The Darling Saudis

A Saudi woman in voluntary exile is visited by fellow Saudis. They commence on encouraging her to end her exile, return to Saudi. She considers her options. 

_______________

Yazan Made of Wonders

I held Yazan's head in my lap. “You masturbated, didn’t you?”

“Maybe I did. Maybe I didn’t.”

“More than once?”

He turned his face away, his burning cheek pressed on my knee.

The next day, I heard his thoughts. I heard his thoughts through his journey back to Saudi, from the hotel to the airport to the check-in line to the waiting lounge to the passengers cabin. I heard his thoughts about, if he could grow strong enough to make his own choices, he would choose Sarah, the woman he has loved for so long.

I heard, later in the evening, when the plane's lights were dimmed and sleep dawned, his thoughts on how he would have fucked me from every hole and position in that coach cabin. I heard his kink and felt pink. 

Does it effect on a man watching the woman underneath him churn and hurt in ecstasy? Does it make him feel stronger, bigger and closer to his ideal? 

Does a woman feel more woman when she can reach the apex of her womanhood and hold it for so long? What would've been worse, one who comes too easily or one who never comes at all? 

And I wondered if this is just another lusty ruse, if I'm just making up excuses to get laid. If this is just another distraction or infatuation taking force. 

Insane Wonders

Saudi has always been more than just a country. It’s home and family and identity. I adore and hate and lust her, my country. 

Since I refused to go to Saudi, Saudi sent her messengers to me, Mshari and Yazan. And they did as they were bid. Two horrified, oedipal Saudis sat in my living room and encouraged me, as gently as they could, to go home. “Give it a shot. See how it works. Things have changed.”

Saudi, without marriage, already drives me mad. Imagine if I were married and deeply lodged in the social system? There is no such thing as a sane Saudi. I won’t even be sane enough to decide on how to spend my evenings with all that noise.

I told them that I am in Indonesia for sanity. The only thing that would send back to Saudi would be a bout of insanity: Falling madly in love. 

***

Obviously, all this is designed to confuse. I needed to count the pros and cons. What do I get out of going to Saudi, and what do I get if I just stay in exile after all?

Pros of Living in Saudi: 

1. I can make a lot of money. Own things.

2. Get a job. Write. 

3. Get married, get laid, have children.

4. Be with old friends and family.

5. Have every kind of tea and dairy and achar ever known on earth.

6-10. Affirmations: Kunafah. Shawarma. Baklava. Ma’soub. Hummus. 

Cons:

1. "What personal freedom?"

2. A job is only as interesting as it can get.

3. Money can only entertain so far.

4. "What privacy?"

5. If married: In-laws. If single: Mama. 

6 - 10. Abstraction: Culture - Commonness - Comments - Context - Calling.

What's Saudi got that is worth the trouble? What's she got to make me move so far and heavy? What's she done for me that Indonesia hasn't?

These questions will answer themselves when the time comes for me to know. Like all of my questions, the questions that I have asked before and groped for answers, I'll know when the time comes. كل شي في وقته منيح.

And the best thing out all this wonderment, is the realization that I have a choice. That makes me fucking cash. I have a choice and the time to weigh my options. I am that rich. I've been blessed. 

***

I live in a very narrow world. 

I wanted to expand on it, fill it with more oomph and oh-la-la. That was one of the reasons why I left Saudi in the first place; I felt choked. 

Instead, I got stuck there, in the past. Relieved but unpassed. I’ve been twenty-five for eight years. I haven't gone anywhere else. This also illustrates the nature of my relationships with others. Ever since I defied the norms, the norms dropped me too. 

Yazan's Saudiness prodded me with devil’s talk and questions:

- What if I had been good?

- What if I let them have me their way? 

- What if I married like everyone else?

- What if I never left?

- What if...and never the answers. 

I stared long into the devil’s void, challenging its devouring emptiness. "Are you done yapping, ingrate?"

***

It felt wrong for Yazan to leave the house at two in the morning. If the neighbors were going to talk, then I had better make it worth their while. So we took turns, Yazan and I, to shower and unwind. We undressed into sarongs and shirts, then sorted the bed. The silent domesticity affirmed flighty thoughts and purged idle talk. 

I said, “See, I don't got me a man I can call mine, but I ain't alone. I don't get to do everything, but what I do get to do is not bad either. I don't want everything, because having everything would have been boring.”

And the boy who was pulling my bedsheets in my clothes said, "Alia, buck up. You ain't ugly. You're worth the fight."

Happiness is worth the fight. 

Booze of Wonder

I’ve had booze and the Sight hasn’t shut down. 

I thought that committing sin would shut down my Indigo abilities; I would be normal. Normal and homogenous go very well with Saudi. Since the man who taught me to drink was a Saudi, I returned the karmic favor by teaching Yazan how to drink. 

