice. In case you’re wondering there are textiles too, and Persian carpets.

Back out onto the Creek we paid a dirham each to board an abra. No docking lines, no railings, nothing to grab onto, everyone steps or jumps aboard in whatever fashion works as the boat rolls around in the water. As we got under way we jostled and bumped into the dock and other abras in the vicinity several times. These things have no fenders; they’re made of stout wood that’s scratched and worn to death from all the chafing and crashing. The diesel smell, the noise of the engine, the garish lights along the shore were pleasant in the simulacrum of breeze as we moved through the torpid night air.

Across the way to look into the Spice Souk with its cinnamon, cassia, cloves, cardamom, nutmeg, mustard, turmeric, dried ginger, big bags of fake saffron, little plastic containers of real saffron, lavender, huge baskets of dried Persian lemons and limes, incense, perfume, pink salt, indigo, rock sugar, thyme water. Every shop selling the same thing. It’s a splendid place.

Outside, walking along the dock where the dhows tie up. Not the floating restaurants shaped like dhows. The dhows that actually sail the Gulf and the Indian Ocean, hauling cargo to and from Iran and Yemen and beyond. Sailors that haul carpets and cashews and herbs a long way under an unforgiving sun with only those funny sky-blue wooden canopies to comfort them, and maybe a cheap AC unit. Guys that might actually meet the Somali pirates we only get to joke about. They park the cargo right on the dock, right by the side of the road — literally tons of cargo of all kinds, you can walk right up and touch it. I was awed by the pink shrink-wrapped boxes of cashews stacked twelve feet high. Never seen so many cashews in my life.

Back onto another abra, another dirham to get across again, to sit at an open-air restaurant hanging right over the Creek. It was built 1935 and it showed. The night air was 90 degrees but we had a fan right on us and plenty of local water. I had a fresh pomegranate juice that was cool and gritty and perfect. My wife and our mate had glasses of bright-green lemon-mint juice. The Lebanese fare — hummus and falafel and fatoush — was humble and satisfying. The Creek is satisfying place.

i … shot that

Tomorrow marks Youtube’s “Life in a Day” project. People from over the world are encouraged to shoot video of their own lives (or whatever else moves them) and upload it; a team of filmmakers headed by director Kevin MacDonald (The Last King of Scotland, Touching the Void) and executive producer Ridley Scott will sift through the entries, take the “most striking” footage, and create a feature-length film. The finished product will be screened at the Sundance Film Festival next year. Meanwhile all entries will be stored on a permanent archive-cum-time capsule on Youtube — as long as they don’t violate Youtube’s “community guidelines,” or come from Syrian, Burmese, Sudanese, Iranian, Cuban, or North Korean citizens. (I’m not sure why these six nations are thus singled out. They certainly aren’t the only nations with troubled or unjust regimes; nor the only ones to have difficult relationships with Youtube. For instance, the site is banned in Turkey but apparently Turks living abroad are welcome to take part.)

A mash-up collage of clips from punters everywhere telling the story of one day on Earth? Youtube is billing it as “unprecedented,” “historic,” and other gushing, hyperbolic things.

Click here for more information and instructions on how to take part.

I’m almost reluctant to admit this stunt has captured my attention just a little. Youtube calls it an “experimental documentary,” and I’ll be damned but the thought of it fascinates me. When I was a kid my family had a copy of A Day in the Life of America, a book of photographs taken all over the States on one day, and I used to love it. It was the first thing I thought of when I heard of Youtube’s project. (The other thing I thought of was, for some reason, Slacker.)

Really the whole thing is an ingenious brew of populism, corporate marketing, and independent filmmaking taken to its logical extreme. As a friend and colleague has already written, it’s like the Beastie Boys’ Awesome; I Fuckin’ Shot That on a fuckin’ global scale. Shoot film by any means necessary indeed. Or is it edit other people’s film by any means necessary? (Actually, if nothing else, this project is a great way for Youtube, Sundance, and the filmmakers to get a lot of publicity out of a film on almost no budget, the production done entirely by willing crews around the world for no pay.)

I have mixed feelings about taking part. I do like the idea — it seems fun; and it would be kind of cool to win the lottery so to speak and be featured in the finished product. Even being a part of that archive sounds pretty satisfying.

On the other hand the timing is weird for me. For a number of reasons I’ve been inspired, after a dormant period of many years, to make films lately. My wife brought her video camera to Abu Dhabi for the express purpose of getting some footage here so that we can do something, anything with it. And for the past couple of weeks I’ve been going around the city, taking snapshots, and brainstorming visual art. I’m especially drawn to the weird landscapes of the massive development projects seen everywhere here — the ripped-up desert, the cranes and other machinery, the exposed infrastructure and weird bits of rubble and colored plastic lying around.

So, I definitely have ideas forming. But I don’t know how I feel about pulling the trigger on those ideas tomorrow — going out and filming just because Youtube says so. Maybe I should abstain in protest, and film something the next day — just for me.

I’ll think about it tonight. If I do take part, here’s what I want to do. It occurs to me that the project, however well-meaning, cannot represent everyone. It’s true that the means of shooting video are cheaper and more accessible than ever, and in the hands of more people around the world than ever. And this has at times taken on great significance, as when the government of Burma was exposed by an covert network of citizens documenting police and military abuse with handheld video cams. (See the film Burma VJ: Reporting from a Closed Country.) Youtube’s promo clip for the project makes a subtle but definite reference to this phenomenon: in the promo’s inevitable rapid-cut montage, you can spot a brief clip of some nondescript riot police.

But not everyone can afford a video camera, nor even a phone that shoots video. And not everyone has the leisure time to spend on filmmaking. I’m especially thinking of the thousands of migrant construction workers here in the UAE. These guys come over here from the Indian subcontinent, Africa, and the Philippines to work six days a week in insane heat and often dangerous conditions for very little pay. They live in camps in the desert, ten or fifteen to a cheap and poorly ventilated hovel. Their labor is creating a science-fiction megalopolis in a desert where there was nothing before. We see the monstrous, sublime, ridiculous towers under construction everywhere we look; and we see these guys going to and fro in their beat-up buses with no AC, or walking along the roads languorously, dressed in color-coded coveralls, cloths tied around their heads to protect them from the sun. We see them in the evenings, sitting dirty and exhausted under palm trees on the median strips of the city streets, hanging out and chatting with what little free time they have. Have they heard of Youtube’s project? Have they heard of Youtube? Do any of them own a video camera? Or a computer? Have any of them ever thought about filmmaking?

I have no interest in documenting my own life in such a way, but I’d like to document them. Not in a pushy way — I wouldn’t want to film someone without permission or otherwise exploit them. But I’d like to find a way to somehow represent lives often taken for granted and certainly without an effective voice in the media.

If I don’t manage to get out and film these workers, anyone who reads this is welcome to do so. Steal this idea. Document these guys’ lives. By all means. By any means.