MAKKAH: One of the most watched ceremonies in the Islamic world takes place this Saturday when the Kaaba is adorned with its new Kiswa.
In a change of tradition, the General Presidency for the Two Holy Mosques will perform the annual event on the night of the new Islamic year of Muharram 1, 1444, or Saturday, July 30.
This marks “a shift from a decades-old custom of replacing it on the eve of Arafat, as per a royal decision issued recently,” said Abdulrahman Al-Sudais, president of the body.
The Kiswa, or the covering of the Kaaba, is replaced annually in a tradition observed for centuries.
For many decades the Kiswa was replaced on the morning of Dhul Hijjah 9, when pilgrims depart to the plains of Arafat. This was usually the time when the Haram was empty, to allow for the smooth replacement.
The new Kiswa will stay in place until Hajj next year.
A team of 200 Saudi technicians working at the King Abdulaziz Complex for Manufacturing the Kaaba’s Kiswa, will carry out the task.
The factory does the weaving, stitching and printing by hand and machines using 47 pieces of cloth and thread. The world’s largest computerized sewing machine, at 16 meters in length, carries out the process.
The cloth is stitched together in five different parts and fixed to the base with copper rings.
Around 670 kilograms of raw silk is dyed black at the complex.
The Kiswa is decorated with Quranic verses embroidered onto the cloth with 120 kilograms of 21-karat gold thread and 100 kilograms of silver thread.
The cost of making a new 850-kilogram Kiswa is estimated to cost SR25 million, or over $6.5 million, making it the world’s most expensive covering.
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Misk Foundation is calling for applicants for a hotel training program in Paris in collaboration with luxury brand Bulgari.
The scheme will allow a new generation of Saudis to take the reins in the hospitality industry, with training taking place at Bulgari’s Paris hotel.
In the bold Italian-style establishment, which offers fine dining and lavish spas, Misk interns will get a chance to launch their professional careers and receive full-scope training in all hospitality-related departments.
“The program will include a rotation, so they will be able to go to the concierge, the front desk, admin support, and they will work also with the restaurant,” Jawharah Altheyeb, the program manager, told Arab News.
The Misk Traineeship Program has helped more than 4,000 interns since 2018, teaming up with more than 400 top-tier local and international organizations across various industries to offer internships.
The Misk team traveled to Paris before Eid to meet with French partners, resulting in the foundation’s latest venture into the culinary arts and hospitality field.
“The agreement with Bulgari is to have interns on a rolling basis, so once we have the first track, after six weeks, we will reannounce the program and have Saudi interns all around the year at Bulgari Hotel Paris,” Altheyeb said.
The aim is to allow young Saudis to engage in cultural exchange and garner valuable professional hospitality skills, which aligns with the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 goals.
“We are also targeting people who are interested in the hospitality industry, so we feed back into the economy in Saudi Arabia where we also have a mandate in developing human capital in the tourism industry and hopefully place them in full-time opportunities in multiple regions in Saudi,” Altheyeb said.
The hotel, located in the heart of the Golden Triangle in Paris, will offer the paid internships with the help of Niko Romito, the renowned Italian chef behind Il Ristorante - Niko Romito, which has outlets in Dubai, Beijing, Shanghai, Milan and Paris.
Romito will pass on his menus and skills to the Misk interns. Before taking his expertise to Bulgari Hotels & Resorts, he was head chef at Reale, which has been awarded three Michelin stars.
Food and beverage trainees will learn kitchen-management skills and will also be trained in in-room dining.
The rooms division will take part in front office, housekeeping, reservations and butler training, “delivering the highest level of excellence to every single guest” staying in the hotel’s 76 rooms and suites.
“As a pilot, I think it’s very good to have an eight-week program, so it will be more of shadowing the experts in those areas. I don’t think the interns will be experts, but it will give them exposure in a really high-quality hotel,” Altheyeb said.
The collaborative program is accepting fresh Saudi graduates in restaurant or food service, hotel or resorts, tourism and travel, or hospitality administration or management. Applicants must also be proficient in English and either French or Italian, or both.