But I can still hear them. I can still hear the voices in my head, of spirits and men. Not as loud as they used to, not to point of distraction. But clear enough. Urgent enough. And it has made me wonder if nothing would shut them down.

It made me wonder if I could ever fit into the Saudi society. Or if the rules only matter when I am with the Timekeeper, my imam and father and guardian.

Then I remembered. What hasn’t the Timekeeper done and given to make my life comfortable, ingrate?

Mshari's Gift

“Well, we kissed,” I said.

Irhan came for dinner after the Saudis were gone. He knew that Yazan and Mshari had left that morning, and I was blue with homesickness. I told him about Yazan sleeping over. Irhan cocked his head to the side. “Did he try to...?”

“No, he didn’t. The very-available and very-tempted Saudi just kissed me. I sensed him, from the way he kissed, I sensed his edge and need. I sensed him trying his damndest to control himself. He isn’t accustomed to being in a situation where sex is an option that is not taken. All the times he’s been in private with women, he has had his heart’s content. Temptation is a terrible thing.”

“But he's Saudi. How could he not…”

“He’s been previously informed, actually.”

“By who?”

“Mshari.” 

“Mshari, who is Yazan's friend and is your family.”

“Yes. Mshari took the time to tell Yazan in private about me. Then he left us alone. He stood aside. That was his gift. Mshari made us happy just by backing off. He must love us that much. We’re grateful. I am.”

Trusting The Mob

Internet Mob Behavior

When the Hamza Kashgari fiasco happened, everything I feared about the Saudi society's judgment returned in folds. As if all the years of public writing and living in exile hasn't taught me a thing about trusting the anonymous crowd. If I had been thinking about writing to an Arab audience, reading about Hamzah being sent to prison over mere tweets, sealed my mouth and fingers silent.

Much to my horror, about a week after Hamza’s fiasco, my brother released the first episode of Takki. I spent the night watching the timeline for any bursts of hashtagging. Nothing bad happened to my brother or any of the crew and actors involved. In fact, as far as I know, they're doing swimmingly even under the judgmental eyes of the Saudi public.

How my brother survived the Saudi mob's attention, while Hamza and Firas did not, I was yet to understand. And it was going to take me a whole year to figure out the right keywords to google that phenomenon.

About a week ago, there was another gossip fiasco in the Saudi twitosphere: A man was photographed sharing a table with an uncovered woman. The hashtag to that translates as #MisterX'sScandal. It grabbed my attention because there was nothing scandalous about a man being in public with his uncovered wife. That it got blown up was what really took me aback.

Is the Saudi society really, really that sick?

Pause. Process. Project.

Now, the thing that mobs have in common, whether online or on the streets, is that they both represent the society at its most extreme state.

Society, whether we like it or not, is a responsive, adaptive and smart organism that behaves as naturally as an individual would given in the same situation. But smarter and, considering its size, more forceful. The mob, or crowd, or society in general, as a single unit, is accurate in its unanimous decisions.

Take, for instance, in Hamza Kashgari's case. Hamza had been poking around the lines of propriety for a while in his columns before he tweeted his doom. The way the mob behaved in response to his tweets were as natural as a pissed off child’s response to a beloved parent being publicly disrespected. I would have at least shunned if a man treated my master with disrespect. And if I weren't such a passivist I would have butchered his entire family too.

Similarly, looking closer into #MisterX'sScandal, I found out that Mister X was not just an innocent bystander being runned down by a bored, scandal-craving mob. A background check on Mister X revealed that he has been a mouthful bitch. And his mouth has offered nothing but vehement spitting upon everything it came across. So much that even his mates gave up on him.

In both Hamza and Mister X's sudden hashtagging, the mob was forced to respond. It was prodded and poked until it grabbed the first slip of tongue to retaliate so forcefully. The same response, I think I would have given if I were in the position to do something about it.

The Other Side of Mob Behavior

Whatever got me worried for so long about the mob’s behavior also blotted out the qualities that I might have liked about it too.

Again, since the mob is a smart organism, it would not exert its powers only in attack modes. It will also protect its interests and create amazing things. Such as the random acts of kindness during natural disasters. The millions of worshippers in mosques, churches and synagogues saying Amen in one voice, every day. And every time a mufti releases a stupid fatwa, or a politician is caught abusing his powers, the mob will protest and reassert its powers to create change.

That is democracy, the united opinion of the mob, in its simplest and most natural form.

So, it's not that one society is sick or that another society is better. That is a tired claim. Every society has its cultural quirks and points of outdated customs. But if you look closer, the things that we, as individuals, might dislike about a society, could be the very things that has kept that society from crumbling down to the ground, with you and I and the people we love and protect along with it.

Holding Hands

"I know you are not Muslims, but that is shameful!"

