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The Globalist
Why is Indonesia’s Prabowo under fire over Israel ban? Plus: Fendi’s new chief creative officer
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Craft matters in small ways like how a coffee is brewed, and in not so small ways like how your money is cared for. Which is why for 160 years, UBS has elevated banking to a craft, tailoring unique strategies that combine human expertise with the latest technologies, all happening across 24 time zones and and 12 key financial hubs. With you at the heart of it all, UBS advice is our craft.
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You're listening to the Globalist, first broadcast on the 15th of October 2025 on Monocle Radio. The Globalist in association with U.
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Hello.
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This is the Globalist broadcasting to you live from Midori House in London. I'm Georgina Godwin. On the show ahead, we begin in Indonesia. Monocle's Asia editor James Chambers is here to tell us why.
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I'll be coming on later to talk about a hot button issue at home. And that's Indonesia's band of Israeli athletes competing in this weekend's World Artistic Gymnastics Championships.
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We'll have a look through the day's newspapers and explore a diplomatic spat between Norway and Venezuela. Then we'll hear about Seoul's plans to build its first civilian nuclear bunker by 2028. In fashion, Maria Grazia Chiuri is named chief creative officer at Fendi will ask what that will mean for the brand. We'll have the latest tech news and.
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Sharjah is spending nearly half a billion dirhams turning culture into infrastructure. But can the Emirates big bet on art, heritage and sustainability really pay off?
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Well, we'll get answers to Sharjah's cultural footprint expanding little bit later on in the show. That's all here ahead on the Globalist. Live from London. First, a look at what else is happening in the news. Israel has reopened the Rafah crossing with Egypt to allow humanitarian aid into Gaza after the bodies of four hostages were returned. A US Strike off Venezuela's coast has killed six suspected drug traffickers, with Donald Trump saying the attacks targeted a terrorist organization as Washington ramps up its military presence in the region. And Madagascar's army has seized power after President Andre Rajoelina was impeached and fled the country, ending weeks of youth led protests that spiraled into a full scale uprising. Do stay tuned to Monaco Radio throughout the day for more on those stories. Now Indonesia's President Prabao Sabianto is facing a backlash after barring Israeli gymnasts from next week's world championships in Jakarta, a move now upheld by sport's top court. It come days after reports that he'd been preparing an historic visit to Israel which would have made him the first Indonesian leader ever to go there. The trip appears to have been shelved after domestic anger flared and Jakarta now insists it was never planned. Well, I'm joined now by Monocle's Asia editor, James Chambers, who's on the line from Bangkok. Good morning to you, James.
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Hi, Georgina.
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Tell us more about the gymnastics role.
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Well, I mean, I guess there's a lot going on at the moment with President Prabowo. You know, he was in Egypt recently for the Gaza summit and as you said, there was this plan that was reported in the Times of Israel for him to fly from Egypt to Israel. And when I hear that news, I was extremely surprised. I didn't think it was a very likely thing to happen given that Indonesia doesn't recognize Israel and he would face a huge backlash at home not very long after he's just faced these big anti government protests. So we'd have to kind of, you know, question why the sources there and whether that was actually something that was planned. The, you know, Indonesia denied it. The government, the foreign minister came out and said that was never the plan, but you never know. And then because, you know, as, as you mentioned on the, the ban that Indonesia has put in place for Israeli athletes trying to take part in in this weekend's world asked to artistic gymnastics championship in Jakarta. I mean that was something that was coming recently. They denied visas and as you said, that was upheld by the, oh, actually it wasn't overturned by the, the Court of Arbitration for Sport. And that's something that Prabowo and his administration would have done to kind of pander to, to the Indonesian voters because there is a lot of support for, for Palestine in these parts. This is not the first time that has done something like this. When it tried it banned in Israel from competing in the Under 20 Football World cup in 2023. The big difference this time is that instead of Indonesia losing the rights to host their championships as it did in 2023 with the football, these, these gymnastics championships are going ahead and Israel will not be allowed to take part.
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Do you know who made the call to block the Israeli team?
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I wouldn't know specifically who made the call. It was, it came from the, the federation in, in Indones. Definitely was something that would have been backed by, by the, the government. And it is not, as I said, it's not a, it's not a surprise. Maybe the only surprising thing is that Indonesia was given the rights to host a global competition given that it has repeatedly denied Israeli athletes and teams the chance to take Part. So in terms of any backlash, the only backlash that Prabowo would face would be, you know, internationally at home. This is going to go down very well. It's very much a populist move and it'll be something that will kind of shore up his administration because he has got off to a very rocky start domestically with a lot of his policies at home. But as we saw, you know, with his trip to Egypt and as we saw for anyone who saw his speech at the UN General assembly, he's on much stronger footing on the, in the international sphere. It has been one of his initiatives to kind of, to build up Indonesia's presence on the global stage and reverse, you know, Jokowi's or his predecessor, Jokowi's stance, which is very much focused on getting the economy moving. So when he, when he, when he's internationally, he's, I mean, he's having a very strong moment. But, and at home I think this, this ban on Israel will, something to kind of shore up his support.
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No, absolutely. I mean, what does it tell us about how sensitive the Israel issue remains in Indonesian politics?
