Beginning Qatar National Day, the three-day Run The World Festival
will host a range of activities including sport competitions, musical
performances and cultural showcases. By Umer Nangiana
In partnership with Qatar Stars League and Embrace Doha, The Youth Company on Monday officially inaugurated Run The World (RTW) Festival, set to take place at Katara Cultural Village on Qatar National Day.
Promising to be even bigger and better this time, the three-day festival provides youth, between the ages of 14 to 29 years, an exciting opportunity to participate in a range of activities including sports competitions, extreme sports shows by professional athletes, musical performances, and cultural showcases.
“Run The World Festival was created because I saw the importance of bringing people together. In a country such as Qatar there are different people from all around the world and RTW brings everyone together and provides the platform for cultural diffusion, sports activities, singing, and a general vibe of pure happiness,” Mohamed Farid, Founder and Chairman of The Youth Company International, told reporters at a press conference.
Run The World Festival began in 2011 and since then has been organised annually, attracting over 120,000 youth.
At the conference, which was held at Hilton Hotel, the official hotel partner, Farid was joined by Dana Alfardan, Founder of DNA Records, Amal al-Shammari, Founder of Embrace Doha, Khalifa Saleh al-Haroon, Founder of ILoveQatar (ILQ) and Ian Riddoch, Director of Sales at Qatar Stars League to speak about their aspirations for the festival and its events.
During the first two days of the festival, RTW 2014 will be celebrating Qatar and Qatari culture, through various activities organised by Embrace Doha. “We are happy to be part of such an amazing initiative. Including the youth in a nation-wide festival and allowing them to rediscover Qatari culture is a great way for them to become more involved in a fast-developing country such as Qatar,” said Amal al-Shammari, the Founder of Embrace Doha. Apart from Qatari culture section, RTW will offer a ‘Global Village’, consisting of different embassies, which will represent their countries and cultures.
“We are going to set up a big tent under the title, ‘Becoming a Qatari in 3 Steps’. The first step, we call, is ‘haya’. It means welcome in English where people can come and sit in a majlis (traditional seating arrangement) and enjoy Arabic hospitality,” al-Shammari told Community, detailing the events Embrace Doha has planned for the festival.
The second step, she added, would be people being invited to experience the cuisine in the typical Arabic style, sitting on the floor in a circle and eat with their hands. The third step would be to ‘dress handsome’, trying Qatari costumes and dresses.
Besides learning the traditional dancing, the participants would be given an opportunity to be pictured sitting in a Landcruiser in a ‘Qatari way’. “At the end of all the sessions, we will give you (the participants) a fake Qatari passport with name inscribed on it with your picture,” she added.
Run The World Festival 2014 cannot happen without its very famous Youth Got Talent (YGT) competition, organised in partnership with Qatar’s first record label company DNA Records.
“We love what The Youth Company is doing in Qatar and love the Youth Got Talent contest as it’s a great example of offering that platform to young performers. We are hoping this will be the start of a long relationship with The Youth Company and really looking forward to seeing some of the talent at this year’s contest,” said Dana Alfardan, the founder of DNA Records.
The semi-finals took place last weekend at Virgin Megastores, the official Entertainment Partner for RTW Festival 2014, and were a huge success. The final competition will take place during the festival itself and the winner will have the opportunity to receive professional mentorship from Dana Alfardan herself, along with the opportunity to record his or her own song, she added.
RTW Festival 2014 will include multiple sports activities, such as parkour supported by Nescafe, skateboard ramps supported by Casio, beach volleyball, football, basketball, cricket, and extreme area BMX, supported by Galaxy Sports and Qatar Extreme Sports.
Professional Red Bull Parkour and BMX athletes will entertain the visitors, while Coca-Cola will take care of hydration of all participants. Finally, street art space will give a chance to young graffiti artists to demonstrate their talents to wider audience, said Farid.
Visitors can be prepared to be surprised with activation area set up by Chevrolet, being the official Automotive Partner, showcasing the latest models of Chevrolet sports cars and SUVs.
