I received it twice. Once from Moodscope and once from a friend.
It caught me off guard a little, because it captured everything that I think about New Years Eve/Day. I could try and explain it or I could just copy paste it and let you read...
So. Here goes...
Resolution is not a lovely word.
If it was able to walk, I can see it sludging along the road with teenage
attitude. (Yes I may have invented a word...)
A re-solution. Nah. Not for me thank you kindly.
It somehow smacks of duty and negativity and we are really after something
inspiring, something that dances, something that makes your insides go
"AWYEAH" (that's "OHYES" for anyone who isn't Scottish).
And in any case, I just don't feel like starting afresh on the first day of the
year.
That makes me feel free. Shrug off the 'new year resolution' mantle and release
from "will", "try", "hope to", "can't",
"should", "must", and all the others. Us LowLifes are
constantly battling and running with change. We assess and reassess our
feelings, attitudes, responses and actions on a daily basis, maybe hourly,
perhaps every ten minutes and sometimes in the same thought and on either side
of a doughnut! Why would we throw another tractor tyre onto the pile for our
personal Strongest Man competition?
Be free my friends. Be.
Because when we are ready to make our next move in our little tete-a-tete with
this unwelcoming, hostile and rigorous attack from our black dogs, our shadows,
our scary monsters, our illnesses...we will. January has nothing to do with it.
Be free my friends and just keep putting one foot in front of the other. If you
step back, it's not a fail, it's a dance move and, from there, there is a
natural momentum to go forward again. NOTE... The above is attributed to a Moodscope member called "Dances With Wolvesin The Room Above The Garage". Although I like them, they are not my words... I own no copyright.
You see, if his wish was to come true, the rest of my life
would be spent getting up at 6:45am, getting to work by 8am and going through the
processes of writing letters to support casual labour travelling to Jubail,
preparing and presenting my payroll returns, starting the 2015 financial
forecasting process and compiling invoices.
It wasn’t a bad day, but even Roy Wood would struggle to get
an upbeat lyric out of it.
Christmas passed me by this year. I knew that it would. As
you would expect from a country that only recognises Islam as a religion and –
theoretically – punishes public shows of other faiths, not many people were
waving the tinsel or dressing their trees.
And I didn’t miss it.
It’s not that I dislike Christmas. I don’t. But it would
feel a little odd in this environment to crave it. On Thursday (as I shall
forever know it…) it was a beautiful sunny day, perhaps hitting 24C. To me, it
couldn’t have been less Christmassy.
“But sunshine and heat don’t mean you can’t celebrate”, I
hear you say.
I know. I’ve seen the pictures and heard friends tell tales
of their Christmas celebrations in Australia, South Africa and across the
southern hemisphere. I get it, but the difference between those and the
environment that I live in is that they will have been prepared and readied to
celebrate. In the weeks before they cooked shrimps on the beach, the TV and
media would be cranking the celebration up. The economy would ramp up sales.
You’d struggle not to see the classic northern European imagery of dressed
trees, stars, Santa Claus, supermarket queues and credit card/debt
consolidation adverts.
Aside a single tree and tragic gold, plastic bells above a
bar in Bahrain, I had none of that.
The closest that retail got to celebrating the season were a
couple of shop displays:
The first was a women’s fashion store where all the window
display mannequins were surrounded by cotton wool snow, with icy blue stars and
glitter.
The second was a banner stand at Seattle Coffee Shop
encouraging me to “add some warmth to the season” by purchasing hot chocolate
in mugs dressed in little cardigans, topped with whipped cream and flavoured
with salted caramel, hazelnut or peppermint. The image on their banner stand
was all muted, warm reds, earthy browns with a blurred open fire burning in the
distance.
Winter… Not Christmas.
I saw this last Sunday night. It was still 20C…
It’d had been 24+C all day.
But – despite the above - I did make a personal effort to
mark the event.