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Yeah, well, it's a huge, it's a huge issue in, in this part of the world, in Southeast Asia, particularly in the, the Muslim majority countries like Indonesia and like Malaysia. But I think, I mean, Indonesia actually could play a huge part in whatever this kind of peace might look like in, in, in Israel and Palestine because unlike Malaysia, which is, you know, even stricter and you know, if, you know, any Malaysian passport holders, it actually says in the passport that, you know, this passport is not valid for trips to Israel. But Indonesia isn't quite as hardcore. And actually, you know, when Prabowo spoke at the un, I mean, he did say that his country was willing to recognize Israel if Israel recognized a two state solution. And obviously, you know, it recognized Palestinian independence. And he went further than that. And at the un, at the assembly, he said, you know, Indonesia is willing to commit 20,000 peacekeeping troops to support, you know, an enduring peace in Gaza. And that might, might well be one of the reasons Prabowo was giving this hasty invite to come and attend these, these, this signing agreement in Egypt. Because as we all know, I mean, there's not been that much thought beyond the, the initial ceasefire. But if you look at who, you know, boots on the ground and which country could provide a lot of those peacekeepers, you know, Indonesia could be one of those countries. It, you know, it's a huge nation, it's the largest Muslim majority population, it's a G20 economy, it's non aligned. You know, it's not in China's pocket, it's not in the US's pocket. And so, you know, he put his hand up and said, hey, we're willing to commit our sons and daughters, we're willing to commit money to peace. And perhaps, you know, Trump's a friend of his. Trump respects Prabowoa because he was an army, a former army general. He calls him a strongman and perhaps that's why he got called up and jumped on a plane. And who knows, we might see peacekeepers from Indonesia as part of the solution to the Gaza issue.
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I wonder how serious the plans were for his visit to Israel before they were dropped and if the fact that those plans came out, that leak made it politically impossible for him to continue.
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Well, yes, as I said, I mean, the story came from an unnamed source and it was reported by the Times of Israel. So I would question whether that is true or not. Who knows if, you know, I would say that, that Prabowo and the Indonesians would potentially be open to, you know, warming relations with Israel. But I doubt it would happen as quickly as getting an invite to Egypt on a Saturday and then then agreeing to visit Israel on a Tuesday. It would seem extremely hasty. So, I mean, I would take that with a pinch of salt because it would be such a big move for Prabowo. It comes at a time when his standing at home isn't very secure. You know, we all remember those protests in Jakarta a few months ago. So, you know, to do that, to make that move without any kind of preparation would be very unlikely and it certainly wouldn't go down very well at home. So as I said, I would, I would question that. And they quickly came out to deny it. It's a bit like, you know, Benjamin Netanyahu not being able to travel to, to Egypt himself. I mean, I don't think he would be able to do it either. So some of these leaders are very restricted. But as I said, I was very surprised to hear that trip was planned and, but we'll, we'll see if something along those lines could happen, you know, with a bit more preparation for the down the line.
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And finally, James, could Indonesia face sporting penalties for excluding a national team as indeed it has done before?
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Well, it's interesting that the, the Court of Arbitration, you know, basically they said we don't have any jurisdiction in this issue because the, the Gymnastics Federation itself has, hasn't reprimanded the Indonesians. They basically said you know, it's Indonesia's right to deny visas to Israelis if they want to. Now, that's a big turnaround from what happened a few years ago and what's happened in the past, because this is not the first time Indonesia has done this. I think it reflects, you know, how the mood has changed internationally towards Israel and the damage that the, the kind of occupation of Gaza has done for Israel's kind of reputation overseas and the amount of friends it has. So it looks like in, in, in the immediate term, you know, Indonesia is not going to face any repercussions and it's the Israeli athletes who are going to miss out. But I guess, you know, it will flag up an issue for, for future sports. And anytime Indonesia does apply to host anything global, then whatever body it is should really question them on whether they are going to permit Israeli athletes to, to take part. Because even though this comes, you know, during the, the worst of the, of the, the kind of fighting in Gaza, as I said, it's not the first time it's happened. This kind of always happens with Indonesia. So it's up for the bodies that award these world championships to kind of raise this question before they start handing out hosting rights.
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But, I mean, it's not just sport, is it? It's across the culture too. I mean, what about Eurovision? We hear that the meeting to decide on whether Israel should participate in that contest has now been postponed.
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Yes, I think, I think because of what, everything changing so quickly on the ground in, in Gaza and the fact we have got this kind of miraculous ceasefire out of nowhere. You know, we saw the, the, the Eurovision committee decide to postpone its vote on whether Israel can be included next year. Probably because we want, they want to see the, the kind of that, they want the dust to settle and see where things stand in a few weeks time because, you know, this time, I guess last month you can probably guarantee that Israel wouldn't be included because of what was going on in Gaza. But now, you know, we have this ceasefire, everyone's working towards peace, hostages have been released. I guess in a couple of weeks time, the mood might be very different. So I think it's probably a very sensible decision by the Eurovision organizers to delay this vote because the world might look very different in a few weeks time.
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James, thank you very much indeed. That's James Chambers, Monocle's Asia editor in Bangkok. Now, here's what else we're keeping an eye on today. Israel has decided to reopen the Rafah crossing with Egypt and resume humanitarian aid deliveries into Gaza after the return of four hostages bodies. The government also scrapped planned measures to halve the number of aid trucks entering the enclave. According to Israeli public broadcaster Khan. The US Military has carried out a strike on a boat off Venezuela, killing six suspected drug traffickers in what Donald Trump called an operation against a designated terrorist organization. The move comes amid a major US Buildup in the Caribbean and growing questions over the legality of Trump's new military tactics. And Madagascar's military has taken control after President Andre Ragiolina was impeached by lawmakers and fled the country following weeks of Gen Z led protests. Colonel Michael Ranjeanirena announced that the army would rule with a transitional government for up to two years after dissolving most state institutions. This is the globalist. Stay tuned now for a look behind the headlines. Here's Monocle's Laura Kramer on the recent diplomatic spat between Venezuela and Norway.
