Stacks of boxes line the pavement and there is plenty of chatter as visitors are handed dates and Arabic coffee to sample in Mina Zayed.
Ramadan is in full swing, and this is evident in the hustle and bustle of Abu Dhabi's date market.
In normal months, the souq is quite busy, especially at night, but at Ramadan it is a whirl of activity.
Shoppers load car boots with kilograms of dates so they are well stocked for breaking their fast during the holy month.
How big is the impact of Ramadan?
It is the most hectic time of the year for the vendors. “Ramadan season is a very, very busy time,” says Anas, of Ali Ashoor Date Shop, as his colleagues load up trolleys. “One person took 1,000 cartons.”
Many vendors, including Mohammed Thanseer, say the local khalas dates are the most popular variety during the holy month and are often presented by Emiratis as gifts.
Expats and tourists mostly buy medjool and ajwa, which mainly come from Saudi Arabia.
Religious significance
Singaporean couple Faisal and Aliyah visited the date market on the night before the start of Ramadan, loading up their car with cartons of ajwa dates.
“We give the ajwa dates because that is the favourite date of rasool Allah, our prophet. So when you give gifts in Ramadan, especially dates, the Muslims look for ajwa. We give those to our friends as well,” Aliyah says.
In Islam, dates play a crucial role. The fruit is mentioned at least 20 times in the Quran, and the Prophet Mohammed encouraged breaking fast during the holy month with dates.
Traditionally, this is widespread throughout the UAE and the wider Arab world, leading to an increase in consumption of the fruit during Ramadan.
Buying in bulk
One shopper from Syria, Hassan Hamsho, has bought 10kg of dates. “I have eight restaurants, so I take about 1,000 kilos [during Ramadan],” he says.
Restaurants, hotels and mosques give out small packages of dates, typically khalas, to patrons for iftar.
Mansoor Alqubaisi, an Abu Dhabi native, has taken shopkeeper Omer Alnaim's advice on which dates to buy.
“It is Ramadan, everyone's buying dates. I bought 6kg of saqai. They are his favourite,” he says, gesturing to Mr Alnaim, who says they have less sugar. Minutes later, he is convinced to add one more kilogram.
Rooted in history
The date palm is one of the UAE's symbols and for good reason – dates have been a staple of the local diet dating back centuries.
Some of the oldest date seeds, more than 7,000 years old, were found in archaeological digs on Delma Island, off the coast of Abu Dhabi.
Now, there are estimated to be 40 million date palms in the country, of more than 150 varieties.
Dr Jonathan Flowers of NYU Abu Dhabi has spent the past 12 years researching dates full-time. His goal is to understand and characterise the genetic diversity of date cultivars.
“Dates were a core component, a part of the rich history of the region,” he says. They were “a source of sustenance, something that fuelled the local economy and facilitated long-distance travel, say across the Empty Quarter”, he adds.
The crop retains a significant economic, social and religious value in the UAE and the broader region.
“It is an important source of income for a lot of people, and so it has great economic value for the country,” says Dr Flowers.
“I would say that, between the social and socio-religious dynamic and the economic and commercial value, that is the basis for the significance of the crop.”
He highlights Emiratis' fondness for the khalas variety. Key factors driving its popularity are its taste, widespread availability and affordability.
'Khalas is the number one cultivar or variety. Every single market, every single grocery store will have khalas. People just like the taste of it. You talk to local people and Emiratis, they all know the flavour of khalas. It's very distinct.”
Dr Flowers says the dates we are eating today are the result of a long history of cultivation. They have been bred through clones that are clipped from the offshoot plants each palm produces.
Simply planting a date seed would not produce the same variety, and it would probably be less appealing, he says. This means the types of dates we eat today were staples hundreds of years ago.
“These varieties are really gifts from our ancestors that have been preserved for long periods of time,” Dr Flowers says. “They're really a legacy of the ancestors of Emiratis and the ancestors of people around the region.”
