Al Jazeera.net: Muscat - Said Al-Adawi is working hard to finish restoring his family's pottery factory, which is considered the oldest in the Sultanate of Oman, as it is more than 5 centuries old.
The Al-Adawi factory is located in the Wilayat of Bahla in Al Dakhiliyah Governorate. Bahla is the most popular wilayat in pottery industry. It is approximately 200 kilometers from the capital city, Muscat. The pottery industry in Bahla dates back to more than 5,000 years.
Upon reaching the factory, you see Said holding blocks at the top of one of the walls of the factory that he is working to restore. He and his brothers are working together in restoration process, as the factory is their family inheritance. He has worked on it since his retirement.
Al-Adawy is passionately telling the story of the factory, with a smile on his face as he is expecting a promising future for the factory. He is touring between its courtyards and corners, talking about the new divisions that his factory will have after the restoration, as it qualifies it to be a training center equipped with electronic screens for trainees.
Said Al-Adawi - in an interview with Al-Jazeera Net - gave more details of the training in the factory. He talked with pleasure about one of the trainees who has trained 3 months ago in his factory. The trainee is now getting prepared to open his own project after he mastered the pottery industry in the factory.
Brilliant industry
Said Al-Adawi held a mixture of clay in his hands to make pottery of different shapes and sizes. He was attracting the attention of the tourists in the factory, in terms of accuracy, skill and speed with which he made this pottery.
During the tour in the factory, we found a group of tourists standing at the pottery-making machine “the molding wheel”, where a French girl sat holding blocks with her small hands trying to make a kind of pottery. Her family was pleasantly watching her and taking some photos for her as she was enjoying the experience.
A French girl experimenting with pottery (Al Jazeera)
Al Adawi said that there are many requests from tourists who are outside the Sultanate of Oman to visit the pottery factory. He added, "This profession is attracting the attention of tourists from all over the world. There are large quantities of requests for the pottery products produced by the factory from inside and outside the Sultanate." Pottery is one of the crafts that the people of wilayat Bahla has been interested in for more than 5,000 years. Fortunately, this craft witnesses continuous development, as people are keen to preserve it and to pass it on from one generation to another.
Furnaces in which pottery is burned (Al-Jazeera)
Al Adawi added that the Sultanate of Oman has treasures of authentic Omani handicraft products of unique artifacts in various fields, especially pottery, leather, wooden and textile products, jewelry and precious metals. If these products are remanufactured and developed, they will provide thousands of jobs opportunities. It also would reduce the gap between the imported and the local manufactured products, paying attention to the requirements of the creative industry.
The stage of kneading before making pottery (Al-Jazeera)
The factory employs 12 persons, half of whom are Omanis. The percentage of female workers in the factory constitutes about 40% of the total number. According to Al-Adawi, most of the existing artistic pieces have an imprint of Omani artistic decoration, such as coffee cups that are adorned with palm-tip inscriptions. The usage of this artistic piece by Omani potters dates back to the third century BC, according to Al Adawi.
He added that there are many pottery pieces that are re-manufactured to preserve them, remind the present generations of them, and preserve them for future generations. Al Adawi noted that the Handicraft Center documents the pottery pieces that the owners of pottery factories have been making over hundreds of years in the book "Bahla Pottery" in order to enrich the Omani library with the Omani heritage.
Source: Al Jazeera