Breaking News: Riyadh Woman Caught Driving

Who says you don't get hot news scoops from The Veeds of Arabia blog?

VOA News
Dec. 23, 2009, Riyadh, KSA — A woman was stopped for driving a car here yesterday, according to a reliable eyewitness who viewed the incident outside the Ministry of the Interior on King Fahd Road.

According to our exclusive source the incident occurred on December 22. The woman, estimated to be approximately 35 and wearing Western-style clothing without an abaya, was apprehended while driving a green car.

The witness, a Saudi veterinarian driving behind, speculated that the woman is most likely a newcomer, possibly working at either the nearby King Faisal Specialized Hospital or a neighboring dental clinic. The Intercontinental Hotel is also nearby. It is believed that the woman was cautioned and let go without further punishment.

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A trip to the mini-mart

The great thing about the mini-marts -- or what I call a mini-mart; they fancy themselves "Super Markets" -- in the ethnic Malaz district of central Riyadh is that they're situated about every block or so. Locally known as a bakkala, the mini mart is essentially just a step up from a souq (which you may spell as you please).

Now, don't be looking for no fancy cheeses, chunky chicken & vegetable soup, fresh strawberries or gourmet coffee.

But if you're in need of milk, OJ, a cold Barbican apple beverage, ice cream, electrical outlet adaptor, crackers, one of three kinds of cereal or household cleaning products, this is the place to go.

Don't need a full dozen eggs? Just pick 'em out yourself and load up an egg tray with what you need.

No need to bother with your ATM card either. These are strictly cash and carry Mom & Pop operations. Well, Pop anyway.

And while the clerk is ringing up your purchase, don't be surprised if another customer simply comes up, places his stuff on what passes for a counter and forks over some riyals. Line queueing is not a highly practiced custom in the kingdom.

(I would like to take this moment to thank the proprietor of this shop for kindly allowing me to take pictures inside and out.)

The first thing you notice, of course, is the cramped quarters with one-person-at-a-time aisles -- and sometimes apparently no-person-at-a-time -- and goods stacked up to the ceiling.

But here, let me shut up for a minute while you browse...

One of the fun things about shopping at the mini-mart is when you come to the end of an aisle and see that there's barely room to make the turn.

Yes, that is a right turn you see below.

Unlike an American convenience store, the mini-marts here are relatively inexpensive. But, like a Circle K or 7-11, they're easy-in/easy-out.

I'm not quite sure how the clerk keeps track of what the various customers have brought, since the counter is clogged with every imaginable gimcrack and gewgaw, rendering it literally invisible.

So picture our genial host below with, say, three customers all piling their goods up on the several-layers-deep counter area and trying to make change for them all.

This is aided a bit by the fact that there are, practically speaking, no coins to deal with in Saudi Arabia. It's all paper money in 1, 5, 10, 50 and 100 riyal denominations*. (One riyal = about US $0.27) If by some inadvertent stroke of chance you happen to get a product priced in a fraction of a riyal, the clerk is likely to simply hand you a pack of gum as your change. But this is a rare occurrence in any store since products are invariably priced in whole denominations. And since there is no sales tax, what you see on the price tag is what you pay.

I refused the gum one day and the owner reluctantly dug into his cash drawer and proffered a couple quarter-riyal coins ("halalahs"**). I really just wanted to see if there even is such a thing.

Not all mini-marts offer exactly the same goods. At some you can get light bulbs, others offer mobile phone re-charging cards (mobile phone service is generally pre-paid on an as-needed basis) and still others have household knicknacks.

And, like every other store in the kingdom, they're closed for prayer times so it's a good idea to check your mobile phone prayer time scheduler before you head out for a milk run.

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*Technically there are also 20-riyal notes, but I've never seen one.

Update: I have since come into possesion of a few. Unfortunately, they leave my pocket almost as soon as they enter.

** One halalah is a hundredth of a riyal. Gas...er "petrol" runs about 60 halalahs/liter (including full-service pumping), which I reckon works out to about 60 cents/gal -- but then, I've never been known for my math.

Originally published 12/24/09; updated 1/22/10 with various notes.

Don’t try this at home

I’m not saying this is the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.

