Emirati Talal Salem Al Sabri to share lessons from the road less travelled

The Sharjah poet Talal Salem Al Sabri has published his first non-fiction work, the travel memoir Emirati in Nigeria, which he'll discuss at the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature.

On Wednesday, March 4, the Emirati author Talal Salem Al Sabiri will talk about his trip to Nigeria and the book based on his travels. Courtesy Talal Al Sabiri
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It took the Emirati poet Talal Salem Al Sabri a year and a half after his return to finish writing about a “life-changing” visit to Nigeria.

“I hadn’t originally planned to write about my trip,” says the 36-year-old. “But when I got back, I had a need to write about it, to relive the trip and to relive key moments as a way of better understanding myself.”

In 2013, the celebrated poet from Sharjah published Emirati in Nigeria, his first attempt at non-fiction writing.

Al Sabri, who has been writing poetry since he was 18 and published three collections of classical Arabic poetry, drew on his experience with verse while writing his travelogue.

“There was definitely a difference in the approach to writing, but I never left the soul of the poet behind,” he says. “The book is written creatively in the pen of a poet and the language of poetry, because it is essentially an examination of self.”

On Wednesday at the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature, Al Sabri – who is also an electrical engineer (“poetry engineers the soul”, he jokes) – will talk about the experience of visiting Nigeria and writing the book in the session titled Travelling the Globe. He will be joined by two other travel authors – the Emirati writer Nasir Al Dhaheri and Abdullah Al Jumah from Saudi Arabia.

“My trip to Nigeria in 2010 was work-related but it was very moving, meaning I had to record it,” says Al Sabri.

“For an Emirati who lives comfortably at home with his family and kids, five minutes away from where he works, with a fancy car and fancy life, one wonders what would make him choose to go to a country like Nigeria? I needed to get out of my comfort zone.

“You hear all about the problems there – diseases, bombings, etc – and, of course, I was in awe when I arrived, and I remember how I was afraid when I was in the airport there. But little by little, you reach a point where you accept the reality of the situation and you start seeing beyond the harsh conditions.”

Al Sabri describes the trip as one of “self-discovery”.

“The experience gave me so much,” he says. “I came out of my fears and it makes you realise that the media does not always give you the correct impression of a place.

“You have to see it with your own eyes. You will meet people living there that are just like you; your perception changes. You end up facing yourself and discovering yourself.”

Al Sabri’s experience in the African country cemented his resolve to continue doing what he is doing – juggling the part of him that is an engineer with the part of him that cannot live without the art and beauty of the written word.

He is a member of the UAE Writers Association, a frequent contributor to local magazines and newspapers, a presenter of social and cultural programmes on Sharjah TV, and the host of a cultural forum on the radio.

And as one of the first Emiratis to take part in and reach the latter stages of the popular Prince of Poets television programme in 2007, his desire to write poetry is unlikely to abate anytime soon.

“As long as I am being in the now, being in the moment, not anticipating what is happening but, in fact, living the moment in all that it has, then that’s when I am happiest,” he says. “And that is why I can keep on accomplishing.”

• Talal Al Sabri will appear as part of the session Travelling the Globe on Wednesday, March 4, at 8pm at the InterContinental Hotel, Dubai Festival City. Tickets cost Dh70 and are available at www.emirateslitfest.com