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Venezuela is packing up and shutting down its embassy in Oslo. The government in Caracas says it's all part of a foreign service restructuring, closing the mission in Norway, shutting another in Australia and opening new ones in Zimbabwe and Burkina Faso. Officially, the Foreign Ministry says it's all about consolidating strategic partners and pushing back against what it calls hegemonic pressures. But let's be honest, few believe this has nothing to do with last week's Nobel Peace Prize. The Norwegian Nobel committee handed the 2025 award to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corinna Machado, the same Machado that President Nicolas Maduro has once called a demonic witch. Norway has called Venezuela's diplomatic flounce regrettable. But this kind of thing isn't new in Oslo. Back in 2010, after the peace Prize went to Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobao, Beijing froze trade with Norway for six years and Norway survived just fine.
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That was Monocle's Laura Kramer. And for more, you can sign up to our daily newsletter, the Monocle Minute. Head over to monocle.com minute. This is the Globalist. Well, let's continue now with today's newspapers. And joining me is Inga Thorder, who is chief external relations officer at the Ocean Bourne foundation and former senior editor at the BBC and cnn. Good morning to you, Inge.
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Good morning, Georgina.
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It's lovely to have you here. The news, of course, from around the world is, is, well, mixed, I think, is the way we would put it. On the one hand, it's very good that we are moving forward with this process, but all sorts of stories coming out around Gaza, around Israel. And first, we were told that Israel was withholding aid from Gaza. We now know that they've opened the Rafah crossing. The reason they were withholding it was that they weren't. That the bodies of the hostages had not been returned. Four more have now come back. What do you have on this? I mean, there's a number of front pages all talking about this.
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Yeah, I mean, it continues to dominate the headlines. And, I mean, I think it's fair to say that the ceasefire remains very fragile, and that's reflected in the reports. But things are also moving incredibly quickly. You mentioned that they released four more bodies. Still a lot more to come from both sides, and I think we have to remember that. So, yeah, having initially said that they wouldn't open the borders, they now have. But I think that the main thing is that there are still two main areas. So first of all, the medical staff releases, that hasn't happened at the same rate as was expected. And then, of course, inside Gaza, the situation remains incredibly volatile. And the sort of reports this morning of Hamas forces cracking down on the rival factions and the violence that is happening there. So the people of Gaza, who have now been suffering war for a very long time, have now got this violence continuing on the streets, and that has left them very fearful of that this internal fighting could erupt even more. And, you know, I think it's very important to talk about just the difficulties of reporting on that. You see that very much there. But people don't know what's happening. So we're exactly in that stage of uncertainty of what exactly is happening on the ground. But I think those are the sort of key developments that have happened. Well, in the last 12 hours, should we say?
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Yeah. And not much coming out of Egypt.
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That's correct. Not much coming out of Egypt. And I think that we will now start to see that the details that were left out of this ceasefire agreement, and I think it's interesting how the language has shifted very quickly to talking about it as a ceasefire rather than a peace agreement, because that's effectively what it is until the details have been put in. So, no, not a lot happening there. But Trump is his bullish self talking about disarmament of Hamas overnight, which is, of course, key part of the agreement. And he said that if they don't disarm themselves, they will do it. Now, what that exactly means, we don't know.
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No. Let's go to Madagascar now. Again, things move pretty fast there. This is part of these Gen Z protests. And it's so interesting to look around the world and See so many young people just saying this is enough. What's driving this? Is it a social media thing?
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Well, I mean I think social media certainly sort of galvanizes the troops but I mean, I don't know, maybe I'm showing my Gen X here but I think it's good to see people out in the street and not just behind a computer. There's the discontent that we're seeing around the world and I mean we can talk about Madagascar a bit more but we're also seeing this in Peru, we're seeing this in Morocco. So there is this ground swelling of unhappiness with how governments are dealing with youth unemployment, with the lack of infrastructure and other things that are driving this mainly. And I think that the sort of Gen Z is demanding a voice that they haven't had before. And I think we're seeing that in Madagascar in particular where reports this morning were saying that the leaders of the Gen Z movement have been meeting with the military and meeting with politicians from the opposition saying we want to be part of this transition. This isn't just where the military takes over and then decides we need to be part of this otherwise this won't be solved.
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And of course the military is saying that they are going to take over. They'll have an interim government for two years at least. They've shut down public institutions. I mean this is huge for Madagascar.
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It is. And I mean it's beeni mean it's been bubbling for a long time. Even if the protest didn't erupt until September, end of September, it has been a long time coming and the government has been accused of corruption and even if the military seemed to be playing along for a long time, I think it was just a matter of time until they did. And as you say, I mean it's interesting we talk about the sort of Gen Z movement and they're being involved but this has all the hallmark of, well, a textbook coup really, you know, shutting down instit, taking over the media, et cetera and putting in this two year interim government. That is normally how these things play out and then you see what's happened after that. But I don't think that this movement is going to go away. I think that they will still have to deal with them and by not allowing them to have a voice the crackdown could get worse or actually this could be a peaceful transition. I think that yet remains to be seen. But they still have to address the underlying issues, the water shortage, the electricity shortage. So I think that without doing that we're in for a volatile situation in Madagascar for a little while.
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And, of course, Madagascar is the fourth most vulnerable country in the world to climate change. And there have been a number of headlines coming out about climate, some very severe warnings in fact, being issued.
