The Great Mosque of Touba, Senegal

Public Domain Photo: The Great Mosque of Touba, Senegal

The Great Mosque of Touba is located at the heart of the Mouride holy city of Touba in central Senegal. The Great Mosque, the place where Aamadu Bàmba Mbàkke, the founder of the Mouride Brotherhood, lies buried, is purported to be one of the largest in Africa. The Mouride Brotherhood is a large Islamic Sufi order most prominent in Senegal and The Gambia, with headquarters in the holy city of Touba.

Completed in 1963, the mosque has five minarets and three large domes. The mosque's 87-metre (285 ft) high central minaret, called Lamp Fall, is one of Senegal's most famous monuments. The name Lamp Fall is in reference to Sheikh Ibrahima Fall, one of Bamba's most influential disciples. The Mosque is open only to Muslims.

Al-Masjid al-Ḥaram, The Sacred Mosque in Mecca

Public Domain Photo: Modern buildings rise over Al-Masjid al-Ḥaram, photo by Meshal Obeidallah, Al Qassim Province, Saudi Arabia, taken on May 23, 2006, photo dimension: 1600x1200 pixels, size 366 KB.

Al-Masjid al-Ḥaram (The Sacred Mosque), located in the city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia, is Islam's holiest place and the largest mosque in the world. The mosque surrounds the Kaaba, the place which Muslims worldwide turn towards while offering their daily prayers. Also known as the Grand Mosque, it can accommodate up to four million Muslim worshipers during the Hajj period, one of the largest annual gatherings of people in the world.

Pearl of Allah: the largest pearl in the world

The largest known pearl in the world, Pearl of Allah, was found in Philippines in 1934. It is a natural, non-nacreous, calcareous concretion pearl from a giant clam. It did not grow in a pearl oyster and hence it is not pearl-shaped, but instead, it has a porcelain-like surface, or glossy like a china plate. Other pearls from giant clams also exist, but this is a very large one.

This pearl is the product of a giant clam, Tridacna gigas, which cannot be grafted. The pearl is also a whole pearl, not a mabe pearl, and whole pearl culturing technology is only 100 years old.

Pearl of Allah is not a gem-quality pearl, but a rare very costly natural pearl. It measures 24 centimeters in diameter (9.45 inches) and weighs 6.4 kilograms (14.1 lb). It is an interesting piece of natural history surrounded by extraordinary stories and legends.

It was discovered by an anonymous Filipino Muslim diver, off the island of Palawan in 1934. According to legends, a Palawan chieftain gave the pearl to Wilbur Dowell Cobb, an American, in 1936 as a gift for saving the life of his son, who was stricken with malaria. The pearl was named the ‘Pearl of Allah’ by the Muslim tribal chief, as it resembled a turbaned head.

After Cobb took the pearl to USA, it was exhibited at the ‘Ripley's Believe It or Not! Odditorium’ in New York, and it was valued at $3.5 million. Gemologist Michael Steenrod in Colorado Springs has appraised the pearl at $60 million in 1982 and $93 million in 2007. Another 1982 appraisal, by Lee Sparrow of the San Francisco Gem Lab, value the pearl at $42 million.