A Blog by the Editor of The Middle East Journal

Putting Middle Eastern Events in Cultural and Historical Context

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Video of Mubarak and Obama

Here's the video released by the White House of Mubarak and Obama meeting the press.



There've been some reports that in recent public appearances Mubarak seemed distracted, and of course this was doubtless well scripted, but he seemed to do pretty well for an octogenarian. He answered questions in Arabic rather than English, but that probably is for precision. His Arabic is a little colloquializing at times (I'm pretty sure there was a ba‘da kida in there somewhere). He seemed to fidget a bit, but heck, it's the Oval Office. I'm sure I'd fidget too.

Still not a gray hair in sight though, at age 81. Obama, at 48, has a few showing though.

Also, I've now added a short YouTube excerpt from the Charlie Rose Interview video to my earlier post referring to it.

1 comment:

ArabNews said...

By the way, as aside remark: Mubarak seems to understand and speak English quite well, but prefers to address the press in Arabic. Also his Arabic is rather informal for a politician, with strong recourse to Egyptian Arabic constructions and pronunciation.