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There is, and that's an interesting fact. I didn't know that about Madagascar. Thank you. So, yeah, a new report from the International Meteorological Organization that has just been released says that CO2 in the atmosphere has trebled since 1960. That's the highest rate since the reporting began in 1957. I mean, the reason for this is our continued emission from humans and wildfire were responsible. And the lack of absorption from the carbon sinks, they used to mask this problem before, like the oceans and the rainforest and the plants. And so, you know, as we're seeing this, you know, we're also seeing governments and, I mean, particularly today, the UK government climate committee came out saying the adaptation needs to speed up. So to secure our homes, to secure food, security, infrastructure and other resources and key services, they. Every government or the UK has now recommended that they prep for 2 degrees in the next decade, even if the IMO is saying that we should prep for 4 by 2050.
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And yet we were told 1.5. There was no going back after that.
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Oh, yeah, no 1.5. I think that threshold has been passed. And so we're very much into the adaptation phase. And I think it's. I mean, earlier this week we had the tipping point report come out just ahead of cop, which is obviously in Brazil next month, and they were saying, you know, depressingly, really, that one tipping point has passed, and that's the coral reefs. And the coral reefs support 30% of ecosystems in the ocean, and the ocean being our biggest carbon sink. You can actually kind of do the maths here, and it's not really adding up to a good outcome, really.
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Not really. Not. Well, we're hoping for a better outcome with a little piece of jewelry which people are madly raising funds for to keep in the country. Tell us about this Tudor Heart.
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F
Yeah, this is the. It's a gold pendant that is linked to Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon and. And it's worth about 3.5 million pounds. And the British Museum is launching a public appeal to keep this in the UK, because otherwise it could go to a private funder elsewhere. It's called the Tudor Heart, and it was discovered in a Warwickshire field a few years ago by a metal detector. That's true. And that's the interesting thing. You can still find these treasures Everywhere. And it was in 2019. So it's been in the British Museum and will remain in the British Museum until April20, when the museum hopes to have raised the 3.5 to keep it in the UK.
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B
And what's really interesting in this piece, it's talking about Catherine of Aragon, for who this heart was allegedly made. And given that she really was, when Henry was away, she ruled the country.
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F
She did, she did. And I mean, it's interesting how the Tudors always come back into the news one way or another. But yeah, I mean, she did definitely do that while he was out of the country. And you know, sometimes she doesn't quite get the credit she deserves for.
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Absolutely. Inga, thank you very much indeed. That's Inga Thordoor, who's chief external relations officer at Oceanbourne foundation and former senior editor at the BBC and cnn. Now this is the Globalist on Monocle Radio.
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Craft is a matter of perspective, a unique outlook, an obsessive attention to detail. With UBS's Chief Investment Office House View, we're focused on identifying the latest investment opportunities and market risks to help you achieve your financial goals. So you get the big picture broken down into thought provoking insights delivered daily and curated by over 200 globally connected, locally active analysts. UBS Banking is our craft.
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It is 1526 in Seoul, 826 in Zurich. Seoul is taking a bold step in civic defense. The city plans to build South Korea's first civilian nuclear bunker beneath a public housing complex by 2028. It's part of Seoul's new Defense 2030 strategy to prepare the capital for everything from missile strikes to drone and biological attacks. Well, I'm joined now by Rafael Rashid, who's a Seoul based journalist. Rafael, welcome to the show. Can you tell us more about what Seoul is actually building?
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Yeah, so Seoul is building what they're calling the first proper civilian nuclear bunker in South Korea. And so by that I mean it's a shelter that will actually be designed to protect people from nuclear, biological, chemical attacks. So not just your kind of standard underground car park that gets labeled as a shelter. And it's going to be beneath a new public housing development in Africa, south so district in Seoul. And so it's a big apartment complex. I think there'll be about a thousand flats. And it will be built on site or kind of on the site of an old detention center that was moved elsewhere. And this bunker will be quite big. It will, it will be I think roughly the size of half a football pitch. We'll be able to house approximately 1,000 people. And it will have air filtration systems, water storage, sanitation facilities, basically everything you need to survive for, well, they say up to two weeks if there were nuclear, biological or kind of chemical attack, were it to ever happen.
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And how does that fit into the framework of this whole defense SOL 2030 strategy? Tell us about that in more detail.
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Yeah, so you have this defence Seoul 2030. It was kind of outlined by the Mayor Osehoon is his kind of security plan that was announced last year. And I think this bunker project is one of the key initiatives under this plan. So basically it's kind of updating Seoul's civil defense infrastructure for what they call modern threats, whatever those may be. And so I guess it's just, you know, especially for this bunker, I think it would essentially be a test case. Seoul wants to see if they can build these facilities and new housing developments and you know, if they work or if they're successful, maybe they'll be rolling them out elsewhere. I mean, it need not be said that the North Korean border or the inter Korean border is just a dozen or several dozen miles away. So I think any threat that we can contain, I think that's what they're looking at.
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I mean, has South Korea or Seoul specifically traditionally invested much in civil defense infrastructure like this? What facilities already exist?
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G
Yeah, I mean South Korea technically has loads of these civil defense shelters. I think there's approximately 18,000 across the country. But the vast majority of them are pretty basic. You know, we're talking about underground car parks or subway stations or building basements. And so these places are designated as shelters but not actually built to withstand much. I would say in Seoul specifically, among all the of city managed shelters, there's only I think one facility with proper nuclear protection capability and that's an underground bunker under the city hall, so under the mayor's office. But I believe there are some private luxury apartment blocks that have certain bunkers. But overall I think this is quite a bold step, at least since the Cold War.
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B
And how have residents and the broader Korean public, residents of Seoul and the Korean public reacted to the project? I mean, do you think that attitudes towards conflict on the Korean peninsula have changed?