It was an hour before dusk, on the first day of Ramadhan. Superstitious Muslims believe that dusk is the witching hour; when the buffer between the worlds thin. Magical beings are then allowed to pass through. Even in Jeddah. Especially near the crossroad.

We were shopping for iftar. Inheriting gait from our mother, we scuttled rather than walked. We moved faster than the traffic along our side, where vistas of congested cars, food fumes and hypoglycemia mangled on each other. We controlled our breaths by not talking and held hands for cues instead.

The man yelled from his car in English. He yelled with the kind of certainty that is typical in an empty stomach. It was enough for him to deem us foreigners and kafirs for my uncovered hair and our interlaced hands.

My brother did not miss a beat. He tapped my arm to excuse himself before releasing. Then he dove into the middle of the road, squeezing between crawling cars and straight to the caller's window. In full-fledged Makkawi Arabic, he said, "Did you just commit murder?"

The man's face crumbled but my brother did not spare him. The canons that protected his cinematography in a country where cinema is outlawed, fired from his mouth in rapid vehemence. And, just like in the movies, he left dramatically before the onset of apologies.

He groused about it until sahoor, but his hand, whenever he clasped mine, was always warm.

The General Disclaimer

I haven't lived in Saudi for nearly 12 years. I’m embarrassed to be the one writing these posts. Who am I to speak about a country I have not lived in for so long?

I have traveled back a few times. Sometimes even tried to make it permanent. The longest, though, was barely two years. Things just happened and I had to go. I would like to believe that I don't have problems with Saudi. A chunk of my sanity depends on a lot of people there, and if it weren't for them, I wouldn't have kept the citizenship, wouldn't have felt so guilty for leaving, wouldn't have...

Well. Anyway.

Memories change over time and – in spite of my obsessive journaling – so have mine. I'm writing these memories not to preserve them, but because I can't avoid them anymore. These are the themes that mar the space between the words, and the themes that fuel the conversations in my world.

I do apologize for my subjectivity. Prolonged absence has stored my memories in slots of tenderness. Not only that we remember better when we’re happy but people also treat you kindlier when they know that you won’t be around for long. They can sense that whatever they say will never fail to impress you; for your eyes are sore with their absence.

If it’s any consolation, I’m writing based on first-hand experiences. Saudi is the quintessential landscape within me. My Holy Grail. It seems a waste not to write from a place so deeply woven into my voice, from the harshest curse to the softest purr.

Economics aside, every time I visited Saudi, my sensors drowned in kaleidoscopic implosions. I could mine from every one of those implosions thousands of written words, dozens of stories. (If only I weren’t so embarrassed.) Like in every society, Saudi is never as straightforward as Halal/Haram, or any less complex and enriching as a bowl of ma’soob.

People and events don’t function like mathematical equations. The variables are countless with each person, every given situation. What works for me, may not apply for my cousins. What works for Jeddawis, might fit the standards of blasphemy in Bon Temps.

Maybe each of us is laden with a unique voice. Or maybe we just haven’t heard enough stories to find the one that relates to us. I only impose that the point to stories is not to judge one another’s experiences.

You have your stories. See if you could find yourself in some of mine.

The Unusual Car

The Mercedes-Benz S-Class is a reliable, luxurious and screaming-legitimacy kind of car.

But if you overfill it with non-Arab-looking folks, take it for a carpool at night around Jeddah’s ghettos, you might understand why Batman prefers to patrol from the rooftops of Gotham than on the Batmobile.

To be fair, we were asking for it. And not just because it was such a flashy car. The way our friends got out, a mile apart from one another. The way my hair was not covered. The way Jay drove at such an hour. We were only relieved that our friends were spared from questioning before the cops finally flashed their high-beams behind us.

I heard Jay say, "My wife," in his cheekiest tone. The car's magnificence seemed to have injected his answers with confidence, regardless to truthiness. “No, of course we don’t have our legal papers. The mu'amalah (permit) takes forever for Saudis to marry outside the citizenship. Would you like to speak with her?”

My social life is actually one of the things that I miss most about living in Jeddah. I’m sure distance has had some effect on rose-tinting my opinion. Though whenever I was there, I hung out with male friends as regularly as with the female, as regularly as I cared to do so in Jakarta. Regardless to citizenship or driving distance.

Saudi is not singular in its treatment to citizens based on race, sex or tribe. On the daily level, life is always much less dramatic, and so much blurrier than any journalistic segment. Authorities do not arrest and question people at random. There has to be glaring causes of suspicion for that.

And even with glaring causes of suspicion, with the help of fancy attitude and a comfortable tone of voice, one might still get away unscathed.

I smiled when I gave my ID to the cop standing by the driver's window. "We lost track of time," I said. “Dropped-off our friends – wanted to spare them the cab fare. With this car, could you blame us? Are you sure you've got everything you need? Would you like to see my father's business card as well? Some gum?”

And they let us go.

