Workers happy to cover site

Makkah: A few days before the start of Haj, dozens of workers were putting the finishing touches to an embroidered black cloth that will cover the Ka'aba, the holiest site in Islam.

Known as the kiswa, the cloth is woven from silk and cotton and adorned with verses from the Quran embroidered in gold.

About 200 people work at a factory in Saudi Arabia making a new one each year to be placed on the Ka'aba during the Haj.

The annual five-day ritual began yesterday.

"When it arrives here it looks like this print and then we stuff it and then we embroider it with gold. It involves four stages," said Saleh Zakzok, a worker at the factory.

"I thank God that I have been able to work on the covering of the Ka'aba."

A cube-shaped stone structure in the Grand Mosque in Makkah, the Ka'aba is a focal point of the Haj, during which more than two million pilgrims walk around it.

When Muslims anywhere in the world say their prayers five times a day, it is towards Makkah and the Ka'aba that they face.

The Ka'aba's black stone was revered even before the birth of Islam in the desert kingdom. Muslims believe it was originally built by the Prophet Ebrahim. It has since been rebuilt more than once.

The kiswa used to be made outside Saudi Arabia and there have been red, green or white coverings in centuries past, but now it is always black with embroidered gold calligraphy.

The silk, enough to cover a structure estimated to measure about 15 metres high and between 10 and 12 metres long, is imported but the kiswa is embroidered and stitched together in Saudi Arabia and paid for by the kingdom each year.

Adnan Shesha, head of the factory, said about 20 million Saudi riyals (Dh19.59 million) were spent on making the kiswa each year, including the salaries of the workers.

"I've been working here now for five years and the work is going well," said Hussain Yassin, who was helping sew the cloth.