Could someone please turn the heat back on?

I didn't think that I would experience this ever in the Middle East: Some 20 hours of non-stop rain & < 10 °C the whole day in R.I.Y.A.D.H. today. Incredible. Luckily the weather forecast for the remaining of the week looks a bit more promising:

(The thunderstorms and rains were so heavy that The Ministry of Education ordered all schools in Riyadh to stay closed on Tuesday & Wednesday. Some nice examples of how Riyadh turns into an artificial lake on days like can be found e.g. from here: http://www.alsharq.net.sa/2011/11/29/25998)

Lingerie

An interesting piece of news about underwear:

http://www.arabianbusiness.com/saudi-pursues-crackdown-on-male-lingerie-clerks-430955.html

Magical Moments II

Ok, so life in KSA can be less than glamorous some times despite the colorful fake diamonds on our abayas. Yes, you read that right, it’s not all beach parties and cheap beer over here. But then there are the moments. Oh those moments.
One of them that I (K) personally like a lot could be described as follows:

It’s a warm spring night. Why not go for a swim you think. In the land of abayas and white dishdashas, you jump into your bikins and walk down to the compound pool. The compound is quiet around you. You’re the only person in the pool area. The water has been heated by the sun the entire day so it is warm. The sky above you is black, broken only by the shining stars staring down at you. The last prayer call of the day starts. From all around you, (remember there are quite a few mosques in this country) you hear the calls. Soft in the spring night, the calls echo around the pool area over and over again coming from all directions at once. That’s a piece of Saudi magic for you.

Oh and by the way, the magic doesn’t work in the winter when the water in the pool is freezing cold.

Magical Moments

Most of the time life in Riyadh is not that glamorous. A lot of it centers around sitting in a car and trying to get from place A to place B while trying to avoid some of what must be the worst traffic on the planet. I mean honestly, driving against the traffic on a street where the speed limit is 100km/h, in the dark without your lights on? Where else than Riyadh do you see that every single day? I honestly don’t know.

There are some magical moments here too though. A fellow expat of ours who has lived in Riyadh for more than 15 years describes one of them like this: sitting by an unnamed country's embassy pool waiting for the party to start with a cold beer on the table in front of you, you bite into your bacon hamburger when the last prayer call of the day starts. That’s the moment when you feel like you’ve outsmarted the system in so many ways, and it feels equally good every time. (Remember, there’s no alcohol, no parties and no bacon in this country.)

More about magical moments in the next post.

Saudi Billionaires

There seems to be a prevailing assumption in the west that basically every individual here in the Middle East has his/her own oil well that can be turned on when ever one is short of cash. The reality is often something else. Many families here live a comfortable life in a house that is bigger than what they'd be able to afford in North America or Europe and many have nannies for their kids and maids to clean the house. But... there are also those who are struggling and it seems that there are more and more people who are struggling. Here's a link to an interesting youtube video of poverty in Riyadh:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlSBqgW5xx0

Naturally, if you've visited South East Asia, South America or Africa you have seen poverty far worse than this.

Camels - All Shapes and Sizes

Below a few pictures from a camel market just outside of Kuwait City that K visited today. It was quite a cultural experience. I should mention that my two female friends and I were the only women present at the market so camels are definitely a man’s word out here in the Middle East. They had camels of all sizes and colors for sale at the live auction. The only combining thing seemed to be the smell. For those locals who had come to buy a camel or two today, we proved to be a lot more interesting than the animals. Some random fellows saddled one camel up and followed us to our car with hopeful looks that we’d want to ride the poor beast. Let’s just say that it wasn’t exactly the environment for a relaxing camel ride in the desert.

About to be auctioned.

Don't know why these two had been separated from the rest. Maybe they'd been naughty?

A couple of eager purchaser inspecting the merchandise.

Family Sections

This is something I’ve (K) been meaning to write about for a long time already. It’s about Saudi restaurants and cafes. Most restaurants in Saudi have two separate entrances. One is for single males and the other one is for families. All non-married males are to eat in the singles section of the restaurant. All married men who are out with their wives or families will eat in the family section of the restaurant. In the family sections, there are usually booths that have curtains to protect the privacy of the womenfolk. If you are female and alone, (or with friends) you will use the family section of the restaurant. When I initially got to Saudi hubby was very excited because he got to see a side of Riyadh that had previously been out of limits for him: family sections of restaurants. Here’s a picture of the Starbucks family entrance so that you know I’m not making this stuff up…

And here’s a Starbucks family booth. This one’s pretty liberal because the entire side is open and there aren’t any curtains.

And here’s a Saudi woman waiting for her order at the same Starbucks. Covered in black from head to toe.

Colors of Life

On my very first day in Riyadh, hubby took me to a shopping mall. As I wrote before, it felt a bit extreme because of the homogenous dress code. Apparently Saudi men are very much encouraged to wear the traditional dress, which is a white thobe and a red and white headscarf. Women all wear black. There is actually no rule that an abaya should be black, but so far I’ve seen one lady in Saudi Arabia (at the airport) wearing an abaya that was not black. Foreign women often wear abayas that have decorations on the sleeves and back, but most Saudi women seem to favor plain black.

In the spring, hubster and I flew over to Dubai for a weekend. One of the things that you notice immediately upon arrival in Dubai compared to Riyadh is the colorful crowd. There is a whole different feeling to a place when you see people wearing so many colors and types of dress instead of the ever-present black abaya. The other thing we noticed in Dubai is music. Saudi shopping malls are quiet during the day because a.) most people flock to shopping malls in the evenings after the last prayer of the day so that they don’t need to worry about salat closings and b.) shops are not allowed to play music.


Here's a picture from a shopping mall in Riyadh:

Black Magic and Demons

There’s been an interesting discussion going on for several weeks now in Saudi Arabia concerning hiring domestic workers from Morocco. Saudis believe that Moroccan women practice black magic and that they should therefore not be allowed into Saudi homes. Now that domestic worker recruitment from Sri Lanka and Indonesia has been halted there is, however, a need to get workers from somewhere. It’ll be interesting to see how this debate ends and whether or not Moroccan women will be allowed to work in Saudi Arabia despite the black magic.

Speaking of black magic… last week, at K’s internship place one girl had some kind of a waking dream experience in the middle of the day. The girl in question had completely freaked out in the cafeteria during lunch break running out screaming “Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me!”. Can you guess how this was perceived by other students? That the girl was possessed by a demon. Yup, that’s right, a demon on campus going around possessing students. For the rest of the day, they were too scared to go into the bathroom poor things.

“Madam, you may take your abaya off”

Fasalya Tower is what I guess could in Saudi terms be called a skyscraper and one of the landmarks of Riyadh. It’s a tall building right in the center of the city and on top of the building there’s a ball, which is actually a fine dining restaurant. Here’s a picture to illustrate:






After the weird semi-encounter with the muttawa downstairs we took a lift to the restaurant, sat down and were brought hot towels to wipe our hands with. At this time, the waiter turns to me and says: “Madam, you may take your abaya off”. My mind is racing a hundred miles an hour thinking “oh god, oh god… this can’t be happening… no, no, no”. The reason? At every other restaurant in Riyadh, even at FourSeasons, western women are asked to keep their abayas on. So, I wasn’t exactly dressed for an evening at a nice restaurant underneath that abaya. Let it be officially known that I have now dined in a fine dining restaurant in golden stiletto heels, gym pants and a faded t-shirt. Very comfortable if you don’t count the shoes, and best of all… no-one ever knew but hubby.