England Oh England

I guess I was away for five months. 

Slightly more.

I thought that the biggest shock I would face would be the weather. I had, essentially, lived in summer from April 2014 until January 2015. Al Khobar and England are incredibly different in February. I’d watched the weather change on the weather websites with a sense of foreboding.

I didn't fancy the cold at all.

But the cold is just something that you get used to.

And it wasn’t too bad. I was expecting to be near foetal when I walked out of Terminal 4 without a coat to jump my lift back to Oxfordshire. It was dawn. It was a suitably uninspiring grey day. Damp. Dank. But not so cold. It was OK.

Somewhere on the M40. Cold. Grey. Damp. Dank. England Oh England.

I accept that the cold eventually got to me a few days later. There was a moment around 10pm one Tuesday. I walked up to Hornsey from Crouch End in the frost and ice with a shiver that was on the edge of turning into dance and teeth chattering to the point where conversation was uncontrollably retarded. This was the point where I stopped dead and demanded Lukey tell me why people accepted living in such ridiculous and uninviting cold environments. Beyond that and a moment where I had to duck into a Costa Coffee to grab a hot chocolate to thaw on the north side of Kew Bridge, the cold never really got to me.

What shocked me most was the dog shit.

It is everywhere.

I noticed it in Bloxham, where I holed up for a few days before heading back to London. Then Hornsey and Peckerwell seemed to be covered in it. Later in my trip, the area around Deptford Bridge seemed to be even worse.

You don’t get it in Al Khobar. You don’t get dogs.

Well, you do… but the dogs you see are semi-wild and they stay away from you as much as you stay away from them. Dogs are not kept as pets over here. No one walks them around town so there is no shite to clear up.

Don’t get me wrong, Al Khobar is untidy. In parts, it’s filthy. But not with excrement. Give me food waste and building materials any day. Dog shit is – well –is  just shit.

It annoyed me. Irrationally.

After a few days, I was becoming used to it. I moved on. I found other things to prickle; to aggravate.

Victoria, for instance.

I’ve never been keen on that part of town. I’d guess, because it is purely functional. It is not a destination, is it? How many times have you dreamed up a great night out in Victoria? How many times have you thought… “Oh. I fancy meeting a friend for lunch. Victoria. That sounds like an exciting Central London location to meet.”?

NB - See the little note at the bottom, where I admit to arranging to meet someone in Victoria.

Exactly!

You pass through. You move on.

But I seemed to find myself there, all too often. Dragging my luggage down Buckingham Palace Road to renew my Saudi visa; dragging my luggage up from Peckham to meet friends in the John Lewis Head Office bar (don’t get excited… it feels like a Travelodge); dragging my luggage across the station to grab a cab to St James Park; waiting for a friend at the end of platform one as a cold started to form; fighting my way into Boots to get medicine to fight said cold and; finally, battling crowds to retrieve my passport from Buckingham Palace Road, again.

I was away for close on three weeks. I swear that I spent two of them trying to find my way around Victoria’s road works.

I see that the road works will be in place until 2018. I wouldn’t have noticed, except I stopped to take a picture of two Italians in front of the hoardings in the bus station. No idea why they wanted to pose there; I had neither the language skills nor desire to know. But it did get me thinking. Perhaps they are regulars and they need something constant to measure themselves as they age. It is plausible and quite possible that, if I had wasted more time there, I would have seen families arriving from Burgess Hill, Whyteleafe and East Grinstead to measure their kid’s heights. The hoardings around the “walk way” near the bus station having been in situ so long that they have been using them over the past years to record their children’s growth spurts in the same way that the door frame to the kitchen was marked in my childhood home.

As an aside. As I was typing that, I began to wonder when all the dates and marks labelled “Alex” and “Sir” on the kitchen door frame showing our growth rates were removed. My head says that we must have redecorated while I still lived there and that they were lost many, many years before we moved out. But, my heart hopes that they were still visible when the next home owners arrived. If it was the latter, I regret not adding two final measures to record “Sir, age 19” and “Alex, age 23”.

Don’t get me wrong, though. I didn’t spend three weeks in England in a state of depression. I saved that for the days following my return to Saudi Arabia. Three weeks was long enough that it allowed me to realise just how much I miss my family and friends but short enough that it flew. It absolutely flew.

England inspired me. England is beautiful.