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G
I think, you know, the attitudes remain the same. I think people are not too interested in these kind of issues. You know, when there's a new, a kind of North Korean missile that flies in the sisi, no one really cares and it doesn't really cause much panic here. But I think this is probably a kind of starting point for a conversation I mean, we just found out about this bunker the other day. So, so there hasn't really been much of a kind of reaction per se. Academics have, or some experts at least have said that, you know, this is sensible and that we should be thinking about nuclear deterrence and gradually expand these facilities. But also some, some other experts are saying, well, is Seoul doing this by itself or should it be coordinating with the Ministry of Defense rather than doing this alone? Is this just a stunt? But I think definitely this is a kind of conversation starter and I think the groundbreaking will start in mid November, I was just told.
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B
And finally, how strong is the threat from Pyongyang perceived to be by the general public?
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G
As I just said, I think a lot of Koreans, I mean, even since the war, the Korean war in the 1950s, these parents and their children have grown up in this kind of cold war state where war has technically has not ended. And so people are, when we hear about these kind of threats, no one really pays attention. No one cares. It's just part of everyday life. And sometimes we get, you know, we have drills every year and things like that. But overall it doesn't cause the kind of anxiousness that we see kind of in Western media when North Korea launches a missile. People really just get on with their daily lives and it's just something that we all kind of forget about. If you live here, at least.
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B
Rafael, thank you very much indeed. That's Rafael Rashid in Seoul. This is Monocle Radio. Now we're heading to Tokyo for a conversation with cultural historian and author W. David Marx. He's written two acclaimed books and also oversaw the first English special edition of the iconic Japanese magazine Popeye. The self described magazine for city boys. This English edition serves as a stylish guide to exploring Japan's capital, Tokyo. Well, Monocle's Fernanda Augusta Pacheco caught up with W. David Marx to discuss the growing global appeal of Japanese magazines and and the world of Popeye.
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H
So Popeye is published by Magazine House, which I believe is celebrating its 80th anniversary this year. So it's a very old company. And I, through chance about 17 years ago, met Takahiro Kinoshita, who was the fashion editor at Brutus. And through that connection I started writing for Brutus. And then he moved a couple years later to be the editor in chief of Popeye. And he really wanted to bring back Popeye to its former glory of the kind of 70s and 80s as a magazine focused on the concept of City Boys. And City Boys is definitely a Japanese English phrase, But what it means is kind of urban youth who know everything that's going on in the world and kind of think of themselves as kindred spirits to people in London and Paris, even though they live in Tokyo. So it's not so much about the nation state as it is about being cosmopolitan young men in their 20s with a little bit of money who know the latest in consumer goods and also keeping up with the latest in media. So Popeye really started with that group, and Kinoshita's renovation of the magazine that happened in the 2010s brought it back to that city City Boy Guide kind of feeling. So he left the magazine, and now Euge Machida is the editor in chief and. And he's continuing that tradition on. And they started moving into Internet media as well. So let's say Instagram and X and things like that. And I went to them a couple years ago. I once in a while still write for Popeye, and we were doing some articles together, and for the first time, you know, I was writing a lot of them in English and then translating them into Japanese myself. And they said, oh, let's put the English into the piece. So we did some of the first bilingual articles in the magazine magazine, and then they had an Instagram feed. And I said, well, you know, how many of your followers are non Japanese readers? And they said, oh, maybe more than half even. I was like, well, let's add some English comments or English captions to the photos, because it just expands and let people really enjoy this great content you're creating. So we started doing English captions on Instagram a couple years ago, and for some reason, that just snowballed into. Because it's the anniversary of Magazine House, they were thinking about doing big projects and they thought, let's do an entire issue in English. And so they collected their Tokyo guide material from over the last six or seven years. So they always have a Tokyo issue every year. So they took the best stories from that, brought it together, and we just started translating it. And so it came out about two weeks ago. It's called hello Tokyo, and it's a guide for. For exploring Japan's capital city. It's 100% English. I mean, there's still some Japanese, you know, captions and titles once in a while, but it's all in English. And if you pick it up and you look from it from far away, it looks like Popeye in the sense that they took the original design and we just plugged the English right into it. So it's as if someone who can't read Japanese puts on this pair of special glasses and can suddenly read the Japanese as English. It's that kind of experience. And I let a translation team to go through all the texts and edited the text myself. And at the end of the day, we were trying to be pretty loyal to what the original text was. So it's not necessarily written for a foreign reader who's never been to Tokyo. It kind of assumes that you have ambient knowledge of Tokyo the way that a Popeye reader would, but at least it's in English.
- [37:01]
D
Now, were there any challenges in the translation?
- [37:05]
H
And of course, I am a Popeye reader, and of course I translated the.
- [37:09]
D
Articles, but I've used all sorts of apps. Sometimes it gets a bit complicated. So when I actually saw that there was an English version, I was like, oh, my God, this is a dream for me.
- [37:18]
H
So tell us about this process, because.
- [37:21]
D
We don't see this very often like a Japanese magazine having kind of a special English edition.
- [37:28]
H
Yeah. I think that translating from one language to another is 50% of the challenge. Right. And that part's the easy part, which is just getting the technique text from Japanese into English. I think what was difficult was trying to capture the Popeye tone. And there's a very specific tone of voice that Popeye has that is knowledgeable but enthusiastic. There's not a lot of snark to it. And so often it will read in a kind of funny, optimistic, almost naive way for an American reader, I think. I mean, because I'm from the US I see it through that lens of if it were New York magazine writing about New York, I think it would have a lot more snark, and it'd be a little bit more sarcastic, and so it lacks that. And it also, again, assumes a lot of cultural knowledge that you would have about Japan that people outside of Japan may not have. And so there was always a dilemma in my head, which is, do we make this the representation of the Popeye voice in English, as in really trying to. To say this is what they're saying and this is the sentence order in which they did it in? And even that. That logic doesn't make as much sense outside of Japanese. We'll just present this to be as authentic and literal to the Japanese, or should we be changing this from scratch and rewriting it to be more of what a native English experience would be like? And, you know, just because the degree of text, I mean, if you. You have to pick it up to see it, but every page just has. Has hundreds and hundreds of words on it. I mean, it's just this tiny, tiny text in which that's the delight of a Japanese magazine.
