“I’m guessing your knowledge level of your camera is somewhere between very little and not much,” Corinna Harrison correctly assumes as we begin our photography excursion with her company Hairy Goat.
Harrison, a 50-year-old Australian, is about to begin offering her sessions – which combine a masterclass in how to use your digital camera with a walking tour – in Dubai in November.
She previewed what they will entail by taking me on a brief sojourn around Deira port. As well as granting us a pleasant amble through the busy wharf, she also uses the time to further my understanding of my camera’s functions.
Before we embark, she recalls the history of her company and her ambitions in the UAE.
Back in Australia, she’d held a number of jobs in the travel industry, from bus driver to tour guide.
After emigrating to the UK, she’d worked as a contractor for a construction firm before being made redundant when the economic crisis hit in 2009.
Rather than return to her home country, she decided to combine her tourism experience with her love of photography.
So, taking its name from the Australian expression “running around like a hairy goat”, the company was born. “It means you’re running around zipping from place to place, as this is what you do on our tours,” she explains.
“But it’s definitely different from running around like a headless chicken, because there’s no panic involved.”
Despite the somewhat idiosyncratic title of the brand, Harrison’s perambulatory tours of central London are hugely popular, gaining top rankings on travel review websites such as Tripadvisor.com
But she hopes Dubai, with its mix of tourists and residents with plenty of disposable income to hand, is ripe territory for her first foray outside of the UK.
“I need to expand and get bigger than London, and get into markets where people have an interest in photography but are not sure what to do with it,” she says.
“My initial expansion plans included other cities in the UK and Europe. But the recession and the Eurozone crisis over there put me off. Over here in the UAE, people do have plenty of cash.”
Perhaps because of this wealth, she believes there are numerous people who have purchased top-of-the-range photographic equipment, yet have never learnt how to use it properly.
“A lot of people buy these really expensive cameras with the dream that they’re going to become a fantastic photographer, but then they just end up using the auto setting for all their shots,” she says.
“They’re still letting the camera control them. If you’re going to spend all this money, you should really make an effort to learn how to use your camera.”
The instruction manuals that come with the cameras, however, are often incomprehensible to the layman. “I gave up reading my camera’s manual after about page 10,” she jokes.
“Even if you read the manual cover to cover, or reading photography magazines or books, or watch YouTube clips, quite often you’re still totally in the dark about your camera.
“But to have somebody standing there ... to guide you, for 95 per cent of people, this is the best way to learn,” she believes.
Hence, as we photograph the workers loading and unloading cargo from the dhows harboured in Deira Creek, she talks me through how adjusting aperture and shutter speed can alter our snaps.
And while my Nikon D5100 does not really have the lens to take professional-level pictures, I definitely have a more complete knowledge of how a camera functions.
“Most people’s problems with photography is that they let the camera control them. If you use auto, you’re only going to get the shot you want about 40 per cent of the time.
“But the camera isn’t a mind-reader, it needs to be told what to take. As long as you remember you’re in control of your camera and pay attention to the light conditions, you should be able to take some great photos.”
• For more information about the tours, visit www.hairygoat.net
hberger@thenational.ae
In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
Test
Director: S Sashikanth
Cast: Nayanthara, Siddharth, Meera Jasmine, R Madhavan
Star rating: 2/5
Living in...
This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
COMPANY%20PROFILE%3A
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
HAJJAN
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The specs: 2018 Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross
Price, base / as tested: Dh101,140 / Dh113,800
Engine: Turbocharged 1.5-litre four-cylinder
Power: 148hp @ 5,500rpm
Torque: 250Nm @ 2,000rpm
Transmission: Eight-speed CVT
Fuel consumption, combined: 7.0L / 100km
