I will start by describing staying over night in a Bedouin tent. I live in Saudi Arabia and believe it or not camping in the desert is one of the most amazing experiences I ever had. People often camp at spring, of course camping in the summer considered a death wish. You wake up exactly at sunrise; I can’t even describe the view, its so rewarding. Inside the tent, there is a place for the fire and the rest is filled with traditional hand made rugs and mattresses with a small height. You might eat on the ground, or set near the fire on the ground, so everything in its basic form. Everyone is active during the daylight but at sundown, everyone gather for the supper, which often include a camel milk, yogurts, and cheese everything is freshly made, if you have a life stock. After finishing the supper, everyone turn to their bag sleeps, some choose to sleep under the stars when the weather is fine.
I chose to talk about Bedouin tents as a built environment because with the little knowledge I have about sustainability, I saw the Bedouin tents as a perfect example for a sustainable life style that I personally experienced. Now Bedouin tents are taking different modern styles, they have the same shape of the old Bedouin tent but with variation.

First opposition: Man and the physical environment:
Bedouin tents HOLD ON desert’s hells. The tents are totally adaptive to the topography of the desert.

Second Opposition: climate and enclosure.
Bediwen tent have a fabric sections that cut the tent in different enclosed spaces. Those sections are removable, so they create an outside inside experience. When it get cold, the tent would be closed completely in response to the weather and opened as early as the sunrise.

Third Opposition: Gravity and movement.
Columns are obviously used as a response to gravitational force.

The movement is horizontally only, Tents never made in two stories or with stairs; it is basically wide horizontal spaces that allow horizontal movement only.

Fourth Opposition: Permanence and entropy.
The Bedouin tents toke their shape and design because they were made for movement. Bedouins with the change of seasons fellow natural resources, so the tents were made as a movable built environment.

Fifth Opposition: Mass and Form.
The Bedouin tents are more of a form than a mass. They are not structured heavily in the ground. The tents were shaped for wind protection and rain.

Six Opposition: Material and tool.
The material used to make a Bedouin tent is primarly goat’s hair. The tools used to make a tent are mainly the hands, the women in the tribe create the texture of the tent and the men raise it up on columns.

Thus, in my point of view, the Bedouin lifestyle support sustainable environment. Now a days, people in my country are living a much different life style that evolves clearing the topography of the land, the maximum use of conditioners in the summer and heaters in the winter, support vertical and horizontal movement, creating built environment that emphasis mass, and all sorts of materials and tools are used daily. I think if we kept moving forward but yet enforcing and using the Bedouins tent strategies, we would be able to contribute in a sustainable environment.

In the eyes of Mohammed Al Dhaheri, Jamilah was already a winner. The five-year-old black camel was gracefully chewing some fresh grass, carrying little about the attention given to her by a group of tourists with photo cameras.

“Jamilah was born in my farm, near Riyadh, where I have about 80 camels, black like her. When it happened, my young daughter, who was about three years old at that time, came out and hugged her and immediately called her Jamilah. And that’s how she got her name,” explained Mohammed.

He was one of the 1,300 Bedouins who came to Al Dhafra Festival last week in the Western Region of Abu Dhabi. In the gentle golden sands beyond Madinat Zayed, leading towards the mighty Empty Quarters of Liwa, 20,000 camels were camping with their owners and keepers. Many of these camels entered the various categories of the beauty competition that offered cash and four-wheel car awards worth nearly Dh35 million. Others were sold in auctions for various amounts, some exceeding the price of a bunch of Rolls Royce! Hafeez Al Mazrouei’s camel for example, sold for Dh7.5 million. Obeid Breiman Al Ameri would have toppled that, as he was offered Dh9 million for his two-year old female camel, but he refused to sell. And so did Hamdan Al Falahi, who was not impressed with the Dh16 million offered for two of his camels.

“The highest record price that was paid for a naqah [female camel] was last year at the fourth Al Dhafra Mazayana festival, when Shaikh Sultan bin Hamdan bought Karam Al Menhali’s naqah for Dh15 million,” said Salem Al Mazrouei, director of the festival.

Business aside, Al Dhafra was, above all, an extraordinary display in Bedouin traditions and hospitality. Right at the entrance two trucks were selling pretty looking packs of dates. A paved road lined with small shops selling camel accessories, household objects, dates, clothes and even bags, eventually ended in a small roundabout with two options: the right turn, going up a small hill, was for the traditional souk, while the left turn was leading to the famous Million Street.

“Come, come! This very nice for you,” called Fatma, who was selling beautiful — and colourful — Emirati dresses.

“I make them. I learnt from my mother, but now she is old and her eyesight is not very good for sowing.”

Like Fatma, many of the souk kiosks belonged to Emirati ladies from Liwa and Madinat Zayed, selling their own home-made objects. There were, of course, camel blankets and decorative lace, dresses, jewellery and Arabic perfume. Sweets, dates and spices seemed most popular with foreign visitors, but small objects too, typically Emirati, were favoured by souvenir hunters.

“I bought this beautiful golden burka, you know, the face masque for ladies. It is so incredibly light! When I saw it on the faces of the ladies here, I thought it is made of metal and a lot heavier. I didn’t realise it’s just paper,” said Christine Gordon, an Australian tourist who came to spend Christmas with her friends in Abu Dhabi.

“I’m sure my mom and my friends in Sydney would be very intrigued by it. They have never seen anything like it!”

As far as the eyes could see tents and camels were dotted across the desert, split by the “main” paved road that went on for several kilometres before ending at the doorsteps of Tilal Liwa Hotel. Trucks packed with wood for campfires, bundles of grass for camels and water cisterns were dotted all over the festival area.

