I’ve found a site of a former Bahrain resident with loads of memories and pictures of Bahrain in the 70s and 80s. Quite nice and gives you a glimpse of the life of an expatriate of that era. Well worth a visit, here’s a sample of what the souq area looked like then:
more historical pictures here…
and how this particular area of the Manama souq looks like now (Jan 30th, 2004) here