On a November morning in Abu Dhabi, a mother dressed her daughter in the national colours before school. It was Elena Obukhova’s first Flag Day since moving to the UAE a year ago, and for her the moment carried a simple message. “For me, it’s about peace, about being brave, and about respect for the country and the government, and for caring for people,” she said.
Across the country, at 11am on 3 November, flags went up in a shared moment of pride. The day, first celebrated in 2013, marks the anniversary of the late Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s accession as President in 2004. To understand what the day and the flag mean for the people who live here, Gulf News spoke with residents and locals, and their reflections are gathered in the reference piece at https://gulfnews.com/uae/abu-dhabi/uae-flag-day-what-this-day-means-for-abu-dhabis-people-1.500734080.
For young Emiratis who grew up under the flag, the day is rooted in the country’s founding. Mohammad Abdullah Ali Saleh Alyassi, a 21-year-old born in Abu Dhabi, ties the banner directly to the nation’s first leader. “The UAE flag is the flag of our country, and it is a role model for us. It was raised by our father, Sheikh Zayed, may God have mercy on him,” he said. He sees Flag Day as a celebration of unity, “when we raise the banner of the union of the seven emirates,” a symbol of Arab identity stretching “from 1971 until today.” When people abroad see the flag, he added, they know which country it belongs to, and it becomes “a source of pride for every citizen who belongs to this nation.”
Saeed Mohammed Al Ameri, 19, comes from Al Ain and studies in Abu Dhabi. Asked what the colours stand for, he answered without hesitation: “Red is strength, white is peace.” For him, the day belongs to the whole region, “a source of pride for every citizen and every Gulf national.”
Parents, meanwhile, are passing the tradition on at home. Engineer Mona Abdullah Al Ali describes the flag as a link between past and future, “a symbol of union, unity and security, of the history of our ancestors, our achievements and our ambitions for the future.” As a mother, she spent the morning getting her children ready in UAE dress and “teaching them to love the homeland.”
Katrin Herz, General Manager of the Abu Dhabi EDITION, also has children at school in the city. “They painted in art class, and they dressed up for Flag Day and the colours, it’s nice how everybody embraces it,” she said. Asked how she would describe the UAE to someone who has never visited, her answer came quickly: “It’s a melting pot.” Different nationalities living peacefully together, with room for both professional and personal life, is, in her words, “an incredible achievement. What they have done in 50 years is remarkable.”
For Bharati Kejriwal, an HR director at the same hotel, the flag is above all a reminder of gratitude. Originally from India, she has lived in the UAE since 2014. “This country has kept us safe. This country has included us,” she said. “I never once felt like an outsider, and that is rare.” Her clearest memory is not of the flag itself but of the country’s people. One night, while working in Ras Al Khaimah, a tire burst on a dark road far from anywhere. A car carrying four young Emirati men pulled up; one changed the wheel and drove off before she could thank him. When she told the story the next day to an Emirati man at a garage, he replied, “Of course, you’re in the Emirates, and you are a lady. Of course we’ll take care of you.”
Erika Fay Nicole, from Italy, first arrived in Abu Dhabi in December 2023 and, after months of travelling back and forth, made the city her home. For her, the flag stands for “belonging, freedom and a sense of protection.” The sight of it over the Corniche still moves her, recalling the emotion of her first arrival. “Even today, it gives me the same feeling: I am exactly where I am meant to be,” she said. As an Italian, she feels an immediate connection to the green, white and red, but the black carries a special meaning, representing “strength and resilience, qualities I value deeply and recognise in myself.” Her most vivid memory of the flag came at National Day in December 2024 at the Sheikh Zayed Festival, where flags, horses, camels and crowds celebrating together left her feeling truly connected to the country.
Read the colours differently and they still tell the same story. Bharati finds the red energising, the green and white peaceful, green being one of her favourite colours in nature. If Erika had to explain the flag to a newcomer, she would say it represents “seven emirates coming together to build one nation,” and that it is also “a place where people from different parts of the world can find their own sense of belonging.”
On Flag Day, the residents of Abu Dhabi say the same thing in different words: the flag belongs to everyone who calls the country home. What will it mean for the children now dressing up in its colours, on the Flag Days still to come?