On the other hand, it’s certainly not up there with remembering the principal products of Brazil in 4th grade or deciding not to see if my dad’s Lincoln Continental could do 120 mph on a Pennsylvania country road.

Picture the scene.

I’m walking down a side street from my apartment in an ethnic neighborhood in central Riyadh heading to a small laundry run by a Bangladeshi. It’s about 4pm on a Wednesday afternoon. I’m holding three sizeable bags of laundry ranging from bedsheets to shirts, so picture the bags pretty full and formless.

About a block and half away I see an SUV fishtailing out of a parking spot, or maybe another side street, and heading in my direction.

Now, I’m not sure I can explain why the next thing happened. Let’s just say that having been here approximately two months now, I’m feeling like I have certain rights to walk safely down the street like any other resident. Let’s also say I was in a cranky mood and hadn’t had my afternoon nap.

What I do is I step out in the middle of the street and start waving my laundry bags in the air…at the approaching SUV driver.

In truth, unlike certain governments who don’t like to see major industries fail, I cannot say I had a bail out plan. All I know is that I’m waving these three white plastic bags and yelling down the street some kind of gibberish like “Hey, what are you doing driving like that, you madman!” I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a question so I’m not going to bother putting the correct punctuation there.

I see the black SUV coming toward me, but he’s stopped fishtailing and the next thing I know is…he’s come to a stop, about three-quarters of a block away.In my mind’s eye of memory, I believe I saw the vehicle as though it were out of some Ferdinand the Bull episode, with the SUV sort of paused, snorting, preparing to disembowel me and leave bedclothes and button-down shirts scattered amongst the stray cats and poorly parked cars.

I am now replaying that memory as a reality check to see if what happened next really happened. I’m pretty sure of it.

What happened was that the driver executed a neat right-hand turn, slowing down as he did so, smiled and…flashed me the Hawaiian “hang loose” gesture.

I could see that it was a 20-something Saudi in Western-style dress—that’s how close I was.

I flashed him a hang-loose in return and off he went.

I guess the laundry is mightier than the sword.
...

Wipers up!

As I meander up the various side streets of Riyadh each day from the Fortress of Solitude where I live to the Institute where I teach, I’ve been noticing an awful lot of cars with their windshield wipers up, or rather, one wiper blade up.

Then suddenly, it came to me.

In a place like Riyadh, which is essentially a city of 5+ million people in the middle of a bunch of sand, car washing is second only to feet washing (OK...and making U-turns).

Consequently, there’s a sort of cottage industry of entrepreneurial car washers. A bunch of them hang out behind the Obeid Specialty Hospital but you can find them all through the neighborhoods.

I guess this won’t be much of a breaking news story to locals, but apparently the car washers lift the wiper blade up to signal to the owner that the car has been tended to.


Wiper up, car clean.
...

How about just saying "Hi"?

Allow me to step aside for a moment from the usual hard-hitting, ripped-from-the-headlines sort of concise and insightful reports you've come to expect from Veeds of Arabia -- oh, wait, that was a completely different place -- and extend an invitation to the variety of anonymous readers who regularly visit this site.

I know a teensy bit about you from the site-meter. For example, I know you're from Finland and The Netherlands and the U.S. and Canada and France and Germany and Saudi Arabia and Australia and a host of other far flung nations. But that's about it.

I'd love to at least know who you are. Why not say "hi"?

If you'd just as soon not broadcast yourself to the teeming millions, feel free to jot a note to me privately at: jveeds@aol.com.

Your secret identity is safe with me.

Regards,

Veeds of Arabia
Your man in the sand

Why Riyadh pedestrians need rearview mirrors

Why drive on the street when you can take the sidewalk?

1) Driver of SUV, having politely honked me out of the way, proceeds up the sidewalk to the intersection.

2) Driver pulls off the sidewalk, neatly bypassing a long line of traffic on King Abdul Aziz Rd.

3) Driver snags a parking spot at the corner, just barely clearing the intersection itself (but behind the crosswalk, which in Riyadh is mostly theoretical anyway)


Nice work...and it's only 7:15 a.m.

...

A long way to Tipperary...and Riyadh

I saw an ad on the Saudi Expat message board, illustrating the age-old copywriter’s maxim: “Spend 80 percent of your time on the headline, 20 percent on the copy.”

