Dubai: The story of two people who relied on Land Rovers to travel between the emirates 50 years ago has been documented in a new film released by Land Rover on its 70th anniversary.
Directed by Hind Shoufani, the film called <A Journey of Rediscovery,> tells the story of Robin Webb, a civil engineer and Majed Awwad, a Ras Al Khaimah resident, in the early 1960s and their experience travelling between the emirates with no roads in place.
The film documents the days before the formation of the UAE and also pays tribute to seven decades of Land Rover by demonstrating how the trusted 4x4 played a role in their journey.
Getting to the other emirates from Dubai was a rough and dangerous experience. Webb describes how he drove his Land Rover across the enormous sabkha flats at low tide, over sand dunes, along the hard-packed wet sand of the beaches and through the gravel plains. “One of the great things about us doing engineering was that we had Land Rovers. We basically lived in them the whole time. They were the most trusted off-road companions and the best way to connect people when few roads existed,” he said.
Webb designed and supervised the construction of some of the first roads in Ras Al Khaimah as one of his final projects before leaving the Middle East in 1968.
The Palestinian Awwad, who came to the UAE as a young adviser before working for the local municipality, said: “Whoever owned a Land Rover back then was considered very important. It was the only car capable of overcoming all challenges.”
The film was shot entirely in the UAE and shows that although everything changes with time, memories remain to light the path forward. The film illustrates how Land Rover has been a part of Awwad and Webb’s UAE excursions half a century ago and is another story in Jaguar Land Rover MENA’s #MYLAND initiative, (“Ardhi” in Arabic), which celebrates the impact of Arab culture on today’s world.
Salman Sultan, public relations and social media manager for Jaguar Land Rover MENA said: “It’s almost unfathomable now to think how harsh the environment was in the UAE not that long ago. Back then, having a Land Rover was literally a guarantee that you would safely get back home before nightfall.”
The film also shows the strong bond that exists between people and their 4x4s and the pride that Land Rover enjoys in the region.