The Unusual Cop

“What isn't romantic about us?”

I twiddled my big toes on his dashboard as reply. Our 4-months relationship was made of stock clichés. My parents did not allow us to marry. I was Saudi, Tamo wasn’t. We snuck out. We had the pluck to go out for a drive, then park on the Jeddah Corniche at 11:32 pm. The weather was gorgeous and smelled of armpits. I was 23, pissed and he was broke.

These things, to deranged poets like him, were romantic.

Of course, romantics are also the most reckless. Puberty in Saudi is celebrated with cautionary tales about couples caught in seclusion and getting publicly defamed ever after. And there is no safe-word.

Not long after we parked, a police car flashed its high-beams behind us. An officer came to Tamo's side, asked him to come out of the car. They chatted for the longest 132 seconds of my life. 

When he came back, Tamo’s face was professional. It was the first time that I saw Doctor Tamo's I'm-Sorry-We-Did-Our-Best-But-You're-Still-Screwed face.

“Cover your hair. Stay calm. We'll tell them that you're my fiancée and your name is Hannah.”
”Are we...”
”No. Not yet. They just want us to tag along.”

They lead us to a quiet residential area. When the cars parked, two officers came out. One took Tamo out for a walk. The other stuck his head into the window, across mine.

“What's you're name?”
”Hannah. And we weren't doing anything wrong. Just talking. I swear. My parents know about him. I swear. You can call my daddy to confirm that. And if we meant to do anything wrong, we wouldn't have gone to the beach. Not that we would gone anywhere else. No, that's not what I meant! I mean, I'm going home right this minute. I promise. I'm never, ever going to do this ever again.”
”Why are you talking so fast?”
”I'm terrified. Isn't it obvious? I've never talked to a cop before. I swear. I didn't mean any harm. Neither of us. We were just talking!”
”What’s your name again?”
”Al…Hannah!”

I honestly don't remember what I said. I might have sworn more than breathed. I do remember, though, seeing my cop stifle a smile. All that police training did not go to waste. And that he had seen through me since the first time I said “Hannah.”

When they gave us leave, I asked Tamo how his interrogation went. He said, "We talked about cars. You and your cop took so long; my cop ran out of ideas and I ran out of excuses. So we talked about cars."

That’s it. No lashing. No public embarrassment. Not even a tweet. Nothing. None of the romantic-horror news in Saudi was based on me. I swear. And you probably won't hear it from another source, either. This isn’t the kind of thing that the mainstream media would care to tell you about Saudi.

That even the Saudi police force isn't immune to reckless, albeit heartfelt, romantic clichés.

Why it's so confusing being Saudi

(Heard in a hotel in Dubai - Last Eid)

Hotel Staff :	Yes, Sir, how may I help you?
Saudi Patron:	Don't call me "sir". That is name for Kaffir. I am Muslim. Call me "Hajji."
Hotel Staff :	Yes, Hajji, how may I help you?
Saudi Patron:	Where is bar?

.

The al-Omrans

My mother was sliding the photos she took of me while practicing asanas. The first frame that followed the asana pictures was the photo below.

"Who is that?" Her voice was thirteen degrees of threat.

"Ahmed’s baba," I said, snatching the phone away from her.

My mother frowned. "That is all very well, but what is he doing in your phone?"

I took a gigantic breath. I had one chance to say it and had to say everything in one breath; because her suspicion was heading somewhere dangerous.

"Because his Baba passed away seven years ago today. Because I knew Ahmed seven years ago, too. Ahmed is the eldest of seven boys. He barely finished being a teenager when he was propelled to be an older and bigger man. His Baba's passing was Ahmed's inspiration and - for so many times when I could not be bothered, Ahmed too was my inspiration. That is why I keep them close; I am one of their صدقة جارية. I only hope I could honor and make good of that memory too."

My mother said some things after that. And I said some things after that too. But the thing that stuck, the verses that I want to remember and canonize was that above. That kindness immortalizes a man when passed on by his good sons.

"Thank you for the reminder. We shall behave."

We waited for the prayer break to end at a café in the mall's lobby. Souma and I. It was a happy place; saturated with gorgeous daylight and a third-worldly permission to smoke in pleasantly air-conditioned indoors.

Since waiting was the main event, between coffee and nicotine intakes I pressed my hands on Souma, partially because she welcomed it, but mostly as matter of habit for the socially awkward.

I remember basking in contentedness and borderline professionalism (as is one’s usual state of mind when in tune with another’s body). Both of us sitting upright, I pressed her arms, shoulders and back. I pressed and hugged her. And – if you must know – it was utterly consensual.

All within a ten-minutes span.

What followed reminded me how inexpressive a society was Saudi, and that our exchange was prone to misinterpretation. A veiled woman came to our table, saying, "You have been flagged by the security of the mall. I am here to warn you not to proceed in such manners."