A can of Barr’s Cream Soda purchased at LuLu and a Chicken
Tikka Masala for my tea with my colleague, Andy. Two traditional British dishes…
Last time I wrote, you may recall that I was missing London
and UK life. The blog appeared to be my version of wearing red sparkly shoes,
clicking my heels and saying:
“There’s no place like home… There’s no place like home”.
It was as if I was having Boxing Day UKTV flashbacks.
But, the feeling has passed. As I knew it could and would.
My company has a new starter making his first visit to
Saudi. I found myself in the position to be the expert; to be the person to
show him the ropes. And this encouraged me to look at all the positives in the
ex-pat life and allowed the opportunity to revisit places that I had been
ignoring for a few weeks.
Despite Andy bringing me a cold from Scotland that knocked
me out for a couple of days, all has been good.
Trawling the Souks in Al Khobar looking at the sports and
electronics shops, gently picking his jaw up from the floor and fixing it back
in place once he realised how cheap it all is.
Of discovering which side of Glasgow he is from when he
refused the green shopping basket I offered, preferring the blue. Touring my beloved LuLu, chuckling at the lay out, collating photos of the "not" booze section. Laughing at the random brands that make it over from the UK.
Demonstrating that you should never order a starter at the
same time as a main course in a restaurant because it leads to a slow
procession of food in orders that you cannot comprehend…
“Yeah, thanks for all the food. But we got this far without
the rice… not sure we can manage all that”
“Oh. Thanks. We’d forgotten the squid dish… nice of you to
bring it with the change.”
Yeah. I exaggerate. But not much…
Today, I got chatting to a couple of Filipino guys
photographing birds down by the coast. They were visiting from Riyadh. They
were telling me how lucky I am to be based in Al Khobar. The coast, a more
open/liberal outlook… less desert. Another Indian marketeer I allowed to queue
jump in LuLu this afternoon (I’m a nice guy) was celebrating our ability to
escape to Bahrain with relative ease.
It all vocalised what I had been thinking over the past
couple of weeks. I’m blessed. Lucky. I live in a decent town, with a wonderful
winter climate. The people are broadly friendly and open. It feels safe and – whilst
it could be cleaner – it is beautiful. With the exception of “Bastard the Cat”,
even the strays are good company.
Al Khobar - Where I go to remember and reflect on my luck... Palm Trees. Flamingoes. Gulls. Herons and a bridge to Bahrain on the horizon.
NB – I have met many, many friendly strays while I have been
here. Most notably, two cats at my office named Trevor and Gary. “Bastard the
Cat” lives on the street outside my apartment. He is so named because of the
bite to the left leg incident.
The church has a blue, grey spire and a red light atop that
guides planes to Northolt.
As a child I could see this church on a hill from my bedroom
window. Across the sports pitches and park, beyond the council flats and above
the grey gasometer, it sat looking back at me as I daydreamed. Staring into
space it would stare back at me.
I recall an incident from when I was eight or nine driving
back from a holiday. My brother – being three and a half years older and
therefore being far smugger – ripped me apart when I confidently told the whole
car that I could see Harrow Hill on the horizon despite only being half an hour
into a trip home from Wales. That is my only memory of that happening, but I am
assured by my mother that I would often look for or claim to see the church on
the hill in counties all across England and Wales. I would look for it. Hope
for it, even.
St Mary’s Church on Harrow Hill was a geographic comfort
blanket for me.
It was obviously something that I sought solace in.
Something permanent that meant safety and home.
If you knew which window to look out of, you could just
about make the church out from the flat that I have left behind me in South
Harrow. The flat that is built close to the site of the old gasomter. I didn’t
buy it for that view – although I fell in love with the view of Bentley Priory
three miles to the North the moment I saw it – but in my heart, I was still so
happy that I could see it.
St Mary’s still has a hold over me.
A Church on a Hill
And not much has changed in me since I was that nine year
old kid. I still like stability. I am not a risk taker.
So homesickness was inevitable.
