About Hope Expertise I`m nineteen years old and I`m an expert in the United Arab Emirates culture. I`m one of country`s locals so I`m able to answer any question about the culture of United Arab Emirates, and the culture of the Arabian Gulf countries in general. You can ask me anything about the culture or the traditions of the United Arab Emirates. I don`t have enough information about the history of the traditions or the name of the tools that were used in the past. I`m also able to answer your questions about the United Arab Emirates youth and what they are interested in nowadays. I won`t be a much of a help in the matters of business. I can only help you with the culture & the people of UAE.
Experience I'm living my life according to the cultural and the traditions of the UAE so it will not be that hard on me to answer your questions.
Expert: Hope Date: 12/17/2005 Subject: kinds of headresses
Question i was wondering what do the different colors of the arab headress mean. like i see one that is black and gray., one that is red and white etc. and could you please also tello me whats the difference between the shemagh , the kufiya, and and the other names that arab people wear that long cloth on their head. i'am very interested in this. and one more thing how to you fold them. i know there is one that exposes the face and one headdress that covers the face
thanks for ya time
jeff
Answer Hello Jeff,
The Qetra or the Shemagh as you called it is simply a piece of cloth to protect the head from the heat of the sun. To prevent having a sun stroke arab men wore this cloth a long time ago so it became part of the official custome. There is the red , gray and white ones .. but there are also the ones that have more than one color like the ones people of Oman wear. There are different ways of wearing it .. but simply you can wear it by crossing the both ends at the different directions, or you can put it in the middle of the head and put the black rounded thing on it to make it stable when moving.
There is no such thing as wearing it to cover the face as far as I know , we simply do that when there is a sand strom or another weather condition to protect the mouth and the nose.
Shemagh is the piece of cloth and the Kufiya is a white hat that people wear first on the head so that when they wear the shemagh it will stop it from falling when moving around, mostly the kufiya is white.
Hopefully you benefited from my answers , consider that things names differ from one country to another and sometimes from one city to another.
