Poverty can be and often is crushing. For Hermanos Espinoza — who are in the midst of promoting their debut studio album “Linaje,” released Friday — growing up in a family that struggled financially after a string of failed restaurants turned out to be the greatest motivator.

Since 2021, the quintet led by the sibling duo of Joel and Leonel Espinoza have steadily built an audience with their brand of new wave norteño, pairing the prominent sounds of the accordion and the bajo quinto with lyrics about making it big thanks to a combination of unrelenting working-class grit, familial love and faith.

Hermanos Espinoza were one of the most buzzed about bands at the 40th South by Southwest music festival, which took place earlier this month in Austin, Texas. At the De Los showcase — one of three appearances the band made during SXSW — the rooftop of the Mala Fama nightclub was at capacity well before the brothers set foot on stage, and a line to get in extended past the door.

“Y que c— su madre la pobreza,” lead vocalist and accordionist Joel Espinoza, 24, belted out from the stage, opening their set with their 2024 hit “Dios Por Delante.” The popular Mexicanism translates to “F— poverty.”

The crowd cheered and danced, letting loose on a late Sunday night.

“I saw my family go through so much because of money, because of poverty. They didn’t deserve it but I understand the world works in a certain way,” he would later tell De Los in a video call. “I just hated it.”

The dynamic singer delivered every lyric with his whole body as he frenetically tapped the buttons of his brightly colored accordion, doing his best to make the squeezebox sound like an electric guitar. The drum set and bajo quinto kept pace, making the set feel more like a rock show than a backyard kickback.

(Cat Cardenas / For De Los)

With “Linaje” — it translates to lineage, a term often associated with nobility and pedigree — the brothers are intent on sharing their hard-earned success with those they love most.

“Some people refer to ‘Linaje’ as royalty, or people who come from money, but for us, it’s the complete opposite,” said Joel. “Our family is hardworking and we wanted to give them credit too. To us, that’s royalty.”

The Espinoza brothers grew up in the South Texas city of McAllen, in the Rio Grande Valley, helping out at their family’s Mexican restaurants. They can still recall prepping food from the early morning hours to late at night. They say it was tedious work that made them disciplined, punctual and appreciative of the value of a hard-earned dollar.

“You see life through a different perspective,” said Leonel, who is 20 years-old.

(Cat Cardenas / For De Los)

The brothers say they brought that same work ethic in their pursuit of music; both were heavily involved in their school’s marching band as part of the drum line, which helped them master rhythmic timing, coordination and motor skills. In high school, Joel picked up the accordion — he describes playing the 49-key instrument as a “love-hate” situation — and Leonel the bajo quinto.

Their mother helped book their first gigs singing serenade covers. But by 2021, house party gigs had slowed down.

“I used to work with my dad back at his restaurant and one of those days I was just feeling really down, ready to give up on my dream of music, but he held me down,” said Joel.

It wouldn’t be long before all that hard work paid off. Hermanos Espinoza gained traction on YouTube and TikTok with their self-released tracks, “Prueba De Fuego” (2022) and the aforementioned “Dios Por Delante,” which describe leaving behind the treachery of poverty for a better life.

“People started tattooing ‘Dios Por Delante’ on their forearms and neck and that’s when we realized that this was more than music, it’s a movement,” Joel said of the impact of the latter song.

Resilience and faith remain at the core of “Linaje,” which was mixed and produced by Ernesto “Neto” Fernández, who has worked with the likes of Peso Pluma and Xavi.

The 15-track LP, a solid representative of the ever-evolving norteño sound coming from the Texas borderlands, begins with a blessing, “29:11.” The title refers to a Bible verse in the Book of Jeremiah: “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’”

“A big part of this album was just letting go of trying to control everything,” said Joel. “I put it into [God’s] hands and we just let things flow.”

Money is the focus in the tracks like “La Moneda,” with Joel’s voice echoing through the backdrop as he proclaims that cash might change some tacky, incompetent chumps, but not him. Almost halfway through the set list is a hazy track, “No Puedo Amarte,” where the singer sours over an unresolved love; the crooning track is reminiscent of a twinkling sad sierreño genre, with an accordion alternating volumes between a bold tremolando and a silky legato.

Still, at its core, “Linaje” fundamentally underscores their grit in tracks like “Modelo V,” the first single under Double P Management that celebrates the journey that led them to success, which honors the lessons taught by their father.

“No matter all the adversities we face, the thing about my dad is that he’s always stayed true to himself and who he is,” says Joel. “That’s how we were raised and how we live day to day.”

I am blindfolded and seated in a vintage armchair set in the center of a darkened, red-lit room with Gothic accents. An actor is performing nearby. I hear their voice, but cannot, of course, see them. I suddenly spring upward in my seat, alarmed at the touch of some sort of cloth — or perhaps a feather? — across my ankles.

I’ll never be entirely sure. For wearing the small veil across my eyes was a requirement to participate in “Poe: Pulse & Pendulum,” the debut offering from new troupe Theatre Obscura L.A. The company’s initial performance contains two one-act plays, modern interpretations of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Pit and the Pendulum” and “The Tell-Tale Heart.”

While the stories are familiar to many, Theatre Obscura increases the levels of discomfort. In this room, I am at times unsettled, at once tracking the movements of the actors while attempting to remain hyper aware of any sudden touch or scent. “The Pit and the Pendulum,” the first half of the program, translates especially well to this setting, its dark sense of demented confinement keeping my nerves on high alert.

Conjuring such a state of anxiety was the point.

“If you take the visual away, it’s going to make you feel uneasy,” says Paul Millet, who devised the concept.

There are jump scares. Downtown event space the Count’s Den has been outfitted with about 50 speakers for the Obscura shows, which run through April 12. Some are visible before one puts on the blindfold. Many, though, are hidden under seats or couches, as the audio will trail the actors around the room, or perhaps a sudden crash or door opening will have me jolting my attention elsewhere.

“The Pit and the Pendulum” is a story of torture, and as the narrator, here played by Melissa Lugo, desperately speaks of a blade swinging above, actors will fan us, timing their waves with each swoosh of the audio. I was prepared for that one, as a fellow theatergoer nearby let out a soft yelp when the unseen gestures first arrived above their head.

For many, sight is the most coveted sense. “If you take that away, you’re already naturally uncomfortable,” Millet says. “So we lean into that. We know you’re going to be uncomfortable. We know this is not the norm. But get on that ride with us. Be willing to be uncomfortable. Discomfort, I think, helps to heighten the experience, and ideally allow it to trigger the emotional reactions that the story does.”

“Poe: Pulse & Pendulum” is two one-act, audio-focused performances of Edgar Allan Poe stories.

(Joe Camareno / Theatre Obscura)

Still, touch is limited in the show. Occasionally a rattling of a chair, but little more. The fluttering I felt near my ankles was to mimic the sensation of a running critter. The troupe will ask for audience consent, and participants can opt out. While I went in wondering if “Poe: Pulse & Pendulum” would seek to recall more extreme haunt experiences with lengthy waivers, Millet wanted to keep it light — an audio play, primarily, with just a few in-the-flesh signals.

“We want people to feel unease, but I don’t want anyone taken out of the story because a boundary or line was crossed,” Millet says.

Scent, too, is used with restraint. There are moments when guests will get a whiff of a fragrance that pairs with the storyline. Millet considers the first run of Theatre Obscure to be an experiment in how much touch and scent audiences may want to endure. Smell, he says, is tricky, as the aroma may linger and become a distraction.

Millet has been honing the concept since 2023. Previously, he was part of the team behind Wicked Lit, which ended in 2019 after running for a number of years at unique locations such as Altadena’s Mountain View Mausoleum. Those immersive performances would feature casts and guests walking the venue. Theatre Obscura, however, is fully seated.

“Poe: Pulse & Pendulum” focuses on the fear that something may happen to us when stripped of sight.

(Joe Camareno / Theatre Obscura)

And while the stories of Poe lend themselves to the Halloween season, spooky events increasingly occur year round. Long-running production “The Willows” is set to wrap in early April, and “Monster Party,” a period piece that takes guests to a devilishly extravagant cocktail party, is re-launching in mid-April. Millet, a longtime theater producer who has a day job in television editing, is hoping to stand out by avoiding “the glut” of horror events that occur each September and October.

Theatre Obscura may face challenges, namely persuading potential guests that “The Pit and the Pendulum” is more than simply a live reading with audio effects.

“You can feel the movement of the characters around you,” Millet says. “You’re in the environment with the story as it unfolds. You can experience it on a more visceral level.”