We tried explaining the nature of our relationship (imagine the stutters) and the asexual nature of touch caught in their disapproving surveillance, to which the security lady nodded dismissively and repeated, "Your behavior was unacceptable."

Hence, like all well-intending citizens when confronted with authority, we offered our gratitude. "Thank you for the reminder. We shall behave."

And we meant it.

I lack the vocabulary, but if something so brief and tender (at least to Souma and I) could draw public attention, then it might have been something important too. Something that is amiss in Saudi's vocabulary of public social expression. Something that a lot of people, whether in Saudi or elsewhere, could go by their days more enjoyably had they experienced it more often.

And that something is surely worth protecting and reapplying whenever and with whomever consents it. If only for the honest gush of gratitude and certainty that fills us afterwards. Gratitude for reasserted beliefs, for the survival of old crafts in spite of the frowning public, for the old languages of affection that might have been lost in the distance between heart and formality and abstinence.

For reminders like that – reminders that fortify our words with action and our action with dedication – we will always be grateful.

Long Drive Ahead

I really like the idea of girls driving in Saudi. It’s hopeful, it’s pretty and sort of liberating.

But I don’t and wouldn’t drive for as long as I possibly can.

I can drive in Indonesia but choose not to. Simply because I’m too lazy to look after a car (I barely shower, man), and because it’s faster, safer and environmentally friendlier to get an Ojek (taxi-motorbikes).

Besides, whether or not I can drive is irrelevant when I’m stuck in a 6-hours traffic jam, in a flooded city, going at 8.3km/hour, which is more or less how fast I can pedal my mountain bicycle.

Needs

Whether or not women can drive in Saudi, whether it’s a Maserati or an 18th century carriage or a donkey, the issue here is personal mobility. Getting between places. Logistics. Getting things done.

People need personal mobility to fulfill basic needs: to buy food, get to work, to get the education that got them working and – here we go again – pay for the convenience of personal mobility. I could go on, but my point is, fi car wala mafi, there have been ways that Saudi women have gotten by without being able to drive.

The argument that the right to drive should be granted gratis, whether or not women need it, bores me. In places where women-driving is the norm, women who must drive are the middle classes and women who are chauffeured are the extra-comfortable. Think about it. When women started demonstrating for the right to drive isn’t it also an indicator that there is a lot of basic needs lacking in that society?

And when basic needs are lacking to the extent that it is driving women out of their homes, armed with a mind that’s ready for whatever may come, doesn’t it  show a symptom of a deeper and more complex desperation underneath?

So what gave? What basic need has been desperately lacking in Saudi? If we ever cracked this part of the puzzle, then the anger that is ruining the journey we’re on, might lighten up a bit.

Law

When it comes to basic needs, the law of لا ضرر و لا ضرار thou shall not do harm, is the only rule that applies.

If driving (the mean) could distract us from doing our jobs and obligations (the ends) then something is not done right. If driving in Saudi could put me in jail, or if driving in Jakarta is going to make me late for my appointments, then wouldn’t it be better, faster and safer to find other means of transportation?

It’s not a moot point; because critical shortages bring supplies of creative solutions. In Jeddah, every one of my girlfriends’ phones are fortified with an armada of freelance drivers. And these girlfriends exchange drivers’ contact numbers, and the drivers recommend one to another.

Legal rights aside, women in Saudi do own the streets. These women make a pretty strong – albeit pink - economic pillar, supporting families who’ve got the cars and not the ways. And let it be known that this credit includes my fellow Saudiyyats as well as my non-Saudi mother and non-Saudi girlfriends as part of the resilient and versatile force behind that pink socio-economic wheel.

Power

Fact is, being able to drive does not guarantee the fulfillment of basic needs, nor does it come free of other additional difficulties. For example: The time we spend waiting for a driver is actually less than the time (and energy and money and worry) we spend on waiting for the mechanic to balance the wheels, or for a turn at the gas station.

Being able to drive doesn’t necessarily create more freedom, or the sudden ability to take better photos or pass exams. And if you’re the type who worries about karmic inventorying, then before the gates of heaven or hell the Auditors are not going to ask you if you knew how to drive. They will ask you instead where you went. And where you got the money to get there. And what you did when you reached your destinations.

On the other hand, whether or not women in Saudi can drive, whether or not they have drivers’ licenses or barely educated beyond tricycles, they have undeniably done heck a lot of good already on the streets, in their homes and as dutiful citizens and resident of Saudi Arabia.

Reread that line again until you can recite it by heart. Then own it. Squeeze every bit of pride in it, for how you’ve managed to get by every day deserves plenty of due acknowledgement.

Priorities

Alfarhan mentioned that our priorities are different from each other; and that the least we could do is to respect each others’ journeys to reach those personal goals. I am all for women driving. I am all for personal mobility and the freedom to self-actualize, as fair and far as they may be optimally achieved. I just hope that we remember during this long journey ahead to look out of the window and enjoy the view and remember what we’ve done so far to make it look so gorgeous.

