I am 31 years old and I have TikTok. I'm well aware I'm about a decade older than the social media platform's target audience, but scrolling through the attention-span-shrinking micro-video app has taken over a place that used to be reserved purely for Instagram.
Is this personal growth or regression? I am not sure.
I haven't signed up for an account, and have never made a video. Nor do I plan to patch together any Megan Thee Stallion tributes in the near future, but I can happily lose more time than I would care to admit scrolling though videos.
I originally downloaded TikTok to follow a girl in Northern Ireland I had heard about, who has been raising 37,930 (her number, I haven't counted) frogs, all the way from spawn to tadpoles to froglets. It's a journey that currently stands at a tally of 106 days.
Without the app, I couldn't see the full back catalogue of Tadpole Girl's content – I wish I was joking by writing that, I am not.
However, I have since discovered that TikTok is more than just perfectly in-sync dance routines, viral recipes and comedy skits. Indeed, there is a pure and beautiful corner of the app dedicated to houseplants.
You read correctly. Many of us, myself included, have become a little more attached to anything green that we share our homes with since March. And it seems we are not alone, judging by the amount of hypnotic, horticultural content on the app.
Be it care tutorials, people just showing the world their favourites plants or relatable videos about buying more, it's all there to be enjoyed.
The recurring Don't Be Suspicious meme is a personal favourite:
I know that I currently sound like Amy Poehler's "cool mom" character from Mean Girls (a reference that ages me out of TikTok's demographic), and for many, I will be preaching to the choir on the app's appeal. But are you all really telling me that you knew there was endless plant content out there to be found? And if you are, why did no one tell me?
Searching #plantmom, #plantdad and #plantlovers are great places to start. Based on the numbers, I am not alone in craving this content. The #plant hashtag has had a staggering 473 million views, while #plantlovers has had more than 4.7 million, and there are hundreds of hashtags and users to scroll through.
You will find users such as @thisisrheed who shows off his many lovely plants, and also gives top tips on caring for them:
There are also users such as @art.of.plants who make videos about propagation, repotting and the best plants for certain purposes.
If you find yourself with a spare few minutes this weekend, treat yourself to a scroll.
You'll find a group of Gen-Zers who can teach you a thing or two about caring for your greens.
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Read more:
Why plants are the green gift that keeps on giving
How to grow your own vegetables: Why now is the time to get into windowsill gardening
Inside information: how to choose your succulents
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Results:
6.30pm: Al Maktoum Challenge Round-2 (PA) | Group 1 US$75,000 (Dirt) | 2,200 metres
Winner: Goshawke, Fernando Jara (jockey), Ali Rashid Al Raihe (trainer)
7.05pm: UAE 1000 Guineas (TB) | Listed $250,000 (D) | 1,600m
Winner: Silva, Oisin Murphy, Pia Brendt
7.40pm: Meydan Classic Trial (TB) | Conditions $100,000 (Turf) | 1,400m
Winner: Golden Jaguar, Connor Beasley, Ahmad bin Harmash
8.15pm: Al Shindagha Sprint (TB) | Group 3 $200,000 (D) | 1,200m
Winner: Drafted, Pat Dobbs, Doug Watson
8.50pm: Handicap (TB) | $175,000 (D) | 1,600m
Winner: Capezzano, Mickael Barzalona, Sandeep Jadhav
9.25pm: Handicap (TB) | $175,000 (T) | 2,000m
Winner: Oasis Charm, William Buick, Charlie Appleby
10pm: Handicap (TB) | $135,000 (T) | 1,600m
Winner: Escalator, Christopher Hayes, Charlie Fellowes
Meydan racecard:
6.30pm: Al Maktoum Challenge Round 2 (PA) Group 1 | US$75,000 (Dirt) | 2,200 metres
7.05pm: UAE 1000 Guineas (TB) Listed | $250,000 (D) | 1,600m
7.40pm: Meydan Classic Trial (TB) Conditions | $100,000 (Turf) | 1,400m
8.15pm: Al Shindagha Sprint (TB) Group 3 | $200,000 (D) | 1,200m
8.50pm: Handicap (TB) | $175,000 (D) | 1,600m
9.25pm: Handicap (TB) | $175,000 (T) | 2,000m
10pm: Handicap (TB) | $135,000 (T) | 1,600m
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
