Zachary L. Zavidé May 14, 2025 Dubai: Rendered, Rooted, and Ready for the Future Date: April 29, 2025 | Location: Dubai Dear Friends, I’ve been to Dubai countless times. I even got married here. An Arabian Night But this trip—technically for work—landed differently. Something in the skyline had shifted. And this time, I saw it. The City That … Continue reading 🌇 Dispatch from Dubai: The City-State That Arrived
The SD story isn’t adding up. BK flies back to surprise his wife (he does back to back reverse flights, which is rough on anyone). He just happens to be there when she has a massive heart attack and drowns in the tub. Usually when people have a heart attack, they shout, exclaim or make … Continue reading Something is rotten in the State of Dubai
Mocking Modi is the only nationalism the Indian liberal commentariat has left.
A Pakistani actress and a Lahori designer slid past the L’Oréal machinery at Cannes 2026 and produced the festival’s most discussed South Asian image. It looked, briefly, like a civilisational reversal. It was not.
There is a desert in the southern Punjab of Pakistan that does not quite belong to Pakistan. Administratively it sits in Bahawalpur Division. In practice, it is shared with Abu Dhabi. Deep in the Cholistan, there is a private airstrip, Al Habieb, also known locally as Sheikh Zayed Airport II, with a runway long enough … Continue reading Cholistan: The Desert at the Edge of Everything
Header Image: US Bases in Mid East. Iran is the only Sovereign country in the Mid East without US Bases “God created war so that Americans would learn geography” ― Mark Twain Why are the Gulf Countries not attacking Iran. Because they are extremely vulnerable a) Resource and Economic Vulnerability b) Political, Regimes can be … Continue reading 2026 Iran War and the Gulf
The Wrong Question About Barbarians Omar’s excellent piece raises the question of barbarians. I want to raise a harder one: whose side is God on? I ask this not as theology but as military analysis. Because the planners of Operation Epic Fury appear to have assumed the answer is obvious; and that assumption may be … Continue reading On Whose Side Is God?
Meanwhile, Pakistan’s average number of children per woman has dropped sharply from 3.61 in 2023 to 3.19 in 2024, reflecting shifting fertility patterns. By comparison, India’s rate declined more modestly from 2.14 to 2.12. Why women in South Asia are aging faster than in Europe, US Those are not marginal adjustments. That is acceleration. For decades, … Continue reading Pakistan’s dramatic drop in fertility
Part 2 Continuing on, X.T.M says that “India’s post-Independence settlement created structural ambiguity” and cites four factors in particular: Upper-caste Hindu political dominance at the center Muslim demographic concentrations with limited elite integration A constitutional secularism that promised equality while leaving communal structures intact No acknowledgment that the Muslim League’s victory posed a legitimacy problem … Continue reading Musings on & Answers to “The Partition of Elites: India, Pakistan, and the Unfinished Trauma of 1947” (Part 3)
Seethapuram is a small, squalid village home largely to Telugu-speaking Naickers, at the foot of the Western Ghats, some 50km northwest of Madurai. Overnight showers, unseasonal in late March, make it hard to see puddles from open sewers in the darkness of 3am. The village is not just stirring; its people are out and about. … Continue reading Jasmine’s journey: From the fields of Madurai to French luxury perfume
