Saudi Jeans

When John Burgess published a recent post on Crossroads Arabia titled “Happy Saudis!” I was like “Huh!” The post links to a chart from a study conducted by the World Values Survey based at the University of Michigan Institute for Social Research which states that Saudi Arabia is the 26th happiest country in the world. “It’s widely believed that it’s almost impossible to raise an entire country’s happiness level,” says Ronald Inglehart, political scientist at U-M and the director of the World Values Surveys.

The “surprising finding” has prompted me to think what possibly could be the reasons behind the overwhelmingly positive attitude of my countrymen…

• Because human rights are respected and any violation of these rights is not tolerated.
• Because the government is transparent and accountable.
• Because the inflation rate is above 10 percent.
• Because only 22 percent of Saudis own a home.
• Because our public healthcare services are awesome.
• Because our education system is mass-producing geniuses.

See? The list is endless!

How about you fellow citizens? Why are you so goddamn happy?

Ghazi al-Gosaibi, the Saudi Minister of Labor, is seen here wearing a waiter uniform and serving food at Fuddruckers in Jeddah. The minister criticized those who look down on some jobs saying they do not understand the spirit of Quran.

I have been tagged by fellow Kuwaiti blogger The Stallion.

These are the rules:

1. Link the person(s) who tagged you.
2. Mention the rules on your blog.
3. Tell about 6 unspectacular quirks of yours.
4. Tag 6 following bloggers by linking them.
5. Leave a comment on each of the tagged bloggers’ blogs letting them know they’ve been tagged.

My Six Quirks:

1. I am paranoid about time. I hate to be late to the point that I usually show up too early for my appointments. Of course that’s not healthy in this part of the world where people have no respect for time.
2. Sometime I will do/say something unpredictable just because I enjoy surprising others. I am always amused by how people react when they are caught off-guard.
3. I have something for bags, pens and notebooks. Bags are not quite popular among young men here, but I have always liked them and I keep buying more of them even though I end up not using them that much. Same goes for pens and notebooks: I do most of my writing now on a computer, yet I can’t seem to stop myself from buying more pens and more notebooks.
4. I am no longer able to read printed newspapers. I read all my news online. Something about following news on the web has made the papers rather unusable to me.
5. If the person talking to me is lame, I tend to expect what he is going to say and almost say it before he does. It has taken a lot of practice to stop myself from finishing stupid people’s sentences.
6. At least for two hours after I wake up in the morning, I’m usually not in the mood to talk to anyone. However, I like to get things done early in the morning and find myself more productive at these hours than any other time in the day. You think I’m a morning person or the opposite?

I tag:

1. Entropy
2. Medical Practitioner
3. Aysha
4. Sami Omar
5. Murtadha
6. Eman

My friend Mahmood has just found that Manama is at No. 8 on the list of Top 10 Sin Cities in the world. According to the website, our Bahraini brethren should thank us, the Saudis, for putting their capital on the international sin map:

Manama is a popular spot for Saudis to kick back from their country’s restrictive laws. Here they can get hammered, go clubbing, mingle with the opposite sex, and if they’re really daring, they can pick up prostitutes — a practice that’s illegal but widely available. For many Saudi males this proximity to an open culture is irresistible and many jam the causeway and fill flights to the city every weekend. Do you want to see what happens when Saudis cut loose and leave the rules behind? You may need to get in line.

We rock, don’t we?

I can’t for the life of me understand why would someone pay $1.72 million for something ugly like this, even if it carried the number AAA-1111. But I guess you know what they say: you can’t buy good taste.

Let’s face it. Despite what Philips may try to tell (or sell) you, life is not simple. We usually try to simplify it by generalizing and using stereotypes but that doesn’t always work. This has much to do with the fact that we human beings are very complex. We are not simple creatures folks. And this, I believe, where this kind of love/hate relationships come from.

1 - Riyadh
I love it because living in this city has given me opportunities I would never had if I stayed in my beloved hometown back in the EP, but I hate its hypocrisy, rudeness, sharp contrasts, restrictions and traffic jams.

2 - KSU
I love almost nothing about it except that some of my favorite intellectuals such as Khalid Al Dakhil, Hatoon Al Fassi and Matruk Al Faleh supposedly belong to this entity. I hate almost everything about it especially that these very same intellectuals are not allowed to teach here because someone thinks they will corrupt the minds of our youth.

3 - Relationships
I love them because they can provide you with a sense of security and peace that you can’t feel it on your own. I hate them because in a society like ours they are risky, shaky and so complicated you usually have little or no control over how they progress.

4 - Religious TV channels
I love watching them every now and then because they offer a form of entertainment rarely found anywhere else: laughing at something not intended to be funny. I hate them because in most cases they promote a very narrow-minded agenda that would actually hurt the religion they claim to represent.

5 - iPhone
I love the multi-touch large colorful screen, the amazing UI and immediate responsiveness, the SMS app, YouTube, etc. I hate the Apple lock that makes it hard to use for regular people without some hacking and geekery, no SMS forwarding, the inability to copy contacts from the SIM, and few other little things. But now that Apple have to offer the iPhone in France unlocked I hope most of these problems would be solved soon.

It was Dotsson who first reported that Krispy Kreme has finally arrived to Saudi Arabia, and now Mochness has the first review after getting a chance to try their donuts before the grand opening which is expected on the first day of Eid al Fitr. I had my first Krispy Kreme donut on my last night in Washington DC. We were like: “we ain’t leave DC without eating them!” But the thing that I really wanted to try while I was in the States was pretzels. Sara Dickerman in Slate says she is surprised by how little respect pretzels get in the snack-food world. I had a chance to try pretzels in New York and I have a picture to prove it! Now I need to know if there is a place in Riyadh that makes good pretzels.

I don’t look as good as Roba when simpsonized (or at any time for that matter :-)) but I was bored and had nothing better to do. You can go and simpsonize yourself here.

Alcohol is banned in Saudi Arabia, but according to this AP piece in the Washington Post, the government don’t seem to have a problem giving away a few bottles of fine wine as a gift to someone who earned it. Other notable gifts include an iPod from California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (cool!) and a tea set from Sri Lanka’s president (boring!) as well as a foal from French legislators which he donated to a local family.