The word is isssssssssssh!! Saudi's have a tradition of not talking about the obvious. Every word you say, before it leaves your mouth has to be censored. I share my office cabin in Aramco with my saudi college, a junior yet to graduate....a great guy to spend the boring afternoon hours. We simply talk, its actually an enriching experience to sit with somebody who belongs to a totally different way of life and talk about common things...generic issues like USA, Religion, Cars, Customs...lots of things.
Religion is a defacto topic of discussion between us, he wouldnt believe that i dont pray and im not religious although im a default hindu. He talks about life, death, afterlife, afterdeath.......the fact that i dont believe in all this totally beats him. His system simply does not accept that somebody without religion can actually live. Although Ahmed(the chaps name) tried to hide his dispeasure about me not accepting his argument i could sense it. Well he is not wrong and i am right so its a stalemate.
I like Ahmed for his wayz, the guy is young, very matured and staunchly defends his religion which i think is very fair. He convinced me how Saudi Arabia 'the land of the pure' is different from other Arab nations. We in India have our own religious places with absurd and weird customs to suit traditions. Saudi Arabia is one such country where traditions far outweigh the religion.
We talk about girls, here you cannot find youngsters hanging out, well they do but guys seperately and girls with their husbands or fathers. You have sprawling malls all over the country but you dont find the vibrancy of youngsters talking, laughing, lovers walking hand in hand. Here the malls are quiet, eerily quiet where you want something to happen to break the ice.
Oh i nearly forgot, 'Rajnikaaaaaaant'. After my daily meeting with the proponents of the project we had an 'off-the-topic' discussion with the guys (all saudi's) the topic of discussion: Movies and obvious i had to justify the dance-around-the-tree routine of our illustrious actors, then out of no where i heard the name 'Rajnikaaaaaaant'....i didn believe it at first but double checked it with the guy who mentioned it and yes he is an avid fan of 'Rajinikanth'.......tell me abt it! In a country where movies are banned (no theaters in Saudi Arabia) and television and internet are highly censored...Rajinikanth is famous!!
If you think this post is highly unorganized, let me clarify that im somehow managing to blog inspite of certain restrictions and this one particular post was composed in 4 days of 2 different weeks.
Will try to keep posting...but now gotta run home....taxi waiting ;)
No comments:
Post a Comment