Our host told me that western women usually don't wear the head scarf here, and that's OK, so I took it off for the rest of the day. As much as I hate it, I'm not sure I actually preferred being out without it. People stared at me a lot, and I felt very out of place. I saw a few other women, mostly western, but some Arab-looking, who didn't wear any head covering, but it was rare. Most women cover their hair but not their face, but a substantial minority cover their face as well. A few even covered their entire face, without even a slit for eyes! The material is thin enough that you can kind of see through it. I have not yet seen a woman in a burka; it's always an abaya and head covering.
At one point, our host asked me if I liked the abaya, and I blurted out, "No, not so much." I realized when he asked whether it fit, that he was not asking me whether I like wearing an abaya in general, but whether I was satisfied with the one he had bought for me. I was embarrassed for being such an ungrateful guest, and tried to make things better by saying, "It's very beautiful, but I'm just not used to it." He graciously said, "I completely understand."
We went to the National Museum, where there was an exhibit on Man in the Universe, and then exhibits showing all of Arab and Saudi history. It was very interesting, and interesting to see their particular take on things. I expected the first exhibit to be a creationist history of science, but I was wrong. It was in actually very scientifically accurate, showing Hubble Space Telescope images and dinosaur bones, and talking about things being millions and billions of years old. There was also a quote from the Koran about the world being created in six days and a lot of talk about things being "created", but all phrased in a very careful way that would not be offensive to a scientist (or at least, was not offensive to this scientist). I learned a lot about the history of Saudi Arabia. Most visitors to the museum were Saudi families. Many of the children stared at me.
As we were finishing with the exhibits, the call to prayer sounded. Our host excused himself for a few minutes to go pray, and Mike and I went to find bathrooms. There was a big section out in the open for the men to pray, and a closed-off section outside the bathroom for the women to pray. They don't all have to pray at the exact same time, just within a certain window, and the women's prayer section was sufficiently crowded that they had to wait their turn. The bathroom was also very crowded, and I had to wait a while. One woman with slits for her eyes, who was standing only a few feet from me, stared right into my eyes for a couple minutes while she waited for the bathroom. She looked angry. Other women smiled at me. Others tried not to stare.
My favorite part of the museum was the courtyard. There was a huge courtyard filled with trees and fountains, and families just hanging out having a good time. Friday is their day off, and the sun had just set so it was finally a reasonable temperature outside, and everyone was out enjoying the weather. Each family had laid out a rug, and people were sitting and talking, and the kids were running all over the place and splashing in the fountains. The children here seem so free! The adults much less so.
When we left the museum, we drove through a part of town where there was lots of traffic and pedestrians everywhere, weaving in and out of the cars. I noticed that all the pedestrians were men, and that there were no women out at all. I asked our host about it, and he said this was the part of town where the workers from Pakistan and India came because they had their traditional restaurants here and they have Friday off. He said these workers come to Saudi Arabia temporarily to earn money, and don't bring their families with them.
Then we got to a much more upscale neighborhood, with almost no pedestrians. I saw a tower and asked our host what it was. He said, "Oh, let's go see it!" and drove the car over to the tower. It was the Al Faisaliyah tower, which our host said was the second (and lesser) of the two great brand new modern towers in Riyadh (we're going to the first, Kingdom Tower, tomorrow). To get to the tower, we walked through a giant shopping mall. I had been curious about the shopping malls, so I was glad we did. As we walked in, I heard people screaming like they were on a roller coaster, and I asked, "Is there a roller coaster in here?" Our host said, "I think there's a small one downstairs." And sure enough, the whole downstairs was an amusement park. The upstairs was the most upscale shopping mall I've ever seen. Most of the stores were filled with designer women's clothes, and most of the customers were women, but only men worked at the stores. I had noticed from looking at women's ankles as they walked, that some of those ladies are wearing some pretty incredible western clothes underneath their abayas. I even saw a lingerie store, not at the mall, but out on a main street, with mannequins in lingerie in the windows. Apparently there are no modesty rules for the mannequins!
The tower itself was not that much more exciting up close than from a distance.
There are no buses or public transportation here, no bicycles, and aside from the Indian neighborhood, no pedestrians. Everyone drives. Our host said gas is only 45 cents a gallon here, which makes driving pretty attractive.
After that we drove around a very large famous street, which is called Desalination Street because the headquarters of a desalination company is there, but which is informally called the Champs de Elysee of Riyadh. The meridian was filled with palm trees with lights covering their trunks, and on both sides were giant fancy restaurants with lots of neon signs, many of which were western chains (Applebees, Johnny Rockets, etc.) Our host said usually the traffic is too bad to drive down this street, but there was a big soccer game tonight, so the streets were quiet.
The American city that Riyadh seems most similar to is Las Vegas. Of course the two cities are complete opposites in terms of how people dress and how they entertain themselves, but they are similar in that both are huge sprawling cities built in the middle of the desert where vast wealth leads to incredible excesses in architecture and rapid expansion. The architecture here reminds me very much of Las Vegas, with huge brightly lit towers and elaborate facades imitating the architecture of every other culture in the world. I mentioned this to our host, and he agreed.
We went to a very fancy Lebanese restaurant for dinner, with the most beautiful elevator I've ever seen. In the restaurant, there was a small "open" section, which was like an American restaurant in that there were a bunch of tables all in the same room, and then there were vast corridors of tables surrounded by wooden barriers that didn't go all the way to the ceiling but completely enclosed the tables, as well as completely private rooms. Apparently most people like to eat in privacy. I insisted that we eat in the open section, because I wanted to people watch. There was one group of 5 women dining together, and two (separate) young couples. They looked like they were enjoying themselves.
