Dubai Shopping Festival ends

Dubai: The 14th edition of the Dubai Shopping Festival (DSF), the region's biggest shopping extravaganza, closed on Sunday with a glittering ceremony at Dubai Festival City.

Shaikh Hamdan Bin Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, awarded prizes and thanked sponsors, marking the end of the 32-day event.

In all, DSF offered Dh100 million worth of prizes and gifts, including Lexus cars, gold and cash.

Among the highlights was the Global Village, where 70 records were set. Once authenticated, the records will be listed in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Records attempted included most beads threaded, most number of socks sorted, most sand moved in 30 seconds, most banknotes counted in one minute, most number of basketball free-throws in one minute, fastest text message in English and Arabic, fastest number typing, fastest M&M chocolate sorting using chopsticks, most clothes pegs held in one hand, longest coin spin, fastest game of operation, most shoelaces tied in one minute, most CDs flipped in one minute, loudest shout, loudest scream, loudest clap and loudest whistle.

The following records have been posted in the pavillion's Record Hall of Fame: 25 baskets by Zeehao Huang, 120 notes counted in a minute by Mohammad Zeeham, 54.41 seconds by Yousuf Ahli in English text messaging, 40.47 seconds by Ali Jaffar Al Ansari for Arabic text messaging, 17.37 seconds by Aisha Khalid for number typing, 40 pegs by Ahmad Bin Darwish for clothes pegs held in one hand, 21 shoes tied in one minute by Khalid Abdul Aziz, 51 CDs flipped in a minute by Mohammad Rohail, 10.68 seconds used to spin a coin by Asma Yousuf, 31.50 seconds to sort M&M chocolates by Yinger Guan Wing, 29 beads sorted in one minute by Erma Glogdove, 16 pairs of socks sorted by Kristina Ilieva, and 194 millilitres of sand sifted by Majid Ebrahim, among others.

What was your most memorable experience this DSF? Has the credit crisis affected your shopping? How was DSF compared to the previous ones?

DSF is one of the key ambassadorial event for Dubai to attracting visitors from around the globe and also part of the dubai lifestlye. This and such initiatives are more necessary and welcome although the amount of spending and footfall has dropped generally.
M Chatur
London,UK
Posted: February 16, 2009, 13:36

This festival is good, as compared to the previous year. It became very interesting for me to participate in it.
Neetugarg
Jaipur,India
Posted: February 16, 2009, 11:54

It is good as compared to previous years, one of the reasons is that, I did not see the previous festivals, that is why. Unfortunately, I didn't become be a millionare during this fastivel. I hope I win Dh1 Million.
Arshad Aziz
Karachi,Pakistan
Posted: February 16, 2009, 08:34

This year's DSF was most memorable for me as it got me lucky winning a few prizes. The most exciting one was that I was lucky enough to win a diamond pendent for the Valentine's day SMS contest. It's always fun to take part in competitions but winning out of luck makes one feel twice as happy. We did reduce our shopping this year because of the crisis. But it's always fun to go shopping, look for the offers going on and get the best bargains. I guess one never feels bored that they've had enough of DSF, there's always something every year for everyone.
Vidya M.
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: February 16, 2009, 08:27

Can we have a statistical comparison from 2007 to 2008 to 2009? I think that would be interesting.
Amyn
Dubai,UAE
Posted: February 16, 2009, 07:58