Omani culture comes alive at AUT
by Michel Sam Mathew
The Omani exhibition, which was recently held at the AUT’s St Paul Street Art Gallery, was all about selling culture.
And as promised, it turned out to be a quite a class act with strains of Bedouin music, food, and dance coming alive in the contained space of an art gallery.
“This exhibition has been long in the making and we students are acting as ambassadors for our country,” says Ghassan Bait Bin Saleem, who is doing his Bachelor of Aviation at Massey University.
Saleem was in charge of the exhibition’s tourism stall that has been decked up with catchy snaps of a different Oman, which is greener and far removed from the pictures and TV images of desert landscapes.
“Most people think that the Middle Easter region is one big desert but certain areas like the rolling green hills around the city of Salalah offers a completely different view,” he says.
The stalls at the exhibition display a wide array of Omani handicrafts, gold and silver jewellery, and a tastefully decorated living room complete with colourful rugs and also confectioneries and sweets from Oman.
“Most of the stuff that has been displayed here has been brought over by students and some have been provided by Oman’s Ministry of Tourism,” says Ahmed Al Alawi, one of the organisers of the exhibition and a Telecommunications Engineering student at AUT.
Ahmed and his fellow Omani students, numbering around 50, who are studying in various universities in Auckland are quite proud that they have put up a good show.
“It’s the first time we have done an exhibition in Auckland and maybe next year we would be planning something on a bigger scale,” he says.
The exhibition was held on the occasion of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Saeed’s ascension to power in Oman in 1970.
“The policies and reforms of our Sultan have pushed forward our country to its present level of economic success and we through this exhibition are trying to give something back,” says Saleem.
It is a very intersting story.