Pedro Oliveira are the guest editors of Diseña #30, themed around Minor Gestures. Full call for papers here. Deadline 26 April.
I responded to 20 questions for the podcast Unique Ways, which felt strange when there wasn’t an exchange on other end. In any case, listen on Spotify or on Apple Podcasts.
My article “Moments of Palestine” was published in Disegno #40: Freedom. Buy a copy. I’ve also scanned the article so you can read it :)
I’m taking part in “Lines of Influence”, Singapore Art Museum’s Design Collection Symposium on 28 March 2026. Strictly by invite only (sorry!).
I am a member of the Design Doha Design Prize 2026 jury. Unfortunately, due to the war, I think it will be postponed.
Books:
Design Otherwise: Transforming Design Education in the Arab Region is available for purchase online, or order it at your favourite bookstore. What’s amazing to hear is the book’s reach: sales from Lebanon, Italy, Egypt, Australia, Taiwan, Pakistan, the Philippines, UAE, India, USA, Canada, and the list goes on!
Designerly Ways of Knowing is available with a new cover (big up Pali!), and is now on its third print! Order here.
Buy cheap, buy twice, is what I always say. I did not follow my own advice and was lured by a half off sale. My purchase lasted three uses before it failed. What do I expect from anything built after 1980, or if I’m being more generous, 2000 onwards? Instead of chucking it, I decided to look up repair cafés.
I soon realised these events are once a month, for three hours only. I went to the Lambeth repair café, thinking I was early by arriving 30 minutes after they opened, only to realise I was number 34. It was 10:30am.
I understand it’s a volunteer-run organisation but I did not get the appeal. Why does everyone rave about this concept? I was given a number written on a piece of paper like an urgent care waiting room and asked to wait on one of the chairs. Everyone around me was looking at their phones. I thought a repair cafe was about “community”, whatever that means now.
When they called my number, I was asked to fill out a paper detailing the information on my broken object, then waited again to fill out some form gathering data. I queried why I should provide my email, the volunteer was confused and said I had to, then directed me to the big boss who told me it’s optional. It’s amazing how we do not question giving away our data anymore, and I’m tired of it.
Following that, I had to queue to fill in another form on an iPad that kept autocorrecting my name filled with questions that could be asked by the hordes of volunteers roaming asking you the same question over and over again: “what are you fixing today?”. All I feel these days is rage and sadness, and I wish I could reply with “my heart and the world”. But these things cannot be fixed. I asked one of the volunteers why they are collecting so much data and she told me “funding”.
The whole concept reminded me of the Apple Genius Bar. Friendly people in blue shirts asking you questions to kill time rather than telling me who is going to fix this thing! At least there’s coffee and cakes offered to people waiting, too bad it was Ramadan and I was fasting.
After 45 minutes, I get to a table with two old men, jolly and knowledgeable. One of the guys is constantly bombarded by other repair people for tools and help, but he’s not distracted. They proceed to run tests on my object, take it apart, then after a back and forth over what colour are the bars on this part, conclude I have to buy said part from eBay for £3.99, come back next month, and this might solve the problem. I assured them I would look into it, thanked them, left, and chucked the item in the bin.
“How could you!” some might say. Think of what you’re doing, adding to landfill! Gentle reminder, THE WORLD IS ON FIRE. I’m amazed at people who are more outraged by a faulty electronic item, or data storage, or polar bears and coral reefs than the loss of human life in senseless wars, which are causing the loss of everything else to begin with. Why is it that with so much access to information, the inability to connect things together seems to be so hard?
The repair café and the ongoing war on Iran did inspire me to seriously consider alternatives to the software I use. In undergrad, I wrote my thesis on the benefits of open source software in places like Palestine. It’s a concept I’ve often returned to but have not explored too seriously, beyond constantly perusing AlternativeTo for Open Source alternatives.
Now more than ever, I want to reduce my dependence on US tech giants, and move away from an American internet (something China figured out a long time ago). So far, most alternatives are European ones with hefty price tags attached to them, which has made me think about what I actually need digitally. Do I return to storing my pictures on hard drives, physically printing the ones I like, and taking less pictures? I mean, people take photos of everything because they can, how many people review the photos afterwards?
Software has become a burden. There is an abundance of software released that claim to solve a problem but make things more complicated (the equivalent of people who think they are organised but have an organisational system that makes no sense to anyone1). If it’s any good, they eventually get enshittified when they are bought out by big tech.
Listen:
I really enjoyed this podcast interview with John Rapley, who discusses a lot of ideas around resilience I’ve been thinking about for the last few years.
Comedic legend Catherine O’Hara (SCTV alum), died in January. Listen to her and Julia Louis Dreyfus – two female comedy legends – on “Julia Gets Wise with Catherine O’Hara”.
Read: Mother Mary Comes To Me, Arundhati Roy’s memoir. Difficult in many parts, and what a life! In a landscape with too many memoirs (read: journals) written by people whose lives are not interesting and have not lived confirms my belief that anyone under 50 should not write a memoir.
Eid Mubarak and be well.
Danah (The Pessoptimist)
Ava from Abbott Elementary
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