- [39:11]
G
So much content.
- [39:13]
H
So, I mean, number one, they wanted to make sure that you had that feeling, which is like you're getting the sense of reading a Japanese magazine page with so much density, information density. And so that was kept. That really wasn't changed and it was hard to. I think it would have been difficult process to rewrite it all. But I think at the end of the day, at least for this edition, it's good for people to know this is what is actually being said in the magazine. It wasn't rewritten to cater towards a overseas audience. You're getting the raw English translation of the text that's there.
- [39:47]
B
That was the writer W. David Marx in conversation with Monocle's Fernando Augusto Pacheco. And for more interviews from the world of print and publishing, tune into the stack on Monaco Radio. You're with the Globe Herbalist. Exciting fashion news now. Maria Grazia Chiuri is returning to Fendi, the house where her career began. After nine years at Dior, where she turned feminist messaging into major commercial success, she'll now oversee all Fendi collections from her native Rome for lvmh. It's a statement about consistency, heritage and Italian craftsmanship. Well, joining me on the line now is Grace Charlton, who's Monocle's associate editor for fashion and design. Grace, good morning to you.
- [40:33]
I
Morning, Georgina.
- [40:35]
B
What's Fendi hoping to gain by bringing Chiori back?
- [40:39]
I
I have a hunch that they're hoping to elevate the brand to the status of where it was when Karl Lagerfeld was the creative director or helping out with Fendi. I think they also. It's a statement of being proud to be Roman and, you know, going back to the roots of the house itself.
- [40:59]
B
And I wonder if it marks a shift towards a more. A more unified creative vision.
- [41:04]
I
For sure. And I think that sells better. That's another hunch I have. I think people really buy into the creative director behind a house. And when there is consistency through couture, menswear, womenswear, it's just slightly easier for the consumer to grasp and get behind.
- [41:22]
B
How different will her approach be from her predecessor, Kim Jones?
- [41:27]
I
Well, I think she's. You mentioned earlier, but she's a real feminist and she's a real intellectual. Fendi is a brand that in the past few years, I think has been diluted a little bit. I think she's going to bring A more intellectual lens to the brand. And. And what I really hope is to see Fendi in movies again, like it was back in the 1950s during the golden age of Italian cinema, when, you know, Fellini used Fendi fur coats to dress his movie stars. Like, I'm hoping there'll be more cultural, societal context.
- [42:01]
B
And is it also. I mean, I think you mentioned this about putting Italy back at the center of LVMH's fashion map.
- [42:08]
I
Yes, definitely. She's a. I'm very into Italian manufacturing, and from Rome, Fendi is a Roman brand. I think there'll be a lot of celebration of that. Kim Jones, who was her predecessor before Silvia Venturini, Fendi was British, and Karl Lagerfeld obviously was German. I think this is a return to, like I said, like, the house's roots and celebrating it.
- [42:33]
B
How might her commercial instincts reshape Fendi's Runway identity? I mean, what kind of. What. What kind of couture are we likely to see?
- [42:45]
I
Well, so when she was at Dior, she staged these incredible shows around the world, and I. I wonder if she's going to do that with Fendi, if she's going to take that Roman vision and, you know, do a big, fabulous, glitzy show somewhere unexpected like Cape Town or, you know, Mumbai. Like, I. I really. I wonder if that's what she's also going to do. Make it a little. Yeah.
- [43:09]
B
And I wonder if. If it's a. Perhaps a broader reset across luxury, away from hype and back to heritage.
- [43:17]
I
Yeah, definitely. And actually, LVMH, this is exciting news. Reported growth in the third quarter only by 1%. Why? I say only by 1%. This represents a lot of money, but I think there's a little bit. There's a glimmer of hope that we're out of this luxury downturn that we've been talking about for what feels like forever. And the Chinese market is picking up a little bit again. So I think this technique of chopping and changing the creative directors and shaking things up is maybe going to pay off as consumers, you know. Invest in the last collection by Maria Grazia Curie for Jeff your before someone else takes. Jonathan Anderson takes over. So it is an exciting time, and it's historical.
- [44:01]
B
I mean, just. Just on that changing at the top of all of these brands, it does seem to be like musical chairs.
- [44:07]
I
It really. It totally is. It's like the most interesting season that we've seen that I've definitely seen ever in my life. Like, it's really exciting.
- [44:16]
B
Grace. Thank you very much indeed. That was Grace Charlton, Monocle's Associate editor for fashion and design Design. And this is the globalist on Monocle. Radio.
- [44:29]
A
Iq, EQ and AI. Three components key to the craft of innovation at ubs. Because to stay ahead in a rapidly evolving age, you need a partner with decades of experience, endless passion for the work and a finger on the pulse of leading technology technologies. Bridging human expertise with artificial intelligence, all to elevate you. UBS banking is our craft.
- [45:04]
F
Now.
- [45:05]
B
I am very excited because I have just been joined by David Phelan, who's Monocle's technology correspondent, and he has bought a variety of different gadgets. Unfortunately, he seems completely incapable of using the one gadget we need him to have, which is the headphones. Oh, no, he's managed it, he's now managed it.