But I planned as best I could. I kept talking to people back
home, I had my Saudi Fridge of friendship, threw myself onto Instagram and kept
recording. I started this account. All actions to try and warn it off. But, it
was going to happen eventually. CLICK HERE FOR SHAMELESS PLUG TO MY INSTAGRAM ACCOUNT
The Latest Version of my Saudi Fridge of Friendship
When it came it took me surprise and it hit me hard. Last
week, I would have done anything not to be in Saudi Arabia, or Bahrain or the
UAE. Any of them… The other Monday, I was in all three at one point or another
but I was yearning for home.
I yearned for London. I yearned for grey skies and twig
trees and rain and cold.
But mostly, I yearned to be closer to my friends.
I’m hardly the first to have had this feeling. I won’t be
the last but it is something that I have never ever encountered. Having lived
almost exclusively in London and trips/time away has always seemed holiday
like, I cannot recall a time of spending more than say three weeks away from
home. As I type I am reaching close to three months. One quarter of my contract
is done, I am planning my first return to the UK and home is in focus.
The catalyst, I guess, was seeing a friend for the weekend
over in Dubai. Alex travelled out and linked up with me after I had been to a
conference out there. We had some pints, explored, chatted life and bollocks.
We laughed. All was good. But it put my isolation into perspective.
I know that I am not alone. Certainly not as isolated as I
imagined that I would be. I’m lucky that I live in the same block as “Special K”
my friend and occasional boss. Colleagues pass through for a few days at a
time. I’ve got to know a few faces for a chat and find Al Khobar friendly and welcoming
but none of this is the same as being able to pick up the phone half hour
before the end of a shift and arrange to meet “whoever”.
Alex sent me a great email a few days later that explained
how pleased he was to see me. That I appeared the happiest and most positive
that he had seen me in years. He spoke of regret of missed opportunities and of
looking at opportunities to step away from London himself. He told me of two
incidents he had had in his first twenty four hours of being hassled by
beggars. And still, I wanted to be nowhere else than London!
In the background, work was becoming stressful for reasons
to dull to explain. I caught myself getting emotionally drawn into the issues and
taking things way out of my control quite personally, rather than standing back
and just “dealing” with them. I know of old, that this is a path best avoided.
There be dragons and shadows over my right shoulder controlling my mood if I
let that happen. All in; not a good week.
For the first time in years, though, I was fully aware of
everything going on around me as it happened. I was maintaining control. And I
sought my own route to get myself back in order. Time. Space. Sleep. Sunshine…
I shook myself down and sought comfort in literature, music
and friends… Thanks, as ever, to Mr Dent for the chat and Helena T for the cup
of tea x.
I found myself down by the sea at dusk last Sunday. The sun
setting behind me. The sea, smooth and calm rippling over the rocks at my feet.
As the light disappears the sea gets darker shades of grey, pink and blue. It’s
warm. I’m wearing a tee shirt. It’s December.
Dusk
I’m thinking about everything that I have achieved this last
year. Of heading out to the Middle East, of agreeing to live in an Islamic
country where so many of my own personal beliefs have to be parked up on a
daily basis to survive. Of facing up to my own unhappiness. Of changing career.
Of stepping away from the dull, throbbing, soulless, thankless routine of my
previous role to step outside my personal comfort zone to achieve it’s goals. Of
succeeding in that change. Thinking about the stress – the ongoing, endless,
hopeless stress – of renting my flat. Of leaving my parents and the fear
associated…
Not too bad for someone who is risk adverse.
Above me, swifts darted, whirled and danced through the sky.
Chattering.
And the sound took me back to summer evenings around dusk in
Rayners Lane. Of listening to the same noise from the same birds swooping above
the garden I could see from my childhood home’s bedroom window. And it made me
think about the church on a hill with a grey, blue spire and a red light atop
guiding planes to Northolt.
A year isn’t a long time. The World is quite a small place
if you think about it. Even for a boy from the suburbs of London.
