[Image]In her 45 years, Barbie has been a doctor, pilot and figure skater, to name just a few accomplishments of this busty vinyl overachiever. But some in the Muslim world also consider her a decadent symbol of the West - hence Saudi Arabia's recent decision to ban Barbie along with her "revealing clothes and shameful postures."

Like Barbie, she is about 11½ inches tall, but unlike Mattel's product, she is noticeably less bosomy. Fulla's creators have gone to great lengths to make her modest and conservative.

"Arab" is the key – if not always specifically defined – sales point.

Fulla's face has a "kind look, the Arab look," said Fawaz Abidin, head of marketing for Fulla at Damascus-based NewBoy, the doll's maker. She has Arab values, not those of Barbie the American, he added.

NewBoy Design Studio, based in Syria, introduced her in November 2003 and now in 2005 she has taken off and become a best seller all over the region. It is nearly impossible to walk into a corner shop in Morocco, Syria or Egypt or Jordan or Qatar without encountering Fulla breakfast cereal or Fulla chewing gum or not to see little girls pedaling down the street on their Fulla bicycles, all in trademark "Fulla pink."

Young girls here are obsessed with Fulla, and conservative parents who would not dream of buying Barbies for their daughters seem happy to pay for a modest doll who has her own tiny prayer rug, in pink felt. Children who want to dress like their dolls can buy a matching, girl-size prayer rug and cotton scarf set, all in pink.
Fulla is not the first doll to wear the hijab. Mattel markets a group of collectors' dolls that include a Moroccan Barbie and a doll called Leila, intended to represent a Muslim slave girl in an Ottoman court.

In Iran, toy shops sell a veiled doll called Sara. A Michigan-based company markets a veiled doll called Razanne, selling primarily to Muslims in the United States and Britain. But none of those dolls have enjoyed anything approaching Fulla's wide popularity. Fawaz Abidin says that is because NewBoy understood the Arab market in a way that its competitors had not.

"This isn't just about putting the hijab on a Barbie doll," Mr. Abidin said. "You have to create a character that parents and children will want to relate to. Our advertising is full of positive messages about Fulla's character. She's honest, loving, and caring, and she respects her father and mother."

Fans of Barbie, though, would probably take issue with his characterization of what separates Fulla from the American doll: "She's loving. She respects her mother and father. She's good to her friends. She's honest and doesn't lie. She likes reading. She likes, rather, she loves fashion."
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Despite the effort to create an Islamic fashion doll, Fulla and Barbie are more closely related than the Saudis and others might like to admit. Fulla may frequent the souks of the Mideast and Barbie may hang out in the malls of America, but they were "born" in the same place - China.

Tags: Morocco, Fès, Arabic, Fez,