The Million Street, named so because this is where all these million dirhams camels are sold, was pretty much the heart of the festival. Here, camel caravans proudly dressed in the winning silky cloth of the competition (if they were among winners) or shinny, glittering “accessories”, led by their Bedu owners in four-wheel cars bursting with loud traditional music, were parading up and down the truck road constantly.

At the top of the Million Street was the arena where all the beauty competitions took place. Daily throughout the 10-day festival, dozens of purebred Asayel (Omani brown) and Majahim (Saudi black) camels, belonging either to sheikhs or to tribesmen, were presented to a panel of Bedouin judges to pick up the best looking of them all.

“This is where I spent most of the time when I visited the festival with my friends. The presentation and the announcements were in Arabic, but we could work out what the judges were looking for,” said Martina Venus, who spent one day at the festival with her friends from Abu Dhabi and Dubai.

“They are looking at body proportions, hair, teeth and general appearance,” she went on explaining.

Like most tourists at the festival, they too got the “royal” treatment.

“It was so amazing! As soon as we arrived at the arena, we sat in the VIP area, in those golden, comfortable armchairs! Then someone came and offered us Arabic coffee and tea. We felt so special!”

“In one of the breaks we were taken into the arena where we could have a closer look at the camels and one TV station even interviewed us. At the end, another person came and gave us books about the camel festival, told us in more details about how the judging is done and asked us if there is anything else we want to know.”

“I must say, in the eight years since I’ve been living in the UAE, this is the first time I come to such festival, and I was so impressed how friendly the camels are! What made the whole experience special, though, is how welcoming these Bedouin people are!”

For Martina’s friend, Carina Shimonek, the camel festival too was something unforgettable.

“I came to visit Martina three times — from Germany — and this was the highlight of all my trips,” she said.

As the sun was falling behind the soft dunes and visitors were heading back home or to their hotels in the region, small campfires began to flicker across the desert. Meat was put on the grill and sweet, aromatic tea was brewed. In the open majlis tents, the Bedouins, some coming from as far as Yemen and Jordan, were gathering to discuss the events of the day. As the last night, December 28, finally arrived, only the stars were left to light the quiet sand dunes. The desert city, with its camels, tents, blankets and memories, was once again packed in trucks and heading back to all corners of Arabia.

Until recently it has been fairly difficult to find any form of quality supplier of high end Bedouin tents in the UK. Suppliers have been fairly thin on the ground and the availability of this versatile tent suffered because of this, but this is thankfully changing as tent fabrics are becoming more advanced, lending themselves to being waterproof and having an array of other features which not only make them feasible with regards to the UK weather conditions, but also comply with the local fire retardancy specifications for insurance purposes. What to look for when renting or buying a Bedouin Tent in the UK There are several tent hire or purchase factors to keep in mind when looking to buy or rent a Bedouin tent in the UK. The most obvious would be to check if your tent is 100% waterproof (because we all know what the English weather is like). At best, the weather in the UK is unpredictable and at worst… Well we all know that too. Because of this there is always the likelihood of rain on the day of the event, this means that many people opt for the safety of an indoor (brick & mortar) venue However, if your tent is waterproof or weather proof, there’s absolutely no excuse to do something different. And this is where a modern Bedouin tent becomes the perfect choice for a UK special event. The go anywhere, do anything function tent With a Bedouin tent you will have a lot of flexibility in the sense that you will be able to choose your décor and lighting to complement your chosen theme. Some tent manufacturers even cater for tent branding, which is ideal for corporates. Furthermore, it’s easy to adapt your Bedouin tent according to the weather. If it’s sunny and warm, the tent sides can be open. These sides can, however, be brought down within a matter of minutes, should it begin to rain or suddenly become windy. A Bedouin tent can also be set up at almost any location. No terrain is an issue for a Bedouin tent, including areas that are normally to used to erect other tents such as Marquee tents. What is a safe Bedouin tent? One thing to keep in mind is the safety of your chosen Bedouin tent. Not all tent manufacturers supply tents that comply with the UK standards when it comes to being fire retardant. It is imperative that event companies, event organisers and individuals alike ensure the safety of their clients and guests by emphatically insisting on the correct fire retardant certificates when buying or hiring Bedouin tents UK.

Living in the desert for even a short while can pose some challenges because of the dry and hot conditions. Bedouin tents are a safe and durable place to live and sleep in the desert.Bedouin tents derive from the Bedouin culture, which is made of mainly Arab nomadic pastoralist groups and some non-Arab groups in the Middle East.
Bedouin tents are long low tents typically made of goat and camel hair. Each side can be rolled up and down. The women weave these durable living spaces. The tent is supported by tall poles in the center. The front, sides and back are held up with lower poles. The more poles, the higher the wealth of the dweller. Some bedouin tents for sale allow you to adjust the height of the tent to suite your needs.

In its traditional use, the bedouin tent is sectioned off into two parts separated by a woven curtain. One side is a sitting area for men, called mag’ad and the other side is where the women cook and have company, the maharama.

The design of the bedouin tents makes it easy to travel with because they can be disassembled and packed up within an hour. They are also easy to repair if needed.
Because of the wool and hair construction of the bedouin tents, the material makes them waterproof and durable. They also keep the occupants cool in the hot weather and warm in colder weather. The sides can be rolled up to let a breeze move through while still providing needed shade to the dwellers. The floor is typically covered with rugs.
Some modern companies today make bedouin tents for the general population to use. Some are available in a canvas material for use during camping trips in North American weather and climates. The canvas can withstand the effects of the sun, wind, rain and salt. One company also offers heat vents to release hot air or smoke if you choose to cook inside during bad weather.

Someone may also choose to make their own custom bedouin tent to use for camping trips using a canvas material and poles. Curtains can be used to separate the living and sleeping spaces.
Published by Candice W.