Pulling the ice axe from my leg
I staggered on
Spindrift stinging my remaining eye
I finally managed to reach the station
Only to find that the bus replacement service had broken down
After wondering to myself whether or not it should actually be
called a train replacement service
I walked out onto the concourse and noticed the giant screen seemed to have
been tampered with
Probably by a junior employee
Disgruntled commuters were being regaled with some dismal TVM
Involving a tug-of-love-custody-battle
Stockard Channing held sway
Down in the High Street somebody careered out of Boots without
due care or attention
I suggest that they learn some pedestrian etiquette
i.e sidle out of the store gingerly
Embrace the margin
Fat kids with sausage rolls
Poor sods conducting polls
There’s a man with a mullet going mad with a mallet in Millets
I try to put everything into perspective
Set it against the scale of human suffering
And I thought of the Mugabe government
And the children of the Calcutta railways
This works for a while
But then I encounter Primark FM
Overhead a rainbow appears
In black and white
...
I got a letter from Stringy Bob:
“Still on suicide watch
Screws not happy
Spotted a Marsh Fritillary during Association
Was roundly ignored
What news you?”
I felt sorry for him
He’d only been locked up for public nuisance offences
One of which saw him beach combing the Dee Estuary
Found a dead wading bird
Took it home, parcelled it up, and sent it off to the rubber-faced irritant
Phil Cool
With a note inside which read: “Is this your Sanderling?”
Another time saw him answering an advert in the music press
“Keyboard player required: Doors, Floyd, etc.
Must be committed, no time wasters”
You can guess the rest
I’d always imagined he would simply wander off some day into the
hills
To be found months later
His carcass stripped by homeless dogs
His exposed skull a perch for the quartering crow
I folded away the letter and put it in my inside pocket
All of a sudden I felt brushed by the wings of something dark
May the Lord have mercy on Stringy Bob
Shite Day
I do believe it’s National Shite Day
It all points to National Shite Day
Someone’s declared it National Shite Day
Shite Day
My birthday! On National Shite Day
No bog roll, it’s National Shite Day
Cue drum roll, it’s National Shite Day
I find it a shame that such wonderful lyrics get wrapped up and hidden in a song with such a shite title (pun intended).
You can argue that most of HMHB's lyrics are casual and throw away and many are, but for what ever reason, I have always found the ones above inspiring and beautiful.
A journey where, despite acknowledging that we had achieved
everything we had set out to do, it felt as if we had failed. We had ended up
in Haywards Heath drinking the worst Guinness ever served, rather than being
able to say “Fuck Brighton!”…
It started in 2008. On a cold, winter afternoon in The
Sultan in South Wimbledon.
The Sultan says "Fuck Brighton!"
Or rather, I should say, that is where it started for me.
Lukey picked up the dregs of a conversation that he had had with Davey about
the possibility of travelling to Glasgow by bus. Not a coach. Not a simple turn
up at Victoria Coach station and travel for eight hours to awaken as you cross
The Clyde. No. They discussed the possibility and plausibility of travelling on
scheduled local bus routes, hopping from town to town, city to city, county to
county. Lukey and I quickly discussed potential routes and reckoned – finger in
the wind – that it was probably achievable but incredibly difficult. We
concluded it would take days but the journey would be so eye opening that it
would be incredible to try.
“The Journey” was a dry run. We decided to find out how
easy, with no research or preparation, it would be to travel from Tooting
Broadway to Brighton. We chose to catch the first bus heading vaguely south,
get off at it’s destination and then seek out the next bus heading vaguely
south. We figured that we would reach the South Coast eventually. We guessed
Brighton was the most likely end to the journey. But we agreed that the journey
was more important. Even if we reached Brighton, we would not waste time
staying and looking around.
We failed, as I have already said, but we learned that it was
incredibly easy if you chose to put your mind to it. We had got caught up
looking around Reigate and going shopping for a new tie at Gatwick Airport. If
we had been more determined, planned a route and less inclined to amble, we’d
have reached Brighton and been home before tea.
