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Whether you want to watch traditional weavers at work or take in a laser show, Haneen Dajani finds there’s something for everyone at the annual event at Al Wathba
Women shake yoghurt in goat skin to make butter, a fountain dances and neon lasers shoot bright patterns across the water – welcome to the Sheikh Zayed Heritage Festival, where the modern UAE meets the traditional.
The annual festival, which celebrates the UAE’s heritage and its oldest professions, opened last week in Al Wathba, Abu Dhabi, and runs until January 26.
This year, the festival has expanded to include international and modern touches, demonstrating the country’s tolerance of all cultures and its status in the modern world.
Mouza Al Mansouri, 46, wraps coloured threads around a small spindle rod.
With a swift movement, she taps the rod against her thigh and then rotates it.
The process is repeated until all the threads have been intertwined. She then places them on metal bars in the shape of a square to create a traditional material known as sadow.
“They used this to decorate the inside of tents or to create partitions between men and women before they had bricks to build walls,” she says.
“I learnt this from my mother and now I am teaching my daughters.”
Sadow can be used to make bags, cushions and decorative pieces to hang in the house.
“In the past, they didn’t have paintings to hang on the walls.”
Mrs Al Mansouri holds up one of the decorative pieces to show how the coloured threads have been mixed to produce perfectly shaped triangular patterns.
“My mother made this. Machines can’t do this detail,” she says. “My mother wasn’t educated – she inherited this talent and I am not educated either. Educated girls can’t do this.”
While the skill no longer brings an income, and Mrs Al Mansouri mainly exhibits at heritage festivals, they continue to produce sadow at home.
“If we stop we will forget how to do it, and we don’t want to find ourselves one day without sadow if it disappears from the market. This is our heritage and we want it to live,” she says.
Next to her is another local
If we stop we will forget how to do it, and we don’t want to find ourselves one day without sadow MOUZA AL MANSOURI Sadow maker
woman shaking a container made of goat leather.
“After they take the milk from the goat, they keep it in a bowl for one day until it turns into yoghurt. Then they place it inside this, add salt and shake it for an hour,” says Hamda Al Ketbi, local professions supervisor at the festival.
Once the shaking is done, butter and yoghurt are produced. “They separate during the shaking process,” she says.
A short walk from the heritage corner, the modern attractions include a theme park and a circus stage with a pool for water spectacles.
“It will be an international show featuring artists from all around the world,” says Cezar Balasoiu, the owner of the circus, which has been brought to the heritage festival for the first time.
The 40-minute show features 14 performers and nine acts, and will run every day at 8.15pm throughout the festival. “The clown is from Mexico, the jugglers from Romania, the aerial artists from Russia and the light and fire shows will be led by artists from Ukraine,” Mr Balasoiu says. Away from the circus, a young girl learns to create colourful bath bombs.
Her mother, Mariam Al Rumaithi, 42, is hosting a soap lab where children can mix bath bombs, colour them and place “toy surprises” inside.
In her soap boutique, there are natural glycerine soaps in different shapes and scents,
“I specialise in brand scents – this is Escada and this is Boss,” she says, holding flower and heart-shaped soap bars.
“I have a small workshop at home and I get the scents from Italy.”
She started the soap-making business, The Soap Boutique, after her husband developed an allergy to regular soap.
He could tolerate only purely natural soap made of glycerine.
“I used to teach IT and business at the Higher Colleges of Technology,” she says. “I taught students how to start their own businesses. As my family started to grow, I resigned and decided to start a business from my hobby.”