Blindfolded, I felt Theatre Obscura was mostly playing off our fears rather than giving in to them, largely keying in on our anticipation that something may happen to us when stripped of sight. Lugo in much of “The Pit and the Pendulum” circles guests, who are seated sporadically around the room, allowing each of us to imagine how close or far we may be from the hole we are told is at its center. Each show deals with claustrophobia in some way, either of a space, or of a mind.

“The Tell-Tale Heart” is louder, more crowded. The sounds of crashing glass and creaky floorboards had my head working overtime to draw a floorplan, only to then have it distorted when actors would unexpectedly whisper in both of my ears to bring forth the protagonist’s nightmares. While I expected Theatre Obscura to be slightly more aggressive in its uses of touch and scent, it’s a show that asks us to live in our heads, and to sit in our own feeling of trepidation.

“I was intrigued,” Millet says, “with really trying to engage the audience’s imagination.”

L.A.’s only dedicated cinnamon roll shop was born during the pandemic, when stay-at-home orders prevented Lindsay Sears-McDonald from going to her family’s favorite bakery to satisfy her craving for sticky sweet buns.

Instead, she attempted the dessert at home. When her first try yielded delicious results, she set out to perfect the recipe. Soon, she and her husband Lawrence were popping up at events across Los Angeles, and in 2023 they nabbed a vendor spot at Smorgasburg L.A.

They named their outfit All About the Cinnamon, a play on the hit song “All About the Benjamins” that features Lil’ Kim and Notorious B.I.G. The menu follows a similar theme, with plush cinnamon rolls named after the rap and R&B artists that Lindsay and Lawrence grew up listening to, such as the Em dotted with milk-chocolate M&M’s or the Busta topped with warm Nutella. Last summer the couple opened a small storefront in Sherman Oaks, complete with a mural of hip-hop greats.

In pastry cases across the city, you’ll see a diverse range of sweet buns inspired by the comforting flavors of childhood. That translates to vegan cinnamon rolls with ube halaya and pandan at a Filipino bake shop in Long Beach and miso-honey milkbread buns sprinkled with sesame seeds at a Korean-inspired bakery in Highland Park. Here are 11 of our favorite cinnamon rolls in L.A.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been driving all over Los Angeles doing something I haven’t done in a long time: playing pretend.

I pretended I was in a medieval castle at a French cafe in Miracle Mile and that I was looking for trolls on a fern-filled hike in Griffith Park. I imagined that Tolkien’s elves built the creekside restaurant where I met a friend for brunch in Topanga and that I was eating alongside real witches in a forest-themed dining room in North Hollywood.

In a Whittier tea room, I poured a glittering potion that said “Drink Me” into a glass of Champagne and in Beverly Hills, I stared awestruck at the platonic ideal of a witch’s house, half expecting a bent old lady with a wart on her nose to come out and turn me into a toad.

It’s been a rough start to 2026 and these brief moments of make-believe have served as a joyful balm in sad and scary times. I’m not looking to bypass reality, but taking a break from it every once in a while can be a welcome reprieve. Fortunately, Los Angeles is especially good at creating transporting experiences that drip with fairy-tale ambience. This is the home of Hollywood after all, the land of artifice, the spot where Walt Disney dreamed up the Happiest Place on Earth. Seeking and finding moments of happily ever after, even if they last just a few minutes, is part of the city’s collective DNA.

So grab your broom and make sure to leave a trail of bread crumbs behind you. L.A. has plenty of magic to share. All you need to do is open your mind and explore.

Imagine waking up early, eager to peep dazzling carpets of brilliant orange flowers at the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve. Instagram posts promised a spectacle.

You drive to the reserve north of Los Angeles, but the rolling hills aren’t alive with color.

Bummer. The bloom is over.

Thanks to AI, and a local scientist, such disappointment may soon be a thing of the past.

This year, Steve Klosterman, a biologist who works on natural climate solutions, launched a “wildflower forecast,” powered by a deep-learning model, satellite imagery and weather data.

In a sense, Klosterman, of Santa Monica, developed the tool to meet his own need.

Last spring, the Midwest transplant was hankering to see some wildflowers. He assumed there was some online resource that offered predictions or leveraged satellite images.

“Surely, there must be something,” he recalled thinking. “But there was nothing.”

There are tools. The state reserve operates a live cam trained on one swath of land. Theodore Payne, a California native plant nursery and education center, runs a wildflower hotline, where people can call in and hear weekly recorded reports on hot spots.

“These are all essential resources,” Klosterman said. “At the same time, they’re limited.”

Klosterman isn’t green when it comes to plants. His PhD, at Harvard, focused on the timing of new leaves on trees in the spring and color change in the fall.

For a class project, a team he was part of built a website that predicted those leaf changes in the Boston area. It was a hit.

California poppies bloom in Lancaster, near the state natural reserve, in mid-March.

(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)

To create the poppy bloom predictor, Klosterman turned to AI initially developed for medical imaging. He has harnessed it to instead analyze satellite images of the Antelope Valley.

The model scans 10-by-10-meter squares of land to determine whether poppies are present by their telltale orange color. (It also identifies tiny yellow flowers called goldfields.)

The model is trained on satellite images — which go back nine years — along with past weather data.

It then uses the current forecast, and recent flower status, to peer into the future.

If the mercury is going to hit 100 degrees and wind is picking up — and in previous years that led to withering flowers — that will guide the prediction.

Right now, the model can forecast five days out and is, as Klosterman puts it, “very much a work in progress.” It would be better, more powerful, if it had 100 years to learn from.

As more data are collected, it might someday be able to forecast a week or two out.

Right now, poppies are popping at the reserve in the western Mojave Desert.

It rained throughout the fall and into winter, and poppies need at least seven inches of rain to make a good showing, said Lori Wear, an interpreter at the reserve.

Snowfall in January seems to push them to another level, but that didn’t happen this season. So it’s a good bloom, but not extraordinary, she said.

Still, poppies — California’s state flower — blanket swaths of the protected land.

“It almost looks like Cheeto dust,” she said, “like somebody had Cheetos on their fingers and just smeared it on the landscape.”

Poppies here have typically peaked around mid-April, but variable weather in recent years has made it hard to predict, she said. Klosterman believes right now is likely the zenith.

Also blooming now: goldfields, purple grape soda lupine and owl’s clover. Wear described the latter, also purple, as looking like a “short owl with little eyes looking at you and a little beak.”

An SUV drives through blooms near the reserve. “It almost looks like … somebody had Cheetos on their fingers and just smeared it on the landscape,” said Lori Wear, an interpreter at the reserve.

(Kayla Bartkowski / Los Angeles Times)

On Sunday, Klosterman experienced the blooms for himself, using his technology as a guide.

It offers predictions in two forms. The first is the amount of the valley — shown in a satellite image — covered in poppies and goldfields, expressed as a percentage. The other is an overlay of orange and yellow splotches on the land.

The map showed a fairly high concentration of poppies near a stretch of Highway 138. He went there and, lo and behold, vibrant flowers awaited him. He sent proof: a smiling selfie in front of a sea of blossoms.

Klosterman’s tool may help answer arguably more complex questions than poppy or no poppy, such as a more precise understanding of the conditions the flowers need to thrive.

Experts know rain is key, but it’s more complicated than that.

Steve Klosterman takes a selfie in a field of California poppies.

(Steve Klosterman)

Heavy rain can supercharge invasive grasses, crowding out the blooms. Natives actually tend to do better after several years of drought, once invasives not adapted to the arid climate die out. That’s what led to an epic superbloom in 2017, Joan Dudney, an assistant professor of forest ecology at UC Santa Barbara, told The Times in 2024.

Klosterman wondered if the recent heatwave would desiccate them. But his model didn’t show that, and neither did his trip. So it’s possible other factors play a significant role in their persistence, such as length of day.

The model could also shed light on what could happen to the flowers as the climate warms. Will they migrate to the north? Will there be fewer blooms?

To game that out, Klosterman said you could invent and plug in a weather forecast with higher temperatures.

For now, Klosterman’s forecast is limited to the Antelope Valley. But if it expands to other areas, and other flower types, it could help people like Karina Silva.

Silva woke up at 5 a.m. last Wednesday to travel from her Las Vegas home to Death Valley National Park, hoping to beat the heat and the crowds to the superbloom.

But several hours later, she and her husband, David, were still trying to find it.

The hillside behind her was sprinkled with desert golds, but the display fell short of the riotous eruption of flowers posted on social media. The superbloom ended in early March, according to park officials.

“I was just thinking it was going to be this explosion of different colors,” Silva said by the side of the road overlooking Badwater Basin.

So much has happened over the past seven days, including the Carabao Cup final, World Indoor Athletics Championships and possibly the most clinical performance of all time in football’s Championship.

That last one’s still up for debate, but what isn’t is 4% of quizzers getting full marks in last week’s edition. Will you make the grade this week?

