DUBAI // Three Emirati students are about to set off on an ambitious project - to take social media to the schoolchildren of rural Kenya.
Arwa al Mazrooie, 20, Khadija al Abbas, 20, and Fatima al Sayegh, 21, all students at Zayed University in Dubai, will set off on Sunday for Kajiado, a town of 8,000 people near the Tanzanian border. There, they will teach 40 secondary schoolgirls to use the internet to further their education.
"Social media is the next frontier in education," Fatima said. "Traditional education can only achieve so much, whilst web 2.0 provides a different perspective into education by tapping into the world's psyche."
And while Kenya might seem an unlikely place to spread the message, she insisted online learning was not only cheap, it was available anywhere, allowing students to use the internet's wealth of e-books, videos, tutorials and utilities to pursue their education outside the school's walls.
The school they are going to is run by Dubai's Al Maktoum Foundation, and offers free classes for schoolgirls.
In preparation, they have set up a website that they will use as a starting point for their pupils. It is called Al Bedaya, or "the start".
"We called it Al Bedaya because it's a beginning for us, for the university and for the schoolgirls - for them to comprehend the magnitude of the information at their fingertips," Fatima said.
"We're using our own experiences to relate to the students," she said. "It was ingrained in our heads, 'Do not underestimate these girls'. We hated it when it was done to us, especially in our high schools."
Arwa believes they will teach the Kenyan students what they themselves could have learned at school if given a chance.
Social media, she said, has opened them to different perspectives. "Before we'd read a newspaper or listen to the radio. Now, we can shape our own lives and make up our own minds."
As well as the Al Maktoum Foundation, the project has been sponsored by the Abu Dhabi Oilfield Service and Malabar Gold company. "We were quite surprised when the [Al Maktoum] foundation said, 'Sure, you're on board,'" said Fatima.
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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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The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Kumulus Water
Started: 2021
Founders: Iheb Triki and Mohamed Ali Abid
Based: Tunisia
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Investment raised: $4 million