اجمل انواع طيور الحمام الشامي مزاد على براملي اسود نخب اول sham pigeon

Bird Markets, Artisanal Pigeons and Class Relations in the Middle East
Bridget Guarasci In: 296 (Fall 2020)
On a dark, empty lot along Garden Street in Amman, Jordan stands an illuminated sign for Victors Café, a subterranean game space advertising pinball, pool and snooker, where pigeon breeders in the know secretly gather every Friday at 9pm for one of the best bird auctions in the capital.[1] Pigeon auctions are serious business. A high-quality bird can command 20,000 Jordanian dinars, roughly $28,200. These auctions are the upper-middle class leisure activity of Jordanian men: the lawyers, the doctors, the dentists and the software engineers who are the vanguard of the global economy. Bird auctions are a regional phenomenon where avian affinities correlate with class identity.

Downtown Amman bird market, May 2012. Photo by the author.

There are three major types of bird markets: auctions that sell breeds to be admired for their craftsmanship, street markets that sell pigeons to fly for the hobby called qshash hamam (the practice of flying birds in a flock at dusk from rooftops) and brick-and-mortar pet shops that specialize in pet birds. Each of these markets attracts customers of a specific class. Street markets are patronized by the working class, the brick-and-mortar shops serve the middle class and the newer pigeon auctions attract patrons from the upper-middle class. Auctions, which have sprung up in the last five years or so, distinguish themselves from the street markets by cultivating elite pigeon breeds. International bird trade regulated by the Jordanian Ministry of Agriculture is officially permitted, but some pigeon enthusiasts in all three types of markets engage in unregulated, illicit trade. Street markets are most commonly associated with such illegal business and are regularly disparaged for it. Upper-middle class bird breeders want no association with the unsavory activity of the pedestrian urban markets because beyond their illicit nature they are also the same live animal markets that have recently been in the news as a source of zoonoses that transmit viruses from animals to humans, including the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

Environmentalists are deeply concerned about animal markets in all of their forms, but especially the unregulated street and auction markets because they move animals across international borders, sometimes in violation of the international treaties designed to protect wildlife.Environmentalists are deeply concerned about animal markets in all of their forms, but especially the unregulated street and auction markets because they move animals across international borders, sometimes in violation of the international treaties designed to protect wildlife. Trafficking animals threatens the logic of global biodiversity protection, which is designed to safeguard wildlife survival largely by conserving nature in situ. The trafficking of many kinds of birds across international borders is a violation of international law according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES), which Jordan signed in 1978. (The CITES convention applies broadly and includes pigeons that are not endangered.) Jordan’s embrace of environmentalist policies is an economic and political strategy to boost and promote their ecotourism sector. By supporting international environmental policies, Jordan also signals the kingdom’s alignment with the ideals of the World Bank, the United Nations and the United States—all institutions and allies upon which the country’s aid-based economy depends.
On top of restrictive environmental policies, social conventions in Arab majority societies associate qshash hamam, and by extension all pigeon activity, with the working class and is seen as a pastime akin to gambling. Avian markets, however, pre-date the contemporary environmentalist movement and are as old as the metropolitan capitals of the Middle East. Even as some in Arab majority societies socially disparage these markets, they are also valued for their history. Regardless, afraid of being socially ostracized because of their association with pigeons, the upper-middle class auction participants keep their hobby a closely guarded secret.



Inside the Pigeon Auctions


One night in March 2017, Abbas found his way to the Amman auction while visiting his family from Dubai, where he was a software engineer for a major global technology company based in Seattle.[2] Abbas was a young trim man in his early thirties wearing skinny jeans, a t-shirt and a black leather jacket. This visit he was in town to take care of some dental work, but he typically returned to the city every three months to visit his pigeon flock, which he kept in Amman and paid caretakers to attend.