The Banana Island: VIP’s destination for Qatar WC
David Beckham will be the face of a new multi-million pound Qatar 2022 tourism drive.... with a trip lined up to the five-star resort 'Banana Island'.
The breathtaking sanctuary and spa includes magnificent 'floating rooms' on stilts above the sea. They come with their own infinity pool and villa host to prepare food and cater to your every need.
And the star, nicknamed Goldenballs, will be able to relax on the 'desert island paradise' which gets its name because it bends like one of his famous free kicks.
The Mirror was given a VIP guided tour of Banana Island which will see celebrities, footballers - and their wives - bend it like Beckham at the Arab world's first ever World Cup. It offers £3,500-a-night floating rooms, picturesque beaches, stunning sunset views and even 'Spice Spoons' cooking class - (just in case Posh comes too).
Beckham, 47, paid a reputed £150m to promote Qatar, will also be seen riding on a motorbike through the capital Doha.
The campaign will not just promote the World Cup - with tickets going on sale to millions of fans on Tuesday.
It will encourage air travellers who pass through Qatar en route to worldwide destinations every year to take a 'stopover' holiday.
Berthold Trenkel, chief operating officer for Qatar Tourism, said: "David Beckham is a great story, he is a great guy and he is such a celebrity.
"He is well known in the US, he is of course well known in the UK and the rest of Europe.
He added: "Around 96 percent of air traffic into Qatar passes through. So how do we get more people out to enjoy a few nights here?"
Beckham may provide the answers.
He was filmed meeting 'Qataris from all walks of life'. And his 36-minute film will be seen by millions of footy fans on Qatar Airlines.
Berthold added: "The world cup will attract people who have never been to Qatar.
"We want to reset misconceptions, that it is not safe or it is not fun. We know people will come away thinking 'wow, this is really different'.
"The average person does not have a camel. They live in a nice apartment, in winter you do not need the air conditioning, it is 65C.
"The footballers are not going to be sweating because of the heat, but because they are running around."
Berthold insisted that many of the fears of fans from the LGBT community were unfounded.
"If you go to Rome and visit the Vatican, you adjust your behaviour accordingly," he said.
"When you travel, you want to experience something new. This is a chance to enjoy what the Middle East has to offer - in Qatar you still see the Arab world, experience the culture."
"We will see coaches and their wives, we will have a lot of VIPs and celebrities, they love the over-water villas popular in the Maldives."
All visitors, stars and ordinary fans alike, will have to have a ticket for the World Cup, as it will act as your visa.
So there will be no place for the hundreds of thousands of ticketless fans who have travelled to tournaments in the past.
There will be a huge demand for accommodation in the Arab state, which is the size of Yorkshire.
It will see its 2.8m population rise by at least 1m. A total of 3m tickets are being sold, with around 130,000 rooms - equating to 3.6m room nights - likely to be available.
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