After more quizzes? Go to our dedicated Football Quizzes and Sports Quizzes pages and sign up for notifications to get the latest quizzes sent straight to your device.

WETHERSPOONS has confirmed that more pubs are opening in Spain, after the success of their first in mainland Europe.

Last month, the famous pub chain opened its first pub outside of the UK at Alicante Airport.

Following this, two more pubs will now open at Barcelona-El Prat Airport in the capital city.

The first one will be at Terminal 1, set to open by September 2026.

This will be followed by a second at Terminal 2 by January 2027.

Passengers will have to go through security to drink at them as they are both airside rather than landside.

Read more on Wetherspoons

SI YOU THERE

Wetherspoons to open first EVER pub in Spain with very unique menu items

HOLA-DAY

I visited ‘Wetherspoons of Spain’ where jugs of beer cost £1.50 and lunch is £1

Little else is known about the pubs, including what they will be called, but they will have space for almost 600 passengers.

You can get an early drink too – they’ll be open every day from 5am to 11pm, including real ale.

The menu is likely to be similar to the Alicante menu, which is mainly the British classics with a few Spanish dishes as well.

Drink prices haven’t been confirmed, although the also similar to the Spanish pub, beers are around £3.50.

Wetherspoon boss Tim Martin said: ” We are delighted to have secured two fantastic sites at Barcelona airport.

“In the short time since opening our pub at Alicante airport has proven popular with travellers and we are confident we can replicate that at our two new pubs in Barcelona.”

He added that they aim to open more pubs in mainland Europe in the next few years, particularly at airports.

The Sun’s Assistant Travel Editor Sophie Swietochowski was one of the first to try the new Wetherspoons in Alicante, called Castell de Santa Barbara.

She explained: “The pub has pitched close to the gates for UK flights to draw in the near 650,000 Brits that pass through this airport monthly.

“Floor-to-ceiling windows flood the small space with light, while candy floss, glossy tiles give it a warm atmosphere.

“There’s a tea and coffee station in the corner, while behind the bar there’s not a whiff of scampi fries or Walkers in sight but instead European holiday favourite, Lays.

“This one boasts something that all other airport Wetherspoons do not, however – an outdoor terrace, where you can catch those last glimpses of Spanish sunshine before jetting off home to drizzly England.”

In the mean time, Spain is home to a dupe pub called Weatherspains, as well as 100 Montaditos which is dubbed the Spanish Wetherspoons.

Staying in the UK? Wetherspoons is also rolling out more pubs at a number of Haven holiday parks across the country.

The Venezuelan leader, who is accused of plotting to traffic cocaine, denies all charges as part of an imperialist plot.

Former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is set to return to a New York courtroom as he seeks to have his drug trafficking indictment dismissed.

Thursday marks the first time that Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, will be in court since a January arraignment at which he protested his abduction by United States military forces and pleaded not guilty to all charges against him.

Maduro, 63, and Flores, 69, remain jailed at a detention centre in Brooklyn. Neither has requested bail.

Judge Alvin Hellerstein has yet to set a trial date, though that could potentially be announced at the hearing.

Maduro, who has led Venezuela since 2013, was abducted in Caracas by US special forces on January 3.

His lawyer contends that Washington is violating the deposed leader’s constitutional rights by blocking Venezuelan government funds from being used to pay his legal costs.

The former president and Flores continue to enjoy some support in Venezuela, with murals and billboards across the capital, Caracas, demanding their return.

However, while Maduro’s ruling party remains in control, he himself has been gradually sidelined within the government led by acting President Delcy Rodriguez.

Rodriguez has removed key figures loyal to Maduro, including his longtime defence minister and attorney general. She has also reshaped state institutions, named new ambassadors, and dismantled core elements of the self-declared socialist project that has governed Venezuela for more than 20 years.

Accusations of helping Colombian rebels

US prosecutors have accused Maduro and several alleged associates of “narco-terrorism” and plotting to traffic cocaine into the United States. If convicted, the charges could carry maximum penalties of life in prison under US law.

Congress created the narcoterrorism statute 20 years ago to target drug traffickers who finance activities the US considers “terrorism”.

Since then, 83 people, including Maduro, have been charged with violating it.

According to the Reuters news agency, the 2006 statute at issue has produced four trial convictions. Two were later overturned over issues stemming from witness credibility.

Maduro is also accused of leading a conspiracy in which officials in his government helped move cocaine through Venezuela in collaboration with traffickers, including the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which Washington labelled a terrorist organisation from 1997 to 2021.

Maduro and his fellow indicted officials have always denied wrongdoing, saying the US charges are part of an imperialist plot to harm Venezuela.

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen said on Wednesday that the US has “clearly made a mistake” in attacking Iran, Anadolu reports.

“What I see is that the United States clearly made a mistake, thinking the Iranian regime would fall within a few days. It has not fallen. The Iranian regime is extremely strong,” Le Pen, head of the National Rally (RN), told France Inter radio.

She said Trump’s war goals are “erratic” and questioned the ultimate objective of the conflict, adding that “no one knows” what he seeks to achieve.

Le Pen underscored that the war has affected several Gulf countries and caused a heavy imbalance in energy supplies.

READ: French president says US-Israel attacks on Iran ‘outside the framework of international law’

“Russia is Hungary’s energy supplier,” and “Ukraine hinders Russia’s oil supply to Hungary,” she added.

The National Rally leader described Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban as a “symbol of resistance” to the European Commission.

“It is perfectly natural that I come to support our allies during electoral situations,” she said, stressing that she does not interfere in Hungary’s internal affairs.

Regional escalation has continued to flare since the US and Israel launched a joint offensive on Iran on Feb. 28, killing so far over 1,300 people, including then-Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

Iran has retaliated with drone and missile strikes targeting Israel, along with Jordan, Iraq, and Gulf countries hosting US military assets, causing casualties and damage to infrastructure while disrupting global markets and aviation.

READ: Iran calls for urgent UN Human Rights Council meeting over school bombing

Before becoming a global phenomenon in the 2000s thanks to artists like Aventura, Monchy y Alexandra and Prince Royce, and before being declared an “intangible cultural heritage of humanity” by UNESCO in 2019, bachata was — and continues to be — the soundtrack of the Dominican Republic.

The importance of the genre to the people of the Caribbean nation is at the heart of “Agridulce,” a music documentary that had its world premiere at this month’s South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas. Filmed over the course of five years, the feature follows four young students at Academia de Bachata, a music conservatory in the beachside resort town of Cabarete. It’s the only school of its kind in the world.

Academia de Bachata was founded in 2013 by music producer Benjamin De Menil. After traveling to the Dominican Republic to record for nearly three decades, De Menil says he wanted to create something that would ensure that the next generation continues the traditions of bachata.

“One of the things I loved about the bachata musicians I was working with early on is that they were such natural musicians. There was never any sheet music, so whenever we were going to record I would say, ‘Let’s do this song and it goes like this,’ and they would listen to it for a little bit before they figured it out and they were playing it,” he said. “I thought that we could somehow harness that energy in a more organized and educational format and make a school where we’re helping young children become professional musicians within this genre that has a lot of opportunity.”

De Menil partnered with DREAM Project, a nonprofit organization that did work in Cabarete, and launched Academia de Bachata in 2013. Since then, the school has provided hundreds of children with a free musical education.

“There were a lot of things we were trying to figure out along the way about what the best way to teach this music was because this wasn’t your typical conservatory. We were focusing on the traditions passed on rather than some style of music that there are already textbooks for.”

To make “Agridulce,” De Menil, who produced the film, reached out to Frank Pavich, director of the 2013 “Jodorowsky’s Dune,” the cult classic documentary about avant-garde filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky’s quixotic and failed attempt to adapt Frank Herbert’s 1965 sci-fi novel “Dune.” It didn’t take much to bring him on onboard.

“Ben contacted me and told me about the project. I responded with what’s Bachata?,” the Croatian American director said. “I had never even heard of the musical genre. And then he sent me some music. He sent me footage that he had shot of [Cabarete] and of the school. And it was unlike anything I’d ever seen. It was so colorful and so incredible that I just wanted to jump on right away. I was like, ‘Great, when can we go down there and start shooting? It was really that fast.”

Pavich says now he hears bachata everywhere.

“I live between Switzerland and Croatia and now that I know how to pick it up, I hear it in cars passing by a cafe in Geneva and in Croatia,” he said. “It’s everywhere, it’s infiltrated everything in the best way possible.”

“Agridulce” is an ethnomusicological documentary — it captures the music of a specific place and people and shows how the tradition is kept alive — that also doubles as a coming of age story. The film follows students of varying ages — Edickson, Frandy, Orianny and Yerian — out of the classroom, showing us moments of intimacy with their families and friends while also giving us a slice of quotidian life in Cabarete.

