Gerald Drißner

Growing up in a working-class family in the Austrian Alps taught me one thing: every person, place, and balance sheet has a story. My work as a journalist, author, and ghostwriter is to find it and tell it well.

Finding these stories means embracing both the old and the new. I use the latest software and AI to organize my research, but my real work begins where the algorithms end: talking with people, digging through archives, and chasing down leads in person.

For over 15 years, I have written about the Arab world, a region I have called home for long stretches. This experience fueled my passion for the Arabic language, which led me to write the "Arabic for Nerds" books and found the Arabic for Nerds website—a community for fellow language addicts.

Lately, I've turned my focus to researching and sharing my knowledge on how to do business successfully in the Arab Gulf countries, as well as in Islamic markets like Indonesia and Malaysia.

Here are a few career highlights:

▸ I won the Axel Springer Prize for a story that captured the mood in Egypt weeks before the revolution.
▸ I graduated from the prestigious Henri Nannen School of Journalism and hold a degree in Economics (Diplom-Volkswirt).
▸ My reporting has taken me across the Middle East, having lived and worked in Egypt, Turkey, and Tunisia.