Saleh Fareed Saudi Gazette The historic Souk Okaz has been growing in size and popularity and attracting a large number of tourists and visitors. In its sixth year, Souk Okaz features variety of activities, stalls selling handmade Bedouin products, traditional food, an antiques exhibition, folk dances, plays and live theater productions and poetry recitations. Organizers said the importance of the Souk is due to its historic status as the ancient destination for Arab intellectuals and poets and people passionate about culture and literature. They added over the last five years 52 projects to develop Souk Okaz have been implemented by the Taif Municipality, costing over SR29 million.
They include rehabilitation of the Souk Okaz avenue, building the site's main gate and pitching up wool tents and camps in the area. Other schemes include repaving walkways, preparing parking lots over an area of 80,000 square meters, establishment of lighting systems and road networks, preparing and erecting advertisement banners along the road leading to the Souk, setting up the interior theater and main lounge area for the opening ceremony, landscaping and setting up a sanitary system. This year the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (SCTA) has redeveloped 10 million square meters of land for the site. In addition, this year's festival witnessed the inauguration of the Souk Okaz Tent funded by the Saudi Bin Laden Group at SR40 million. The Souk Okaz Tent comprises three parts.
The first part is the main building, which includes a first floor and 3,061 seating capacity, including 300 seats exclusively for women. It also includes adjoining waiting rooms, offices and support service areas and halls for conducting lectures and events. Scheduled events include a series of literary and intellectual seminars, poetry evenings and a presentation on the legendary Arabian poet and warrior Antara bin Shaddad. The Souk's activities kicked off on Tuesday with a special seminar on what Saudi Arabia wants from the youth and vice versa at Taif University. The event aimed to establish an open dialogue between the Kingdom's youth and decision-makers. As part of the opening ceremony, Makkah Emir Prince Khaled along with members of the supervising committee honored the winners of six competitions held at the event. The included Raudah Ali of Sudan, winner of the Poet of the Souk Okaz award; Iyad Hakami of Saudi Arabia, winner of the Okaz Youth Poet award; and Ahmed Al-Qarni of Saudi Arabia, winner of the Outstanding Science Invention award. Citizens of neighboring Gulf countries also attend Souk Okaz to display their products and services, including food, handicrafts, folk dances, poetry and theater. The festival is named after the old Souk Okaz hosted every year from the fourth century BC to 746 AD. The modern festival was revived by Prince Khaled six years ago and is now considered one of the most important cultural activities in the region.
