Saudi Arabia - مع السلامة

One way of saying goodbye in Saudi Arabia is ma'a as salama or مع السلامة which means 'go with safety' according to Wiktionary, said by the person who is staying to the one who is leaving.  It looks like I'm the one who's staying and I'm afraid it's time to say goodbye to Saudi Arabia!  I feel like I've barely scratched the surface of Saudi Arabian culture, nor have I had time this month to really do it justice.  I've learned a lot more about Saudi Arabia than I had time to blog about. 

I've also kept an eye on the English language and Saudi-based Arab News website - well worth a visit, if you want to get an insight into life in the Kingdom.  The news has been full of Saudi Arabia's response to the flooding in Pakistan on one hand, contrasted with the very disturbing reports in the Twittersphere about the abuse of a Filipino maid by her Saudi employers.  I was also surprised to read a report in the Arabic language Al-Riyadh (الرياض‎) newspaper, about the moral degradation of Saudi society, because of all the (straight) couples kissing in public.  Just today the Pink News has published a story about a gay Saudi diplomat, who claims he will be killed if he is sent home.

Some of the other things I've learned about Saudi Arabia are:

- It's almost ten times the size of the UK, with half the population.

- Saudi Arabia isn't just about deserts, it also has lush coastal areas on the Red Sea and fertile mountain resorts such as Abha. 

- The Rub al Khali or 'the Empty Quarter' is one of the most hostile landscapes known to man.

- Less than 2% of Saudi Arabia's land is arable. 

- According to The Economist's 2008 Democracy Index Saudi Arabia is the seventh most authoratitative country in the world.  I think I was more surprised to find out that Uzbekistan, a country I've lived in, came fourth in that index!

- Saudi Arabia didn't abolish slavery until 1962.

- Riyadh means 'the Gardens'

- 12 million Brazilians are of Arab origin.

- Non-muslims are not allowed to visit the holy cities of Medina and Mecca.

- Jeddah is the most multi-cultural and 'open' city in Saudi Arabia.

- Houses in Jeddah's Al-Balad district are made from coral, from the Red Sea.

- The religious police are called matawwa.

- Saudi Arabia has one of the highest road death rates in the world.

- Asir, now a province in the south-west of Saudi Arabia, was an independent kingdom until 1922.  It contains Saudi Arabia's highest mountain, Jebel Sawdah, which is 2910 metres tall.

- Wild baboons live in Asir region.

- The Farasan Islands, which are in the Red Sea, could become a major draw for tourists, if Saudi Arabia ever relaxes its strict visa requirements.

- Saudi Arabia is one of the richest regions in the world for Rock Art, with over 2,000 sites. 

- Saudi Arabia has a UNESCO world heritage site at Mada'in Saleh.

- Matthew Shepard's parents (the young man who was brutally murdered in a homophobic attack in Wyoming in 1998) lived in Dhahran and worked for the major oil corporation Aramco.

- Education isn't compulsory in the Kingdom and an estimated 39% of Saudi children don't attend school.

- Women are not allowed to practise law in Saudi Arabia.

- During Soviet times a quota of 20 Muslims were allowed to travel to Saudi Arabia from the USSR every year to perform the Hajj. 

- Winston's Hiccup or Churchill's sneeze is an anecdotal explanation of the sharp corner in the border between Saudi Arabia and Jordan.

- Folk beliefs claim that Eve is buried in Jeddah (جدّة‎) and that the name of the city comes from the Arabic word for grand-mother, which is jaddah (جدة)

I'm a big fan of Arabian music, although I'm more familiar with Arabesque singers of Turkey, than Saudi singers.  Arabian music has to be the definition of exotic for most western Europeans and, as I've been researching this blog, I've been listening to some of Saudi's greatest singers.

I'm going to leave you with one of my favourites - Mohammed Abdu.  Abdu grew up in Saudi Arabia's smallest province, Jizan and was orphaned at a very early age.  He's now a Saudi institution, but I like this video because it shows him at a time when he was still very young and had all the energy and passion of someone following his dream. 

Image credits:

The award-winning image of the Empty Quarter was taken by flickruser IrenicRhonda aka Rhonda Surman who is originally from High Wycombe, but now lives in the Highlands of Scotland.  You can see more of Rhonda's photos at http://www.flickr.com/people/irenicrhonda/

The picture of the Kaaba in Mecca was taken by flickruser Ammar Abd Rabbo

The photo of the Mada'in Saleh UNESCO site was provided by flickuser Omar A.

