OUTLOOK — By Ahmed Al Falahi — The times, through their material heritage, constitute a very important dialogue station, through the level of knowledge that attracts the interests of a large segment of researchers, specialists, and those interested, because it reflects spaces of time formed during those long early ages which has produced so much of heritage materials in its various forms that reveal many mysteries. Those were the times that were able to produce us and our heritage.
These huge treasures are now added to those that we now have in balance today and it is up to us to take care of them so that they stay alive in our memories tomorrow looking brighter than ever. They must be present in the agendas and interests of our officials and the general public. I was sitting with one of my friends, who is now the ambassador of one of the European countries. He said that one day he happened to visit one of his friends there who is a researcher and who had lived in Oman for long time.
He said that sitting down there he noticed one of the unique heritage pieces in the living room. It was taking the whole corner of the room and the piece seemed to have the features of an Omani artefact. When he asked him about it he was told that: “One day as I was wandering around in Souq A’Seeb I noticed this piece which was thrown there beside a trash bin. This piece, which actually goes back hundreds of years, was discarded in the garbage without realising its actual value. Because I love such works of art I was able to recognise it and felt sad that such a precious piece of art was actually being discarded.
“The actual place of this ancient work of art should have been in the corner of one of the Omani museums, had the concerned authorities taken care of such things. So I took it with great care and attention and it is now alive again”.
This is not the only real story of this kind. There are lots of stories that reveal that the authorities concerned are not giving the much needed attention to their heritage. They don’t realise that this heritage could be transferred to their children and the coming generations as the wealth of the nation. There are specialists working in this area who don’t recognise the importance of such valuable artefacts. Only those who know the significance of heritage would be able to take care of such rare works of art and preserve them for the future.
