How Gorgeous is Your Camel?

by Jordan Yerman | April 26, 2007 at 10:54 am

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A camel beauty pageant. Odd as this story sounds, animal pageants are by no means new. We have dog shows, cat shows, horse shows... county fairs have cattle shows. Why not camels? Turns out that camel pageants can mean big money for the owners of the prettiest and the strongest: such beasts command a much higher price in the marketplace.

The legs are long, the eyes are big, the bodies curvaceous.

Contestants in this Saudi-style beauty pageant have all the features you might expect anywhere else in the world, but with one crucial difference -- the competitors are camels.

This week, the Qahtani tribe of western Saudi Arabia has been welcoming entrants to its Mazayen al-Ibl competition, a parade of the "most beautiful camels" in the desolate desert region of Guwei'iyya, 120 km (75 miles) west of Riyadh.

"In Lebanon they have Miss Lebanon," jokes Walid, moderator of the competition's Web site. "Here we have Miss Camel."