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Solar-powered rain showers, a mountain covered with herbs, flooring made from fungi and curtains produced from corn – these are some of the marvels that await visitors at the Netherlands pavilion for Expo 2020 Dubai.
As visitors travel through the pavilion, the sounds of a busy street in the Netherlands will ring out overhead.
On Tuesday, the country was among the first to open up its pavilion, which is in Expo's Sustainability district.
Growth in the desert
Michiel Raaphorst, founder and director at V8 Architects, said artists and designers worked together on this project to create solutions.
“This building is our message. It is proof we can harvest, grow food and make it rain in the desert,” he said.
“It shows how inspiration and solutions can come from outside your discipline. Imagine, the floor we are on is made from mushroom. And these ideas have come from artists and innovators who have integrated their solutions into the building.
“Relating and learning from all disciplines is what Expo is about.”
The pale-coloured floor tiles and wall panels in the pavilion's lounge are made from mycelium, a biodegradable fungus-based substance used in building material.
A pleated brown curtain separates the lounge on the upper level from the visitors' section of the pavilion.
Imagine, the floor we are on is made from mushroom. And these ideas have come from artists and innovators who have integrated their solutions into the building
Michiel Raaphorst,
V8 Architects
The biodegradable curtain was produced using corn, sugar cane and cassava, a root vegetable.
The centrepiece of the pavilion is a towering 18-metre vertical farm covered with edible plants such as basil, mint and fennel.
“I’m really happy to see an idea we had more than three years ago now in the design of this building, both physically and mentally,” Mr Raaphorst said.
Re-purposing existing material
Architects and organisers said their building was proof that a circular economy was possible when using recycled material, leaving a lighter carbon footprint.
Steel sheet piles, pipes and tubes have been rented from Dubai’s construction industry and will be returned once the Expo ends in March next year.
Gravel and stones make up the flooring instead of concrete, so that it can be easily repurposed.
“We have used desert stones, rocks and gravel for temporary streets. These are used on building sites,” Mr Raaphorst said.
“Our legacy is that we will put it all back into the ground. There are more than 3,000 plants on the cone and we have selected them based on local conditions.”
Water pulled from the air
When visitors descend four meters to the bottom of the pavilion, the temperature drops noticeably and guests are handed umbrellas in a darkened space.
The white umbrellas turn into projection screens, illuminated with how the sustainable structure was created.
A burst of water falls from the top of the pavilion in a real-life illustration of how 800 litres can be generated every day out of desert air. These images of water being harvested will be released when the Expo opens next week.
Solar cells and panels in the skylight and roof provide electricity to power the process of capturing moisture from the atmosphere.
On the upper walls of the dimly lit cone interior, oyster mushrooms grow and thrive in the humid, cool and dark conditions.
Carel Richter, consul general of the Netherlands and commissioner general of the Expo, said his country was keen to work with the UAE and the region to boost food security.
“These are exciting elements,” he said.
“We have got a lot of out-of-the-box thinkers involved. We would love to work with the UAE and the region, with the cost of logistics going up and with food more scarce.
“It’s about sharing knowledge, pinpointing what the challenges are and having the dream and vision to work on it.”
“New companies and artists have been part of this journey. What we see now is how buildings can be designed.
“This can only happen because so many people believed and wanted to be part of this story.”
The six-month event opens on October 1.
Expo 2020 was postponed by a year owing to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Hundreds of countries and companies have built pavilions in three themed areas called Sustainability, Mobility and Opportunity. These are located in Expo's Dubai South site.
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The specs
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The Details
Kabir Singh
Produced by: Cinestaan Studios, T-Series
Directed by: Sandeep Reddy Vanga
Starring: Shahid Kapoor, Kiara Advani, Suresh Oberoi, Soham Majumdar, Arjun Pahwa
Rating: 2.5/5
BOSH!'s pantry essentials
Nutritional yeast
This is Firth's pick and an ingredient he says, "gives you an instant cheesy flavour". He advises making your own cream cheese with it or simply using it to whip up a mac and cheese or wholesome lasagne. It's available in organic and specialist grocery stores across the UAE.
