Season's Greetings

So, I've been on the lookout for Christmas decorations. Saudi Arabia is an Islamic country which means no Christmas celebrated here. And, although it is ok to practice a religion other than Islam in your own home, it is a no no to sell Christmas decorations or otherwise promote a faith other than Islam publicly or in a group. And for those of you thinking well, celebrating Christmas is just what we do, whether or not you're religious...right. Here there is no such thing. Everybody has a religion whether they know it or not, whether they practice it or not, or whether they believe or not.

We are going to be here in Riyadh for Christmas. At first, I thought that during our quick trip home to Sweden in December we could celebrate Christmas and be done with it. But after more thought, I realized that we live here and we will be here. Why not make an attempt to make it Christmas-y?

I had heard that the careful shopper, during November, can find Christmas decorations. This is apparently because nobody is looking for the selling of Christmas decorations until December. So, during November, Christmas decorations can be purchased and then, come December 1, everything is pulled from the shelves. I have not found this to be the case..in my wanderings during November, I have not come across any Christmas decorations ... well, almost.

I had it all figured out. I would smuggle a Christmas tree in to Saudi Arabia on my next trip abroad. (***and now, as I am sitting here writing this, I am thinking, humm, how much of this can I actually write in an open blog????***) I'll leave it at that, I had a plan. Had discussed the plan, and was prepared to set the plan in action when I found myself at...a place. At this place I saw...a person. And, the person was carrying A CHRISTMAS TREE (of the fake variety). I stopped this person and asked,

"Where did you get that tree?!"

A quick trip to...another place and I found myself talking to...another

person :-) (Ohhh, it all seems so secretive and sneaky!!)

"Do you have Christmas trees?" I asked.

"Yes. What you want? One meter? Two meters? Three meters? What you want? I have. I can deliver it to you"

"Uh, I don't know, how tall are you?"

After a little sign language we settled on a size. "Yes, yes, I have" I was told.

"You give me your phone number and I will call"

The next day I get a phone call.

"Yes, madam, I am here, with your tree."

"Uh, you're here? I don't have any money to pay you"

"Its ok. I have tree. You call me when you want to pay"

Sometimes this country makes me smile...in a good way. I have a tree and I get to pay for it when I feel like it.

So, I have a Christmas tree....Looks like I'll be teaching the kids how to string popcorn this year!

Any other ideas?????

Keeping Up Appearances

Ok, Ok, I'm sorry!! Life here in KSA is being impacted by much more than just the ways of KSA. My husband has a job that is keeping him at work until all hours, so that he can come home and work at the dining table and when he isn't doing that he is traveling....so everything is falling on me and that doesn't leave much time to blog. It also means that I am very distracted. When I see something or am involved in something (like being pulled over by the police a few nights ago) that I think may be "blog worthy" the gazillion and one other things that happen between the event and the computer swiftly remove all thoughts of blogging. But, I am doing my best, keep on me and eventually I'll post something!

I may have mentioned once or twice :-) that five times a day in Saudi Arabia there is prayer. At this time, everything closes...restaurants, shops, etc so that the population can go to prayer. Here there is a mosque on almost every corner as, from what I understand, it is the goal to have a mosque within walking distance of every citizen. During prayer, everything closes for between 20 and 45 minutes. So, the smart errand runner gets to where ever they are going at least 5 minutes before prayer so that when the doors close, and the lights turn off, one is inside doing their business instead of locked outside waiting for the doors to open. Need to go to the grocery store? Why not time it so that you can be locked inside in the piece and quiet, gather the items you need and find yourself at the front of the line at the check out counter when the store reopens. Want some Chinese food? Get to the restaurant in plenty of time to look at the menu and order and then eat during prayer time when you'd be sitting inside anyway. Today as we were sitting eating our lunch and the call to prayer started, and the restaurant lights dimmed I was thinking about how it really is an exercise in keeping up appearances. Not everybody runs to prayer five times a day. Where ever you are, you see people waiting...waiting....waiting...for prayer time to end. Yet, if the doors are locked and the lights are dimmed it appears from the outside that nothing is going on on the inside.

