From Dhows to Tankers

Al Hashemi - the largest Dhow ever built

 In this part of the world, it is and understatement to say that oil is the lifeblood of the different countries that make up the region.  As you might suspect though, this was not always the case.  In fact, one could argue that the people of the Arabian peninsula have gone through one of the more dramatic shifts in history over the past few hundred years.  For most of Kuwait and the rest of the peninsula, Bedouin nomadic lifestyle dominated for most of recorded history.  There were permanent settlements here and there that sprouted up because of access to different resources; most likely fresh water.  In Kuwait's case, other than Alexander the Great setting up a settlement on Failaka Island off the coast, there were really no permanent settlements of any kind until the 17th century.  The main reason for this settlement was the access to one of the best natural harbors in the region.  Bedouin's slowly started adapting to a settled lifestyle so they could benefit from a key geographical trading location that linked East Africa and India to the Ottoman Empire.  To boost this trade many ships were built in the regional style known as Dhows.  The wood had to be imported from India, but that didn't stop Kuwait from amassing one of the largest Dhow fleets in the Arabian Gulf.  They used these versatile ships to transport goods to and from India and Africa.  They especially took advantage of the pearl rich waters off the coast of Kuwait and the Arabian Gulf to create the backbone for the permanent settlement that we are living in today, Kuwait City.  Pearls along with spices, dates, and horses continued to draw desert wanderers to abandon their millennia's old Bedouin lifestyle and these Dhows created the means to have such a dramatic shift.  Not until the 1920's and 30's did the importance of the ships begin to gradually fade.  Two events happened in Kuwait and the Gulf region that would start to draw the attention of the entire world.  First, Japan began to manufacture cultured pearls that undermined the dependence of the region on these luxury items.  The rest of the world could now enjoy pearls at a much cheaper price, although at the expense of Kuwait and neighboring countries.  Not long after this happened, a precious commodity that would come to have dramatic influence over the events of the 20th century was discovered in Kuwait; oil.  Thankfully for Kuwait and a few of its neighbors, they had a somewhat sizable amount of oil; the world's largest reserves at the time.  Because of this and rapidly increasing demand for oil around the world after WWII, Kuwait began to rapidly modernize and saw unprecedented economic growth.  The Dhows started to become replaced by tankers that transported their good fortune around the world. This is even more evident today by the presence of no fewer than a dozen tankers in the Arabian Gulf within view from our humble abode.  Dhows are still used today for fishing and for importing water until desalinization became more prevalent.  They still have a very important meaning for the Arabian peoples, represented by the fact that every Kuwaiti coin has a Dhow proudly placed on one side; but for the foreseeable future they no longer play the vital role that they once did.

If the past few hundred years can bring about this much change to the Arabian peninsula that hadn't changed that much in the past few thousand years, then the future will be exciting indeed for this rapidly developing part of the world; especially with humanities ever growing demand for what brought us here to Kuwait in the first place; oil.  

Captain Fields

Modern Dhows