Seeds
"We've got a big jar of mixed seeds in our kitchen," Theasby explains. "That's what you use to make a bolognese or pie or salad: just grab a handful of seeds and sprinkle them over the top. It's a really good way to make sure you're getting your omegas."
Umami flavours
"I could say soya sauce, but I'll say all umami-makers and have them in the same batch," says Firth. He suggests having items such as Marmite, balsamic vinegar and other general, dark, umami-tasting products in your cupboard "to make your bolognese a little bit more 'umptious'".
Onions and garlic
"If you've got them, you can cook basically anything from that base," says Theasby. "These ingredients are so prevalent in every world cuisine and if you've got them in your cupboard, then you know you've got the foundation of a really nice meal."
Your grain of choice
Whether rice, quinoa, pasta or buckwheat, Firth advises always having a stock of your favourite grains in the cupboard. "That you, you have an instant meal and all you have to do is just chuck a bit of veg in."
MATCH INFO
Azerbaijan 0
Wales 2 (Moore 10', Wilson 34')
Gothia Cup 2025
4,872 matches
1,942 teams
116 pitches
76 nations
26 UAE teams
15 Lebanese teams
2 Kuwaiti teams
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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
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Race card
4pm Al Bastakiya Listed US$300,000 (Dirt) 1,900m
4.35pm Mahab Al Shimaal Group 3 $350,000 (D) 1,200m
5.10pm Nad Al Sheba Turf Group 3 $350,000 (Turf) 1,200m
5.45pm Burj Nahaar Group 3 $350,000 (D) 1,600m
6.20pm Jebel Hatta Group 1 $400,000 (T) 1,800m
6.55pm Al Maktoum Challenge Round-3 Group 1 $600,000 (D) 2,000m
7.30pm Dubai City Of Gold Group 2 $350,000 (T) 2,410m
The National selections:
4pm Zabardast
4.35pm Ibn Malik
5.10pm Space Blues
5.45pm Kimbear
6.20pm Barney Roy
6.55pm Matterhorn
7.30pm Defoe
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Global state-owned investor ranking by size
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Honeymoonish
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Sunday's Super Four matches
Dubai, 3.30pm
India v Pakistan
Abu Dhabi, 3.30pm
Bangladesh v Afghanistan
VEZEETA PROFILE
Date started: 2012
Founder: Amir Barsoum
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: HealthTech / MedTech
Size: 300 employees
Funding: $22.6 million (as of September 2018)
Investors: Technology Development Fund, Silicon Badia, Beco Capital, Vostok New Ventures, Endeavour Catalyst, Crescent Enterprises’ CE-Ventures, Saudi Technology Ventures and IFC
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Pharaoh's curse
British aristocrat Lord Carnarvon, who funded the expedition to find the Tutankhamun tomb, died in a Cairo hotel four months after the crypt was opened.
He had been in poor health for many years after a car crash, and a mosquito bite made worse by a shaving cut led to blood poisoning and pneumonia.
Reports at the time said Lord Carnarvon suffered from “pain as the inflammation affected the nasal passages and eyes”.
Decades later, scientists contended he had died of aspergillosis after inhaling spores of the fungus aspergillus in the tomb, which can lie dormant for months. The fact several others who entered were also found dead withiin a short time led to the myth of the curse.
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.
Stage results
1. Julian Alaphilippe (FRA) Deceuninck-QuickStep 4:39:05
2. Michael Matthews (AUS) Team BikeExchange 0:00:08
3. Primoz Roglic (SLV) Jumbo-Visma same time
4. Jack Haig (AUS) Bahrain Victorious s.t
5. Wilco Kelderman (NED) Bora-Hansgrohe s.t
6. Tadej Pogacar (SLV) UAE Team Emirates s.t
7. David Gaudu (FRA) Groupama-FDJ s.t
8. Sergio Higuita Garcia (COL) EF Education-Nippo s.t
9. Bauke Mollema (NED) Trek-Segafredo s.t
10. Geraint Thomas (GBR) Ineos Grenadiers s.t
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Amith's selections:
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