On the other hand, maybe the point isn't to keep up appearances. Maybe the powers that be understand that in Saudi Arabia about 1/5 of the population is foreign workers who may or may not be muslim. Maybe the fact that people are allowed to continue their business despite it being prayer time is an extended courtesy. A sign that there is an understanding that not everybody in this land, a muslim land, is muslim. To this I can only say: Thank you! Thank-you for letting me finish my lunch! Thank you for letting me finish my grocery shopping! Thank you for not making me suffer for not sharing your religious views.

A Day in the Life

Today I ventured out again. Really, it isn't so often that I get out of the compound. With the prayer times and such I find that mostly I am at home or traveling between compounds. In general, if I need to do anything, I try to get it done between 9:00 and 11:30. Everything closes at 12:00 until 16:00. And now, the Dhuar prayer (1st prayer after sunrise) is so early, 11:39 that really all errands must be completed by 11:30. My hairdresser, however, does not close for prayer! So, today I got a haircut.

My driver picked me up at 9:30 and off we went. When we left the compound there were about 20 cars out front. Police and military. You always know when something is up here because the compounds are immediately surrounded by police and military. Although I get a lot of information from various places...the embassy, my husbands security office at work, the womanly rumor mill of the compound...I usually ask my driver what is happening. He usually seems to have an answer for me. Once he told me that two terrorists had crossed the boarder into Saudi. This was right after a security warning was sent from the embassy and a friend suggested I stay close to the compound and not run any errands for awhile. This time it was an iquama crack-down. Apparently on the Saudi national day, the King pardoned all individuals here illegally and gave them until March to leave the country without reprimand. In conjunction with this, there are road blocks all over Riyadh with police checking iquamas. The westerners aren't bothered, they only look at the middle and east asians and africans.

We continued toward the salon and as we neared my driver pointed out a building that was a prison. A prison? Yes, a prison for people who have received sentence of 6 months or less. At this I said, "Really? What type of offence would get a sentence of 6 months or less?" My driver answered, "Drugs for instance" Drugs!!! I thought it was sward to the back of the neck for a drug offense. No he said, only if you traffic drugs from outside and bring them in to Saudi. If you are in the country selling drugs or taking drugs it is another matter. Interesting.

I have actually heard that among the teenagers here drugs are a big problem. Here in the compound there are several people workings at schools and they talk a lot about drugs being a problem. But also in the compound apparently it is a problem. I wasn't expecting this.

At the salon I took off my abaya and placed it in my bag. The salon is really a women's center and has shopping, cafe, spa, gym, nursery. So, no abaya needed. Most of the women I know choose to get their haircut on compound. All of the big compounds have a beauty salon. But, I think it is fun to go off compound. Here I get to see middle eastern women and listen to the chatter. It is really a fun outing I think. I could see that I wasn't going to make it back in time to get the little one from nursery so I called our maid and asked her to pick him up and feed him. (Maybe this maid thing isn't such a bad idea after all). After getting my haircut I decided to get my eyebrows shaped a little. I have to admit, I was a little bit nervous. I had never done this before in Riyadh and I am not the best person for handling pain. I was shown into a little room and asked to lay down on what looked like a massage table. The woman took out a long piece of thread, held it at one end in her mouth, did some kind of twisting and pulling and voilá nicely shaped eyebrows. And it was painless!!

The blow came when she asked me if I wanted her to do my upper lip!! What!! Do I have hair there??? (Of course I have a little peach fuzz but hey, doesn't everybody?? Not enough that anybody would notice??? Or, have I been running around my entire life with people thinking, you know, she really should do something about that hairy upper lip!! LOL!) And then when I was paying: Ok, you had a cut, color, eyebrows, and MUSTACHE.

Saudi Gazette's Tips on Being a Successful Husband

Saudi Gazette Friday, Oct 8, 2010

10 tips on how to be a successful husband:

1. Dress up for your wife, look clean and smell good

When was the last time we men went shopping for designer pyjamas? Just like the husband wants his wife to look nice for him, she also wants her husband to dress up for her too. Remember that Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) would always start with Miswak when returning home and always loved the sweetest smells.

