Read Me/Disclaimer

Read Me/Disclaimer: This is a non-political/socio-political blog. It's a running tale of my Saudi Arabian adventure, great, good, bad, and ugly. It is uncensored, and I don't really care what you think of it, read it or don't. I don't care. I did not decide to do this as a means to an end, but rather to document the means with which I occupied my time while waiting for my end... All that being said, I'm an American Expat in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The opportunity to help build this system and the salary that accompanied it were to good to pass up.-Geoff

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"The views presented here are just the views of some asshole named Geoff, they are not necessarily the views of my employer, my co-workers, my family or anybody else. First hand knowledge and second hand accounts were used to compile the information. These are not scientific facts and figures. These views are not necessarily supported, endorsed or even appreciated by the KSA the USA or any other country for that matter and the author makes absolutely no claim that they are."**

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Same the world over...

I've tried to express in these pages that I believe human society to be the same the world over.  This is also a view I've tried to spread and support over the years and especially since 9-11.  Dividing the world into us and them is possibly the silliest and most dangerous concept ever introduced.  Mainly because I don't know who "we" are, let alone who "they" are!  Funny thing though, it's done here as much as it is at home, which brings me to the inspiration for this post; government bureaucracy. Government bureaucracy and government employees are the same in Saudi, as they are in the states, and I'm quite sure the world over.   There are great ones, OK ones, and then the majority of them...the bastards!  We ran into one of these today while trying to get some official stuff done, his attitude was one of unbridled contempt and his facial expression said it all: "stupid foreigners".  A wrong side of middle age man, he sat behind his glass window and dealt out loud and vicious Arabic smattering's, refusing to speak English.  He took all of about 5 minutes to declare to our boss in Arabic that we could not have licenses because our paperwork wasn't in order.  We'll try again tomorrow, maybe he'll be sick...When we first walked away from his window, I could feel my face doing that red thing it does, you know the one when I try and impersonate a tomato? Kay's statement that if I ever get angry about something, I might as well spit it out because it's already visible on my face came rushing to the forefront of my mind.  I thought about turning around, walking up to his window, hitting the glass and saying something nasty, something along the profane lines of "hey don't want me here?  Good, put me on a plane and send me home!"  Oh and by the way, after you escort me to the airport and put me on the plane in handcuffs, I'd be sure to drive safe if I were you because guess what jackass?  Your Police force, fire department, and military might be in tip top shape, but your ambulance?  It's an f-ing joke, you currently have 6 paramedics on duty in this city of nearly 6 million, and they're all from western countries...Yeah that's what I'm doing here, trying to fix that problem, the same thing that other American's, Australians and Brits have been trying to do since the early 90's"!!!!And the whole reason it hasn't worked yet is because of bastards like you!"  But really folks, whats the point? if this guy knew anything interesting that we didn't know in the US, and he was hired to come over and try and share it with us, I'm quite sure he wouldn't make it past the airport before he hated us.  Some fat-ass TSA worker would probably shove a baton up his ass, pose for a picture and at best offer the apology "sorry Osama, can't be to careful after the old 911 ya know".  Then again, I think the TSA would probably do this to 99% of airline passengers regardless of race and without the sarcastic apology if they were left to their own devices (security at Heathrow was nicer than security in St. Louis!)

I don't know if tomorrow will go better or not, I do know that I support more than ever my belief that the world keeps getting smaller, and less and less different.  I remember a conversation I had with an acquaintance who despite having no education past a GED felt the need to share his expert opinion and beliefs about Islam before I departed for Saudi Arabia.  "They're all crazy over their Geoff, they don't even get along with each other, they all believe different sh%&, and think they're gonna get 1000 virgins or something if they kill you, you just watch, you'll see, only good ones a dead one, that's what I think"  I offered the feeble resistance that as far as Religion went, Christianity was pretty fractured as well, you know with the Catholics and all their denominations, the 1st Baptists, 2nd Baptists, Freewill Baptists, Southern Baptists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, 1st Presbyterians, new Presbyterians, Mormons, Jehovas, and I'm not even going to touch all the strip mall churches that have popped up or the mega church televangelists that rob old ladies of their social security checks every month.  I thought I had more to say, but the conversation pretty much ended here.  I registered the look of disgust on his face, and realized I'd lost another facebook friend.  he told me to be safe over here and walked away.

The point?  If today's new friend and my old acquaintance could somehow correspond through a neutral medium, one in which they didn't know where the other was located, and they didn't have any insight into the others skin tone, language or religion, these two simple minded jackasses would be best buddies.  It is a "small world after all" (very notably in the Magic Kingdom) and it's time for intelligent people to stop getting out of the way.  Please make a mental note to stand up to one of the bastards in your life and just kindly tell them to give it a rest.  I don't guarantee results, I'm willing to speculate that they outnumber us 2-1, but it's worth a shot. 

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