For Saudi fan, road to World Cup is a desert trek

AL-KHASRAH, SAUDI ARABIA: The idea hit Abdullah Alsulmi earlier this year, while he was watching a television show in which a senior Qatari official promised an “exceptional” experience at the upcoming World Cup.

His excitement building, the 33-year-old Saudi recalls thinking: “I will go to Doha no matter what, even if I have to walk!“

It was an unlikely beginning to what has become an audacious adventure dismissed by some of Alsulmi’s own relatives as “crazy“: A two-month, 1,600-kilometer (1,000-mile) solo trek from his native Jeddah to the Qatari capital.

Alsulmi says the journey, faithfully documented for his thousands of Snapchat followers, is meant to highlight regional enthusiasm for the first World Cup in the Middle East — which Saudi officials have pitched as a milestone “for all Arabs.” 

“We want to support the World Cup,” Alsulmi told AFP one day last week as he sheltered from the midday sun near roadside shrubs in the town of Al-Khasrah, 340 kilometers southwest of Riyadh.

Wearing a wide-brim hat and a backpack to which he’d affixed Saudi and Qatari flags, he said: “I consider myself like a Qatari who is very interested in this World Cup and its success.”

Alsulmi has experience with extended treks in Canada and Australia, where he used to live, yet those pale in comparison to the rigors of traversing the Arabian Peninsula.

He typically sets out at sunrise and walks until 10 or 10:30 a.m., but then the heat forces him to break for a few hours before resuming in the afternoon and continuing until sundown.

Occasionally he walks at night to maintain his goal of around 35 kilometers per day.

To keep his load light, Alsulmi subsists on food he can buy at petrol stations, often chicken and rice, while