I went to Bahrain today with a Saudi friend. In the morning we crossed the King Fahd Causeway from Saudi Arabia, negotiating the customs and passport control checkpoints in about an hour. We headed first to the Bahrain Mall, a small shopping mall in the capital, Manama. The most beautiful feature of the mall was a well-lit area next to the main entrance, where there were moving walkways leading from the ground floor to the first floor, fountains and marble-looking columns underneath a towering ceiling that looked like a conical tent canopy. We found my way to the Costa Coffee station and I had one of my favorite “flat white” coffees. We then wandered around for half an hour to see what kinds of wares were available.
My flat white from Costa, minus two sips.
A carpet store – that also sold traditional wood furniture – and a trinket store that sold prayer rugs (sajada) looked to be the most interesting. I wanted to buy a prayer rug – they had a nicely crafted appearance – but, unfortunately, the store was closed for lunch. I would have liked to have looked at some of the carpets in the carpet store but was not in the mood for the inevitable sales talk, and decided to walk on by. I hoped to find some packets of instant coffee at the Starbucks store but they did not sell any. “Instant” coffee probably has negative connotations for the locals since they are connoisseurs of fine coffees, so I was not really surprised that I could not find any “Italian Roast” or other flavors of Starbucks’ VIA brand coffee.
After leaving the mall, we drove across town to the old suqs near Gold City and Delmon International Hotel. After parking the car near the hotel, we walked through several streets to find the suqs (traditional markets). After about 15 minutes we found our way to a square surrounded by old concrete buildings with narrow side streets that wound their way into shaded corners. In the middle of the square there was a fountain featuring two stylized fish that looked like they were swimming up to the sky. We paused for a few minutes to determine in which direction we should continue and then selected a side street that looked the safest. Many of these streets are too narrow for cars and some of the store owners have put up awnings between the buildings to provide cool shade for themselves and their customers.
Next to the “fish fountain,” close to the “hidden” souqs.
We followed the narrow streets past market stalls with prayer rugs, clothes, and household items laid out in colorful displays in hope of finding a traditional café where we could sample coffee as the locals like it. We did not find a café but we eventually came to a mosque. The building was very large, with a huge chandelier in the main prayer area and a deep red carpet. Between the prayer area and the ablutions (wudu’) area there was a kind of hallway that was partly open to the sky and partly covered. I took a photo of a minaret through the opening above the hallway. We were going to take a rest at the mosque and make use of the lavatories, but then the Imam made the call to prayer and we stayed to line up with the faithful for the afternoon prayer. After we had finished our prayers, we set off through the narrow streets again to find our way back to the car.
The minaret above the mosque entrance.
We came to the Delmon hotel again and decided to stop in at the Saryah Café, which belongs to the hotel. The café is full of what in the West would be called Arabesque designs, from the architecture to the furnishings. Much of the adjoining hotel had a Moroccan feel to it. Someone at the hotel obviously liked extremely loud music, because it was blaring out from the hotel’s restaurant. It sounded to me like an Arabic disco. I tried a cappuccino and the lentil soup. The soup was tasty and hot but the coffee was disappointing. It tasted more of milk than coffee and it was barely warm. My friend, being wiser than me, did not order anything. After this, we got back to the car, a short walk from the café, and headed to the Al Fateh Grand Mosque (Masjid al-Fatih), the last item on our list of things to see for the day.
This mosque is also located in Manama. It is a beautiful and huge mosque with two extremely tall minarets and a dome. I read somewhere that this is one of the largest mosques in the world. According to the official website of the Ahmed Al Fateh Islamic Center, the mosque was built to accommodate 7000 worshippers. The website also has this interesting information on some of the materials used to build the mosque:
“Italian marble covers the floor and part of the walls … the dome is made of fiberglass and has twelve stained glass windows. The … doors are made of teak wood imported from India [and] the central chandelier was made in Austria and is surrounded by numerous hand-blown round lamps made in France.”
We reached the mosque toward the end of the afternoon, when the sunlight was waning, and the soft light seemed to enhance the beauty of the outside walls of the mosque. After admiring the interior of the mosque, we drifted outside again to the plaza area and I bought some oud oil perfume from a trader who had set up a small table and was selling oils for use as perfume and small pieces of wood for aromatic burning.
The Grand Mosque, Bahrain, bathed in late afternoon light.
After concluding our visit to the Grand Mosque we headed back through Manama to the causeway and Saudi Arabia.
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