Established 1961 13 Lifestyle Features Wednesday, December 23, 2020

oussef Abdelkarim’s storefront on were my own child,” he told AFP, squint- A timeless trade one of Baghdad’s most historic ing through black, thick-framed glasses. Indeed, much has changed since Ystreets is a time capsule-literally. Abdelkarim began fixing watches at the then. People swapped their analog Thousands of wristwatches fill the tiny age of 11, after the death of his paternal wristwatches for digital models, then shop, where three generations have grandfather, who opened the store in the dropped them altogether for smart repaired Iraq’s oldest timepieces. The 1940s. His grandfather had already phones. But Abdelkarim insists an origi- dusty display window on Rasheed Street passed the trade onto his own son, who nal timepiece isn’t a thing of the past, features a single row of classic watches began to teach Youssef. telling AFP with a wink: “A man’s ele- gance begins with his watch. And his shoes.” That may be right: his shop is still packed with customers of all ages and styles, including former ministers in sleek suits, collectors looking for vintage clas- sics and younger Iraqis bringing newer pieces for him to fix. “Everyone finds what they need here,” he said proudly. With his eyesight starting to falter, he fixes just five pieces a day now, com- pared to the 1980s when he sold and fixed hundreds every day. At the time, Rasheed Street was bustling with busi- ness during the day and the top place to Watch repairman Youssef Abdelkarim presents Watch repairman Youssef Abdelkarim, wearing be seen at night. Abdelkarim still remem- an antique Omega pocket-watch as he sits at a jewelry magnifier, repairs a watch at his bers the famed theatres, movie halls and Watch repairman Youssef Abdelkarim sits at his workshop on Rasheed Street in Iraq’s capital his workshop. workshop. coffee shops: “They never closed!” His Baghdad. — AFP photos shop was competing with dozens of oth- er repair stores then, but they started to Street was shut for months by a huge place in Baghdad,” he said. He is teach- in their felt boxes right at the front, with a He has repaired expensive Swiss shutter in the 1990s, when crippling inter- protest camp in nearby Tahrir Square, he ing his sons, Yehya, 24, and Mustafa, 16, mountain of haphazardly piled pieces models, including 10,000-euro Patek national sanctions left many households managed to keep working. “I’d open to take over the family business. But he behind it and others hanging from hooks Philippes, and what Abdelkarim calls struggling to feed themselves. once or twice a week, because the riot insists they will preserve the store as it is, overhead. Inside, there are watches in “the poor man’s watch”-a Sigma. And he police often clashed with protesters here, with its cracked walls framing the door, plastic buckets on the floor, packed in suspects he even fixed a piece that ‘Something different’ but I still came,” he told AFP. its dusty shelves and its mountains of cardboard boxes on shelves and stuffed belonged to Iraq’s feared dictator Then, the US-led invasion of 2003 top- All around him, the vintage clothing timepieces. “This shop hasn’t changed in into suitcases. In a far corner, behind an Saddam Hussein. “It was a rare watch pled Saddam and opened a pandora’s stores or bookshops have closed, trans- 50 years, which is what keeps people old wooden desk, 52-year-old brought to me by the presidential palace, box of sectarian violence, including car formed into warehouses or stores selling coming back,” he said. “That’s what pre- Abdelkarim is hunched over an antique with Saddam’s signature on the back,” bombs on Rasheed Street. Abdelkarim car accessories. “The street’s features serves its identity.”— AFP piece. he recalled. It cost 400 Iraqi dinars to moved to live in a safer neighborhood were erased and most of my friends “Every watch has its own personality. I repair-more than $1,000 in the 1980s but but still walked to the family store to keep moved. But there’s just something differ- try to preserve it as much as I can, as if it less than a dollar today. it open. Even last year, when Rasheed ent that sets it apart from every other

Jupiter (left) and Saturn appear about one-tenth of a degree apart during an astronomical event known as a Great Conjunction on December 21, 2020 in Santa Barbara, California. — AFP

