People run for lots of reasons: to achieve fitness goals, to help others less fortunate or just to challenge themselves.
I run to escape noisy toddlers. The further I run, the quieter it gets. It helps that they can't keep up. Don't try to run before you can walk, I tell them.
Were it not for the escapism, I'd find running impossibly tedious. Lately, it has been about more than just fleeing the tiny tots.
At some point since the start of the year in which some Mayans predicted the world would end, I morphed into a Mamil (Middle Aged Man in Lycra).
A colleague claimed this denotes a compulsive obsessive disorder associated with mid-life crisis, which was unkind.
The real reason we Mamil moths are drawn to our spandex flame is the sense of foreboding that comes with the realisation of our own mortality.
Foreboding has had a great decade so far. Hollywood fed our need for apocalyptic fix with one end-of-the-world movie after another.
Later, we got a taste for economic Armageddon with the sub-prime crisis, which kept us going until the sovereign-debt crisis arrived like a long-awaited sequel.
A similar sense of metabolic foreboding has led me and my Mamil mates to the start lines of various competitions in this our final year.
First it was the Dubai Marathon, shuffling beneath the Burj Khalifa at dawn next to a man dressed as a rhino. Then came the Abu Dhabi Triathlon last weekend, which is the ultimate festival of Lycra and middle age. A wobbly Woodstock.
Foreboding has also got off to a great start in the Gulf this year, with the Strait of Hormuz brewing up nicely - Israelis, Iranians, nuclear reactors - you've got all the classic elements of a tip top Armageddon right there.
Closer still, 2012 is the year Dubai Inc debt repayments peak. This milestone has been greeted with a certain amount of Mayan apprehension by lenders owed more than US$13 billion (Dh47.75bn) coming due before the end of the world.
It came to mind at the start line of the Dubai Marathon, where most of the runners appeared to work for Dubai Holding - one of the emirate's three big government-backed conglomerates.
At first I thought I kept seeing the same person, wearing what looked like the Sunderland home kit with the name of his company across his chest. But then I noticed scores of these red-and-white striped Dubai Holding clones everywhere.
The race organiser's website search engine revealed there were more than 1,100 Dubai Holding folk pounding the road that day, more than 10 per cent of the entire field.
This seemed to me a stroke of corporate finance genius.
Who needs debt standstills and haircuts when you can get all your staff to go on a giant sponsored run? Charitable causes tend to hog the sponsored race space. Saving the rhinos is all very well, but what about the poor old corporate borrowers?
Dubai Holding and its indebted peers may not have to take such drastic action after all. Foreboding is on the back foot again - at least as far as Dubai's credit profile goes. Some thought 2012 would be a bigger test for the emirate than 2009, when Dubai World rocked global credit markets with its debt standstill. So far it hasn't shaped up like that.
The first positive signal came from Dubai Holding Commercial Operations Group on February 1, when it repaid its $500 million bond on time. Last week, Dubai World's ship repair unit said it was close to agreeing new terms on $2.2bn of upcoming debt obligations. The emirate's state-owned utility to repay about Dh1.2bn of debt ahead of schedule.
These positive signals arrive against a backdrop of improving business sentiment. Tourism and retail appear to be on the bounce, and that could help to replenish the coffers of some Dubai Government-owned entities. Assets will still have to be sold to balance the books, but the picture looks better than it did six months ago.
I still don't know whether those 1,100 Dubai Holding employees made it through the dreaded marathon wall. But the emirate seems to be running through its own wall of debt.
In the meantime, my next meeting of Mamils will be the Yas Triathlon in Abu Dhabi on April 13 - a Friday I believe. No bad omens there at least.
scronin@thenational.ae
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MATCH INFO
Newcastle United 2 (Willems 25', Shelvey 88')
Manchester City 2 (Sterling 22', De Bruyne 82')
Padmaavat
Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali
Starring: Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone, Shahid Kapoor, Jim Sarbh
3.5/5
A MINECRAFT MOVIE
Director: Jared Hess
Starring: Jack Black, Jennifer Coolidge, Jason Momoa
Rating: 3/5
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
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Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
Need to know
When: October 17 until November 10
Cost: Entry is free but some events require prior registration
Where: Various locations including National Theatre (Abu Dhabi), Abu Dhabi Cultural Center, Zayed University Promenade, Beach Rotana (Abu Dhabi), Vox Cinemas at Yas Mall, Sharjah Youth Center
What: The Korea Festival will feature art exhibitions, a B-boy dance show, a mini K-pop concert, traditional dance and music performances, food tastings, a beauty seminar, and more.
For more information: www.koreafestivaluae.com
DSC Eagles 23 Dubai Hurricanes 36
Eagles
Tries: Bright, O’Driscoll
Cons: Carey 2
Pens: Carey 3
Hurricanes
Tries: Knight 2, Lewis, Finck, Powell, Perry
Cons: Powell 3
The%20specs
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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
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
More from Mohammed Alardhi
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