I wish us all a pleasant journey. توصلون بالسلامة

How to Trigger a Social Revolution in Saudi

That Law

The new Saudi internet law has been in the backs of our heads for ages. Nothing really new about it for people who are used to risk the dangers between honest anonymity or timid exposure. The only difference is that, now that it's governed by law, we are more aware of the risks we take in our choice to (ab)use our freedom of speech.

First Choice

We can always revert to the byproduct of that freedom, the freedom to state the fifth: silence. Looking at the immense amount of monolog diarrhea that Saudi bloggers have abused in their blogs, it's actually a good thing that blogging is part of that new law. The world needs not another verbal vomitter, or another "how I spend my afternoon with my cats" post.

Then again, the law is mostly for those who want to be heard. Who need to be heard. Who choose to risk their personal safety and comfort to say the things they feel need to be said.

Freedom

Freedom, any kind of freedom, is a responsibility. Having laws to govern freedom may be a hassle, but it also reminds us just how big a responsibility this freedom carries. If all of us, bloggers-tweeps-writers are aware of that importance, we might treat that privilege with more reverence.

Responsibility

Public exposure results in public concern, and as far as governments are concerned, either delivered with appeasing promises or tyrannical threats, controlling the public behavior is any government's first job description.

The responsibility in speaking your mind (whether in public or with intimate friends) means that you are aware of the possible results that your words might take. That you bear the risks of getting responses from your audience. (Unless you're severely autistic, but I haven't seen many autistic bloggers of late. Have you?)

Now, people who do speak their minds, whatever responses they risks in saying them, are folks who are

• a) too pessimistic of immediate society's response to their words, (e.g. I don't want to marry my cousins, yumma.)
• b) desperate to have their words out there, (Don't marry your cousins, kids)
• c) aware of the importance of their arguments (Marrying close relatives might increase risks of genetic disorders)

Response

If people write in public, and I did say write, not just blurt vomits of unreasonable hate, then the weight of their words is multiplied by every reader. Think about it this way: a postcard from a beloved can uplift you or ruin your day. A tweet can save a life or destroy it. This blog has saved and ruined my reputation more times than I would like to admit.

Imagine if you're as hot and intelligently sexy as @Diana, @Soumz & @LamaSabri, or as provocative as the Big Daddy of Saudi Blogging. Oh the swooning hearts, oh the fallen temptations.

If you're a blogger

Be upset about the laws regulating the Saudi internet, that's fine. Just remember, if your thoughts are so important that you would risk your personal safety for it, then by all possible means have them said. (Pass them on to me, and I'll post them anonymously from my blog. Anything to rock your boat.)

But consider the risks you're taking to have these thoughts out there. Consider the people you are saving (yes, saving) or hurting by saying them. Consider your intent in spreading your ideas. Are you doing this for good cause or just anarchy? How much comfort can you afford risking by having your thoughts spoken publicly? Does your significant others support your ideas?

If you're a reader

Understand that no blogger sticks to their craft for the heck of it. Blogging starts from the heart, and goes back there. Consider that serious bloggers (folks who are risking their personal comforts to write publicly) are people fighting to be heard, hence worth listening to. They are striving for betterment, for change. They're writing for bigger sentimental gains: That this is what they think is right and honest and just.

And if they are swimming against the mainstream media, then there must be some sense in their work, for only few people are able to think out of the box, and even less dare to speak/write them out loud.

Writing from my tower of ivory freedom,
Hning a.k.a. Alia M. Makki

PS. Can't believe I'm breaking my blogging fast with a post on Speech! Civil rights, ya naas?! Get me something katkoot to chew on! #gnarfls

Why people don't get up early in Saudi

There's this saying that the early birds gets the best worms.

In Saudi, everyone gets the best worms, at any time of the day.

So why not do it AFTER midday, when the fattest worms are awake too?

Simple Joys in Saudi

I wanted to write 20 things that don't need to change in Saudi. Simple things that I cherish. Funny thing, the first things that came to mind were detailed, personal things. Nevertheless there should never be a list of "20 Personal Things Hning Loves about Saudi", so let's keep them to three.

Item 1. Saudi is a Culinary Whore's Halal Heaven.

There's so much to eat in Saudi (and enough money for most to go by). You can stuff yourself (and 3 other girls) full with Al-Baik, Bukhari Rice, Foul & Tameez at as cheap as USD5. You can find USD500 Caviars, and you can find the best Hindi sweets in the busiest corners of Sharafiyyah. We can know everything about a place from the things we eat there. So if there is so much to eat in a place, and food can fix even a broken heart, doesn't it mean that life is generally good in Saudi?

