Qatar's falcons get subsidised healthcare

Once a pursuit for humble Bedouin tribes, falconry has become a hobby for the people of Qatar. Photo: dpa/sampics

The Souq Waqif, Doha’s ancient marketplace, unspools from the nearby bay like a roll of precious fabric. A medieval maze of narrow alleyways linked to a wide main plaza, the Souq has long served as a trading post for Bedouin arriving by camel and travellers in small boats.

But today, as one of the city’s last surviving historic urban spaces, the Souq also serves the rapidly modernising emirate as a link to a history and a culture that is fading. Nowhere is that clash of past and present more apparent than at the market’s falcon hospital, a state-of-the-art medical facility dedicated to caring for animals that have been revered here for centuries.