Seamons Mahall
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Stories (80/0)
The country calling 2022 the 'year of coffee'
Jabar Al-Maliki stepped onto a stone perch and looked out over the boundless landscape. High up in the clouds at 1,600m, he peered over the craggy mountain tops cascading into terraced farms lined with coffee trees, banana plants and corn crops. Colourful houses and stone fortresses speckled the steep slopes of the Sarawat Mountains, which extend from Saudi Arabia's Jazan region over the border into Yemen just a few kilometres away. He whistled at a scurrying hyrax, the high-pitched echo ringing across the otherwise silent valley below. Then, with a twinkle in his eyes, he said, "It's time for qahwa [coffee]."
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Feast
The sweet flavours of Pinoy BBQ
Late afternoon sun seeped through the cracks of the mid-rise buildings, casting a golden glow on the gritty side streets of Metro Manila. Here, on the fringes of the Makati and Pasay business districts, kitschy jeepneys, whizzing motorcycles and rickety tricycles shuttled daily commuters through the snaking lanes. As always, the unmistakably sweet scent of charred barbecue perfumed the air, wafting from smoky coals being fanned on the roadsides.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Feast
India's next big street-food craze?
Kishan Yadav poured sattu powder into a steel pot half-filled with water and vigorously stirred the contents with a wooden ladle. He sprinkled the thickening mixture with salt, cumin powder, black pepper and a dash of lemon juice and whisked the beverage to ensure there were no lumps. Then he filled a tumbler with the pale-yellow shake, garnished it with a few onion slices and bright-green coriander leaves and handed it to me.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Feast
The woman reviving Egypt's Nubian heritage
In the opening lines of a forgotten song called Mshkomsy, 70-year-old Haseeba is transported back to her childhood on the banks of the Nile in southern Egypt. Two hundred kilometres north of her drowned ancestral land, Haseeba's daughter Hafsa has asked her to sing something in Kenzi (also known as Mattokki) – one of two Nubian languages spoken in Egypt along with Fadicca – and from somewhere deep in her memory, Haseeba extracts part of the song she loved when she was young.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Wander
The unearthing of Ireland's mysterious naked sweathouses
Naked and sweaty, they laid inside grass-covered stone igloo-like structures in the remote fields of Ireland. Some were ill, others may have been having hallucinations, hatching plans to distil illegal alcohol or imagining they were the Vikings who once raided this country. By the time these addled folk emerged from the structures back into the fresh air of 19th-Century Ireland, they had been through a jarring mental and physical journey. One that still holds many mysteries.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Earth
Spain's untapped 'liquid gold'
Stretching north from Madrid, north-west Spain's autonomous Castilla y León region is a patchwork of vast mountain ranges, high plateaus and medieval towns. While most visitors come to marvel at the castillo castles that lend the region its name or admire the enchanting cathedrals in León and Burgos, much of the area is blanketed in scrubby sierra and high-altitude meseta plains that extend as far as the eye can see.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Wander
Spätis: The convenience stores that rule Berlin
New York City has its bodegas, Paris its tabacs, and Berlin its Spätis. Formally known as a Spätkauf, which translates-ish to "late shop," a späti can be found on most blocks in the city and is open late into the night – if not all night. They supply locals and tourists with cigarettes, snacks and €1 after-work wegbiers ("beers you drink on the go"). But during the pandemic, and particularly during the warmer months, they became essential fuelling stations for outdoor gatherings, as shuttered bars and nightclubs turned social life inside out.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Wander
Saudi's lineage of interior stylists
If you walk through Rijal Almaa heritage village in the heart of 'Asir province in south-western Saudi Arabia, you'll soon notice how different this remote region is from the rest of the country. Instead of a monochromatic desert landscape, there is colour everywhere, from the green mountains that surround the village to the brightly hued flower wreaths that 'Asiri men wear on their heads.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Wander
The last known ship of the US slave trade
"It's crazy to think they would have sailed right past here," Darron Patterson said, pulling his car onto a scrap of grass overlooking the murky Mobile River. As president of the Clotilda Descendants Association, Patterson is well versed in talking about the voyage of the Clotilda – the last known slave ship to reach America. His great-great-grandfather was Kupollee, later renamed Pollee Allen; one of the 110 men, women and children cruelly stolen from Benin in West Africa and brought to the US onboard the notorious ship.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Wander
Social phobia is one of the common subtypes of phobias.
Patients with social phobia have an excessive and irrational fear of an external object or situation. Patients are aware of their irrationality but are unable to control their nervousness, and the fear continues to recur.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Psyche
The Arctic Circle: A new frontier for sustainable wine
When Emma Serner met and fell in love with Italian enologist Andrea Guerra in Tuscany, the young couple began to dream about starting their own vineyard together. "We were both very invested in climate topics and environmental questions," said Serner, who was interning at the vineyard Guerra was working at. "But I really felt like it would be impossible to do in the south of Europe. Climate change really has become drastic and it's affecting agriculture in a very severe way."
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Proof
Introverts are more likely to have an open life
Usually, the public believes that those who are introverted are weak and closed inside, not good at interacting and expressing themselves with others, and they have a hard time adapting to the complex and diverse social environment. The biggest feeling people have about them is that they are ordinary and uninteresting.
By Seamons Mahall2 years ago in Humans