As such, “Agridulce” doesn’t shy away from the political tensions of the beachside resort. Much like in the U.S., immigration is a contentious topic in the Dominican Republic — the country shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, which has seen an exodus of its people over the decade.

De Menil and Pavich said that nearly a third of Academia de Bachata’s student body is of Haitian descent, and that they would have had to go out of their way to not include one of them in the film.

This tension plays out in the storyline of Frendy, a magnetic student of Haitian descent who uses bachata to fit in.

“Many young people are in that position of being made to feel they don’t belong at that time in life when a person most wants to find their place,” De Menil said. “We see that music can help kids, particularly immigrant kids, find belonging.”

“The film ultimately speaks to the way that culture and shared history contribute to the development of authentic, lived creativity,” said South by Southwest consulting programmer Jim Kolmar. “It’s something innate and inevitable, and ‘Agridulce’ really explores that beautifully. Obviously it’s full of incredible music, but the deeper cultural context is essential, and seeing it through the perspective of the students at Academia de Bachata helps us connect the dots.”

Three weeks into spring practice, USC football coaches are making one thing clear: 95% of their best will not be accepted or tolerated. Wednesday’s practice started with some of the players doing up-downs after forgetting equipment.

“It was a good message from some of our staff and leaders in terms of the approach that we need to have every day that we come out here,” Trojans coach Lincoln Riley said.

A sentiment that was shared by junior defensive tackle Jide Abasiri: “We just have to be better prepared.”

After the hiccup, Riley said the team responded well and it was back to business.

USC defensive tackle Jide Abasiri (97) is pushing himself to be a more vocal leader as a the Trojans help young players get acclimated to the program.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

After a spirited day on the field on Tuesday following a one-week spring break, Wednesday’s practice was scripted with the intent to cause stress and create discomfort — stacking multiple two-minute drills after a 6 a.m. team meeting. The goal is to build a no-excuses program.

“It’s invaluable time, invaluable reps,” Riley said. “Coming out and working plays and the techniques, great. When you start putting those guys in real-life situations and you make it really difficult on them, you really start to see who rises up and they’re great teaching moments for these guys and for the team in terms of what we want to be and what we want them to be.”

Regardless of the mental challenges Riley applied, the Trojans’ morale remains positive as players compete for spots in the lineup. The energy of the team comes from within, Riley said.

“It allows us as a staff to really hone in on pushing these guys, and coaching and critiquing and correcting,” Riley said. “And they’re taking it well.”

Attention to detail has always been important at USC, but Abasiri said this year there is an extra emphasis being placed on play-specific details. The staff has implemented drills that focus on a player’s specific movement or job during various plays.

Entering his third season with the Trojans, Abasiri said he felt like he needed to be a team leader. USC landed the No. 1 class in the nation for the first time since 2006. With so many new young players joining spring practice and a limited number of Trojans with three years of experience, Abasiri felt it was his job to lead.

“Just being an older guy, I feel like it’s important for me to … help them just come along,” Abasiri said.

So far, his advice has been to “just have fun with it.”

“I mean, obviously, stay on top of everything and all your stuff, but I feel like people get so stressed and so caught up in what they’re doing that they forget that this is supposed to be enjoyable,” Abasiri said.

The coaching staff, meanwhile, is balancing teaching schemes and the playbook.

“You have to be able to do both at this level,” Riley said. “The new guys that came in did have a pretty good foundation. A lot of them came from really good programs. A lot of them had a pretty good working football knowledge to where when we got started with them, it wasn’t like you felt like you were starting from literal square one.”

Return game is still unsettled

USC is still working to identify its top kickoff and punt return options.

“We haven’t done a lot of live returns yet,” Riley said. “We’re just trying to figure out who really fields the ball well, who understands it, who makes decisions and honestly, the returners, they’re showing us a lot of what they can do just in the offensive and defensive periods.”

The coaching staff has a pretty good idea who some of the best players in that position are, but at the moment, they just want to develop the skills, from a return standpoint.

March 26 (UPI) — On this date in history:

In 1830, the Book of Mormon was published. There are about 200 surviving first editions of the book, one of which was stolen before being returned to its owner in 2013.

In 1953, U.S. Dr. Jonas Salk announced he had successfully tested a vaccine against poliomyelitis, the virus that causes polio.

In 1971, East Pakistan declared independence as Bangladesh, sparking the Bangladesh Liberation War. The war ended Dec. 16, 1971, when West Pakistan surrendered.

In 1975, the city of Hue in South Vietnam fell to the North Vietnamese army.

In 1979, Israel and Egypt signed a peace treaty at the White House, ending 30 years of hostilities.

In 1991, Mali’s dictator, Gen. Moussa Traore, was overthrown in a violent overnight military coup. Fifty-nine people died.

In 1992, former heavyweight boxing champion Mike Tyson, convicted of raping a teenage beauty pageant contestant, was sentenced to six years in prison. Tyson was released after three years.

File Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI

In 1997, 39 members of the Heaven’s Gate religious cult were found dead in a large house in Rancho Mirage, Calif., in what authorities said was a mass suicide.

In 1998, Bill Clinton became the first U.S. president to visit South Africa.

In 1999, Dr. Jack Kevorkian, the euthanasia advocate, was convicted of second-degree murder in an Oakland County, Mich., courtroom for the videotaped “medicide” of a man suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease.

File Photo by Vaughn Gurganian/UPI

In 2000, acting Russian President Vladimir Putin was elected president by a more than 20 percent margin. Putin won a third term in 2012.

In 2014, a National Labor Relations Board regional director ruled that Northwestern University scholarship football players were employees of the school and entitled under federal law to form a union.

In 2020, new unemployment claims in the United States surged to 3.3. million, the largest weekly increase in U.S. history to date amid job losses related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2024, a Singapore-based cargo ship struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, causing a catastrophic collapse of the structure. Six people died in the failure of the bridge, which crossed the Patapsco River.

File Photo by David Tulis/UPI

EXPLAINER

The US and Israel’s war on Iran is intensifying, as Trump again claims Iranian leaders want to ‘make a deal’.

The United States and Israel’s war on Iran continues, with an Al Jazeera correspondent in Tehran reporting strikes are “increasing in number and in intensity” amid conflicting claims about whether negotiations are taking place.

US President Donald Trump says talks are happening, but Iran rejects the talks, saying it will continue to “resist” US aggression.

On Thursday, Iran carried out retaliatory strikes against Israel and several Gulf countries, as the Middle East conflict sees no signs of ending, and global energy and food prices continue to rise.

In Iran

• Intensifying attacks: US-Israeli attacks on Iran are “increasing in number and in intensity”, according to Al Jazeera correspondent, with Israel announcing extensive strikes on central Isfahan. Alongside US forces, Israel has launched a “wave of extensive strikes” across Iran.
• Civilian casualties reported: Iranian media reported that two teenage boys were killed in a recent US-Israeli strike on a residential area in a village in the county of Shiraz.
• Iran talks: US President Donald Trump insisted that Iran was taking part in peace talks.
• Iran chooses ‘resistance’: Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tehran will continue its “resistance” and does not intend to negotiate.
• US targets missile capacities: The US has hit two-thirds of Iran’s production facilities for missiles and drones, a top officer said.
• Threat to Iranian island: Tehran warned enemies may try to occupy one of its islands with support from an unnamed regional country.
• Iran’s leverage: Jane Foley, an analyst from Rabobank, noted that Tehran’s position on negotiations leaves the ball firmly in their court. Because the critical Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed, she suggests Iran could have the power to dictate the terms of any resolution.
• New toll legislation: The Iranian parliament is preparing a draft law that would mandate the collection of tolls and duties from ships and tankers transiting the Strait of Hormuz, treating the waterway like a standard transit corridor.

In the Gulf

• Hezbollah plot uncovered in Kuwait: Authorities arrested six people allegedly linked to Hezbollah, accused of planning assassinations in the Gulf state, the Interior Ministry said.
• Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabia’s Defence Ministry on Thursday morning announced the interception and destruction of a drone in the Eastern Province. Its air defence systems intercepted and destroyed at least two dozen drones targeting the Eastern Province, home to the majority of the kingdom’s oil facilities, on Wednesday.
• Bahrain: A fire broke out at a facility in the Muharraq Governorate due to what the Interior Ministry described as “Iranian aggression”.
• United Arab Emirates: The UAE’s Defence Ministry said on Thursday that its air defence systems have been actively responding to and intercepting incoming missiles and drones from Iran.

