REPRESENTATIVES from a number of Kempinski luxury hotels around the world showcased their properties to members of the travel trade and media at a roadshow at the Doha Marriott this week.
A team of senior sales directors was in Qatar as part of a GCC tour that also includes Bahrain, Dammam, Riyadh, Kuwait and Dubai.
“The GCC is an important source market for international outbound tourism”, says Ulrich Eckhardt, Senior Vice-President Middle East and Africa at Kempinski.
Kempinski is to add six luxury properties to its portfolio in the Middle East and Africa and hospitality sources in Qatar are expecting an announcement about a new Doha property to be made at next week’s Arabian Travel Market in Dubai. Kempinski are also set to announce a new lifestyle concept hotel brand.
Represented at the roadshow were the Kempinski properties in Germany, the UK, Russia, Jordan, and the UAE — and included the Kempinski Hotel Ishtar Dead Sea that opens in Jordan next week. Visitors were given presentations on the Emirates Palace, Kempinski Hotel Mall of the Emirates, Kempinski Hotel Ajman, Hotel Adlon Kempinski Berlin (right by the Brandenburg Gate), Kempinski Hotel Amman, Hotel Baltschag Kempinski in Moscow.
It also included the highly original Courthouse Hotel Kempinski London, amazingly designed in a way that retains some of the incredible architecture of the original building — an 18th century courthouse — complete with court and witness box, and with three original prison cells incorporated into the bar as special private booths!
Fine art photography in the Arab world
PHOTOGRAPHER Manal Al Dowayan, who was born in the Eastern Province of Saudi Arabia, came to Qatar this week to talk about the evolution of fine art photography in the Arab World over the past 100 years.
Addressing an audience at VCUQ, Manal, who holds a Masters degree in Systems Analysis and Design, also spoke about some of the social and political issues which Arab photographers face in the Middle East, and what can be done to advance the art of photography within the region.
Manal has attended a number of photography courses in different art schools in Saudi Arabia, Dubai and London, and participated in exhibitions in London, Bahrain, the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Her pictures have been published in several books and magazines. She was also selected to be part of a photography project funded by Nokia Dubai called Fonetography, which led to a Christie's auction of her pictures for a local charity. One of her photographs, called 'Pointing to the Future', was exhibited in New York at the 49th Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women.
Recently, Manal exhibited in the Common Ground exhibition organized by the British Council in a number of Gulf countries.
A 'well of knowledge'
QATAR is to establish and fund a project that will redirect the knowledge and expertise of expatriate Arab scientists back to the Arab world as a whole, and Qatar in particular.
Delegates attending the Founding Conference for Expatriate Arab Scientists (Intelligencia Qatar, IQ 2006) held in Doha this week have said that Qatar’s initiative, under the auspices of the Amir’s wife, Her Highness Shaikha Mozah bint Nasser Al Misnad, the Chairperson of the Qatar Foundation of Education, Science and Community Development, will channel about $2 billion into scientific research between now and 2010 and a further $300 million will be used to establish a “well of knowledge” that can be drawn on by the Arab world.
The research projects and information will be divided into three broad areas: information technology; medicine and medical technology; and the environment. Some of the projects will be related to social development, but all will be tailored according to Qatar’s priorities and research needs.
In-flight lounge experience for visitors to ATM
VISITORS to the Qatar Airways stand at the Arabian Travel Market in Dubai next week will be able to see a mock-up of the new in-flight First Class Lounge that the airline will be introducing on the first of its new Airbus A340-600s being delivered this summer. With its biggest-ever stand at ATM — a 200 square metre two-tier glass and steel structure — Qatar’s national carrier will also be showing off its new aircraft livery.
The design of the new stand reflects the ‘wave theme’ of the architecture for the New Doha International Airport, due to open in 2009, which is currently being built on reclaimed land. The upper floor of the exhibition stand features a bar and a VIP meeting area with plenty of hospitality space.
As the official airline partner of the 15th Asian Games, being held over a two-week period in Doha in December 2006, Qatar Airways will also be unveiling its new marketing material promoting the sporting spectacle. Qatar Airways’ CEO, Akbar Al Baker, will be heading a delegation of officials from the airline’s corporate headquarters in Doha to ATM in Dubai.
“On behalf of Qatar Airways, I am delighted to once again be participating at Arabian Travel Market which has grown into the most important travel show in the region,” he said. “This is an excellent opportunity for visitors to see first hand Qatar Airways’ new First Class lounge; our latest products will also be on show at ATM and, of course, visitors can experience our superb Arabic hospitality that we are so renowned for around the world. As a major player in the Middle East and, indeed, around the world, Qatar Airways believes in being visible and making its presence felt at shows like ATM.” He pointed out that the UAE is a key feeder market for Qatar Airways which has a total of 77 flights a week from Abu Dhabi and Dubai to Doha, with connections to onward destinations across Europe, Middle East, Africa, Indian subcontinent and Far East.
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