S pop superstar Ariana Grande has announced her engagement Uto Los Angeles luxury real estate agent Dalton Gomez. The “Stuck With U” singer, 27, confirmed the news in an Instagram post Sunday showing photos of her fiance and her diamond engage- ment ring, with the caption “forever n then some.” “Sooo happy for u guys!” wrote Kim Kardashian West, among the petrator,” Toptas said. “I sincerely apolo- many celebrities responding to the gize to anyone I unknowingly have hurt or announcement. The couple publicly upset,” he added. Writer Buket Uzuner appeared dancing together earlier this brushed aside Toptas’s comments. “What year in the shot-from-home style music does patriarchal perpetrator mean?” she video for “Stuck With U,” a bubblegum- tweeted. “It’s an apology he was forced sweet ode to isolation with close ones. rench prosecutors on Monday newspaper: “ is a cosmopolitan to make.” Buzluk separately told a opened an investigation into a torrent country, the Miss contestants come from The charity track, also featuring Justin reporter. “It’s not the apology of someone Bieber and recorded in California, was Fof anti-Semitic social media mes- different backgrounds, different cultures, who regrets his actions.” released in May and featured lyrics sages aimed at the runner-up of the latest different regions, and that’s what’s great referring to couples living together dur- Miss France contest. April Benayoum, 21, about this competition.” who holds the title of Miss and EU internal market commissioner ing the pandemic. “Lock the door and exual assault and harassment alle- throw out the key. Can’t fight this no gations have shaken Turkey’s liter- competed for the national crown on Thierry Breton said Twitter and other more, it’s just you and me,” sang ary world, creating a rare #MeToo Saturday, became the subject of hate social media platforms would have to S messages after saying at the event that move quicker to remove hate speech Grande. Grande-who has nearly 300 mil- moment as women break taboos and lion followers across Instagram and speak out in the still largely patriarchal her father is of Israeli origin. The insults- under a new Digital Services Act pro- Twitter-was briefly engaged to “Saturday country. The online testimonials have led such as “Hitler forgot about this one” and posed for the bloc this month. “What Night Live” comedian Pete Davidson in to the suicide of one author who was sin- “Don’t vote for a Jew”-were posted mainly we’re proposing is to confirm that plat- 2018. According to his real estate com- gled out after allegedly sending a series on Twitter and drew condemnation from forms give themselves the means to pany’s website Gomez, born and raised of lewd text messages to younger politicians and associations. respond instantly to demands from the in southern California, has worked in the women. But while born in social media They also prompted criticism of Twitter authorities when offences like this occur,” industry five years and boasts “one of anonymity, the movement has since been itself for its handling of offensive material. Breton told BFM television on Sunday. the largest rolodexes of A-list buyers joined by well-known voices, marking the A photograph taken in Istanbul shows a logo “I am deeply shocked by the flood of anti- The Union of French Jewish Students and is already connecting many high first time women have dared to come for- of Everest publish house’s headquarter in Semitic insults against ”, (UEJF) said the number of offensive mes- profile deals across the city.” ward against major authors-and the first Istanbul. — AFP Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said. sages was so great that Twitter should Scooter Braun, Grande’s agent, time Turkey’s mainstream media have “We will not let this stand. Shame on the have found it easy to block them via key- authors.” prosecutors said Monday word filters. “We ask the big platforms to wrote: “Congrats to these two amazing taken notice. It all started with a single ‘May you lose sleep’ that they were investigating the messages do what is necessary. They should stop souls... Dalton you are a lucky man.” The tweet. A user called “Leyla Salinger” Toptas later said his statement did not for “racist insults” and “instigation of race thinking that their legal norms are above timing of Grande’s announcement coin- shared a video of novelist Hasan Ali imply an admission of guilt and denied cides with the release of her behind-the- Toptas-once dubbed the eastern Franz Buzluk’s description of events. “Nothing hatred.” the norms of countries,” UEJF president scenes Netflix documentary film “ariana Kafka-accompanied by a caption read- like that happened at all,” he told the Noemie Madar said. Twitter did not imme- grande: excuse me, i love you.”