So we set ourselves a greater challenge. We would travel to
Bristol. It was to be a mission. We would research. We would plan.
At around 5:45am, one Saturday morning in early March, Lukey
and I met up with Davey at a bus stop on Colliers Wood High Street. You know
the one. Just down from the River Graveney. The one outside the bathroom
showroom, opposite the “modern” tandoori restaurant that glows orange at night.
Yeah. The one where the friendliest staff in the World work make you feel such a
leach when they see you walking away with a takeaway from the substandard
competition on the other side of the road. Yes. That bus stop!
Davey was early. Very early. Beyond early. About an hour
earlier than we had agreed to set off. We boarded a bus to Kingston. It may
have been a 131. I cannot recall. We were in good spirits which improved when
we realised that leaving early meant that we were banking precious minutes for
delays along the route. Kingston was a blur and we remained a full hour ahead
when we reached Heathrow Airport to board our bus to High Wycombe.
High Wycombe seems a strange route to take to get to Bristol
and you are right. But it got stranger. We were heading for Thame, which sits
to the North East of Oxford, before heading to Swindon, Chippenham, Bath and –
eventually – Bristol. All in it took about nine hours, I guess. Nine hours is
better than the ninety to one hundred and twenty minutes by car.
The geographical reasons for the unusual route are locked in
economics clashing with the physical environment. I won’t discuss it in detail
here, I did too much of that at UNL in the 1990’s…
But, you probably want to know why we were doing this. And –
my dear friends – I am unsure whether I will ever be able to quite explain. Certainly,
I know I will not convince many of you to re-tread our steps and I don’t seek to. But
I will give a go at thinking through some of my motivations:
As a starting point, I loathe advertising.
I loathe being told what to think, what to buy or how I
should feel. I distrust any organisation that tries to convince me that something
that I might covert, want or desire is something that is an actually necessity. Want and need are two words that have become synonymous. And that is wrong. I
have a default setting of “contrary”. I always have. Perhaps it’s born of arrogance, I don’t know. But back in late 2007 or early 2008, around the
time of Lukey and my conversation at The Sultan, I had been annoyed seeing a
poster at Stockwell station day after day after day on my commute to work. It told me that if I was feeling lost or direction-less, I needed to visit Goa in India. The advert implied that it was only here that I would be able to clear my head and
make sense of my life and place in the World. Of course, I may have been
reading too much into it, but that is how I was perceiving it. And – given that
this was my perception – at a level it was “true”. The opportunity to travel by
bus, I decided, would demonstrate that I could do exactly the same sitting on
the back seat. You can "find" yourself anywhere you wish to. Sales executives are liars. Whether travelling from Redhill to Crawley or Thame to
Oxford, I knew that I had as good a chance of “finding myself” as I did giving a holiday
company a stack of cash to travel half way around the World to stay on a
Western owned, compound holiday resort in India. Beautiful beaches or no beautiful beaches.
This encouraged me to make the initial journey. We decided that we would
head to Brighton but not stay. Once we arrived, we would turn around and hot
foot back to London by train. We would not be drawn in to the idea that Brighton
was our destination. It was just the end of our journey that day.
Fuck
Brighton!
I like the idea of seeing what space looks and feels like. How
towns fit together in the landscape. Modern travel destroys this. You set off
from one location, cocooned in a vehicle, and magically appear in another sometime
later. Automotive travel has made it progressively easier. Roads cut through
hills and valleys to fit the most practical lines and routes. By-passes allow you to avoid bottle necks and make the world a far smaller place. There is
absolutely nothing wrong with this. It serves mankind well, but it can be a bit
boring, can’t it?. I mean, how much do you miss seeing while you sit in your
plane, train or auto mobile?
Local buses take the long way round. They provide
those links to places off the beaten track. They need to dwell and pause in order to fulfil their function. They can be laborious and - at times - tedious, but they give you an opportunity to watch and see and listen and observe. They make it easier to better to understand the space
around you. Better to build your mental maps…
Sometimes it is good to be “slow”.
