There are some stories that invite us into the heart, and others that invite us into the mind. In our world today, shaped by constant stress, uncertainty, and an overwhelming exposure to crisis, mental health has become an increasingly important part of the conversation. 

Stories that allow us to enter the minds of others, and to better understand the complexities of our own, have the power to create empathy, awareness, and greater understanding. 

The more we explore the reasons behind the way certain minds think and feel, the more we begin to understand ourselves. This is why bringing mental health into Arab art has the potential to influence society as a whole, not just by helping us empathise with one another, but by encouraging us to recognise, support, and protect each other before we lose ourselves to the darker corners of our own minds.

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Egyptian cinema has often treated mental illness through exaggeration, comedy, or melodrama, making the mentally ill character an object of spectacle rather than someone whose interior life deserves to be understood. 

Be’r al Herman (A Well of Deprivation), by contrast, asks the audience to look beneath the behaviour, to consider what happened to Nahed before asking what is wrong with her. It places this within a wider Egyptian context in which mental health has historically been difficult to discuss openly.

At first, Nahed's divided identity appears almost like a cinematic mystery: by day she is composed, restrained and respectable; by night she becomes Mervat, more playful, rebellious and uninhibited. But the film's real interest lies not in the revelation that these are two sides of the same woman, but in the question of why she needs to become two people in the first place. 

Her fractured identity becomes a way of giving form to something that cannot otherwise be spoken.

Read the article here.

Anyone interested in the relationship between literature, mental health, gender and power should read Nawal El Saadawi’s The Innocence of the Devil. Set largely within a mental asylum, the novel deliberately blurs the boundaries between sanity and madness, reality and fantasy, and even good and evil, using the asylum as a distorted mirror of the society outside it.

It is not an easy or conventional read, as the narrative moves restlessly between memory, dream, fantasy and reality, but that disorientation is part of its power. El Saadawi makes the reader inhabit a world in which the line between individual madness and a society that produces suffering becomes increasingly impossible to draw.

Read more here.

This song seems to exist between eras, between Beirut and the wider Arab musical imagination, taking the language of longing and placing it inside something darker, stranger and more nocturnal. Soapkills were among the earliest indie bands to emerge from the Middle East, and their music helped demonstrate that Arabic music could move into electronic and experimental territory without abandoning its emotional or cultural vocabulary.

Listen here.

Bypassing cynicism to speak straight to the heart, Baking Powder is a tender and moving look at the bond between two brothers, centering on Khalid as he navigates the silent spaces of autism to find his own unique way of expressing love. Without relying on melodrama, it illuminates the very real communication barriers and integration challenges faced by individuals on the spectrum, proving that emotional resonance often lives in the smallest, everyday routines.

Watch it here.

The Salted Karamel Tres Leches from Koffee Kulture is definitely worth trying this weekend. This decadent treat combines the soft, melt-in-your-mouth texture of classic tres leches cake with the rich sweetness of caramel and a touch of salt that helps balance every bite. The result is a luscious, creamy dessert with layers of milky richness and that irresistible salted-caramel flavor.

Find out more here.

Dinner dates are always better when the setting is a little different. Step into a magical world where dinner meets art, as you enjoy a delicious Oriental set menu in a one-of-a-kind projection-mapped dining environment, all beneath our mesmerizing floating moon installation. Come for the food, stay for the atmosphere, and leave with a night worth remembering.

Find out more here.