2. Use the cutest names for your wife.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) had nicknames for his wives, ones that they loved. Call your wife by the most beloved names to her, and avoid using names that hurt their feelings.

3. Don't treat her like a fly.

We never think about a fly in our daily lives until it 'bugs' us. Similarly, a wife will do well all day --which brings no attention from the husband--until she does something to 'bug' him. Don't treat her like this. Recognize all the good that she does and focus on that.

4. If you see wrong on the part of your wife, try being silent and do not comment!

This is one of the ways the Prophet (peace be upon him) used when he would see something inappropriate from his wives (may Allah be pleased with them). It's a technique that few Muslim men have mastered.

5. Smile at your wife whenever you see her and embrace her often.

Smiling is charity and your wife is not exempt from the Muslim Ummah. Imagine life with her constantly seeing you smiling. Remember also those Ahadith when the Prophet (peace be upon him) would kiss his wife before leaving for Salah, even if he was fasting.

6. Thank her for all that she does for you.

Then thank her again! Take for example a dinner at your house. She makes the food, cleans the home, and a dozen other tasks to prepare. And sometimes the only acknowledgement she receives is that there needed to be more salt in the soup. Don't let that be: thank her!

7. Ask her to write down the last 10 things you did for her that made her happy.

Then go and do them again. It may be hard to recognize what gives your wife pleasure. You don't have to play a guessing game, ask her and work on repeating those times in your life.

8. Don't belittle her desires.

Comfort her. Sometimes the men may look down upon the requests of their wives. The Prophet (peace be upon him) set the example for us in an incident when Safiyyah (may Allah be pleased with her) was crying because, as she said, he had put her on a slow camel. He wiped her tears, comforted her, and brought her the camel.

9. Be humorous and play games with your wife.

Look at how the Prophet (peace be upon him) would race with his wife Ayesha (may Allah be pleased with her) in the desert. When was the last time we did something like that?

10. Be the best

Always remember the words of Allah's Messenger (peace be upon him): "The best of you are those who treat their families the best. And I am the best amongst you to my family." Try to be the best.

There are Adventures and then there are Adventures!

I think the adventures that my husband and I are having may not be one in the same. Take today's events for example:

My husband is currently working very close to the Yemenese border. So close that he can see the homes in Yemen and compare them to the homes in Saudi Arabia. He flew out of Riyadh yesterday and will work where he is now working for a few days. This morning, he jumped into a car to start the day. The day started with 6 cars, 2 filled with engineer types and 4 filled with bodyguard types, hitting the road. They then went off road onto unpaved hilly terrain to survey the area. At times (as he relayed the experience to me) he was not sure if the vehicle he was riding in would manage the gradient it was encouraged to travel on. This went on for hours. Finally when they broke for lunch at 4:00pm he sat with a group of local border patrol ("These are simple people" I think were my husband's exact words) around a whole grilled lamb (he assumed) and started pulling the meat from the bones. When the special guests had finished, the lower ranks were allowed to eat the left-overs.

At this I asked, did you take pictures (I must admit, I fantasized a little about National Geographic with this story)?

I hope he is taking a moment to realize what a fantastic experience this really is...I wish I could've been there! Although, I probably would have started crying with the car ride!

Succombing to the Powers That Be

Ok, ok, it may not be the most interesting of topics and by now you may be yawning at the thought of reading yet one more entry about having or not having a driver...but, be forewarned, here I go:

So, today our driver-in-a-pinch showed up on time as scheduled. Picked up myself, my 5 year old and the baby. Drove us to nursery school where I dropped off the baby and then drove us to school to drop of the 5 year old.

On the way he asks me:

"You have no driver? I thought you had a driver?"

"No," I reply "we don't have a driver. We've been thinking about it but don't really know what we want."

"You want driver with accommodation or without?"

"Without"

"You want driver with car or not"

"Without"

"You tell me how much you pay, I'll drive, I have car, I have everything. You tell me how much?"