— AFP ing: “How many of us are waiting for this Milliyet daily. That same day, the newspa- ‘Anti-Semitic cesspool’ diately respond to requests for comment. man to be exposed?” per ran interviews with five women accus- The International League against Three associations-UEJF, SOS From there, accusations from 20 ing Toptas of harassment. After the Racism and Anti-Semitism (Licra) said the Racisme and SOS Homophobie-had in women mainly on social media against claims blew up on social media, Toptas’s messages had turned Twitter into “an anti- May filed a legal complaint against Toptas followed, leading many more to publishing house Everest dropped him, Semitic cesspool” and called on internet Twitter, accusing it of failing to moderate describe the harassment and abuse they saying it was “against all kinds of harass- users to report the offending content with content properly. Justice Minister Eric allegedly suffered at the hands of other ment”. He was also stripped of awards he a view to launching a class action suit. Dupond-Moretti meanwhile said prosecu- male writers. Ibrahim Colak, 51, another received this year and in 2013. The contest organizers also condemned tion of the authors of hate messages author swept up in the wave of stories of #Tacizesusma, which means “Don’t be the attacks, as did the competition’s win- would become easier once a draft law abuse, killed himself on December 10 in silent against harassment”, began trend- ner, Amandine Petit from in against extremism is approved. “Their Ankara after tweeting a seeming apology ing on Turkish Twitter. northwestern France, who called the filthy remarks sent from their living room to his family. “I had not prepared myself Another writer, Asli Tohumcu, said social media messages “inappropriate” sofas will lead them into a courtroom the for such an end. I wanted to be a good author Bora Abdo harassed her, which he and “extremely disappointing.” Benayoum very next day,” he said in a tweet.—AFP person but I failed,” Colak tweeted before denied. “Taking courage from Buzluk, I herself deplored “that this kind of thing still taking his life, adding he could not “look wanted to show we’re not alone,” she told goes on in 2020,” telling La Provence in the faces of my wife, children and the Hurriyet. The Iletisim publishing house friends”. Local media attributed allega- dropped Abdo after the claims surfaced. tions that Colak sent the lewd text mes- Women have also been encouraged to sages to the same Twitter user Leyla. Her send their stories to an email address, Twitter account has since disappeared. [email protected], which means “May you lose sleep”. ‘Very frightening’ While the reputation of some reputable Moved by the stories, author Pelin authors has been shaken, none of the Buzluk came forward with her own allega- allegations have yet led to criminal tions against Toptas to the Hurriyet daily charges. But similar stories also hounded newspaper. “I was in shock,” she said, Turkey’s main opposition parties this year, describing a “very frightening moment” in resulting in legal action. The main opposi- which Toptas “approached and forced” tion Republican People’s Party (CHP) saw himself on her in 2011. “‘Well, why did its deputy chairman for Istanbul’s Maltepe you wear that dress?’,” Buzluk said he district charged last month with rape. And told her in response. Toptas issued a the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic statement that caused further controversy Party (HDP) — the second-largest oppo- and confusion, describing his actions as sition parliamentary group-removed a that of a “patriarchal perpetrator”. “An deputy accused of rape earlier this year. individual can make mistakes without It is not the first time Turkey’s literary com- In this file photo US singer-songwriter Ariana realizing, unaware of the large pain inflict- munity has come under scrutiny.—AFP Grande arrives for the 62nd Annual Grammy ed on the other party, until one under- Miss Provence April Benayoum competes on stage during the beauty contest Awards in Los Angeles. — AFP stands what it is to be a patriarchal per- at the Puy-du-Fou, in Les Epesses, western France.—AFP