Dubai mother invents doll reciting Quran
dubai — A Dubai-based expat hopes that her labour of love — a Quran-reciting, Abaya-clad doll — will help teach young girls across the region the Holy Quran while they play.
The doll, Jenna, recites four chapters of the Holy Quran, and comes dressed in regionally appropriate attire, complete with a purple headscarf that matches her abaya.
Jenna’s designer, French national Samira Amarir, said that the idea came to her four years ago as she searched in vain for a toy or tool that would help her young daughter learn in a simple and fun way.
dubai — A Dubai-based French expat and mother hopes that a new toy — a Holy Quran-reciting doll — will help young girls across the Arabian Gulf region to learn the Holy Quran quickly, and have fun while they’re at it.
In an interview with Khaleej Times, French national Samira Amarir noted that the idea for the doll, Jenna — Arabic for “heaven” — came to her four years ago as she found herself struggling to find a tool or toy to help her young daughter learn verses of the Holy Quran “easily and in a fun way”.
“When I began, I started to imagine the product. My daughter is six and a half, and I started to think about it when she was only one and a half years old,” she said. “I was trying to put it on paper, thinking about the shape, the body, how she would be dressed, and what kind of features she would have.” The final doll comes dressed in a lengthy abaya with a matching purple headscarf, as well as light and soft make-up and a slightly dark skin tone.
Following Jenna’s initial success, Samira and her family decided to move to the UAE from France in July 2015 to market the doll in the Gulf region. “It was a big decision. We sold our house and cars and came here with only our savings,” she said. “We bet all we had, our stability and assets... everything, on the doll. Of course, it’s very easy to start a company here (in the UAE) and to start officially working on a product,” she added. “That’s what’s fantastic about Dubai. Once the doll was finished and we moved on to mass production, I found a job quite easily.”
The doll was officially launched in the UAE in January, and quickly hit the shelves of the UAE’s major toy stores, including Toys R’Us, Kiddy Zone and The Toy Store. In June this year, Jenna became available in Bahrain and Oman, followed by Saudi Arabia in July.
Samira attributes the doll’s success to the way children mix learning with play. “Everyone is used to playing with such toys, but because of her features and the fact that Jenna can recite (the verses), kids learn without even noticing. They are pushing the button and repeating after the doll, but they are actually learning.”
The feedback she’s received, Samira added, has been “warm”,
The children are pushing the button and repeating after the doll... they are actually learning.” Samira Amarir, creator of Jenna with her daughter
both from parents and children.
She is particularly proud of a glowing review of Jenna from ‘Jeddah Mom’, a well-known Saudi Arabia-based blogger and social media influencer. “When we launched this product, we started reaching out to influencers, and quickly found out that they needed to be paid,” she said. “But this lady ordered the doll online without telling us. We didn’t reach out to her, and she published such a nice article about it.
“The most rewarding part is that she didn’t do it for money,” Samira added. “She just really loved the product, and her daughters did as well.” Looking to the future, Samira said that she is exploring ways to make the doll even better. “We are working to make the doll smarter and more intelligent with new technologies,” she said. For Jenna, better possibilities lie ahead.
bernd@khaleejtimes.com