I love people watching. And, buses are a great place to
watch people.
Here is an example. Back to The Mission.
We encountered DJ
Choons.
DJ Choons joined us one stop beyond Oxford Coach Station.
Not quite at the railway station. There was immediate tension. Davey, Lukey and
I had spaced ourselves out across the back three seats of the bus making it’s way to
Swindon. Route 66. Given the iconic route number and our own pilgrimage to the
West and all the opportunities available in Bristol, Severn Beach and Clevedon,
we had high expectations. Something good was going to happen. DJ Choons meant that we would not be disappointed. It
was clear that we, or more pertinently, I was sitting in DJ Choons preferred seat.
The spacious one by the fire escape. The one with the leg room. The best seat in the house. To the obvious hilarity of
Davey and Lukey, DJ Choons spent the first ten to fifteen minutes of the
journey intermittently staring me out.
DJ Choons boarded the bus with a skate board. I forget the
design but it was scuffed to shit. He had all the kit befitting his attitude.
He was no poser. It was clear that he skated and he was serious in his pursuit. Wearing cans that
put my little £2.99 bud earphones with a loose connection on the left ear to
shame. Perhaps they were Beats, I cannot honestly recall. He added this to a garish hoodie, a beanie
hat, faded/worn and loose fitting jeans finished off with a battered and bruised a pair of Vans.
And a Freedom Pass.
DJ Choons was in his mid 60’s.
He eventually forgave me for the theft of his seat. We ended
up in discussion with him about skateboarding. Turns out he was there since it’s
(inexplicable) rise in popularity in the late 1970’s. Once a month he crosses
from Oxford to Swindon to visit what he told us was one of the best skate parks
in the country.
I’m never going to understand skate boarding. Never. As a
kid, I was rubbish and that was my best chance to learn. Even if I had the
spirit and heart to give it a go, I doubt I could get over the embarrassment of
failure. Sheepishly, I would claim defeat and give up. But, regardless, I genuinely hope that when I reach DJ Choons age, I
have the spirit, passion and desire to keep doing what I want to do for myself
and on my own terms, regardless of convention or what others may think or say.
DJ Choons is an inspiration.
A terrible little sketch of DJ Choons from my notebook.
Inspirational.
And this pulls me back to another reason why I enjoyed the
adventure.
After the failed trip to Brighton I happened to reread “45”
by Bill Drummond. Later that year, “17” was published. Both feature
inspirational stories of journeys that he has or may not have conducted. I
still find Bill’s observations of the norm or the mundane hopelessly inspiring
and have been absorbed and lost in videos of Gimpo’s adventures on the M25 or
listening to his rambles as he filmed the Docklands Light Railway. I've lost hours of my life far, far too often. With the buses, I didn’t start with an intention to ape Bill’s attitude and approach, but his work resonated in
my heart and head. I recognised the spirit of the journey as a worthy endeavour or adventure.
And, finally, I guess, I made that journey "just" to be with my mates. Doing something a bit different that sitting in a pub. Looking for a different stimuli that would allow us to spark and spar off each other, like mates do. So, we ate Tunnock's Caramel Wafer Biscuits and tried to work out what possessed Lukey to bring so many Scotch Eggs. We decided that Pheasants had evolved and changed their natural call to mimic "The Fonz" from Happy Days and generally talked a lot of bollocks.
But why am I writing this today?
I happened on a series of posts on Instagram by an
American/Cambodian psychedelic band called Dengue Fever. They are travelling to
playing some gigs out in the Far East. But it made me recall that day
travelling to Bristol.
All through “The Mission” I had a Dengue Fever track running
through my head. “Seeing Hands”. I’d just bought the “Venus on Earth” album and
was in love with the opening track.
Before Lukey and I set off to meet Davey at the bus stop in
Colliers Wood… you know the one etc… I played “Seeing Hands” to him. I
explained that it wouldn’t leave my head and that it would be my soundtrack to
the journey. And it was, all the way through Kingston, Uxbridge, Thame, Wootton
Bassett, Box and Keynsham.
