Pearling in Bahrain: A tradition of heritage and wealth

I always say this, that all Bahrainis have pearl diving in their blood. Mainly all the families that moved from the Arabian Gulf or from Iran's coast or Iraq's coast and came to Bahrain to live here were divers. So it was the best place to come work as a diver. So a lot of the families here will always have someone in their family that is either a pearl diver or someone who helped in the pearl diving industry. Bahrain has always been the pearl hub in this region, mainly because it's one of the most shallowest areas. It's an island. Most of the people who resided here were working in the pearl diving industries. Most of our traditions will have to do with the pearl diving industry. For instance, the pearl diving singer, the folk of the pearl diving, has been passed down for generations. We still sing the same songs. It was mainly done to create morale on the boat. Bahrain is famous for its pearl diving industry. We used to use it for diving. It depends on the maintenance. If you're going to fish here, you have to have two years of experience. The Bahraini women talk about pearl diving, about fishing, about the whole term of the sea. The profession is about providing food, as I said at the beginning. But for me, thank God, it's about providing food In taking out tourists, I always used to ask people, who are you finding the pearl for? And when the answer was, for my mama, the pearl gets bigger for some reason. I'm one of the people who, without having guidance from my parents or my family to fall in love with pearl diving, I wasn't taught by anyone. Because the generation before us were not allowed to dive when they were young. Because since the oil was discovered, all the jobs moved to the oil industry. The risk of diving and pearl diving was very high. So it was not recommended or not wanted from the parents that you say, I'm going to go work in the sea. It was one of the no-no's for our parents' generation and probably even our granddad. There was a gap, a very long gap. Maybe from the 50s till probably 2010-12. Since 2017 in particular, when they created the pearl diving license for the pearl divers, a lot of the ones who signed up were people who don't know anything about pearl diving. Now seven years down the line, the majority of people in Bahrain have gone back and got in touch with that aspect, and it wasn't handed down by their parents. It was us wanting to create a new system. Even our diving techniques have changed compared to the old ones. Even the way we sell pearls has changed. So the new system is created by the new generation. A lot of Bahrainis are into the pearl diving. There's more than 1,000 divers now registered in pearl diving on a daily basis to create an income for themselves. A lot of people are worried that the new generations are depleting the beds because they have new technology, for instance scuba diving. So people think that they will be able to collect more oysters and find more pearls. It's actually the opposite because of us using the scuba diving, and it refines you on a certain time. You're only allowed three dives a day due to decompression sickness and other problems that could occur. Hopefully, if God gives me the health, I will definitely try to go back to pearl diving on a regular basis. It's very fulfilling.