William Dobson

William Dobson’s fascination with the Middle East was first ignited during the many months it took him to finally complete Prince of Persia on the Apple Macintosh LC475, which he had somehow managed to misappropriate from his father’s office. A trip to Marrakesh and the Atlas Mountains aged 13 further fuelled his interest. After reading Naguib Mahfouz’s ‘The Cairo Trilogy’, he was so impressed that he decided to study Arabic at Durham University with the aim of one day being able to read it in its original language.

While the unfortunate scheduling of his course meant he hasn’t yet managed to achieve such lofty ambition (his lectures seemed to coincide either with his morning lie in or his afternoon nap), a few months living in Yemen, followed by a year studying at the University of Damascus in Syria taught him to be able to order any assortment of flavoured tobacco for his shisha pipe and direct taxis at will to his favourite karaoke bar in nearby Beirut.

Perhaps more importantly it also instilled in him a love for Levantine culture, in particular the food, and he considers himself the world expert on sha’af, a Damascene speciality of marinated grilled lamb. The highlight of his time there, a trip to the Baptism Site in Jordan, was simultaneously the lowlight as even his impassioned shouts of ‘but f**king Jesus was here’ couldn’t instil the same level of enthusiasm in his friends for what was, after all, just a hole in the ground.

Since leaving university he has spent time working as a food and art journalist in Cape Town, a tour guide in Cambridge, a research analyst in Dubai. He currently works as a freelance journalist and editor and writes regularly for Eat Me magazine.