Item 2. Saudi has plenty of underground communities

Have you noticed how underground communities forge the most intimate and longstanding friendships?

By hobby: musicians, photographers, fashionista, Harley Davidson, books, poetry, filmmakers, bodybuilders, scuba divers, scuba diving photographers, writing.

By region: Jordanians, Syrians, Lebanese, Egyptians, Indians, Pakistanis, Afghans, Bengalis, Iranis, Turks, Pinoys, Malaysians (they used to have acrobatic takraw sessions at the consulate), Indonesians, Chinese, Japanese (albeit limited to technology and sushi), Taiwanese, US Americans, other kinds of Americans.

If people can have the time and energy to pick up hobbies, doesn't it mean that their basic needs have been fulfilled? Or that they're that bored?

Item 3. Saudi has enough for the survival of all, and then some.

The standards of living in Saudi is well-off above survival. Most folks can get by. Most folks are protected from natural disasters and mosquitoes. Most folks can put their children through school and then some. Most folks got secure healthcare and pension plans. And everyone reading this from Saudi are folks who have gotten their hands on the relatively latest communication methods and technology, which is few scales above mere survival.

Maybe it's the oil. Maybe it's the fact that there are so much traffic international going on there, of people coming and going every year from the days of Abraham that the Lord gave pity to such a barren spot. And if we still complain about Saudi it's from boredom and saturated homogeny. Because not every country in the world is as generous as Saudi, it's that simple and true.

Ain't it glad to be Saudi today?

20 little things that would make life in Saudi AWESOME

Happy National Day!

As a Saudi, I like Saudi as it is. I love Jeddah as it is. But if I may suggest a few changes on the following items, it'd be even nicer to be Saudi and live there.

Public Behavior:

1. Not get (nearly) killed for being in or near a moving vehicle (highest traffic death toll)
2. Not get killed while performing Hajj and Umrah
3. Not get killed for arguing with authority
4. Not get hooted at for taking a walk on the Pregnant Wall, the beach or the mall
5. Not get hooted at for showing up in public without Abaya (girls) or Shmagh & Thobe (boys)
6. Not get killed for expressing non-conformist ideas on TV, Internet, print publication or dress-code
7. Not get incarcerated for being at mixed-sex parties or movie screening
8. Not get assumed of flirtation for smiling and being courteous to strangers
9. Not get killed for taking pictures of women in public
10. Not die while waiting for a guardian's consent to work, travel, issue legal documents, get married, divorce, giving birth, enter court of law, and owning property (Boys up to the age of 25. Girls until they start shitting gold)

Work:

1. Not get judged for starting, running and working for independent non-profit organizations
2. Not get slowly roasted for NOT working at for-profit organizations
3. Not get judged for being Saudi and work as a janitor, Baqalakeeper, servant, driver, builder, nanny, maidservant, officeboy/girl, etc.

Relationships:

1. Not get judged for being Saudi AND unmarried in your 30s (it's the 21st century for Vimto'ssake!)
2. Not get killed for being unmarried AND lacking virginity
3. Not get killed for being Saudi and wanting to marry your un-Saudi sweetheart
4. Not get killed for PDAs (Public Displays of Affection) between opposite sexes
5. Not get killed for openly converting to an alternative sect, religion or sexual orientation

Others:

1. Not get killed for being a pluralist, hence having no violent opinion towards most things. Especially on National Days.
2. Not get killed for writing this. Hihi.

Anything to add? Thanks for reading and leaving comments.

PS. This post

Saudi Family & Sex-segregation

ضع "السعودية" في جملة مفيدة…و لا أقول لك؟ ضعها في جملة و خلاص.

Untie is an article addressing the over-tightness of Saudi families. I would like to state for the record, that even though I think that you were so eloquently sexy in that article, Omran, I also think that YOU'RE WRONG and you're missing huge elephants.

In fact, families in Saudi are separated. Sex-separated, that is.

If having to go through life's milestones without your loved ones doesn't look like a broken family, then what does?

Define family

My mother couldn't witness my brother's wedding vows because it's an all-men ceremony. Even at the wedding reception, she can't really see her whole family celebrate together. Not really.

Sex-segregation or none, how about giving "family" its working definition? As family, we spend our days together whether good and bad and awful. Family members give each other first row stadium tickets in each other's live shows.

Because grief and joy are sexless and, in milestones, it's our family's approval we seek and fear, no matter how big a crowd we show for.

Taking away the right to be each other's witnesses is a dirty, emotional rip off. Aren't graduations, weddings and funerals the most important events that one would hope to go through together as a whole family?

I could care less if it's a grand wedding or Reverend Elvis in Vegas, when it comes to milestones (pinnacles of our everydayness) you can't just segregate loved ones from each other based the contents of their bras and briefs... It's just wrong.

Thou shall not remain a family when the crowd gets too big.

