Abu Dhabi: A 33-year-old United Arab Emirates (UAE) based Indian ex-patriate visited 100 pavilions at Expo 2020 Dubai, the mega event within five days.
Blesson Thankachan hails from Kerala, India and works as a service delivery manager in UAE. Instead of going home to India for his annual holidays, Thankachan used his annual leave to go on a world tour without hopping on a plane.
Thankachan, started the tour from day one of the Expo 2020 Dubai i.e., October 1 and made his way through 100 country pavilions – from Lithuania to Lebanon and Switzerland to Singapore – all in just five days.
“I saw 100 countries and learnt about their culture and achievements, while staying in Dubai. That was fascinating,” he told Khaleej Times, showing off his Expo passport as proof.
On the first day, he covered 18 countries, starting with the UAE and Saudi Arabia pavilions. The next four days, he managed to get stamps from each of the 100 countries he visited out of 200 plus country pavilions.
Expo 2020 Dubai, is the first international exhibition to be organised in the Middle East. Visitors have been assured an “amazing world of innovation and entertainment” over 182 days from October 1 to March 31, 2022, as it is expected to attract more than 25 million visitors.
Total of 411,768 ticketed visits in the first ten days since the world’s greatest show opened on October 1, organisers revealed on Monday.
Three million people watched the opening ceremony live on Expo virtual-the digital platform for the world Expo.