The second Winter Festival, under the patronage of Prince Muhammad Bin Nasser Bin Abdul Aziz, Emir of Jizan, will get under way Thursday at the Heritage Village on the Corniche in Jizan. The village is a showcase for the culture of Jizan, portraying its three main environments – mountain, plain and coast – and this year has on display a typical mountain house with exhibits inside, a well and a mountain hut. The marine environment has been recreated with boats and a pearl-fishing exhibit, while a mini-museum provides information and background on the most important historical features of the environment. The area depicting the plains of the Tihama may be the most interesting to locals and outsiders alike. The zone is centered around a typical Tihami hut, perhaps the most striking symbol of the local heritage. A classic marketplace has also been constructed with locally-made handicrafts on offer, as well as a traditional restaurant serving visitors the most well-known traditional Jizani dishes. The Jizan Heritage Village has been built using concrete foundations and pillars shaped with the raw materials used to build houses in times gone by, all finished off in traditional colors. The hut, Tihami house and umbrellas of the restaurant are covered with the leaves of date palms, cane and locally-made rope, and large numbers of “Al-Madh” sticks which are well-known for their strength were used in constructing the roof of the hut and the mountain house, capturing the houses in Al-Aridha Governorate as they used to be. Artist-designer Majed Suwaid said the entire project of the village would reach final completion in three years, the aim being to make it a center of tourism and a prime destination for every visitor to the region.