If Saudi hails itself as an Islamic country, where have the Saudis seen a hadith or Quranic verse that said: ولا تختلطوا. Where was there a religion in the world that said, thou shall not work and speak and mingle with the opposite sex?

I would love to know who came up with the idea of sex-segregation in Saudi (among other things). Because the bedus in the desert don't practice this kind of segregation. There's a sheet between where the parents and children sleep, but the desert and donkeys and darlings are together in joy and grief and scandals.

I heard that, in Jeddah, they're supposed to be more advanced than the bedus. I guess, even now, it can only go so far as the privacy of our Saudi living rooms.

Hateful Cousins

The general assumption is that all Saudis are Muslims. If, within 300 years since the first revelation, Islam had spread across the Arabian Peninsula, then every Saudi should – at least – not be Jewish, right?

So goes the theory.

Stop reading here if you’re sensitive about this. I try not to offend anyone. Though I realize that I can’t make EVERYONE happy. Move on if this isn’t working for you.

Contracts of Love

If you haven’t noticed, it’s not marriage that I’m trashing. It’s ROMANCE. It’s marriages that are based on romance. And the subsequent divorces that are based on the dying of romance. It’s the wrong, romantic and adolescent causes to get into this serious business of legal, financial, social and religious contract.

“Nahi an il-Mungkar”

I’m all for marriages that are based on the right causes. Even child marriages and polygamy (which, when done properly, can be lucrative and protective life investments). I don’t mind marrying to extend my residential visa in Indonesia (yes, to me, that is a matter of survival). I don’t mind marrying to have legal children, if it ever became desperate call for me. (It isn’t.) I don’t mind marrying for sex, if those 11 minutes of romp can ever be THAT GOOD. (Does it ever? Seriously, no eleven minutes in the world are good enough at the cost of lifetime of a devotional sacrifice and work as marriage.)

“Nisfu Deen”

If there is no good reason in the world for folks in the urban, modern society to marry, why is everybody still doing it?

Because, as much as we adore being free and irresponsible, a lot of us admit that being free and irresponsible can get tired and boring. And we know how destructive boredom can get on lost, irresponsible souls. Especially those who smoke a lot. And posts on her blog daily, just for kicks.

But before deciding that “Yeah, I’m old and responsible and bored enough to bind the rest of my life decisions to a spouse,” I have to figure out what else could be so wrong about my life that would make marriage seem like the ONLY bearable alternative to boredom and daily postings.

Shield your evil eyes before you read this next sentence.

None. [Alhamdulillah. Mashallah. Knock on wood. Throw salt over shoulder. Rub a Buddha belly. Kiss a rabbit’s foot. Or two.] My life as a single woman is perfect. Still Saudi, nevertheless, perfect.

Because, as far as the gods of matrimony are concerned, I am loved even in their absence.

“Mawaddah o Rahmah”

When the Lord said that we marry to fill each other’s lives with compassion and kindness, I wonder if He meant to add, LEST THERE’S NO OTHER WAY!!

Do we need to be married to be compassionate and kind? Do we need to be married to be happy? Isn’t that a smidge too much responsibility to lay on anyone, our personal happiness? Do we need romance to feel loved and wanted? Do we need spouses to support us and our fashion tastes?

If the answer to all of that is a firm, calm “yes”, then by all means, marry. And marry as often as you must.

Otherwise, if there is even a glint of “no” in your hesitant answer, then think of all the ways that you have ALREADY been happy blessed without having to marry.

Think of all the friends (of both sexes) who still enjoy your company. The dogs and cats you can adopt without bothering to send to college. The elders and nieces and cousins who already have as much right to your attention and time and love. The people and things and ball games that only need a bit of that attentiveness that otherwise would have been devoted to a single person, had you been married.

Being unmarried doesn’t make you a less loving/loveable person. Only evens out the lateral distribution of love.

Why I Don't Live in Saudi

Mount Bromo, Java

Is this right, living here with you and loving it?

Is there anywhere else you prefer to be?

Isn't there any other place I'm supposed to be? Kids my age are busy doing other things, like climbing a career ladders or making money or just getting married and stuff...

Like the kids in Saudi? Your mother would've loved you moving back there.

Yes, sir, she would.

Hmm...Saudi is such a small place compared to this village.

Sir?

The buildings there are bigger and prettier compared to the ones we have here. But it's still such a "small place". You might busy yourself with your job, and shopping and friends, but it's still such a small community and selection of things to do.

Whereas here…

You don't have a lot of things or conveniences, you don't validate your existence by being proactive...but you have the world. You have the entire world to respond to.

And it's enough?

Don't you think you have more than enough?

I just don't feel that I deserve it so soon.

"The world is full of people looking for spectacular happiness while they snub contentment."

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Other posts about not living in Saudi:

• Why I Left Saudi in the First Place


• Lifestyle of Choice