Todd Nims was born in Dhahran, an expatriate community within Saudi Arabia, where he studied & traveled the Middle East from an early age. He is now chairman of Aramco Brat Media and helped direct and produce HOME-The Aramco Brats? Story. He has been in the film and music business for eight years and has done production for companies such as Golden Era & The Hallmark Channel. Todd attended University of Wollongong in Wollongong, Australia for Engineering & Cultural Studies and University of Colorado in Boulder, Colorado where he received his bachelor?s degree in Communication.

Name a country where you’ve experienced cultural differences: United Arab Emirates

Describe one of those experiences: We sped down Shiek Ziyad road and arrived to 400 Club. It was the new Dubai ?hot spot? and after the necessary preliminaries of our VIPs checking with the club VIPs, we were let in. I began my walk down a set of stairs into the deep thump of some serious sub woofers and a throng of dancing bodies. Oversized champagne bottles with giant sparklers were being paraded around, two or three at a time and delivered to guests amidst shouts of encouragement from gyrating onlookers. Beautiful women were everywhere in a place packed so tight you were forced into perpetual contact with at least one person, usually many more but you didn?t mind. Everyone sort of ?oozed coolness,? so I sort of did the ?moving dance? thing you do when you are maneuvering through clubs, doing my best to ?ooze it? so as not to embarrass my hosts. We hadn?t spent more than a few minutes with some recognizable faces from MTV when one of the guys pulled me aside to follow him elsewhere. I began weaving with him past couches and tables filled with people. The tangible sex appeal was smothered over everything and the walk was drenching me. Finally, we made it to a back room in front of what seemed to be an entrance. He told me to wait by a table of ladies while he slid into a door on the other side of them. In my mind, I conjured images of a room full of super beautiful & exotic American-loving woman mixed in with a healthy dose of princes, movie stars and various government types, but as the minutes ticked by I grew impatient. I turned to one of the ladies while pointing to the room he had gone in and asked, ?what is in there?? She pointed at the same door and smiled, ?that?s the bathroom.?

What did you learn about your own culture from that experience? Movies and TV in America have been messing with my head.

If you were going to adopt a custom, gesture, or trait from another culture,
what would it be? In Japan, they slurp noodles to show appreciation; I tend to do this anyway, so having it be seen as a compliment would be fantastic - what fun!

Where would you like your next culture crossing adventure to take you? I am a big diver and I would love to dive in the Maldives of India. My other pick would be to trave