In the US

• Trump says Iran wants a deal: Trump again claims Iranian leaders want to “make a deal so badly” but are afraid to say so “because they figure they’ll be killed by their own people”.
• Trump threatens ‘hell’ if no deal: Trump is ready to “unleash hell” on Iran if Tehran does not accept a deal to end the war, the White House warned on Wednesday.
• Strategic posturing: Jason Campbell, a former Pentagon official, said US threats to “hit Iran harder” are more about signalling than intensifying attacks.
• Intentional vagueness: Campbell told Al Jazeera that Trump is deliberately omitting specific details because he wants the Iranian regime to believe the US is fully capable and willing to execute these harsher attacks.

In Israel

• Missile salvoes: Israel’s army on Thursday morning said it had detected a wave of missiles from Iran heading towards the country, the second salvo in less than 30 minutes.
• Rockets and missiles targeting Israel: Iranian missiles continue to target central and northern Israel. Additionally, Hezbollah has fired volleys of rockets into the Western Galilee region.

In Iraq, Lebanon

• Gulf issues Iraq demand: Gulf states and Jordan have urged Iraq to stop attacks by pro-Iran armed groups from its territory.
• Ground clashes with Hezbollah: Israeli troops have crossed the border into Lebanese territory and are actively engaging in ground combat. Hezbollah says its fighters are continuing to clash with invading Israeli troops in south Lebanon.
• Defending Lebanese soil: Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Naim Qassem stated that the group is now in a war against both the US and Israel and will do everything it can to defend Lebanese territory.

Oil markets and food

• Oil prices climb: Oil prices have climbed higher amid fading hopes of de-escalation in the Iran war following Tehran’s rejection that talks with the US are under way.
• Food supply shocks: Antony Currie, a columnist for Breakingviews, warned that the Iran war will likely have a more severe impact on global food security than Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

Like millions of pop-culture-obsessed Americans, Howard Stern is bingeing FX’s “Love Story” and soaking up the nostalgia of ’90s-era New York, but unlike most of America, the radio host was buddies with the series’ real-life stars, and even graced the cover of JFK Jr.’s George magazine.

“I had done the cover for George magazine,” Stern said on his eponymous SiriusXM radio show Monday. “So I knew John Kennedy Jr., and he actually showed up to the shoot. It’s one of the worst covers I ever did. And I’ve done a lot of bad ones.”

John F. Kennedy Jr. launched George magazine alongside his partner, Michael J. Berman, in September 1995. With the tagline “Not Just Politics as Usual,” the magazine married pop culture and politics in an unprecedented way and aimed to flip the script on mainstream political discourse. The covers were legendary in their own right and featured supermodels, rock stars, Oscar winners and action film stars dressed up as the nation’s first president.

And, of course, radio jokester and provocateur Stern.

“They convinced me to be chopping down a cherry tree with a chainsaw, dressed up in colonial garb, dressed up, like, I guess I was supposed to be George Washington, but George Washington didn’t wear the s— I was wearing,” he continued.

“It was 100 years ago, and I remember I wasn’t doing a lot of magazine covers by choice,” Stern said.

When John Kennedy Jr., whom Stern described as “literally American royalty and the nicest guy in the world,” asked him to pose for the cover of the April/May 1996 issue, themed “The Virtue Issue,” Stern told his agent, “Of course I’ll do it.”

“I went down there, and they were like, ‘It’s George magazine. We have a theme cover. You can’t be in your regular clothes. We want you to be, like, George Washington,” he continued. “They must have caught me on the right day, because I was incredibly amenable. Normally, I would have gone, ‘I’m not wearing this s—.’”

Stern said he got the full supermodel treatment. “You know what John and the photographer did, that thing that they do to supermodels, ‘Gorgeous! You look great! Oh, man, this is the greatest cover. This is our best cover!’ They’re yelling while the guy’s clicking away, and I’m posing like I’m Cindy Crawford, like I’m one of the Hadid sisters,” he continues. “I’m standing there thinking I look handsome with my chainsaw and Louis the 14th [outfit.]”

After Stern went on dragging everything from the “pilgrim shoes” to the “poofy shirt” he wore for the shoot, he revealed that he actually knew Carolyn Bessette Kennedy as well, although he was a bit cagey about how exactly he knew her.

“She was very lovely,” he said. “She was a really nice woman. I don’t want to go into how I knew her, but I knew her.”

When Stern’s co-host, Robin Quivers, pushed him on why he couldn’t divulge how he knew the former Calvin Klein publicist, he said, “I just know enough to keep my mouth shut about that. Some stuff you do have to keep private. But anyway, I knew her. “

According to Disney, “Love Story: John F. Kennedy Jr. & Carolyn Bessette” is FX’s most-watched limited series ever on Hulu and Disney+, with reports that the first five episodes have been streamed more than 25 million hours since the Ryan Murphy series premiered in February.

The show, starring newcomer Paul Anthony Kelly as Kennedy and Sarah Pidgeon as Bessette, will air its finale Thursday.

INDIANAPOLIS — Even LeBron James couldn’t muster the energy. With a wide-open lane in the ending moments of the Lakers’ 137-130 win over the Indiana Pacers, James simply dumped off a pass to Jake LaRavia. The 24-year-old had hops to put the finishing touches on the Lakers’ successful six-game trip.

Tired and shorthanded, the Lakers punctuated their extended trip with a fifth win Wednesday. Luka Doncic effortlessly scored his league-leading 14th 40-point game of the season, 43 points and seven assists.

The NBA’s leading scorer appeared ready to settle for simply his 11th consecutive 30-point performance — which is tied for the longest streak of such games in the last 20 years — after the Lakers opened a 20-point lead entering the fourth quarter, but he returned to the game because Indiana, despite having the worst record in the NBA, was still pressuring with its starters. The Pacers (16-57) trailed by as many as 29 in the third quarter and trimmed the deficit to six with 27.9 seconds left.

“I think everybody was a little bit tired,” Doncic said. “It’s been a long trip, but we got the win in the end; that’s what matters.”

The wear and tear of an intense trip in which the first five games all came down to the final minutes didn’t faze Doncic. He nearly outscored the Pacers alone in the first quarter, putting up 21 while the Pacers trailed 45-28. He threw a lob to Maxi Kleber for a dunk in the third quarter then pumped both of his fists. Doncic nailed a step-back three from the top of the key, held his follow through and hopped backwards on one leg.

The Lakers (46-26) toyed with the struggling Pacers (16-56) for much of the night. Indiana’s Andrew Nesmith and Pascal Siakam fell over each other trying to contest a Euro-step layup by James, who then posed over them and pointed to the Pacers players. Nesmith and Siakam could only grimace at each other.

James finished with 23 points, nine rebounds and nine assists. Austin Reaves had 25 points and eight assists Jaxson Hayes dunked seven times as the center had his first double-double of the season with 21 points and 10 rebounds, both season highs.

While players typically would drag through the end of such a long trip, Hayes found home-cooked fuel. Hayes stayed with his parents in his hometown of Cincinnati on Monday night after the Lakers’ win in Detroit. He woke up to a full home-cooked breakfast from his mother, who stacked plates of pancakes, eggs and bacon in front of her son. He scoped out properties he’s hoping to buy in the summer and hung out with his dad all day. The family made the hour-and-a-half drive to Indianapolis and had dinner Tuesday night.

“Best way to end the trip for sure,” Hayes said with a blissful smile.

Lakers center Jaxson Hayes, who finished with 21 points and 10 rebounds, battles Pacers center Jay Huff for a rebound during the first half Wednesday.

(Michael Conroy / Associated Press)

Hayes brought the energy for the shorthanded Lakers, who were without Deandre Ayton (back soreness), Marcus Smart (right ankle contusion) and Rui Hachimura (right calf soreness). Smart and Hachimura remain day-to-day as they missed their second consecutive games while Ayton was ruled out immediately before the game. Even the reinforcements were shorthanded as rookie Adou Thiero missed the game because of left knee soreness.

Thiero, who has been back and forth between the NBA and the G League‘s South Bay Lakers, played 29 minutes in a G League game on Saturday and flew directly to Detroit for Monday’s game. He played two minutes against the Pistons, making his first appearance in a first half of a game since Dec. 7, but his knee didn’t feel good the following morning, Redick said. The team held the forward out for precautionary reasons, Redick said, as Thiero has struggled with injuries in both knees this season.

The Lakers relied on another part-time G League contributor to carry them through a sloppy fourth quarter. Bronny James had four points, two steals and one block in 13:22 off the bench. Lakers coach JJ Redick said the second-year guard’s pull-up free-throw line jumper with 3:55 to go “was big to kind of settle us.” It stopped a 6-0 run by the Pacers.

It was just the second game father and son have shared the court together this season. The elder James had the perfect shirt for the occasion. He walked out of the locker room wearing a gray T-shirt with a photo of him and his son on the front. Across James’ shoulders on the back read “The Chosen 1.” Across the bottom of the shirt, it read “The 1 who chose.”

