User:Malyousif

Who is Mahmood Al-Yousif? (Please visit http://mahmood.tv for my blog and more information about me and my thoughts, thank you)

It’s very hard to summarise your life isn’t it? What can you really say about yourself other than born on whatever date and in wherever country or town? What schools, college or university you went to? So what? Just about everybody on the planet does the same – give or take.

I guess you’re here because you want to know a little bit about me, that’s fair enough. You want to know who is behind this site, or just feeling voyeuristic.

Here you go: My achievements so far include being a husband, father of two girls and a boy. Have one dog, a vicious rescued parrot, three deranged rescued cats and several exotic plants. I’m an accidental entrepreneur. I own and operate Gulf Broadcast where I help businesses thrive through video and digital marketing.

I’ve had many hobbies through my life and still participate in most I started a long time ago, the format might have changed, but the enjoyment is still there. I have always been fascinated by the visual arts having a father who was one of the founders of the contemporary art movement in this area of the world is bound to rub off on you.

At school I started the first ever photography club. I have entered just one photography exhibition in Bahrain, and won 2nd prize.

I am also fascinated by computers and their potential. Especially communication and how that marriage can bring disparate peoples together. I started one of the first BBS (bulletin board service) in the Gulf in ’86. Called it Stray Cats BBS and proceeded to commandeer my wife’s monthly salary to pay the telephone company for the privilege! I put a stop to that in ’91 – much to my wife’s happiness and unbound relief. That didn’t last long.

I became an aircraft avionics maintenance engineer, did that for ten years, realised that I wanted more out of my life so I went to the States and came back three months later with a commercial pilot’s license. The second Gulf War started soon after my return, so employment opportunities for pilots disappeared.

In yet another change of career, I started my company in 1991 and left the airline industry behind. Hello entrepreneurship!

Now I try to dispel the image that Muslims and Arabs suffer from in the rest of the world, mostly by our own doing I have to say. I am no missionary and don’t want to be. I run several internet websites that are geared to do just that, create a better understanding that we’re not all nuts hell-bent on world destruction.

At the end, I’m just an Arab man attempting to bridge the cultural gap and trying to make a difference. I might fail a lot, but succeed once in a while.

last updated 28 August 2015