It was wonderful to allow myself to visit London as a tourist. All be it a really well informed and “cool” tourist, but a tourist just the same. I was blessed. Friends, intentionally or unintentionally, were able to show me things that I had never seen. Places that I had never visited or never knew. My mental maps of the city were challenged. I explored places on foot that I had never had time to find.

I took in a few places that I don’t really know. Crouch End, Camberwell and Blackheath. I got to revisit places from my past, like Upper Street, Bethnal Green Road and Hanwell. And old favourites like Barnes and Brentford and Hammersmith. I even got a few minutes in Harrow to be told all about hypertension and discuss my hopeless caffeine habit.

What sticks with me most, though, were the skylines.

Now, I can wax lyrical about the impressive nature of the Dubai skyline forever. Regardless of how I feel about Dubai generally – I’m not it’s greatest fan… I don’t like really like plastic – I cannot deny it’s sheer scale and audacity. 

Wow. Wow Squared. Not taken from an aeroplane.

A view I once caught of it from an aeroplane taking off over the sea will remain one of the most awe inspiring and remarkable sights I have ever seen. Dubai really does just appear out of a desert… Mile upon mile of nothing and, then “Bang!”, there it is, just “there”. Jagged, angular and huge. Wow. Wow squared.

But London is my home. London cannot be beaten.

You can get pulled into the classic views. Of Waterloo Bridge, Hungerford Bridge and the stunning vista’s that you can get from the South Bank. And you should. They live up to everything that has been written about them in poem, prose or song. 

I spent a wonderful Sunday afternoon with my brother and Rosie poking around between Tower and Westminster Bridges in glorious winter sunshine. Art, shopping, life, living and a really expensive gin cocktail to die for. I will level with you. I’ve visited a fair few cities that have captured my imagination, heart or soul but that part of London on its day – Southwark… pronounced “Suth-uck”… - is damned hard to beat.

Picture Postcard London

Gull

Gin with a homemade lime cordial that made you squint.
All infused with hops for extra "floweryness".
Heavenly.

But what I really loved to find again, were the views that creep up on you. The ones that are not expected. The view from the railway viaduct between Kilburn and West Hampstead on the Metropolitan line or the view of the planes heading into Heathrow you get on Barnes Bridge station. They are the views I crave and that I love. The ones that are known by the locals and are missed from the guide books. Those are the ones that I miss. And, by venturing into parts of town that I don’t really know, I got to see some more.

There are too many to single out, so I will note the luck I had with my accommodation.

Jodie’s flat up in Hornsey that allowed me to look out over the old church at Hornsey and Alexandra Palace rising up above.

Toe’s spare room that allowed a view of the city and – if you know what to look for – the top of Tower Bridge. All from Peckham/Camberwell borders.

My brother’s spare room overlooking London Bridge’s railway tracks with the awful Walkie Talkie and Cheese Grater over the river.

And Alex’s living room over Deptford Creek and DLR with a vista right across the city, Elephant & Castle, Stockwell and - if you pay close attention - the beautiful BT Tower.

Over Deptford Creek

Back in Al Khobar, I am left with memories that are gold, or oil or whatever commodity hasn’t had the arse fall out of its value yet. I was born in London. I have lived most of my life within its boundaries. I love and loathe the place with equal measure. It has treated me well and badly. And I know it will always be there for me. At the end of a three thousand mile plane ride, it will welcome me.

I shall be back. Quite soon. And I will fall in love with it all over again.

But first...

First, I shall be visiting Bristol.

My future home.

Note – OK. Admission time...

I do remember a really enjoyable lunch date that I had in Victoria, once. And I chose the venue. And it was in living memory, too. There is/was a really good little, independent café down on Wilton Road (?) where I waited an age for someone in a scarlet red coat and shared parsnip cake. Or courgette cake. Or something that wasn’t carrot cake. Whatever it was, it was good but it doesn’t really matter. In truth, I was only there for the company. xx

Suburban Homesick Blues

There is a church on a hill surrounded by trees.

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.

Everything will be fine.

And all is good.

Yes. All is good.

More Giggles & Alarm

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.

Yeah. Just like being back at Topshop…

Picture Update. Beauty & the Beast

Never let it be said that I do not listen.

Less verbs, more pictures. I hear you!