“Felt like this was a game we really needed him,” Redick said of Bronny James. “It was a game that [we needed] his athleticism, his defense. … I think the biggest thing with him is he’s got a lot of confidence right now.”

The Lakers have won 13 of their last 15 games to vault to third place in the competitive Western Conference. They have six of their last nine regular-season games at home and, after this grueling stretch, they can’t get there soon enough.

“Do we have to do this?” Redick said quietly as he sat down for his postgame news conference.

He knew everyone in the room wanted to get home.

March 26 (UPI) — Britain’s armed forces and law enforcement have been authorized to board sanctioned vessels of Russia’s so-called shadow fleet, Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced Wednesday, as London targets a key revenue source funding the Kremlin’s war against Ukraine.

In an effort to hinder Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ability to wage war, Britain, along with other European nations, has focused on his fleet of semi-clandestine tankers used to evade sanctions to ship and sell oil.

London has sanctioned at least 544 of these ships and the EU has blacklisted nearly 600.

Russia’s shadow fleet is estimated to consist of anywhere from several hundred to more than 1,000 vessels, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies. In September, this fleet transported a seasonal high of 3.7 million barrels of oil a day, real-time intelligence, analytics and data-tracking firm Kpler said.

Britain’s armed forces will be able to interdict vessels London has sanctioned and found transiting its waters, Starmer said a day before he is to arrive at the Joint Expeditionary Force Summit in Helsinki, Finland, where leaders will discuss regional security amid the U.S.-Israel war with Iran and how they can combat Russia’s escalating aggression.

“Putin is rubbing his hands at the war in the Middle East because he thinks higher oil prices will let him line his pockets,” Starmer said in a statement.

“That’s why we’re going after his shadow fleet even harder, not just keeping Britain safe but starving Putin’s war machine of the dirty profits that fund his barbaric campaign in Ukraine.”

According to 10 Downing Street, a suspect vessel will first be reviewed by law enforcement, military and energy specialists, who will then make a recommendation to ministers before an operation is carried out.

After the ship is detained, criminal proceedings may be brought against the vessel’s owners, operators and crew on allegations of breaching British sanctions, it said.

Starmer said that Putin and those in his inner circle “should be in no doubt: We will always defend our sovereignty and stand with Ukraine for as long as it takes.”

The announcement comes months after Britain aided the United States in seizing Bella 1 on Jan. 7. Following the operation, British ministers ordered the development of plans for London to carry out future, similar operations targeting Russia’s shadow fleet, resulting in Wednesday’s announcement, according to 10 Downing Street.

A week into the United States-Israeli war on Iran, and Iran’s attacks on its Gulf neighbours, Jaya Khuntia spoke – as he often did – to his Doha-based son Kuna on the phone.

It was March 6, about 10pm, and Khuntia and the family were worried. “He told me, ‘I am safe here, don’t worry,’” the father recalled from the conversation with Kuna.

It was the last time they spoke.

The next day, the family in Naikanipalli village of India’s eastern Odisha state received a phone call from Kuna’s roommate telling them that the son had suffered a heart attack after hearing the sound of missiles and debris from interceptions falling near their residence. He collapsed and was later declared dead. Kuna’s body reached home days later.

Al Jazeera cannot independently confirm the cause of Kuna’s death, but the family of the 25-year-old, who worked as a pipe fitter in Qatar’s capital, is among millions across South Asia directly affected by the war in the Middle East.

Of the eight people killed in the United Arab Emirates in Iranian attacks, two were Emirati military personnel, a third a Palestinian civilian, and the remaining five were from South Asia: Three from Pakistan, and one each from Bangladesh and Nepal. All three people killed in Oman were from India. An Indian national and a Bangladeshi national are the only deaths in Saudi Arabia.

Migrant workers from South Asia total nearly 21 million people in the Gulf nations, a third of the total population of the region. At stake, for their families back home, is the safety of their loved ones and the future of their dreams.

The Khuntia family had taken on a 300,000-rupee ($3200) debt in 2025 for the marriages of their two daughters. Kuna’s income in Doha – where he had moved only in late 2025 – of 35,000 rupees ($372) was helping them collect what they needed to pay back the loan. Kuna had been sending back about 15,000 rupees ($164) every month.

“We thought our suffering was finally ending,” Jaya said, his voice trembling. “My only son would say, ‘Baba, don’t worry, I am here.’ He was our only hope… our everything.”

That hope is now extinguished. “That one call finished us,” Jaya cried. “He promised to return after clearing our debts … but he came back in a coffin. We have nothing left now. Losing our only son is the biggest debt we have to live with.”

‘I thought we would be next’

In all, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE – the six Arab countries in the Gulf – host 35 million foreign nationals, who form a majority of their total population, 62 million.

They include 9 million people from India, 5 million each from Pakistan and Bangladesh, 1.2 million from Nepal, and 650,000 from Sri Lanka. Most of them are engaged in blue-collar work, building or supporting the industries and services that are at the heart of the Gulf’s success and prosperity.

But since the US and Israel launched their war on Iran, these migrant workers have often been among the most vulnerable. That vulnerability extends beyond deaths and injuries to the very nature of their work: Oil refineries, construction areas, airports and docks, where many work, have been targeted in Iranian attacks.

The suspension of work at many of these facilities, coupled with fears of a major economic downturn in the region, has also left many workers and their families worried about the future of their jobs.

Hamza*, a Pakistani migrant labourer working at an oil storage facility in the UAE, recalled a recent attack that he witnessed. “A drone struck a storage unit right in front of us. We were completely shaken. Most of us there are from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh.

“We couldn’t sleep for nights after that. The drone was so close that it could have killed us, too,” Hamza added. “For a moment, I thought we would be next.”

Despite these dangers, he said, leaving is not an option.

“We want to go back, but we can’t,” Hamza said. “Our families depend on us. It’s dangerous here, but if we stop working, they will have nothing to eat. We have no choice.”

Experts say Hamza’s sentiment is common across South Asian blue-collar workers in the Gulf, because of poverty and limited employment opportunities back home.

Imran Khan, a faculty member at the New Delhi Institute of Management working on migration economics, said migrant labourers from South Asia are often driven by desperation to take up jobs in the Middle East. He said Western countries have, in recent years, dramatically raised entry barriers for less-educated blue-collar foreign workers.

“These workers are the worst affected during crises – whether war or natural disasters,” he says. “I have been speaking to several migrant labourers, particularly Indians in the Middle East, and many are living in distress since the conflict began.”

But, like Hamza, most cannot afford to leave, Khan said.

“They cannot simply quit. Their income would stop immediately, and there are very limited opportunities back home,” he explained. “They have families to support, and without these jobs, survival becomes difficult.”

Families – and societies – that depend on remittances

Middle Eastern countries remain a key source of remittances for South Asian nations such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. The remittances these five countries receive from the region, $103bn, are comparable to Oman’s total gross domestic product (GDP).

Just the remittances that India receives from the Gulf, $50bn, are more than Bahrain’s entire GDP. Pakistan receives $38.3bn in remittances, Bangladesh $13.5bn, Sri Lanka $8bn, and Nepal $5bn.

With the recent escalation of conflict in the Middle East, experts warn these flows could be significantly affected, especially if Gulf economies contract and layoffs follow.

Faisal Abbas, an expert in international economics and director at the Centre of Excellence on Population and Wellbeing Studies, a Pakistan-based research institute, said remittances from the Middle East form a crucial economic backbone for South Asian nations, not just families.

“Remittances are a critical pillar for Pakistan and other South Asian economies, and a large share comes from Middle Eastern countries,” he explained. “If the situation worsens, it will not be a positive development for the region.”

Pakistan’s remittances from the Gulf constitute nearly 10 percent of its GDP, about $400bn.

Abbas added that the effect may extend beyond remittance flows. “Migration patterns could also be disrupted. Many workers may return home, while those planning to migrate might reconsider,” he said. “This could further increase unemployment in a region already facing job shortages.”

Unlike Hamza, a number of South Asian workers are planning to return home.

Noor*, a migrant worker from Bangladesh employed at an oil facility in Saudi Arabia, said he no longer feels safe and plans to return home once his contract ends.

“I will never come back here again,” he said. “It’s too dangerous. We can’t even sleep at night. The fear never leaves us.”

Noor said drone attacks had occurred close to his workplace. “We saw it happen in front of us,” he said. “That fear stays with you… It doesn’t go away.”

His family, too, is deeply affected. “My children cry every time they call me. They are scared for my life,” he added.

He said he knows that returning to Bangladesh would mean more economic hardship for his family. But Noor said he had made up his mind.