I think that's about as much as I can write before I collapse from exhaustion. I had no idea I'd be writing so much about this trip, but it's really helping me decompress a bit.
Sam
At one point, our host asked me if I liked the abaya, and I blurted out, "No, not so much." I realized when he asked whether it fit, that he was not asking me whether I like wearing an abaya in general, but whether I was satisfied with the one he had bought for me. I was embarrassed for being such an ungrateful guest, and tried to make things better by saying, "It's very beautiful, but I'm just not used to it." He graciously said, "I completely understand."
We went to the National Museum, where there was an exhibit on Man in the Universe, and then exhibits showing all of Arab and Saudi history. It was very interesting, and interesting to see their particular take on things. I expected the first exhibit to be a creationist history of science, but I was wrong. It was in actually very scientifically accurate, showing Hubble Space Telescope images and dinosaur bones, and talking about things being millions and billions of years old. There was also a quote from the Koran about the world being created in six days and a lot of talk about things being "created", but all phrased in a very careful way that would not be offensive to a scientist (or at least, was not offensive to this scientist). I learned a lot about the history of Saudi Arabia. Most visitors to the museum were Saudi families. Many of the children stared at me.
As we were finishing with the exhibits, the call to prayer sounded. Our host excused himself for a few minutes to go pray, and Mike and I went to find bathrooms. There was a big section out in the open for the men to pray, and a closed-off section outside the bathroom for the women to pray. They don't all have to pray at the exact same time, just within a certain window, and the women's prayer section was sufficiently crowded that they had to wait their turn. The bathroom was also very crowded, and I had to wait a while. One woman with slits for her eyes, who was standing only a few feet from me, stared right into my eyes for a couple minutes while she waited for the bathroom. She looked angry. Other women smiled at me. Others tried not to stare.
My favorite part of the museum was the courtyard. There was a huge courtyard filled with trees and fountains, and families just hanging out having a good time. Friday is their day off, and the sun had just set so it was finally a reasonable temperature outside, and everyone was out enjoying the weather. Each family had laid out a rug, and people were sitting and talking, and the kids were running all over the place and splashing in the fountains. The children here seem so free! The adults much less so.
When we left the museum, we drove through a part of town where there was lots of traffic and pedestrians everywhere, weaving in and out of the cars. I noticed that all the pedestrians were men, and that there were no women out at all. I asked our host about it, and he said this was the part of town where the workers from Pakistan and India came because they had their traditional restaurants here and they have Friday off. He said these workers come to Saudi Arabia temporarily to earn money, and don't bring their families with them.
Then we got to a much more upscale neighborhood, with almost no pedestrians. I saw a tower and asked our host what it was. He said, "Oh, let's go see it!" and drove the car over to the tower. It was the Al Faisaliyah tower, which our host said was the second (and lesser) of the two great brand new modern towers in Riyadh (we're going to the first, Kingdom Tower, tomorrow). To get to the tower, we walked through a giant shopping mall. I had been curious about the shopping malls, so I was glad we did. As we walked in, I heard people screaming like they were on a roller coaster, and I asked, "Is there a roller coaster in here?" Our host said, "I think there's a small one downstairs." And sure enough, the whole downstairs was an amusement park. The upstairs was the most upscale shopping mall I've ever seen. Most of the stores were filled with designer women's clothes, and most of the customers were women, but only men worked at the stores. I had noticed from looking at women's ankles as they walked, that some of those ladies are wearing some pretty incredible western clothes underneath their abayas. I even saw a lingerie store, not at the mall, but out on a main street, with mannequins in lingerie in the windows. Apparently there are no modesty rules for the mannequins!
The tower itself was not that much more exciting up close than from a distance.
There are no buses or public transportation here, no bicycles, and aside from the Indian neighborhood, no pedestrians. Everyone drives. Our host said gas is only 45 cents a gallon here, which makes driving pretty attractive.
After that we drove around a very large famous street, which is called Desalination Street because the headquarters of a desalination company is there, but which is informally called the Champs de Elysee of Riyadh. The meridian was filled with palm trees with lights covering their trunks, and on both sides were giant fancy restaurants with lots of neon signs, many of which were western chains (Applebees, Johnny Rockets, etc.) Our host said usually the traffic is too bad to drive down this street, but there was a big soccer game tonight, so the streets were quiet.
The American city that Riyadh seems most similar to is Las Vegas. Of course the two cities are complete opposites in terms of how people dress and how they entertain themselves, but they are similar in that both are huge sprawling cities built in the middle of the desert where vast wealth leads to incredible excesses in architecture and rapid expansion. The architecture here reminds me very much of Las Vegas, with huge brightly lit towers and elaborate facades imitating the architecture of every other culture in the world. I mentioned this to our host, and he agreed.
We went to a very fancy Lebanese restaurant for dinner, with the most beautiful elevator I've ever seen. In the restaurant, there was a small "open" section, which was like an American restaurant in that there were a bunch of tables all in the same room, and then there were vast corridors of tables surrounded by wooden barriers that didn't go all the way to the ceiling but completely enclosed the tables, as well as completely private rooms. Apparently most people like to eat in privacy. I insisted that we eat in the open section, because I wanted to people watch. There was one group of 5 women dining together, and two (separate) young couples. They looked like they were enjoying themselves.
I think that's about as much as I can write before I collapse from exhaustion. I had no idea I'd be writing so much about this trip, but it's really helping me decompress a bit.
Sam
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