So. Here you go…

Some are taken on trips and jaunts to Dubai and Bahrain. The rest were taken in and around Khobar where I am living.

It was quiet. Friday mornings always are. It is the day of rest. A religious day. No-one works. Well, not until after midday prayers, anyway.

The photos I took do not reflect the bustle, but when you look through them please appreciate that waving a camera in people’s faces in Saudi is not something that is encouraged. Ignoring the potential for provoking religious or personal outrage by snapping women or strangers, I was really aware that I was heading into the poorer parts of town. My camera is worth more than a month’s wages to many of the people around these parts. Maybe in time I will increase my confidence and get more involved with the population… but this was the first time and I was really conscious of flaunting my comparative wealth.

Readers: "Eh? We’ve seen the middle east. In brochures. It’s incredible." 

Readers: "Hey! You keep posting amazing pictures of the seafront… What do you mean?"

There are two worlds out here. The need each other so they live on top of and alongside each other. They feed off each other. They are symbiotic. They are both beautiful and ugly simultaneously.

First we have the exciting, planned, developments. Highways and bold developments of shopping centres, hotels and office blocks. They are built around landscaped parks and recreational spaces. They are built to impress. They regularly succeed. I've been lucky; I've seen some incredible sights:

Dubai - From Grand West Media City

Bahrain - World Trade Centre

Bahrain - Movement

Saudi Arabia - Al Khobar Corniche

Bahrain - Lanterns... Where I spent my Birthday :)

I love these parts of the region. I feel comfortable. I understand and relate to them.

No photo’s I am afraid, but a view the view of Dubai as you land/take off from the airport takes your breath away. The palm shaped residential developments and map of the world sculptured as sand banks in the clear, still waters backed up with the tower blocks behind isolated and alone in a flat, pancake desert stands out as one of my favourite views of all time.

But in order to have these, you need to have service. And I have seen it. It shows the rougher, far less glamourous side of the countries. They are not included in the brochures but I am finding them just as impressive and – sometimes - more interesting and engaging from a life experience and creative perspective. I am passionate about photography and geography, after all.

Saudi Arabia- A mosque in a warehouse district between Al Khobar and Dammam

Dubai - Warehouses, Office Blocks & Trailers

So this is where I got out to explore Al Khobar...

Khobar Back Streets

Clothes Drying and Low Cost Housing

Golden Hyderabad. Selling tea in plastic cups. Busy before Prayers.

Bridge over The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Road.
Where you can find beggars with missing their lower arms, hands and/or feet. Victims of Justice.

The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Road

Shop Front

Apartments

Cables

Decorated Truck. Many of the vehicles are driven by Pakistani and Indian immigrants. Most are personalised...

Abandoned Car. Remember... Khobar sits between the desert and the sea.
Anything that stays still starts to get buried. 

Street Signs.
In all honesty, I took this as a reminder to help me locate a Malaysian Restaurant I stumbled across.
Used to eat Malaysian on Holloway Road and down near The Riverside in Newcastle Upon Tyne. I doubt either place are still there.
Love Malaysian food!

Offices? Apartments? I dunno.
I stuck my head in the doorway. You will be relieved to hear that it had the same rank, stale urine smell that it would attract in London, Berlin, Kiev... The  whole world round.

This battered and grubby stair well was in a parade of jewellers which will explain the discarded cabinets.
I love the disparity between the rubbish strewn hall way and the apparent value of the cases.

Adverts.

Parking Rebel

This reminded me of The Lanes in Brighton... Joke :)

Never Back Dawn...
Too bloody right. What's Dawn ever done for me?

Not quite the same the word round.
There is a bit of graffiti around. On the walls or in the dust on cars. But I am yet to see a comedy cock n balls!

Street Scene - Khobar

Dereliction - Back Street Khobar

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Street Scene - Khobar

Street Scene - Khobar

To close, I experienced my first sandstorm on Tuesday. I flew back to Dammam from Dubai and dropped into into a yellow wasteland...

On the Apron at Dammam

On the road to Khobar
The wind was blowing straight off the desert. The four by four we were in was being brushed out of lane. The sand on the metalwork and windows sounded like the most torrential rain.

And, finally... back to the pretty.

The beach at Khobar.
Low tide in the Arabian Gulf. Egrets, Reef Heron and Flamingo grazed and hunted on the sand bar just off shore.