Justins Saudi Adventure!: Saudi Arabia’s Most Aptly Named Clothes Shop

Thursday, 25 September 2008

Saudi Arabia’s Most Aptly Named Clothes Shop

My memories of shopping at malls in the UK are of gangs of surly teenagers, packed shops and poor service. It might not be fair but that’s how I remember it.

I love the malls here in Saudi Arabia. As a man they actually make shopping almost bearable. They’re always clean, they’re rarely busy, I’ve never seen any surly teenagers and generally the service is pretty good.

It can also be a slightly surreal experience for a foreigner. One of the first things I saw was a ninja (a lady in a full abaya with either her face totally covered or just a slit to see out of) buying make up at Debenhams. Obviously she couldn’t try it on and the (male) staff could not see her skin tone to help her pick the right colours. It just struck me as odd. Because their eyes are often the only thing you see, women here wear a lot of eye make up. I wonder if they also do up the rest of their faces when they go out shopping.

You see a lot of ladies here carrying Louis Vuitton hand bags. I always thought a large part of the appeal was that people can see you carrying something considered expensive and desirable. But if no one knows who you are or can see your face it suddenly doesn't seem to make as much sense.

Barring a few exceptions (e.g. nurses, ladies' toilet cleaners, shop assistants in ladies' malls) women are not allowed to work, so you see guys doing things here that they would not be seen dead doing anywhere else in the world. Dressing mannequins in clothes shops (and boy can you tell!), selling make up and perfume and (most bizarre of all) selling ladies lingerie.

In a country as conservative as this, it seems odd to me that ladies buy their lingerie from men. I wonder how many people apply for the job when they have a vacancy.

Women are not allowed to try their clothes on and there are no female changing rooms. Refuse any offer to use the store room to try clothes on. A western woman accepted such an offer at Granada mall and was attacked by one of the staff. Fortunately she was unharmed.

This means that when a woman sees an item of clothing she likes, she has to hope it will suit her, estimate the correct size, buy the clothes, take them home and try them there. Then return the ones that do not fit.

Saudi’s most aptly named clothes shop?.........

.....Guess.

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Glossary

Abaya - A long black robe designed to cover all of a woman's body
Haram - "Forbidden"
Istemarah - Car registration
Khalas - Finished, the end
Mushkilla - Problem
Muttawa - Religious policeman, the "authority for the promotion of virtue and prevention of vice"
Throbe - Traditional dress for Arabic men
Ghutra - The tea-towel like headscarf worn by men
Iqual - The black band that holds the ghutra in place
Wasta(h) - Having powerful social connections
Insha’allah – God willing
Insha'allah Bakora - Tomorrow god willing ......or definetly not tomorrow in my experience, more likely next month, if you're lucky!
Iqama - Visa

Monty Python Sketch

Although its not anything to do with living in the Middle East, I find the following Monty Python Sketch hilarious and pub lish it in the hope it also brings a smile to your face:

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Aye, very passable, that, very passable bit of risotto.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
Nothing like a good glass of Château de Chasselas, eh, Josiah?

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
You're right there, Obadiah.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Who'd have thought thirty year ago we'd all be sittin' here drinking Château de Chasselas, eh?

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
In them days we was glad to have the price of a cup o' tea.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
A cup o' cold tea.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Without milk or sugar.

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Or tea.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
In a cracked cup, an' all.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Oh, we never had a cup. We used to have to drink out of a rolled up newspaper.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
The best we could manage was to suck on a piece of damp cloth.

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
But you know, we were happy in those days, though we were poor.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Because we were poor. My old Dad used to say to me, "Money doesn't buy you happiness, son".

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Aye, 'e was right.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Aye, 'e was.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
I was happier then and I had nothin'. We used to live in this tiny old house with great big holes in the roof.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
House! You were lucky to live in a house! We used to live in one room, all twenty-six of us, no furniture, 'alf the floor was missing, and we were all 'uddled together in one corner for fear of falling.

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Eh, you were lucky to have a room! We used to have to live in t' corridor!

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Oh, we used to dream of livin' in a corridor! Would ha' been a palace to us. We used to live in an old water tank on a rubbish tip. We got woke up every morning by having a load of rotting fish dumped all over us! House? Huh.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Well, when I say 'house' it was only a hole in the ground covered by a sheet of tarpaulin, but it was a house to us.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
We were evicted from our 'ole in the ground; we 'ad to go and live in a lake.

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
You were lucky to have a lake! There were a hundred and fifty of us living in t' shoebox in t' middle o' road.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
Cardboard box?

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Aye.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
You were lucky. We lived for three months in a paper bag in a septic tank. We used to have to get up at six in the morning, clean the paper bag, eat a crust of stale bread, go to work down t' mill, fourteen hours a day, week-in week-out, for sixpence a week, and when we got home our Dad would thrash us to sleep wi' his belt.

SECOND YORKSHIREMAN:
Luxury. We used to have to get out of the lake at six o'clock in the morning, clean the lake, eat a handful of 'ot gravel, work twenty hour day at mill for tuppence a month, come home, and Dad would thrash us to sleep with a broken bottle, if we were lucky!

THIRD YORKSHIREMAN:
Well, of course, we had it tough. We used to 'ave to get up out of shoebox at twelve o'clock at night and lick road clean wit' tongue. We had two bits of cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at mill for sixpence every four years, and when we got home our Dad would slice us in two wit' bread knife.

FOURTH YORKSHIREMAN:
Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.

FIRST YORKSHIREMAN:
And you try and tell the young people of today that ..... they won't believe you.

ALL:
They won't!