“I would rather go back and struggle to survive with my family than live here in constant fear,” he said. “At least there, I will be with them.”

*Some names have been changed at the request of workers who fear retribution from contractors for speaking to the media.

Imagine cutting the cost of accommodation on your next holiday to about £5 a day. You can have a whole house, rather than just a bedroom. And you can go almost anywhere in the world and stay as long as you like, within reason. Welcome to house swapping.

You’re sceptical, I know. I was, too. Our terrace house was too small. Too overflowing with stuff. The 1980s kitchen was too old (and battered). We aren’t in a nice enough neighbourhood. Who would want to stay here? Lots of people, it turned out.

Our first swap was with a pair of retired Australian judges who had lived in the UK decades before. They came to our house first and, over a cup of tea and cake in our living room, we talked about where to find a good pint and the best fish and chips locally, as well as mastering the idiosyncrasies of how to run our dishwasher. They told us about their favourite local parks (warned us about snakes) and when to put out the bins, before we headed for our month-long stay at their house in Perth. It’s these conversations and connections that really make house swapping special.

Yes, we have stayed in some truly extraordinary homes. There was a house in Florida where we watched rocket launches while lounging in the pool; a clapboard cottage with a hot tub in the Stockholm suburbs; and a swanky five-bedroom villa in the south of France that we shared with friends. We couldn’t have afforded any of these if it were not for house swapping. In fact, the swaps themselves are free, but I pay $235 (£177) a year to use Home Exchange, a house swap booking platform, which works out at about £5 a night for the 35 or so nights I used it last year.

The greatest pleasure, however, is in the genuine relationships forged. Through the messages exchanged before and during the swap, friendships are created. You become, however briefly, part of each other’s lives. We have swapped pets and cars, and watered plants along the way. For a week, we became passionately involved in helping pick a summer school for our Basque guests’ kids. Warm welcomes are universal. We’ve had olive oil from the garden grove of a house in Greece and marmalade from Seville. In return, guests at our house can expect to find sparkling wine from Kent, Essex jam and a pile of Cadbury chocolate bars to try – French guests are big fans of the Crunchie.

Even in challenging moments we found friendship, such as when our shower sprang a leak and rained all over the dining table. We had to arrange an emergency repair via video call with our Spanish guests, an Albanian plumber and a UK insurer, all while frantically looking for a reliable phone signal in the countryside. The babel of languages resulted in a tube of silicone being applied and both parties leaving five-star reviews.

I won’t go back to hotels. I have saved tens of thousands of pounds over the past five years, but what has really hooked me is the interactions with hosts and guests that make my holidays more fulfilling. It’s like having a friend everywhere you go.

Q&A – Everything you need to know

Will I be comfortable house swapping?
If you’re precious about the things in your home or anxious about someone sleeping in your bed, a swap is not for you. Likewise, if spending the last day of your holiday cleaning is a deal-breaker.

How do I house swap?
For some sites, you pay a flat annual membership fee (£100-£200) to use a booking platform with thousands of homes. I use Home Exchange because it verifies member identities and offers some guarantees such as damage, theft and cancellation protection. Kindred is a smaller and generally more expensive rival, focused on upmarket homes. Instead of locking you into membership, it charges variable service and cleaning fees.

How does it work?
Classic swaps are simultaneous; you exchange houses on the same dates. But non-direct swaps are also allowed via a points system: you are awarded credits for stays at your house, which you can then spend to stay somewhere else.

What about scams and safety?
Everyone on Home Exchange is a host and a guest, so there is a high degree of trust. Most swaps don’t involve money, so scams are rare. The only exception is a cleaning fee, payable when the stay is at an end. If you’re asked for money in advance, it’s a scam.

How do I pick my accommodation?
This is time-consuming. The website looks similar to Airbnb, where you filter by availability, destination and the type of property you want, but you need to match with a host, too. Hosts and guests both have ratings from previous stays, but some people still like to phone or video call before agreeing to an exchange. Then once the exchange is agreed, there are messages to organise the swap and answer questions such as how to use the cooker or where the bedding is. Many hosts prepare a house manual. Cancellations are rare but do happen, usually due to illness in our experience. The one time it happened to us, Home Exchange helped us find a new host in the same city, and it will pay for a hotel in a true last-minute emergency.

Do I need to own a luxury house?
No. If you have a pool, hot tub or luxurious mansion, you will certainly get more offers, but flats and smaller houses near popular UK destinations (whether that’s Edinburgh, or the Dorset coast) do just as well. Most houses, like ours, are completely ordinary.

Do I need to put my stuff in storage?
Clear a few drawers, perhaps a wardrobe, for guests, and that’s it. Most of the houses on Home Exchange are family homes.

What about cleaning?
You do need to scrub that oven and clean that grout. Cleanliness expectations are high (and should be agreed upfront). We usually spend much of the last day of our holiday cleaning, and return to find our own house absolutely sparkling. Some hosts give you the option of paying a cleaner.

And DIY?
One of the fringe benefits of house swapping is that it has made us look after our house a little better. Sticky door handles and dripping taps need to be dealt with.

What if I break something?
We have broken small things, as have our guests; usually this is simply forgiven. Put more precious items away. For more expensive items, such as a TV or screen door, house swap platforms usually offer a level of cover, but you should make sure you have home insurance.

Will my home insurance cover my house swap?
Ask. Some insurers offer no cover, others offer it for a certain number of exchanges, or you may need to buy a bolt-on. House swapping is still relatively unusual, so persevere to get a clear answer. Insurers that cover holiday lets, such as Pikl, are also useful.

Are there legal restrictions?
Because no money is exchanged, house swapping is not restricted in the same way as Airbnb and similar services – except in Amsterdam, where only reciprocal swaps are allowed (so no paying with points). You do need to check visa rules if looking after someone’s pet – some countries (such as the US) may view this as providing a service and in breach of a visitor visa.

Other house swap sites
Keybento, Kindred, HomeLink

Rory Boland is the editor of Which? Travel

JACQUELINE Jossa and Dan Osborne’s 13-year relationship has finally come an end and the reason is far less explosive than their scandal-hit time together would suggest.

In simple terms, it just fizzled out, with the pair leading separate lives that saw Dan move into a different house earlier in the year.

Having forgiven multiple cheating accusations over the years, there was no other woman involved this time, instead, Jac has decided to put herself first and refuses to put any more effort into a relationship that’s ran its course.

We take a look back at some of the biggest moments they faced during their time together.

GABBYGATE

Jacqueline walked out on ex-Towie star Dan in 2020 after learning he’d sent Love Island’s Gabby Allen a flirty message, which she didn’t respond to.

On top of this, the pair had a series of rows in lockdown that piled further pressure on the relationship.

read more on Jacqueline Jossa

WORKING IT OUT

Jac Jossa spotted without wedding ring after denying marriage troubles

JAC’S FURY

EastEnders’ Jacqueline Jossa and Dan Osborne ‘shocked & upset’ over split claims

Jac quietly took out a six-month lease on a new property and moved out of the family home.

A source said at the time that Dan “begged for one final chance” and Jac wanted to fight for the marriage for the sake of their kids.

Gabby wanted no part in the drama and previously told us: “I mean me and Dan were just mates, but we weren’t that good mates to like warrant continuing a friendship.”

At the time, Gabby’s ex-boyfriend Marcel Somerville accused her of cheating with Dan during the trip to Marbella, a claim both parties strongly denied.

CBB STAR THREEWAY

In December 2019, model Chloe Ayling claimed she had a threesome with Dan and US reality star Natalie Nunn after a boozy night out.

Chloe said: “He had full sex with Natalie in front of me in the bathroom, and then kissed and performed a sex act on me.”

Dan never directly addressed the claims but posted cryptic messages on social media at the time.

He also liked a tweet branding Chloe Ayling a “s**g”, making it clear he wasn’t happy about the claims.

Around the same time, Jacqueline became the first winner in I’m A Celebrity history to cancel live TV interviews due to the allegations.

Despite previous champions appearing on daytime shows the next day, Jacqueline is said to have refused to go on any and said she wanted to spend time with her children instead.

A source told The Mirror: “She has to film for the ‘coming out’ show which airs later this week, so cancelled all other TV offers like GMB and Lorraine to spend more time with the family.

“Jacqueline and Dan spent time together in the hotel and probably had a lot to talk about.”

LOVE ISLAND LINK

Dan Osborne and Jacqueline Jossa: A Relationship Timeline

2013 – The Beginning
Dan and Jacqueline’s love story began in 2013 when they started dating. Dan was known from The Only Way Is Essex, while Jacqueline was starring as Lauren Branning on EastEnders.

February 2015 – Welcoming Baby Ella
The couple welcomed their first child, Ella, in early 2015, strengthening their bond.

