Kuwait

Kuwait grew from a small settlement on a sheltered bay into one of the busiest ports of the northern Gulf. Its merchants sailed to India and East Africa, its shipyards built some of the finest dhows in Arabia, and its divers worked the pearl banks every summer.

The discovery of oil transformed the country within a single generation, funding schools, hospitals and one of the earliest welfare systems in the region, while the old sea trades passed into memory and museum.

Kuwait's modern story also includes the occupation of 1990, the liberation that followed, and the long work of reconstruction.

Kuwait City faces the water along a long corniche, its skyline marked by the Kuwait Towers and the domes of the Grand Mosque. Souq Al-Mubarakiya still trades in spices, textiles and dates in the middle of the modern centre.

Offshore, the island of Failaka carries Bronze Age Dilmun remains and a Hellenistic settlement founded in the time of Alexander the Great — one of the very few Greek sites in the Gulf.

The diwaniya, an evening gathering held in a room set aside for guests, remains central to Kuwaiti social and political life. Conversation, poetry and debate move through these rooms every night of the week.

Music keeps the sea alive: the work songs of the pearling crews, the sawt tradition, and the annual voyages of restored dhows all recall the years when Kuwait's wealth came from the water.

Beyond the city, Kuwait is open desert that turns briefly green after winter rain, when families camp across the Kabd and Al-Sulaibiya areas. The Jal Az-Zor escarpment rises above Kuwait Bay in the north.

The bay itself, and the nine offshore islands, support seagrass beds, shrimp grounds and large numbers of migrating birds on the route between Asia and Africa.