Bahrain – Al Muharraq

Today we went further afield to a different part of Bahrain which seemed more residential and not touristy or commercial. Al Muharraq. There were some gorgeous cultural sites and ancient houses dating back to the 15th century where poets and artists had resided. These people are still celebrated and quoted and their homes are kept in immaculate condition as museums. We also stumbled across a really unusual building, all curves and interesting angles with trees and bushes planted throughout. We have missed the greenery and tree’s of Christchurch so were delighted to discover this gem. It had been part of an agricultural exhibition and then relocated to Muharraq as a permanent fixture. We were so happy to find tree’s we pulled out our daily flatbread and humous to eat our lunch there much to the amusement of the guard! All these places are free and really well looked after. One house next to the Mosque belonged to a Pearl family, and is part of the Pearl Route that was such a major influence on Bahrain’s economy. This house was massive, even by today’s standards! See pictures below. It is weird because it is so ancient, however in preserving it with constant maintenance it is freshly painted and the floors are clearly newly concreted so it doesn’t feel/look particularly old!

We were just ambling around avoiding the mangy cats and trying to look like we were supposed to be there when we came upon this crazy building structure – what immediately came to mind was post earthquake ChCh – this structure was a car park still under construction but nearly finished BUT the levels were wavy (on purpose) and it looked like a soggy sandwich (Dave’s description)! WHY??? The architecture here is very creative, we’ve seen some awesome modern buildings, but this is just bizarre! (see pic below) While we were getting our heads around this structure a massive building came into site – like 5 stories in height, but just columns and a roof, so off we trotted to see what it was about. Kind of cool, it housed some ancient ruins from BC so that was great, but the structure was super futuristic and had the feel of a Star Trek set mixed with that of a nuclear bunker. Just when things couldn’t get weirder this huge slab of glass set into the concrete glided open and out stepped a guard to ask us questions for his clipboard!! Turns out he was from Kenya, pretty sad story actually, he was promised work and a decent salary in Bahrain, but upon arrival is only getting paid the same basic wage he was earning in Kenya. Exploitation of our own island migrant workers came to mind…