June 2015 – Engagement News
Dan proposed during a family holiday in Greece, and Jacqueline said yes!

June 2017 – The Big Day
The pair tied the knot in a beautiful wedding surrounded by family and friends.

2018 – Marriage Troubles
Rumors of trouble began surfacing, and Dan briefly moved out of their family home.

December 2018 – Baby Mia Arrives
The arrival of their second daughter, Mia, brought the family closer again, though challenges persisted.

2019 – Public Challenges
The couple continued to face difficulties, with Dan being linked to infidelity rumors, though both parties remained relatively tight-lipped.

2020 – Jacqueline’s Jungle Confession
After winning I’m a Celebrity, Jacqueline addressed the ups and downs in their marriage, admitting they were working on things behind closed doors.

2021 – Separation Speculation
Reports of time apart and ongoing issues fuelled speculation, though neither confirmed an official split at the time.

2025 – Uncertain Future
Dan and Jacqueline’s relationship remains a topic of fan theories, with Jacqueline seen without her wedding ring in January.

Dan denied cheating with another Love Island star in 2019, Alexandra Cane.

Onlookers told The Sun how the dad-of-three made a move on the reality star in the middle of Manchester’s Neighbourhood bar.

One eyewitness said: “Dan was all over Alexandra. At one point he grabbed her and kissed her.”

Another onlooker added: “He was putting his hands all on her – grinding against her and thrusting his hips.

“He’s a married man so it was pretty shocking. She didn’t seem that into it but she laughed it off.

“Everyone was talking about how he was acting. There were loads of women there but he was only interested in Alexandra.

“They left together in a taxi with a couple of friends when the party was over.”

Dan denied he did anything but dance with Alexandra and insisted they had been mates for a while, despite him only following her on Instagram the morning after.

The couple got back on track and planned to renew their vows after Jac’s I’m A Celeb victory.

She said: “The thought of it cringes me out slightly but we might do something like renew our vows when the time is right.

“We would like all five of us in the photos – we’d do it for the kids.

“It does feel like we have a new relationship though, so it might be quite nice to celebrate that.”

However, they never appeared to follow through with the plan.

MONEY WOE

Dan appeared on Towie for two years until 2015 and then came third on the 2018 series of Celebrity Big Brother for which he was paid £60,000.

But the money didn’t last long and in 2019 his personal business had just £978 left on the books and his firm Storms Entertainment was £7,469 in debt.

Another company he owned called Charlie Entertainments was dissolved in 2017.

It went bust with undisclosed debts after HMRC petitioned the high court to put it into liquidation.

Despite this, Dan’s fortunes turned around and he was able to accumulate enough to secretly buy a £1.3m property close to the family home in 2024.

The Mail reported that Dan made the purchase as “security” amid the deteriorating marriage, and it did nothing to help things with Jac who reportedly felt “betrayed” by the decision.

BURGLARY NIGHTMARE

The couple were left shaken in 2024 when thieves targeted their villa in Marbella during a family holiday.

Jac woke in the night to see two men in balaclavas with torches in the property.

She startled them and they made off with £20,000 of cash and jewellery.

The couple’s daughters, Ella and Mia were in the villa, too, as was Dan’s son, Teddy.

Alexander Isak, Viktor Gyokeres and Anthony Elanga.

Sweden are not short of talent, yet they face the prospect of not reaching the World Cup.

They finished bottom of their qualifying group but reached the play-offs by finishing first in their Nations League pool.

Graham Potter’s side will travel to Valencia to face Ukraine at a neutral ground because of the war in Ukraine.

After a tumultuous time managing Chelsea and West Ham, Potter has returned to the country where he first found success.

Potter managed Swedish side Ostersunds FK between 2011 and 2018, leading them to their first Swedish Cup win in 2017.

Sweden have not won since Potter took charge, losing 4-1 to Switzerland and drawing 1-1 with Slovenia.

Potter is without Isak as he recovers from a broken leg, but Liverpool manager Arne Slot said the striker could return in late March or early April.

March 26 (UPI) — A California jury has found Meta and YouTube liable for negligently designing addictive social media platforms that harm children, in a landmark verdict that could have lasting implications for the tech industry.

The Wednesday verdict marks the first time technology companies have been found liable for creating addictive online products, amid increased scrutiny of the industry and a wave of litigation.

“This jury saw exactly what we presented from the very first day of trial: that these companies built digital spaces designed to negatively influence the brains of children, and they did it on purpose,” Mark Lanier, lead trial counsel and founder of The Lanier Law Firm, said in a statement.

“The evidence showed that Meta and YouTube knew their platforms were hooking children and harming their mental health, and instead of fixing the problem they kept developing features to maximize the time kids spent on their apps. Now a jury has told them that is not acceptable, and you are being held accountable.”

UPI has contacted Meta and YouTube for comment.

The verdict follows a seven-week trial centered on a now-20-year-old plaintiff known to the court by her initials K.G.M., who testified that her use of Instagram, owned by Meta, and YouTube, an Alphabet product, from a young age caused her to develop anxiety, depression, body dysmorphia and suicidal thoughts.

During the trial, she testified that the platforms’ addictive design features, including algorithm-generated recommendations, beauty features and push notifications caused her severe mental harm.

“[The plaintiff] put a human face on what these companies have known for years: that their platforms were engineered to hook young users, and that the children most vulnerable to trauma were the ones they were most effectively reaching,” Rachel Lanier, co-lead counsel and managing attorney of The Lanier Law Firm’s Los Angeles office, said in a statement.

In its verdict, the jury found Meta 70% responsible for the harm the plaintiff suffered and YouTube 30% responsible, and ordered the Mark Zuckerberg-owned tech behemoth and Google‘s video-sharing service to pay her a combined $6 million, half for compensatory damages and half for punitive damages.

Of the punitive damages, Meta is to pay $2.1 million and YouTube $900,000.

This was the first trial in a much larger consolidated case involving more than 1,600 plaintiffs seeking to hold social media companies responsible for the harm they suffered from using those products.

“This is a major victory for the public, for social media users and for child safety,” Libby Liu, CEO of nonprofit legal organization Whistleblower Aid, told UPI in an emailed statement.

“Each successful lawsuit paints a crystal clear picture showing that Meta is not above the law and can and should be held accountable.”

The verdict came down a day after a New Mexico jury found Meta liable for misleading consumers about the safety of its products, ordering the company to pay $375 million in civil penalties for violating the state’s consumer protection laws.

During the trial, state prosecutors showed that Meta’s design features enabled predators to engage in child sexual exploitation, while demonstrating that Meta intentionally designed its platforms to addict young people.

Following the verdict in Los Angeles County, New Mexico Attorney General Raul Torrez, a Democrat, celebrated it as “another critical step toward justice that puts Meta and other big tech executives on notice that they cannot evade responsibility for design choices that jeopardize child safety.”

“We will seek court-mandated changes to Meta’s platforms that offer protections for kids,” he said in a statement.

The rulings come as more attention is being paid to the effects social media has on youth, resulting with Australia in December banning those under the age of 16 from social media, while other countries are considering similar restrictions.

Brent crude tops $104 a barrel as hopes fade for deescalation in US-Israel war on Iran.

Oil prices have climbed higher amid fading hopes of deescalation in the Iran war following Tehran’s denial that talks with the United States are under way.

Futures for Brent crude, the international benchmark, rose nearly 2 percent on Thursday to top $104 per barrel after Tehran dismissed reports of direct negotiations with US President Donald Trump’s administration.

The rise comes after oil prices eased on Wednesday following reports that Trump had shared a 15-point plan for ending the war with Iran.

Asian stock markets opened lower on Thursday, with Japan’s Nikkei 225, South Korea’s KOSPI and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index all seeing losses.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in an interview with state media aired on Wednesday that Tehran was not engaged in direct talks with Washington and has “no intention of negotiating for now”.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt warned on Wednesday that Iran would be “hit harder” than ever before if Tehran did not accept military defeat.

Iran’s effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a conduit for one-fifth of global oil supplies, and its attacks on energy facilities across the Middle East have prompted a surge in energy prices worldwide.

Oil prices are up more than 40 percent compared with before the US and Israel launched strikes on Iran on February 28, prompting numerous countries to implement fuel rationing and other energy conservation measures.

Market-watchers say prices are likely to rise further until shipping is free to traverse the strait, despite efforts by countries to bolster supply by tapping emergency stockpiles in coordination with the International Energy Agency.

While Tehran has repeatedly claimed that the strait is open to ships that are not aligned with its enemies, daily transits have all but collapsed since the start of the conflict.

Four vessels were tracked transiting the waterway via their automatic identification systems on Tuesday, down from an average of 120 daily transits before the conflict, according to maritime intelligence firm Windward.