The deadline to apply is Aug. 13. The internship program will run for two months from Oct. 17 to Dec. 17.
RIYADH: The World Health Organization, a specialized agency of the UN responsible for international public health, praised the Saudi Crisis and Disaster Management Center’s readiness to respond and prevent crises and disasters before they occur.
“A delegation from the WHO’s regional office accompanied by a Yemeni health ministry team visited the health emergency operation center in Riyadh on Thursday,” said the health ministry on Friday.
The Saudi health ministry said that the visiting delegation was briefed on the center’s experiences in operations, emergency preparedness and navigation of data management systems.
The visit comes within the WHO initiative to train personnel at the Yemeni Emergency Operations Center, and was aimed at transferring know-how to Yemeni counterparts.
WHO officially accredited the Kingdom’s first health crisis and disaster management center in the Eastern Mediterranean region in October 2021.
The center’s role is to respond and prevent crises and disasters before they occur. It serves as the operations and control center for the implementation of prevention programs across the Kingdom.
The center is to facilitate government communication to 20 other centers across the Kingdom.
Meanwhile, under the directive of King Salman, the surgical team for the Saudi conjoined twins program successfully separated Yemeni twins Mawaddah and Rahma at the King Abdullah Specialized Children’s Hospital, National Guard Health Affairs, Riyadh.
The babies, who were born on March 13, 2022, were conjoined at the lower chest and abdomen, and also shared a liver.
Dr. Abdullah Al-Rabeeah, the head of the surgical team, announced the successful procedure, which was the 52nd separation conducted during the 32 years of the Saudi conjoined twins program.
Al-Rabeeah said that several remarkable successes were achieved during this particular procedure. The twins’ recovery time (between completion of surgery and awakening from anesthesia) was shorter than in any previous separation surgery conducted by the team. Also, the twins did not require blood transfusions during the procedure, and although the procedure was expected to take more than 11 hours, the surgical duration was only 5 hours.
A team of 28 Saudi doctors and specialists participated in the separation, which went smoothly, with no complications.
Al-Rabeeah declared the twins to be in very good condition following surgery.
To date, the Saudi conjoined twins program has reviewed 124 cases referred from 23 countries.
The Saudi conjoined twins program is considered one of the leading programs of its kind in the world.
The parents of the twins were overwhelmed by the success of the separation, and their twins responded well after the operation.
Father of the twins, Hudhayfa bin Abdullah Noman, expressed his thanks to the Saudi leadership for the generous humanitarian gesture of sponsoring the costs involved in the separation.
He also thanked the highly skilled medical team for giving his daughters the best possible chance to live full, happy lives.
RIYADH: In a change of tradition, the new cover of the Holy Kaaba in Makkah was installed early Saturday, at the dawn of the new Islamic year of 1444.
It used to be that the Kiswa was replaced once a year during Hajj, specifically on the morning of Dhul Hijjah 9 after the pilgrims go to Mount Arafat, in preparation for receiving worshippers the next morning, which coincides with Eid Al-Adha.
Last month, Saudi Arabia's General Presidency for the Two Holy Mosques announced the change in tradition so that the annual event would be held on the eve of Muharram 1, the first day in the Hijri calendar.
Sheikh Abdulrahman Al-Sudais, president of the Two Holy Mosques presidency, had said the change was being made based on a royal decision.
According to the Saudi Press Agency, the changing of the Kiswa early Saturday was carried out by a team of 200 Saudi technicians from the King Abdulaziz Complex for Manufacturing the Kaaba’s Kiswa, under the supervision of Sheikh Sudais.
Describing the process, the SPA reported: "The new kiswa consisted of four separate sides and the door curtain was installed. Each of the four sides of the Kaaba was raised separately to the top of the Kaaba in preparation for its unfolding on the old side, and fixing the side from above by tying it down and dropping the other end of the side, after the ropes of the old side were loosened.
