Category Gulf

We Would Like to Breathe

For some reason, Arab News chooses not to name KSU when they write about the stifling restrictions Saudi Arabia’s oldest university impose on their female students. Considering how this country is obsessed with segregation, there is no surprise here. And the ironic thing is, they say the university “is supposed to be a place where young women experience greater freedoms.” Says who? Wake up girls! This is freakin’ K of SA you are living in. The university, as you may expect, claim that the point of these restrictions is to protect the students. Again, no surprise. Welcome to Saudi Arabia, where everyone claims moral authority over the rest.

In the other hand, the newspaper chooses to name another university in Riyadh, Imam Mohammed bin Saud Islamic University, which supposedly is even more strict than KSU. It is said that IMSIU is to launch a new college of medicine, but according to Ali Al Mousa in Al Watan daily, the university president could not answer the question of whether female students would be accepted in the new college. Al Mousa tends to cut the president some slack because answering that question might put him in confrontation with the extremists who would, for sure, use the ‘segregation’ card. Let’s wait and see how this drama is going to play out.

And in case you didn’t know, the extremists are not only controlling the campuses in Saudi Arabia, but they also managed to extend their notorious control to the press in neighboring Kuwait, where this article by Dalaa’ Al Mufti was banned from Al Qabas daily, apparently because Al Mufti dared to comment on the ridiculous decision of the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice to spend SR 700,000 on a study that examines the mingling of the sexes and its “harmful effects” on the society. I’ve told you that these people are obsessed, right?

Driving While Drunk

You would think that in a country where the consumption of liquor is illegal, drunk driving won’t be a problem to deal with, but Molouk Ba-Isa got some news for you. She, like many who live near King Fahd Causeway, aka the Johnny Walker Bridge, is complaining that they have to deal with impaired drivers every weekend, and it gets much worse during the Eid week every year.

king_fahd_causeway

She goes into the details that I’m not sure if most of you need to know, but here is the money quote: “The problem is a lack of enforcement.” On both sides of the causeway, little is done to prevent the potential dangers of drunk drivers. Sadly, some people don’t know how to celebrate without putting others and themselves in danger.

Kuwaiti Bloggers Abducted

Some very sad and disturbing news coming from Kuwait:

At Saturday 8pm Kuwait State Police abducted 2 Kuwaiti bloggers Bashar Al-Sayegh from Al-Ohmmah.org and Jassem Al-Qamis without the due protection of the Kuwait Constitution while leaving work. The reason being that an anonymous commenter wrote something criticizing the Emir yet even though it was removed immediately by Al-Sayegh they are still holding him responsible.

You can keep up with the latest updates from the Kuwaiti blogosphere through Safat.

Gold Digger

Despite their frustration with our role in Iraq, the Bush administration seems more than willing to sell us $20 billion worth of advanced weapons. While the Congress is expected to oppose the deal when notified about it this fall, and some lawmakers have already said they plan to stop it, everything seem rather quiet around here.

rice_drinking

I don’t have much more to say about this than what Mahmood said, but it is really sad that no one here seems to give two shits about this. Why no one is objecting to spending this huge amount of money on weapons which we can’t use when we better invest in our younger generations, the future of this country?

Saudi Arabia Outclass Bahrain

Saudi Arabia are through to the Asian Cup quarter-finals after they brushed aside Bahrain 4-0 in their last match in Group D. Korea also made it to the knock-out stage after they beat co-hosts Indonesia 1-0. Saudi Arabia and Korea will face Uzbekistan and Iran, respectively, in the next round.

First let me say that I have not expected our team to beat Bahrain easily, let alone with a big score like that. Bahrain have become such a rival in the past few years, and their team used to give us some hard time even when we won. Bahrain wanted to win in the time that they could have been through with a draw, and that’s where they made a huge mistake. I have never seen Bahrain play against Saudi Arabia in this kind of open play game before. It is true that such tactic has given them advantage in the first 15 minutes and they were very close to score on several occasions in the first half, but their attempts were blocked by a solid performance of Saudi defense and keeper al-Mosaileem.

yassir and talal

Although Saudi Arabia were the younger side, they knew how to deal with the match. On the 18th minute, Yassir al-Qahtani passed a clever ball over Bahraini defenders to Malek, who barely touches the ball in the way of Ahmed Al-Mousa who enters the box and beats the goal keeper to take the lead for the Green Falcons. Bahrain tried to equalize and had some good chances but could not score.

On the last minute of the first half, Saudi Arabia proved how they can be very dangerous on the counter-attack, when Yassir passed a long ball to Malek on the right flank who sent a low cross to Abdul-Rahman al-Qahtani to easily score the second Saudi goal.

Bahrain have had a good start after the break and could have scored early in the 2nd half but were again denied by al-Mosaileem. It did not, however, take long for Saudis to kill the game on the 68th minute when Taiseer al-Jassim fired a beautiful 30-yard strike into the top right corner of the Bahraini net. With 10 minutes remaining in the game, Taiseer scored again after a sweet play between Malek and Omar. We could have scored more, but at that point of the match it didn’t matter anymore.

Who Can Outshine Dubai?

Upon a recent visit to Dubai, Tareq Al-Maeena confirmed what many people have been saying recently: the thriving city has become very expensive, crowded, with too much ‘bling’, and not much substance. I wonder what he would say when he learns that Hooters are coming soon :-) In his conclusion, Al-Maeena suggests those can’t stand living in Dubai anymore should consider taking the nearest exit, hinting that Saudi Arabia can be heaven for those repelled by Dubai’s luxurious hell. Actually, this kind of argument is not exclusive to us; it is very visible in Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar as well.

However, Al-Maeena does not forget to point out, though shyly, that in order for this to happen Saudis should relax their regulations and implements some changes and reforms before they can offer their country as alternative to our Emarati neighbors. Saudi Arabia is the largest market in the region after all, right? I wonder what suggestions Al-Maeena, and the rest of our distinguished intelligentsia, have on how we can make our cities more attractive than Dubai. I mean: with the fierce opposition against everything “different” and/or “liberal” we see in our country on daily basis, is this idea of competing Dubai even realistic?