While this works better for ads than Internet message boards, a lot of time and trouble could have been saved if the writer would have spent a little more time thinking about his headline.

It goes:

WEEKEND SALE — LAST DAY-GOING-AWAY SALE! THROWAWAY PRICES

The particular item that caught my eye was a printer/scanner/copier combo for a mere 100 riyals (about $26).

I called the number listed and the guy and I agreed that since I don’t have a car, he would meet me somewhere and we’d go to my place to fire up the system before purchase. He had all the cables and discs.

At the risk of revealing the Veeds Of Arabia super-secret Fortress of Solitude, I can say that it’s near several prominent city landmarks — to wit, Al Yamama Hotel, the King Abdul Aziz University Hospital and the Radisson Hotel. Cabbies all around town know at least one of these so I figured this guy would too.

We arranged to meet the next day at the Al Yamama. He would use his GPS to locate the hotel.

Now, I’m wary of GPS navigators but I’ve used them before and sometimes they work just fine. But sometimes all it takes is a wrong left turn to throw you off. Sometimes it’s simply a question of GIGO — Garbage In/Garbage Out.

We connect by cell phone as planned Sunday. He says it should take him about 30 minutes, but he’ll call when he’s near the hotel rendezvous.

The Al Yamama Hotel, once the jewel of Riyadh, has faded in its glory, but it still has excellent tennis courts, a big pool and some vestige of tainted elegance in its lobby. Most of all, it’s a well-known landmark in this part of the city and it’s a 7-minute walk from my apartment. I get a call from the guy — we’ll call him “Ramesh” — an hour later and he says he should be there in about 10 minutes. I hurry out the door and arrive 7 minutes later. No Ramesh.

The circumstances become a little cloudy in my head at this later point in time because there were numerous calls back and forth, using up my precious mobile phone minutes but, after all, Ramesh is going to the trouble of driving so I’m figuring it’s a fair trade-off.

Despite, or perhaps because of his GPS, he keeps getting lost. Finally, 40 minutes and a hotel lobby catnap later, there’s a final call: he’s now hopelessly lost and can we regroup tomorrow when he’s had a chance to study a map and check the three landmarks?

We can.

I’m savoring the addition of a scanner to my electronic arsenal at the Fortress and if I’ve learned anything in the Kingdom, it’s that nothing goes right the first time.

Monday comes bringing Ramesh’s call about 4 pm. He thinks he’s got it solved. I hand the phone over to a colleague who’s lived here for 10 years and knows the city well. He gives very clear directions and guidelines. He reports to me afterwards that it doesn’t sound like Ramesh knows where he is coming from.

Ramesh is now on his way to the Radisson Hotel, well-known as the former Hyatt and also as the headquarters for General Schwarzkopf during the Gulf War. I head over.

Ramesh’s next update comes 20 minutes later. Yes! He’s pulling in now and would I come outside so he can verify that he’s at the right place? We don’t see each other and our descriptions of the building don’t match. He concludes that his GPS has led him to the wrong Radisson. Grrrr. He will recalibrate and go the correct one.

Back inside to the lush lobby I think: Why not ask the reception desk for help?

The clerk confirms that the hotel is indeed on King Abdul Aziz Road, known as the Old Airport Road, etc. etc. I ask where the other Radisson is. He says, “There is no other Radisson, sir.”
Ramesh calls back and says he’s confused about the Radissons and why his GPS isn’t directing him correctly.

I estimate that counting yesterday’s driving and today’s he has now wandered aimlessly up and down various highways with a printer/scanner for which he will receive about $26 for about four hours work. The cost to me is mobile phone minutes and some time spent catnapping in hotel lobbies.

Our final conversation goes like this:

Him: “Ok, I must have gone to the wrong Radisson. I’ll have to recalculate my position and get to the other one.”
Me: “I just talked to the hotel clerk. He says there is only one Radisson in Riyadh.”
Him (pausing): “Riyadh?”
Me: “Yes, only one Radisson in Riyadh.”
Him: “I’m in Jeddah.”

See? It pays to pay attention to your headline.
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Note: Riyadh and Jeddah are 525 miles apart, approximately the distance between Phoenix, Ariz. and Salt Lake City, Utah. It's a long long way to Tipperary too, I wonder if they have any scanners?

Photos by author.