Katara’s diverse activities attract global audience
The festivities at Katara - the Cultural Village Foundation, accompanying the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022, have drawn the attention of fans from around the world.
The 12th edition of the Katara Traditional Dhow Festival on the Katara Beach promenade, which runs until December 18, has been witnessing a remarkable turnout. The festival showcases Qatar’s pearl-diving legacy and fishing and maritime history.
The festival features 50 pavilions - including exhibitions of marine heritage collectibles and others for crafts and handicrafts known as 43 handicrafts, and ship building workshops from nine countries: Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Iraq, Yemen, India, Turkiye and Tanzania.
The pavilions at the festival display the crafts of sailors, pearl-divers and everything related to the manufacture of ships and boats as well as fishing tools.
Besides, there are a number of heritage museums including the Museum of the Late Jassim Al-Mannai, the Abdul Aziz Al Buhashem Al-Sayed Museum, and the Issa AlMulla Museum. Different fishing methods are on display at the festival such as hadra and kargour, which are semi-circular cages made of palm fronds, Yarouk mossadeq nets made of yarn, and a one-piece ‘diffar’ of spinning nets, and Askar. The museums explain the means of building ships and boats. Meanwhile, on Ibn Al-Reeb Cultural Street, the Katara Handicrafts Exhibition has evoked public interest in the collection of souvenirs and handicrafts. The exhibition displays products by artisans from Qatar and other Arab countries. The expo also has handicrafts such as sadu, hand embroidery, traditional clothes, leather works and paintings of different kinds.
The Tunisian Cultural Days will be continuing its activities until December 18. On Saturday evening, a concert by singers Fadi and Akram at the amphitheatre opposite Building 39 wowed visitors. People also continued to flock to the exhibition of Tunisian handicrafts, which features mosaic paintings, ‘marqum’ (a kind of rug/carpet), and the famous Tunisian ‘shashia’.
As part of Katara’s activities accompanying the World Cup, the Abdullah Bin Zaid Centre of the Ministry of Endowments (Awqaf) and Islamic Affairs screened an advocacy film with virtual reality cameras at the theatre opposite the Postage Stamp Museum.
The Abdullah Bin Zaid Centre is distributing books to introduce Islam in many languages, including Spanish, French, Russian, German, English, Filipino, Urdu and others, and brochures are distributed to teach Arabic to non-native speakers, all for free.
Visitors also enjoyed a special military show presented by the Military Parades Centre and the Qatar Armed Forces Music Brigade on the waterfront of Katara.
Meanwhile, Katara saw the presence of a large audience who had come to watch the opening ceremony and match of the World Cup on two large screens installed on the premises.