Thanks to Rhonda, Ammar and Omar for sharing your images with us, using the Creative Commons License.

Saudi Arabia - Cradle of the Arab race

It's hard to study the history of Saudi Arabia without making reference to the historical context of the rest of the Middle East.  I picked Saudi as my first Middle Eastern country for a good reason - because this is where it all started.  By that I mean, Islam, the growth of an Arab identity and the influence of oil-rich nations on the global politics of the late twentieth century. 

In preparation for this learning journey, I watched Lawrence of Arabia, the 1960's epic starring Peter O'Toole and Egyptian-born Omar Sharif.  It covers an interesting period in the history of the Middle East, when the British were conspiring with Bedu tribes of Arabia, to overthrow the oppressive yoke of the Ottoman Empire and establish a united and, according to Lawrence, independent Arabia, with Britain's support.  A major historical theme of the movie is the fact that Lawrence helps unite disparate tribes from different parts of the Arabian peninsula.  The concept of a united Arab identity is, in many ways, an historical construct and the real picture is a lot more complex, with tribal and religious loyalties taking precedence over the idea of nation.

In the same way as Hinduism has long been associated with ethnicity in India, Islam too was very much the religion of the Arabian people.  The main difference is that, whilst Hinduism is still predominantly practised by people of Indian origin, such was the appeal of Islam that a mere 20% of Muslims now live in the Arab world, with approximately 203 million Muslims in Indonesia and half a billion Muslims in Pakistan/India/Bangladesh.  Although the holiest Islamic sites of Medina and Mecca are in Saudi Arabia, the centre of Islamic culture has shifted around since the time of Mohammed to cities like Damascus (under the Umayyad's) and Baghdad of the Abbasid.  Delhi, Cordoba, Cairo and Constantinople have all had their golden ages of Islam and even a city like Samarkand in Uzbekistan, where I spent two years, has played its part in the development of Islamic culture and sciences.

I find the history of the Middle East fascinating.  European involvement in Middle Eastern affairs goes back to the days of the spice trade.  The Portuguese occupying the island of Socotra (in Yemen), securing their safe passage to India.  The Dutch stealing Arabian coffee beans and introducing a craze to 17th century Europe.  It would seem as though Saudi Arabia has bobbed along through all of this, taking a sceptical interest in regional affairs, often divided between the politics of the Gulf states and Iran, on one side of the country, the influence of Egypt and Africa on the other.  The change came in the 1920's, when the royal Saudi family of Riyadh managed to gain control of most of the Arabian peninsula, uniting the various nomadic tribes in, what was to become, a definitive Saudi Kingdom. 

Both the US and Britain have actively supported the national integrity of Saudi Arabia.  Even more so, when oil was discovered in the late 1930's and American interests moved in to make a quick buck and get the Saudi oil wells open for business.  King Faisal was a key figure in the OPEC oil embargo in 1973.  The major oil-producing countries found that they could treble the price of oil overnight and that affluent Western nations would still pay the price.  The result was an unprecedented explosion of wealth in the Middle East, for the oil-rich nations, naturally, and even the labourers coming from poorer neighbouring countries, who could send their wages home and create mini economic booms there too. 

I'm not sure anyone could have guessed how quickly things would change in the Kingdom and Riyadh, a city of 150,000 people in the 1960's, now has a population of 5 million!  Saudis enjoy one of the highest living standards in the world, have become notorious for their immense wealth in a way that, more recently, the Russian oligarchs have caught the world's attention.  The ruling Saudi families can send their children to the world's most exclusive universities.  Obesity is a pressing issue for a country hooked on American fast food. 

Of course, there is a downside to all of this - the exploitation of immigrant labour, the repression of women and LGBT people, the emergence of shadowy fundamentalist groups and the uncompromising hold that the ruling Saudis have on the country's governance.  Who only knows what the future has in store for this highly-influential nation, I guess the oil will run out some day? 

Image credits:

The satellite image of the Arabian peninsula is from Wikimedia Commons from the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) Project.  The image is more than 5 years old and is, therefore, in the public domain.

The beautiful picture of King Fahd Road in Riyadh (one of the wealthiest addresses in the country) was shared with us on flickr.com by flickruser Ayman Aljammaz who is from Dhahran in Saudi Arabia.  Ayman is a very talented photographer and you can see more of his images at

http://aljammazphotography.com/photography/