Snow Joke

Those of you who have read this from the beginning will have noted my rather acerbic observations on heatwave levels. No doubt they are all a very distant memory now that the UK has been plunged into ‘Arctic conditions’ and is ‘as cold as the North Pole’ – you really can’t fault the tabloid journalists for being able to sensationalise a bit of snow.

I am delighted to say that I was far too young to remember the extent of the cold snap in the early 80s, but there is pictorial evidence to suggest I was there; that aside, I can’t recall the travel chaos, I certainly don’t remember the school being closed, or indeed anyone running out of salt.

It’s perhaps not surprising that the Brits are famed for their fascination with weather; if any sort of weather more severe than a light drizzle or a gentle summer breeze causes the infrastructure to collapse, I guess it pays to be fascinated by it.

Don’t misunderstand me, they are not alone in being incapable of dealing with certain weather conditions; here in Saudi for example, there was some immensely heavy rain recently, and it caused very severe flash flooding, largely due to the drainage, where it exists, being designed to deal with light rains only. But I think the UK is pretty unique in not being able to deal with ANY weather conditions.

I also can’t help but smile about the irony of various world leaders leaving the world conference on global warming because of the threat of snow in their homelands.

Was delighted to see the schools managed to open up for the exams though – i guess the threat of being sued because little Johnny fell over in the playground was a lesser one than having to re-arrange the entire exam timetable. Tragic.

Visas and Immigration

Saudi, being a largely insular country (notwithstanding the many millions of pilgrims that make the journey to visit the two holy mosques in Mecca and Madinah) has very strict immigration rules. As an expatriate worker, i have to hold with me at all times my residence permit (Iqama) or my passport, failure to do so is an offence that would get me arrested.

The UK has for many years talked, often controversially about the compulsory issuance of ID cards, now i am not suggesting that the model here should be viewed as a best in class representation, but it is in stark contrast to the existing UK immigration policy in that getting in and out of the country for any reason is entirely at the discretion of the authorities, and a lack of proper documentation completely forbids it.

I personally fell foul of such procedures when recently trying to leave the country for a vacation, and this was because, as my sponsor, my company has to obtain a visa on my behalf to allow me exit and subsequent re-entry. Such visas are single-use in most cases, and whilst the country is largely paper-based in it’s beaurocracy, it’s visa processing is both paper and electronic, and should anything not match, you will not travel, and in my case, the paper was fine, but the visa was not valid on the system. There was no right to appeal, there was no protracted argument, simply a statement that i was not travelling that night.

Now this was simply for a temporary exit from the country – the process for finally exiting the country (a different visa) is something i can’t help but feel is a good idea; Once you have been granted the residency permit (Iqama) you have the right to obtain credit, buy a car, get a driving license etc etc. This Iqama is  linked to your passport, and consequently all your financial and criminal activity is associated to your passport. As my sponsor, my company has a financial responsibility for anything i may owe upon exiting the country, so a final exit visa will not be issued if i owe anyone anything, or have any unpaid traffic tickets etc. I for one do not see this as an infringement of my civil liberties, I think it’s absolutely appropriate.

In the end, i managed to get a replacement visa and travelled the following evening. As it happened i was met at passport control with the same man I’d been turned away by the previous night, he had a bit of a laugh at my expense and set me merrily on my way – again something i can’t see as a bad thing.

Drinking – or rather, not drinking

Having lived a fairly normal life of a 20-something man, i used to spend a lot of my free time in the pub, and, it must be said, it was a source of a great deal of good times, good friends and great memories, and of course the inevitable lack of memory.

Living in a country now therefore, where drinking is strictly forbidden did leave rather a gap in my life for a while. Now whilst i say it is strictly forbidden, the human spirit (or rather love for spirits) is indomitable, so it does exist in both home-brew and black market forms.

Now home-brew beer, at least in the case in point, involves putting yeast and sugar solution into a vat of non-alcoholic lager, and leaving it to ferment for a few weeks…now the process of refining this varies, but generally it’s best when siphoned into bottles, left for another week or two, and then a third time. Finally you end up with (reasonably) clear, flat and ridiculously strong lager. To turn this into something palatable (and i use the term loosely) this then has to be mixed with more alcohol free beer. The resulting ‘beverage’ varies enormously in strength and taste, but in the absence of any alternative, it serves a purpose.

There is also a home-brewed spirit called ‘sid’ now i don’t know if that’s the right spelling, or indeed why it’s gained such a moniker, but it’s a clear spirit made from i know not what and distilled to the point where spillages could cause irreparable damage to most anything it touches. Nobody of course warned me of this the first time i had a try, and it seems i was fortunate to only lose the use of the left side of my body, and not my sight. It is truly abhorrent, but merely proves what lengths we will go to for a drink.