- [45:22]
J
But it was a little bit of a struggle, I admit.
- [45:25]
B
But you are going to demonstrate the remarkable Paper Pro Move. What is that?
- [45:32]
J
Well, Remarkable is a Norwegian company. It's very interesting because I don't know if this is just me, but sometimes I pick up my phone with an intention to do something and then a notification comes in and it distracts me within five minutes. I have no idea what I really picked that phone up for. And so there's something to be said about devices that only do one thing, and that's what the remarkable Paper Pro and its latest version, the remarkable Paper Pro Move, is all about. It's just a note taker, a digital note taker. I'll pass it to you. And you can see that it's designed to be about the size of a sort of reporter's notebook and it works very well. There's a stylus on that attaches magnetically and you can have a go at the writing. It's got a very clever screen that is textured so that it does a sort of okay impression of being pen on paper.
- [46:23]
B
Yeah, it feels like. I mean, you can hear the scratch.
- [46:26]
J
Yes, yes. That's a very satisfying noise.
- [46:28]
B
Wow. Wow. But so you can't. You can't connect to the web on this.
- [46:34]
J
Not in that sense. You can share your documents to the web so that you can. You can. The advantage over regular pen and paper is that you can. Can save your documents in a way that you can't with paper. You can share them with other people. You can also, with one tap, turn your scribble into printed text and you can search very cleverly through the scribbles that you've made. The Remarkable's intention is that they should create something better than paper. And I mean I like pen and paper, but this is a very clever. And there's something very nice about the size of it, the way it sits in your hand. It's beautifully made with anodized aluminium and it works very well.
- [47:21]
B
I'm very, very impressed by that. So I do a lot of on stage chairing and I use a mini iPad now with the document that I've done on my laptop, but then it's saved and there it is on my iPad. Would it have that capacity?
- [47:36]
J
Yes, absolutely. I mean you, you, you, you can put documents on it. And the good thing is that what's great is the, the, you cannot beat the immediacy of pen and paper or in this case digital pen and paper. So you can just scribble or, and if you want something bigger then you turn it sideways and the, the, the, it, it grows on the screen so it's easier to see. Say you were presenting.
- [47:56]
B
Oh, sold. Sold to the lady behind the microphone. 399 pounds it looks like.
- [48:05]
J
Yes, that's right. They also do larger screen version which costs a little bit more.
- [48:10]
B
Let's talk about the Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold.
- [48:14]
J
So this is next in show and tell. This is, as you know, there is a fad. Perhaps it will turn out to be, I don't know, for folding phones. As you can see, it looks like a perfectly reasonable regular fold, but then it folds out so that it's got a big 8 inch display. So the idea is, well, for example, just referring to your use case there, it's got the same size screen as an iPad mini, just slightly bigger in fact than the original iPad mini, but you fold it shut and it slides into your pocket very well. Now there have been problems with folding phones. The internal screen wasn't robust enough and the external one was too small. I think Google has come a long way to solving this with the Pixel 10 Pro fold that came out last week and I saw you admiring the hinge this. Google is very proud of this. It's what's called a gearless hinge because apparently the gears in some of the folding phones can snag or get difficult to use. This should be smooth and useful for a long time.
- [49:24]
B
I tell you what I don't like about it is the weight. It's very heavy.
- [49:28]
J
Yes, yes, I, I hear what you're thinking is saying, and it's, it is thicker than a regular phone is now because we're so used to thinner phones, which leads me to a phone that came out a little bit earlier in the year, but which you may admire because it's much, much thinner, much lighter. Yeah, yeah, indeed. That. That's the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7. And when you open it, and it will just open, as you prise it open, you can see how thin it is. That's about the thinnest smartphone there is available. So thin that it can't get much thinner because the USB C socket on the bottom is almost completely the width of the phone.
- [50:15]
B
It's quite difficult to open and close that one.
- [50:18]
J
That eases up with wear. But yes, no, I hear what you're saying. Again, that's, I think, to do with the fact that there's a combination of trying to balance robustness so that it lasts and simplicity and lightness.
- [50:35]
B
And finally onto the Oura Ring 4.
- [50:38]
J
So Oura Ring 4 came out earlier in the year, but just in the last few days they've announced a new version, the ceramic ring, which, which is. It's a new design for it and it comes in four different colors. That's the midnight one. It also comes in a light color called Cloud, a pink one called Petal, and a greenish shade called Tide. And it's slightly bigger and heavier than the Oura Ring 4, which was remarkably thin and light. But it does exactly the same. That is, it has sensors, including a temperature sensor, for example, and a heart rate sensor, so that when you wake up in the morning, it tells you how your night has been. And it includes something called Symptom Radar. This is on earlier versions of the Oura Ring as well, which means that if it's spotted certain things in the night, it can say to you, I think you're coming down with something. It could be cold, it could be flu, it could be Covid. It can't tell the difference between the three, but it knows knows that it's one of those and it really works. I was very mistrustful of this at first. It told me this on say, a Monday morning. By Wednesday I had full on cold, but it was able to tell me in advance. And the advantage of that is that you can take action to ensure you don't overdo things or get dehydrated or the other things that you might not think about in everyday life. But when you've got a cold or flu, you should be thinking of, isn't.
- [52:08]
B
It just huge encouragement for hyperconjax?
- [52:11]
F
No, I don't think.
- [52:12]
J
Well, I hear what you're saying, that there can be an over focus on this kind of Health detail. But I think Aura gets it right. The company actually just yesterday announced an enormous expansion in funding which I think is towards, apart from other things for health innovation in the future.
