We arrive outside the mosque after a bit of a drive through a residential area where all the relatives of the ruling party live. Once at the mosque there is a bit of confusion between the driver and the guide – the driver says we are only here for a photo stop, we’re not going in – but that’s what we thought. The guide calls the boss and gets the straight scoop so we proceed to the parking lot to go inside the mosque. But in hindsight, I wonder if it wasn’t just some communication snafu. The driver had stopped in front of the mosque, in the best location to actually take a picture of the entire mosque. We could have had a quick picture stop there, then gone into the mosque parking lot – but because of the confusion, we didn’t get to get out to take the photo, and we didn’t come back that way either, so….. who knows? At any rate, on to the mosque we went.
As we get off the bus, our guide is reviewing our clothing. They are very particular here with women’s clothing – and if you don’t pass you can’t go inside. Arms covered down past your wrists, legs covered past your ankles, head and hair covered. And nothing can be see-through, white is typically not acceptable. We’ve got varying degrees of compliance on our bus – one lady gets an abaya from the guide immediately – others he thinks will make it in. But then as we walk up to the entryway – there are “guards” who are reviewing our clothing and they turn away one of the other ladies – who has to go back for an abaya. And then, when we go through security – ladies on the left, men on the right – another one of our ladies is turned back because her skirt is too see through – even though she made it past the first review! These people are serious!
We use the delay to snap some photos of the exterior of the mosque – and of me in my head scarf (blatantly flaunting the rules because my hair is showing – I was actually reprimanded for that later on when the scarf kept slipping).
At last, we are all together and we head off into the Sheik Zayed Grand Mosque. Words just can’t do this place justice. It is an amazingly spectacular example of architecture and a testament to Sheik Zayed’s belief in a tolerant and Islamic culture. The Sheik oversaw every detail of design and construction, which is no small feat for such a huge structure. The building can hold up to 40,000 people and is made of marble, stone, glass and semi-precious stones. The exterior courtyard alone is amazing.
The interior courtyard is stunning with its acres of marble tile flooring and the view of the domes and minarets. The guide proves to be a better guide than photographer, but it’s still sweet he said he could help with our pictures.
We walk through a colonnaded portico that surrounds the courtyard, marveling at the inlaid marble pillars topped with gold leaves.
We remove our shoes and enter into an ante room with a gorgeous chandelier and delicate inlaid marble creeping flower vines on the walls….
…then into the main prayer room with the largest rug in the world. It took 1200 carpet artisans 2 years to complete this 6700 square foot masterpiece (that’s almost 1 1/2 acres of carpet). It’s hard to get the immense perspective of it, but we try as best we can.
Oh, and if you ever wonder how everyone lines up so nice and neatly to pray? Well, here’s how…
….there are raised lines underneath the carpet for you to put your feet on when you line up to pray. They are spaced evenly across the entire floor so everyone will have enough room to kneel and pray.
The detail work is astonishing, everywhere you look there are different inlays, different treatments, chandeliers – over the top beauty.
There is also a clock that tells the time to pray – in standard roman numerals, Arabic and some other language of which I’m not quite sure.
Wow – that’s the only thing left to say. Just wow.
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