Tragically though, as i write this on a Tuesday night, i do so looking forward to tomorrow night, where i will be partaking of more of the same! Strange how my memory of Thursday mornings seems to disappear so quickly…

Driving

Once again i made it home through the death-defying act of driving in Riyadh, which almost defies description, but i will do my best to outline the basics for you:

1. Mirrors and Indicators are entirely optional

2. Lane markings are, at best, for guidance only

3. Driving in the dark is best employed with lights off, this way when you approach someone at 90 mph and flash your lights, they really will take notice

4. If there are too many people in front of you at traffic lights, no problem, simply mount the pavement, or the unused filter lane and pull to the front and take your place firmly in the middle of the junction where you can’t see the traffic lights change and wait for the horn-blasts to confirm you should now pull away

Now this is just a small set of some of the challenges of driving around Riyadh, the real joy of all this is the speed at which these manoeuvres are undertaken; now we have all been in jostling traffic, but generally this is at less than 10 mph, not at 60…but therein lies the genius of it – everyone expects everyone else to drive the same way, so you don’t have to try and be careful, you simply have to forget everything you’ve ever learned about a vehicular discipline…and be prepared for evasion at any time.

Saudi is a country of massive contrast in wealth terms – the uber-rich sheikhs are well recognised throughout the world, but the underclass, and the expatriate communities from the subcontinent make the wealth of these people even more striking. Seeing $200,000 cars is reasonably commonplace, but not nearly so commonplace as $200 cars; I have never seen so many 20 year old Datsuns and Toyotas, many of which seem to actually be held together with sheer will, and clearly the will of some of the drivers leaves a little to be desired. In addition to the small Japanese saloons, there are also a large number of old American SUVs (made of steel and the size of a studio apartment), which mean that the vast majority of road-users have a lot less to lose in terms of damage to their car than i do.

There is a driving test here i am led to believe, but finding evidence of it on the road is a rather difficult undertaking, especially when you consider that under local law, the eldest male in the family is allowed to drive, so if the father is unable to drive for any reason, the eldest son is allowed to do so, even if he is only barely capable of seeing over the wheel. Seeing a 12 year old behind the wheel of an American SUV nearly twice his age does little to bolster your confidence on the road.

For all this, driving does have a massive charm here, and provided you’re prepared to be frustrated, scared and horrified in equal measure, getting around is very effective, largely because the local authorities’ approach to accidents or road debris is simply to let vehicles go past; roads do not get closed for 5 hours because someone has chosen to redecorate the central reservation, for that  reason, coupled with the very liberating feeling of driving with your eyes closed, i applaud it.

British Heatwave

The UK is about to be gripped by a dreadful and searing heatwave i am being reliably (and repeatedly) informed by Sky News, temperatures are going to soar to 34 degrees centigrade (that’s over 90 in old money). It is also expected to raise the ‘heatwave alert level’ to level 3 – yet another means by which to measure how the UK authorities feel the populous are entirely incapable of understanding simple principles without having a comparative measure, terror levels, pandemic levels, flood watch levels and now heat wave levels.

Context i think is important here; it’s no secret it’s warm in the middle east, very warm; today for example the temperature touched 50 degrees (in Fahrenheit that’s ‘lots’) and there is no heatwave threat level here, just a general understanding that if your sandal melts to the pavement, perhaps you should be indoors, and if you don’t drink any water, you’re going to die. It’s not difficult is it?

Don’t get me wrong, the prevalence of air conditioning here is the only thing that makes living in heat like this bearable, but the number of cars on the road which were build in years when air conditioning came in the form of a wind-down windows (yes, where you turn a handle and the window goes up or down, imagine that) means that it must still be possible to survive in conditions like this without it.

As i write this, it’s 7.30 at night, and it’s been dark for an hour…the temperature? 43 degrees…wonder what heatwave threat level that would be.

Introduction

Well this is going to be my first foray into blogging, and whilst i hope you find what i write entertaining and or amusing, i offer no guarantee thereof, and no further correspondence will be entered into.

So, about me a little in the first place, i am a guy who recently went past the notable and fearful milestone of 30. I am currently resident in Saudi Arabia working for a fashion retail company.

This blog will contain mostly my thoughts on life out here, observations about the same and also anything else i may deem worthy of inclusion. My opinions are my own, and i do not profess to suggest they are either right nor wrong, merely my own.

As for update frequency – that will be defined largely by available time and availability of interesting things to blog, but i would hope i will manage an update every week or so.

I hope you enjoy reading…