Back in my post titled “22nd August - Alive With Pleasure”, I noted how
a Viva Voce track got me thinking about cycles and closure. Fate.
Well the same thing happened that day.
Arriving in Bristol we stumbled over a bar on Balwin Street
called “Start the Bus”. Inevitably, we had to go in for a drink. We didn't know it existed and had walked into Bristol aimlessly looking for somewhere that was "calling" us. We passed and declined a fair few venues, before "Start the Bus" came into view. Inevitably, “a
drink” turned into “many”. But as soon as we were first served our first, Dengue Fever's “Seeing Hands” fired
up on the PA… I didn't request it, I didn't expect it. It just worked out that way. It told me that the mission was complete.
Here is a cracking live version... Check it out... If you listen closely to my head, you can hear it playing, still...
But how does all this relate to my time in the Middle East?
I’m not sure. Perhaps I’m choosing to tell this story
because I have waited too long to write my version of events down. I've tried and failed a few times. One day, it was inevitable that I would reach the end of the story.
Alternatively, I could include references from my past
couple of month’s experiences to support or illustrate some of the points that I have made. I mean,
I’ve travelled to and from Riyadh a fair few times now but seen nothing of what
is between. To me, it is just an endless, tiresome strip of tarmac through a
dusty, yellow, grey desert between Dammam and Riyadh, but a journey at night
betrays the number of settlements that lie between. The continual lights on the
horizon show how little I have seen so far in my stay. And that inspires me. I
want to take the long road. I want to stop and to listen and to see how Saudi Arabia slots together settlement by settlement.
Grey Road From Dammam to Riyadh
Or you could take another look at the photographs of Khobar posted a couple of
weeks ago. Again, I deliberately stepped away from the bright lights and
undoubted, impressive beauty of The Corniche. The photo’s sought to seek out an
alternative real life in Khobar to the one that is so readily available to see online. My
urge to seek the mundane, the average and the normal continues.
A Little Version of Khobar
Of course, it may be that I chose to tell the story because
I have little to say this week (I’ve been locked into work and physically and
mentally broken) but that I am enjoying the discipline of sitting down and writing.
Yesterday, I ended up in a one on one meeting with the woman
I mentioned last time.
You remember the one. The one from the advertising/marketing
agency.
We were alone in the office.
And she has a name… which I will say is “Sh”.
All my colleagues had left on errands, leaving us alone. I suddenly
felt exposed. Everything that I had been told would not happen and was utterly
frowned on was going on around me. I started this irrational thought process,
convincing myself that I was part of some elaborate set up to prove the decadence
of Western Men. As the meeting continued, I assumed that a couple of fully
bearded and robed Arabs would arrive backed up by a couple of overweight
coppers to take me down the Clink and give me a whipping. Before the Embassy
could say “excuse, me… please show restraint”, I’d be passed across to her
family for the real beating to start.
Later, I spoke about my concerns with A from my team. He
gave his usual faggy chuckle and assured me that:
“There are many, many women. Too many women working now. It
is usual in business.”
Please rest assured, A’s native tongue is Arabic. When he says “too many”, he
means “so many” or “a great many”… He is not hopelessly anti women.
I was assured that I wasn't being set up…
The meeting – as you would expect from a professional
marketing executive and a semi-professional man – went without hitch. The
detail is as dull as you would expect but we achieved the aims and goals that we intended to achieve.
But, we chatted a little. I established that “Sh” had
studied at Dammam University where she had picked up her pretty good English. As I accepted a receipt in Arabic, she appeared a little embarrassed that she couldn't write with the same
confidence as her spoken English. I found it quite charming given how shockingly my Arabic is developing.
