Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque (Arabic: )


Ted888

Senior Member
Dec 19, 2008
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Happened to be in Abu Dhabi and only had a few hours to spend, got into a local taxi and paid 50AED (SGD20) to arrive at Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque. Took some quick snapshots to bring home. Sharing them here in case someone might be interested to visit one day.
Ths Grand Mosque is named after the founder and first President of the UAE, the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. It is also his vision to build such a large mosque possibly 3rd in the world.
Under the hot and glaring sun at 45C, badly taken Samsung S5’s pano shot:
#1 Outside
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#2 Inside, can see not a lot of visitors this time round
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The dress code is easy to follow. Without proper attire, one can always borrow the long dress (abaya) and headscarf (shaya) from one of the service desks below next to the underground car park.

For the photographer, there is one important responsibility:
"Observe the sanctity of the mosque when taking photographs. Do not sit or lie down or make any gestures that are disrespectful to the mosque during the visit or photography."
I guess this is where Rihanna got herself sent off by the mosque. And I saw with my own eyes two visitors, one of them stretched out his both arms posing for his friend to take a quick photo with hand phone outside the visitor entrance (quite far away actually),obviously without knowing the rights and wrongs, and within second, the security guard ran after them to get the photo deleted.

#3
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Major international companies specialised in the manufacturing of crystal chandeliers garnished the mosque with seven gold-plated chandeliers in different sizes, made of Swarovski crystals. The largest of the lustres is the largest in the world.
#4
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#5 Believe it or not, the central chandelier weights 9000kg (9 tons).
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#6
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#7
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Another astonishing feature of the mosque is the large carpet in the main prayer hall hand-knotted by about 1,300 Iranian craftsmen.
#8
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Pure white marble from Italy used for interior sections. The huge Qibla wall in the prayer hall is also surrounded by beautiful floral designs.

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Taken with D300S, Tokina 11-16mm:
#10
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The side of the mosque with water
#11
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#12
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12
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#13
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#14 visitors entrance
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#15
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#16
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Thanks for the information.
I found it useful.

Really impressive place