Now all of a sudden I am intrigued. Part of the reason the driver thing has been difficult for me is that, at the end of the day, it is myself and the kids spending time with the driver. I haven't been so keen on "trying out" driver after driver, getting to know, seeing if the kids like, etc. etc. a person that we will come to rely on. The entire thing makes me well, tired just thinking about it. But, this man we feel as if we know. He has been driving us from time to time over the entire time we have been here. When we were staying at the hotel in the beginning, he drove the kids and I everywhere...so, to me this doesn't sound like a bad idea. To top it off, he wouldn't have to drive our car and our 5 year old LOVES him!

So, what's the problem?

Part of the problem, for me, is simply the thought of having a driver. We already have a live-in maid and now we are considering adding a driver to the list of our household employees.

Over the last couple of weeks I have been talking to people trying to get information on what they have their drivers do, how much people pay, and so on, and so forth. I had one conversation that went a little something like this:

"Do you employ your driver yourself?"

"No, no, my husband's company provides a driver. Once you reach a certain level in the company they just give you one."

At this point I am already disappointed in the conversation and don't want to take it further. I am completely unimpressed. What do I care what your husband does or if a driver is included in his benefit package. Is it now my turn to give a detailed reporting of what my husband does? What is included in his package? Or what I do? It isn't a contest.....or, is it? If it is, it is certainly a contest I do not want to compete in. (But, now as I write this I see that it was I who asked the question. Am I overly sensitive? I do not want to become that person that can only talk about position as if trying to carve out some kind of pecking order. I am a social worker for goodness sake, you know empowering the vulnerable...what am I doing here with a maid and a maybe driver??)

Then, the friend --all the while admiring her newly manicured fingernails--pipes in.

"You'll find that they don't do anything. The drivers, the maids, you really have to stay on them all the time to get them to work."

(No, they don't do anything, they just leave their families to come here to make the minimalist of wages working unbelievable hours to clean up your

c -r -a -p!)

Then, woman no. 1 "Yes, we just seem to go through the maids and drivers. Although our nanny has been with us for years".

To this I can only reply in my kindest of voices, "Well, we aren't looking for a nanny, we can take care of our own children."

I politely thanked them for their time and left. That's it. I decided. There is NO WAY we are getting a driver.

This morning however, when we arrived at the compound which houses our 5 year old's school. I walked up to security and told them that I would like another pass so that driver-in-a-pinch could drive onto the compound. They informed me that they thought the 2 passes that I had (for the compound's drivers that pick up after school) were plenty and probably would not issue a 3rd. So...it is a problem. I need a driver for when hubby can't drop of at school and neither of the drivers from the compound that have a pass can do that. --and, everybody around me probably thinks I am crazy...JUST GET A DRIVER ALREADY!)

Fast forward a week after deciding to definitely NOT have a driver and I believe our driver-in-a-pinch is going to become our personal salaried driver. Oh the torment and relief all at the same time.

Another Week, Another Adventure

We've been contemplating getting a driver. I must admit, I have a difficult time with the idea. Nine times out of ten we really don't need a driver, but there is that one time where I find myself thinking "Why don't we have a driver?!!" Today is one of those days.

The man of the house, had to go out of town for work again. So, as we face the start of a new week I am left wondering how to make things happen without a car. Dad usually takes the 5 year old to school in the mornings. I usually walk the baby to nursery. So, I thought well, I'll just call the compound and arrange a car for the morning to take us all to nursery and then to school. Nope. No can do. No cars available until 8:45.

Ok, no problem, I'll call our "driver in a pinch". No problem..pick-up at 7:50. We'll be a little late for school but, hey, it could happen to anybody. Unfortunately our "driver in a pinch" doesn't have authorization to drive onto the compound where the school is...so I'm going to see if we can't get him a pass also. Problem solved...I hope.

But, what if there were an emergency? Right here, right now? Somebody gets sick or, I don't know. I really don't even want to imagine. I can't go to the neighbor and ask him to take me anywhere. As I am not his wife (or daughter, or sister.....etc), I am not allowed to be in the car with him. So, maybe the 1 time out of 1,000,000,000,000 (I really want to add more zeros here because, well, nobody wants an emergency, right?) makes the full-time driver worth it??

I don't know.