I found out that it was “Sh’s” birthday, establishing that
she didn't celebrate but that it was custom for people to wish her “happy
birthday”. I'm a gentleman and I have a default “polite” setting that is
fitting for an Englishman. I duly wished her a happy birthday. This is really mundane and unexciting stuff, but I draw reference to it because it is so far removed from all my expectations and those of the people who I spoke with from the UK and beyond before I set off to live here. Put aside the meeting content that was essential and timely, I was really aware of how exposed I had left myself - and, possibly more pertinently - how exposed I may have left her to criticism. I've said before that the law is very much open to interpretation. I've always tried to err on the side of caution.
As the meeting concluded, the fire alarms sounded. In
itself, this is not unusual. They have been going off now and again for a few
days, but this time they went on and on and on. Initially, my irrational side
thought “Ok, this is it. There are sensors. They know that a single woman is
with a godless man.” They were the pre-warning of the arrival of the religious
police.
But, “Sh” didn't seem to care, so I concluded the meeting
rather than make a run for it trying to outrun them in a cab to Bahrain.
Of course, I should have been making my way quickly but
without running to the established fire evacuation muster point. But I didn't.
I still waited for the meeting to conclude. In part, this is because I don’t
know where the fire muster point is and also, because I knew that I was the
only one there. Conducting a head count for the team was quite easy. As long as
I knew where I was, I couldn't consider myself “missing”.
After a while we strolled downstairs and discovered a hot,
plastic smelling haze on the ground floor. All the Facilities guys were running
around with fire hoses and extinguishers while desperately making phone calls.
One brave soul was pushing the suspended ceiling tiles up to see if he could
see the fire. But most people just stood and watched. They didn't leave the
building, they just seemed content to offer support, advice and criticism to
those involved in trying to work out what to do. It was like being back at
Topshop… utterly disorganised, stupid and walking the edge of dangerous.
My survival instinct kicked in.
No. That is untrue.
It didn't so much kick as give me a little nudge. So I left the building and stood in the
car park. Ignoring that it is always quite nice to stand in the sunshine, I
guessed it would be in line with the appropriate “fire” protocols.
I performed
a quick head count.
I confirmed that I was still there. No-one was missing. I didn't need a laminated sheet or clip board. Everything was good.
A joined me. He had a big smile on his face. He appeared to
find it just as funny as I that most of the neighbouring office workers were
content to stay in an apparently burning building. It’s different over here.
Then the Fire Brigade arrived; they were waved in by the Facilities guys. Chains were locked in place on the gates, so the Facilities guys returned to the apparently, burning building to get the keys to allow the fire fighters access. It was beautiful to behold.
Last week, while exploring Khobar, I stumbled over a Fire
Station. I took a few snaps of the engines, tenders and equipment and would
have strolled on without thought had a Fire Officer not chased me down shouting
at me in Arabic. Although I didn’t understand a word, it was clear that the
presence of my camera was not welcome…
So I took a snap of the engines arriving and was immediately
shouted at by A.
A - “No. Mustn't photo. You mustn't photo.”
Me – “Why?”
A – “Mustn't photo.”
Me – “Oh. Why?”
A – “Not allowed.”
Me – “Oh. OK. WHY!”
A – looks puzzled… my incisive line of questioning appears
to have him thinking… he dismisses me with a shrug and an arm gesture and
lit a ciggie.
It seems that Government agencies do not appreciate,
encourage or allow you to photograph them. I knew that. It’s pretty standard
the World around. Everyone is sensitive nowadays. But, I've never considered
the Fire Brigade as being included. It appears they are.
But, I'm clearly turning into some kind of rebel.
I talk to "chicks". I sit alone with them in offices. I'm unintentionally turning into a
walking revolution…
So here are a few snaps that I am not supposed to have
taken.
Man runs.
Where you get shouted at...
Close Up and Piss Yellow.
Of course, the fire wasn't really a fire. It was just the air con
overheating… After an age, we were allowed back into the building. No-one
officially said we could but we made unilateral decisions once the Fire Brigade
had ambled off. I went to the office to find that all the electrics had
tripped. My work mojo was broken. I took it as a cue to go home.