"By moving the new side up and down in a permanent movement, then the old side fell from below and the new side remained, and the process was repeated four times for each side until the dress was completed, then the belt was weighed in a straight line to the four sides by stitching it.
"This process began first from the side of the hem, due to the presence of the gutter that has its own hole at the top of the garment, and after all sides were fixed, the corners were fixed by sewing them from the top of the garment to the bottom."
Technicians at the King Abdulaziz Complex do the weaving, stitching and printing by hand and machines using 47 pieces of cloth and thread to make the Kiswa. The world’s largest computerized sewing machine, at 16 meters in length, carries out the process.
The cloth is stitched together in five different parts and fixed to the base with copper rings. Around 670 kilograms of raw silk is dyed black at the complex.
The Kiswa is decorated with Quranic verses embroidered onto the cloth with 120 kilograms of 21-karat gold thread and 100 kilograms of silver thread.
The cost of making a new 850-kilogram Kiswa is estimated to cost SR25 million, or over $6.5 million, making it the world’s most expensive covering.
The Kiswa is the special cloth cover of the holy Kaaba at the Grand Mosque in Makkah. Around 670 kilograms of raw silk is stitched together in five different parts and fixed to the base with copper rings. It is decorated with Qur'anic verses embroidered onto the cloth with 120 kilograms of 21-karat gold thread and 100 kg of silver thread. The cost of making a new 850-kg Kiswa is estimated to cost SR25 million, or over $6.5 million, making it the world’s most expensive covering.
RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s Civil Defense on Friday urged the public to take caution as it warned of chances of thunderstorms in parts of the Kingdom from Saturday until Wednesday. The authority said the regions of Asir, Najran, Jazan and Al-Baha will be affected by moderate to heavy rain and brisk winds, which may lead to torrential flow, and the regions of Riyadh, Sharqiya, Qassim and Hail will be affected by light to medium rain. Spokesman Col. Mohammed Al-Hammadi called for caution against potential dangers of the weather, to stay away from places where torrents gather, and to abide by the instructions of the Civil Defense announced through various media and social networking sites, in order to preserve their safety.
RIYADH: The Mohammed bin Salman Foundation “Misk” launched the “Youth Impact Council Initiative” on Thursday.
The initiative was launched in the Prince Mohammed bin Salman Non-Profit City in Riyadh, the Saudi Press Agency reported on Friday.
The initiative is the first platform concerned with supporting the growth of youth organizations by providing an effective environment and sharing experiences and information that serves organizations in the non-profit sector.
It aims to make them more sustainable and effective, and in a way that enhances interconnection between workers in the sector and creates new opportunities to maximize the impact of quality youth organizations.
The Youth Non-Profit Organizations Initiative includes non-profit associations and institutions, experts and specialists in the non-profit, government and private sectors, volunteers in youth programs and bodies that graduated from the Youth Non-Profit Organizations Building Program of the “Misk for Community” path.
Misk also launched the Youth Non-Profit Organizations Incubator Program, which is the second batch of the Youth Non-Profit Organizations Incubator 2022 to be launched, and an opportunity for youth initiatives and newly established associations to accelerate their growth and expansion and multiply their societal impact.
Out of 226 entities participating in the program, seven initiatives and two associations will start the program for guidance and direction on Sunday, including the Digital Games Association, the Robo Tuwaiq initiative, the Wassila platform initiative, the specific community initiative, the Rawasi Youth initiative, the Saudi initiative for nanotechnology, Tarim Association, the Hijaz Bloggers Initiative, and the Theatrical Production Initiative.
The three-month program for non-profit youth organizations includes a training course on the “Misk Hub” platform, which aims to develop the services of the participating parties and build their organizational capacities, including managing development projects, human resource management, governance, financial sustainability, communication, increasing impact and measuring it.
The program concludes with a closing ceremony and a presentation event that will be held in November for all participants, to measure the impact of the program and celebrate the participants’ efforts.
All those participating in the program will give presentations for community projects that serve young people, aimed at obtaining financial support from Misk for their input.