Picture this:Mobile phone rings …. Echoey woman’s voice calls out: “Paging the driver of the black BMW....” This was the ring tone of the taxi driver while we were on our way out into the night, during Ramadan in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. We were: a Pakistani bedraggled taxi driver, an Egyptian (professional), an Indian (professional) and me – the white guy, all in this beat up white/cream taxi sliding around corners and weaving between traffic, all at high speeds, out on an adventure to explore the city. This setting repeated itself in one form or another over the past week or so as we collected essential things for our houses that we were preparing to move to. Each of us were getting really tired of traveling 1.5 to 2 hours each way on the bus from the hotel to the University. These trips and the work day made for some long days: 12 to 14 hours, often with us finishing dinner around 9:30 to 10 in the evening and then asleep by 12 or later, to be up the next day at 5:40 or so. Then with us getting out an about, we were getting back by 2 am some nights.
IKEA
During one of these trips we found ourselves at IKEA looking for sheets and other miscellaneous household items. At this store, all the prices were written in Arabic and I had to hunt to find the small inconspicuous and often missing ‘western’ pricing. I think I am getting better at reading their numbers.
I think it was the ‘IKEA evening’ that I was watching someone fill in a form and finding myself like many times before, being amazed at the way that Arabic people write. They write letters from left to right, but when writing numbers they write them from right to left (like us). I have always wondered how they estimate the space they have for large numbers when they are filling in forms…. Mohammed my Arabic friend mentioned one evening that ‘western’ numbers are what is called Arabic numerals yet Arab people write using Indian numbers!
I am not used to, nor do I think I will ever get used to the fact that stores close for every prayer time; this means that when we are out shopping that we are often asked to leave the store for about a half hour around 6 and then again around 9. But, when in IKEA, they just announced that the tills were closing and that anyone in the store could remain but the doors would also be locked during this time. So we remained in the store -- to the sound of the call to prayer playing over the PA system, while we shopped.
When the store opened again, we progressed to the tills and passed out into the area where the food area is (we have all been there !) and we purchased shuarma (chicken wraps) and an ice-cream cone for me. We moved over to the seating area and sat down. Shortly after a security guard sidled up to us and attempted to tell us with gestures that we needed to move – no way! I was there for the duration of my meal, so we only spoke English and played dumb. Later we realized that we were sitting right below a large sign that said ‘Family Section only.” I guess I am a bachelor now and have to watch were I sit. I think I will tell them next time that my wife is lost in the store and I am waiting for her. 8-) The seating is better in the Family Section anyway.
Al Balad
Last week myself and two others (a German, Paul, who is responsible for the salt water aquariums in the research labs on the Red Sea and Douglas an Irishman, Forensic Computer Security Specialist) went to the ‘Old Town’ area of Jeddah. We left at 9 pm just after the last prayer-time of the day and traveled by… guess what? Taxi! The Al Balad district is an area that has many old coral bock buildings of which many are boarded up and extremely dilapidated. Too bad that night is the time when things hum in this part of the world but is not that great a time for photography. I will travel back to this part of the city during the day and spend some time photographing some of the better preserved buildings. The district is a hub of business and small streets all heading out of the center like the spokes of a wheel.
I think the image that will stay in my mind about this trip was walking down very busy streets restricted only to foot and handcarts, and stepping over and around little mobile battery-operated toys like dancing dogs and the like wondering where their owner was. It was like these things had got loose and were making a flat-out run for the edges of the roads lest they get stepped on and crushed to bits. A few times, I had to take a hop to the side lest I be the one causing the demise of one of these escapees and then being chased by its enterprising owner looking for the replacement cost.
Shops galore in this area! There are stores selling everything and anything. The Middle East is a great example of marketing gone awry – or maybe we have it wrong and need to think out-of-the-box a bit more… Take for example, plumbing supply pipes and pad locks displayed on sheets in the middle of the street, every possible variety of TV remote ever made on the planet with knock-off watches, or coffee carafe/watches to gold jewelry/flashlight stores all over-layered by the sweet smell of hot buttered corn venders and other unmentionable smells wafting up from bent-grated sewer holes in the street. As we walked, we passed from the textiles district through the watches to the pens and abaya areas. I have found a great little gathering of shops that do photo enlargements and plan to come back to get some of my photos enlarged for the walls of my home.
Around the Campus
We have live music in the toilets at work from the people hired for janitorial duties at the University, working 12 hour shifts and told to not loiter in the halls of the building. So, we have these fellows standing right at the door when you walk into the smallish bathrooms. It is rather uncomfortable to go into the stall and have someone just outside the wood grill – singing. These people are definitely proving that they can sing just about everywhere.
Someone told us the other day that he had got the keys to his house a few days before and his parents had come to see him so he took them to the campus from Jeddah. He toured them around the place and then to his new home as he had not moved out of the hotel to his home yet, he had nothing in the house but wanted to show it any way. He arrived at his home and put the key in the door and opened it to find a lady standing there. She asked, ‘who are you and where did you get a key to my house?” Shaker was shocked and basically asked the same of her. She said that they had problems with their house and so were told that they could live temporarily at this one. Shaker was going to move to his house shortly…. The lady said that he could not come in because her husband and children were upstairs asleep. Could this be a Goldilocks and the Three Bears retro?
The big event happened; the grand opening of the University had a budget of $60 million to be blown over a two day opening event. Here is a page with some information and links to photos. http://inauguration.kaust.edu.sa/inauguration/exhibition.aspx
And From the desk of ‘Confusion about ID’:
I was making use of the free-food-across-campus bonus that staff still have (everything from Quiznos, to Pizza Inn to Baskin Robins and Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf to name a few). This event took place this evening (second night in my new house) when I was ordering dinner from the Indian restaurant. I had ordered my meal and another person was just in front of me. He talked to the man at the till for a while, then signed the form to keep records for the businesses and left. I moved to the counter and was signing the form when I noticed that he had written down my ID number. Luckily, he had by chance left his mobile phone number with the employees. I showed my ID in some haste, suggesting that the he must have seen my ID while I was standing there. He was called and he came back. In walked the suspect…. a short Indian, rather plump with a round happy face. He showed his ID and ‘Bob’s your uncle’ if he did not have the same as me! But his ID had HIS face on it. We talked for a bit and I discovered that his name was Phylip Joseph, who incidentally, I had met a week or so ago and he has house was # I-3535; my number is I-5335. I just wanted to check if he was not living in my house or expecting to move in on me! Never knew I had an Indian twin, although we do not look much alike! Guess it is off to HR tomorrow to figure this one out. 8-)
I am HOME!
I think that you just cannot take the Canadian behavior out of a Canadian. I found myself walking with that hunched over walk, flat-footed and arms swinging stiffly at the sides when I carefully stepped on a patch of water that was from dripping condensation off the ‘cool’ windows of the buildings around the University – I was instinctively walking carefully lest I slip on the ice….
This morning was my first ‘meal’ that I made in my new home. Last night I had stopped by the grocery store on campus and because I have to walk everywhere, I only picked up a few things. I got milk and Honey Bunches of Oats cereal. This morning I prepared that meal to spectacular failure! I was pouring the milk over the cereal when realized that I had purchased buttermilk (Laben here) – it came out thick and with a strong tang. So, I collected my stuff and left for work and dropped in at the cafeteria for free scrambled eggs, two cups of coffee and some salty grilled goat’s cheese. And you already know what I had for dinner. 8-)
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