The Sharjah International Book Fair (SIBF) set a new attendance record with this year’s event.
Organisers say 2.3 million people visited the 35th edition of the fair, at the Expo Centre Sharjah, which ended on Saturday. This doubled last year’s attendance of 1.1 million.
SIBF chairman Ahmed Al Ameri put it down to a successful attempt to appeal to a wider variety of communities in the UAE, including the business and education sectors.
He also hailed the success of a partnership with Snapchat – the first-of-its-kind for an Arab cultural event.
“Every year we have new goals,” says Al Ameri. “It’s not about just making it bigger, we want to expand the offers to different people.
“For example, this year we worked with the Filipino communities in the UAE. They had a battle of the bands here in the fair and that was a great success.
“We want everyone to get something out of this event and I feel we achieved that.”
Food for thought
That something for everyone approach was obvious during the final weekend of the fair.
A touch of Bollywood glamour was added to Thursday night’s programme with the arrival of film star Shilpa Shetty.
The health-conscious 41-year-old, renowned for her dramatic performances in Dhadkan (2001) and Phir Milenge (2005), was in Sharjah for the UAE launch of her nutrition book, The Great Indian Diet, which she co-authored with Luke Coutinho.
Speaking to packed crowd at the Intellectual Hall, Shetty said the aim of her book was to debunk the notion that preparing healthy food was a complicated, time-consuming task.
Shetty said the plethora of diseases linked to poor eating habits is a modern development, blaming an increasingly time-poor culture for many of our aliments.
“Lots of people seem to be developing cancer these days, which was never the case years ago,” she said. “I personally know quite a few people with the disease: my friend, my sister-in-law and my mother’s friend.
“If you were to go back 70 years, you would never see this level of lifestyle diseases, including diabetes and obesity. We may not have all had air conditioning then, or cars, but we were certainly much healthier.
“This is the reason why I launched my book. I wanted to make sure that people stay healthy. After all, health is wealth.”
With Middle Eastern cuisine sharing similarities with Indian food – the book offers examples of light dishes containing chicken, lamb and rice – Shetty said The Great Indian Diet could be helpful to many people living in the region, as well as in her homeland.
“I hear lots of reasons why people claim that they can’t eat healthily,” she said. “Women say they are too busy with their children, while men say they have too much work to do.
“I wanted to show that this need not be the case, by showing healthy meals that are realistic and practical to do.”
Another big crowd turned up to see Ahlam Mosteghanemi. The Algerian poet, novelist and media personality has attracted a large following for her lyrical, sometimes controversial, works. Her 1993 debut novel, Memories in the Flesh, is one of the landmarks of Arabic literature, with more than a million copies sold.
Speaking in The Ballroom, Mosteghanemi mostly focused on the importance of reading.
“It’s absolutely imperative. It is not only an awesome responsibility but a way to help us evolve,” she said.
“Books know no boundaries. It is one big republic which we are all part of, and where we are all leaders.”
Mosteghanemi said she has transformed her Facebook page, which has 10 million followers, into a virtual workshop where readers can express ideas and share some of their own writing. She hopes to publish a compilation of some of the strongest writing posted on her page.
“I turned from a writer to a reader,” she said. “There was a sense of competition between them as they knew I would highlight some of their work.
“Writing is a preventive medicine for those who lost everything. It makes us feel strong and beautiful.”
A new chapter
With the fair’s growing success, Al Ameri said the event had outgrown the Sharjah Expo Centre.
He confirmed plans are underway to move next year to a new, bigger venue in Al Tai, a suburb intersecting with Emirates Road and Malhila Road. Construction is already underway.
Al Ameri said the new location will cut travelling time to Sharjah and be more accessible to people from neighbouring emirates. While he did not comment on the size of the new venue, Al Ameri promised there will be more events and even more books on offer.
“I wish I could tell you what we are doing next year, but it’s too early,” he said. “If I tell you the package of authors we have coming for you, people will go crazy.”
sasaeed@thenational.ae