- [52:34]
B
Right, right. And, and David, do you personally, because I know you wear, you do wear one. Do you find it, apart from the sickness warning, but do you find it useful in, in other areas?
- [52:45]
J
Yes, there's a, there is certainly a psychosomatic thing that you wake up feeling exhausted and you know that you've had a rubbish night and you've been awake all night and then you look on the, the Aura app on, on the smartphone and you think, oh, actually I did get six and a half hour sleep and you do feel better as a result, or you, you, you notice how things are and you, you can kind of make adjustments the following day.
- [53:10]
B
Excellent, David, thank you very much indeed. That's David Phelan, Monocle's technology correspondent. And this is the globalist on Monocle Ra. Now, Sharjah is doubling down on its role as the UAE's cultural capital. The Emirates investment arm, the Sharjah Investment and Development Authority, known as Shahrukh, has unveiled projects worth 447 million United Arab Emirates, Emirates Durhams or AED, across heritage sites and creative hubs from the House of Wisdom to the heart of Sharjah and the newly listed Maleha National Park. It's all part of a much bigger 7.2 billion AED push to blend culture with sustainability and economic growth. Well, I'm joined now from Dubai by Insaman Rashid, who's Monarch Monocles Gulf correspondent Insi. Good morning to you, you.
- [54:20]
D
Morning, Georgina.
- [54:21]
B
What's this broader strategy then, behind the latest round of investment?
- [54:26]
D
Yeah, so the latest round of investment is around 120 million US dollars and it is part of this broader 7.2 billion dirhams, which is around 30, around 1 point. I'm trying to do the maths quickly. Just over 1 billion it is. And so this is part of 52 developments by Shahrukh, the Sharjah's Investment and Development Authority. And, well, what does this tell us about Sharjah's kind of ambitions and the Gulf's cultural landscape more broadly? Well, unlike Dubai and Abu Dhabi, I think Sharjah's cultural strategy has always been quieter, more kind of bookish, more heritage driven. And this new funding kind of consolidates that reputation, not as a city of skyscrapers like you'd find in Dubai or finance in Abu Dhabi, but as a thinking kind of Emirates. And you could argue that Sharjah sees Culture as infrastructure, not as an ornament like you would potentially find over in Saadi at Island in Abu Dhabi, where they're shoving a load of museums on kind of one island. And it's as essential to the city's social and economic health as some of the other Emirates. But with that comes a challenge, I think. Can cultural investment generate sustainable returns in tourism, jobs and identity, something that Sharjah will want to do, or is it all just about prestige? And I think that's a big battle that Sharjah will have to face. And the Gulf as a whole is kind of crowded with a field of cultural ambition. As I mentioned Abu Dhabi with the Louvre and the Guggenheim projects, they've also got a natural museum coming there as well. Riyadh's emerging art cities and festivals that they've got going on, and Doha's museum expansion as well. So Sharjah's edge that they've got what they say is authenticity, it has long kind of nurtured a cultural identity rooted in their heritage and its archaeology, which is something that they're doing a lot of work around as well, and literature. But I think this race for a cultural capital kind of brings maybe a bit of a risk of over saturation. Georgina, you. When and every city builds a museum, the question becomes, well, who's gonna fill them?
- [56:51]
B
How pivotal has Sheikha Buddhu Al Qasimi been in shaping this vision for the Emirates? I mean, I know that you and the Monocle crew actually met with her a little while ago.
- [57:02]
D
Yeah. So Sheikha Badoor is the daughter of the ruler of Sharjah. Her husband is also the deputy ruler of Sharjah. We were welcomed to the House of Wisdom, a beautiful building which was designed by Fost, and it was essentially, it's a library. It's an education space for students to come and spend time to learn, to read books to do their work from as well. And in the center of it had this beautiful kind of garden, which was filled with a lovely outdoor space, obviously really nice in the winter months out here. It was a very kind of clean and open plan building. And so we had a really fascinating conversation with Her Highness at the House of Wisdom. And she is really at the forefront of all of these projects that are going on. She does head up the Shahrukh department, Sharjah's Investment and Development Authority. And she's really at the forefront of all these projects. They're very close to her heart. We could hear that when she was talking to us about them. She's also bringing some events out into the desert in Sharjah as well to show off the archaeological sites that Sharjah has to offer. Many of the them now, or one of them in particular now, which has been recognized by UNESCO after years of trying to get that recognition. So she's really fighting hard to make sure Sharjah is this kind of capital of culture. But they are also doing it quietly as well and actually showcasing some real interesting products that they have in the Emirate.
- [58:37]
B
Insi, thank you very much indeed. That's Insamin Rashid, Monocle's Gulf correspondent in in Dubai. And that's all we have time for today. Thanks to our producers, Monica Lillis, Carlotta Rebelo and Ryuma Takahashi. In Tokyo, our researcher Joanna Moser and our studio manager, Christy o'. Grady. After the headlines, there's more music on the way. The Briefing is live at midday in London and the Globalist will return at the same time tomorrow. And don't forget our wonderful archive of Monocle Radio programmes. You can dive in there at any time and listen to any show that takes your fancy. This week I'm recommending Meet the Writers and the latest episode with Sam Sussman, who may or may not be Bob Dylan's son. I'm Georgina Godwin. Thank you for listening.
- [59:36]
A
With ubs, you have a truly good global partner, incorporating new technologies, innovative approaches and unexpected opportunities, leading you to insights that help answer the questions that matter. Delivered with passion, care and unmatched expertise. Because it's about rising with the dawn each day, knowing that we can do even better. That's what banking is to us. Not just work, but a craft. UBS advisory price is our craft.