Saudi Arabia is a cruel place if you are not related to the ruling clan. If you are a foreigner, you might be living in the apartheid era in
The Sheikhs of Araby
By Mohammed Hanif
26 October 2009
http://www.newslinemagazine.com/2009/10/the-sheikhs-of-araby/
Mohammed Hanif was born in
In an interview given at the height of his power, General Pervez Musharraf tried to make sense of his own good fortune and why he was destined to rule this nation: "I am the only Pakistani for whom not only the door of Khana-e-Kaaba was specially opened but I had the unique honour of saying azaan from the rooftop of Khana-e-Kaaba. Not once, but twice."
For people like me who have grown up watching countless images of the Khana-e-Kaaba, the scene was hard to imagine. It sounded disrespectful, even mildly blasphemous. Because of all the images that we have seen of the Kaaba in all its sacred glory, never has one seen a human being on the rooftop of the Kaaba. If it happens, it probably happens off camera and one has to be the head of a nuclear armed state to earn the privilege. Given Pakistan's brotherly ties with Saudi Arabia, or to be more accurate, given successive Pakistani rulers' brotherly ties with the very extended clan of Khadim-e-Haramain al Sharifain, Musharraf might have been granted this extra ordinary if not heretic-sounding privilege.
Musharraf was trying to evoke divine sanction by revealing his exalted status. He was appealing to our absolute devotion to the idea that
The
There is enough evidence to suggest that it is all nonsense.
Somewhere between the world of our devout imagination and cruel reality, lives the real
Islam is often cited as the main reason for our fascination with Saudia and Saudis. We do not seem to have the same brotherly love for Palestinians or our brothers in
There was a picture circulating on the internet earlier this year: a number of Saudi young men sprawled in front of a lingerie shop, trying to look up the dresses on mannequins in a window display. Undergarments again made headlines last month when an Al-Qaeda member tried to blow up Prince Muhammed Bin Naif,
In a society where they pretend that underwear doesn't exist, underwear sometimes tends to blow up.
May 13, 2010
Affluent Qataris Seek What Money Cannot Buy
By MICHAEL SLACKMAN
New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/14/world/middleeast/14qatar.html?pagewanted=print
So why do so many people here seem so angry?
The problem, many Qataris say, is that they resent being treated as a minority in their own country, which is what they are. Citizens make up about 15 percent of the nation's 1.6 million people — a demographic oddity that fuels a sense of privilege and victimization.
"The priority always goes to the foreigner," said Ali Khaled, 23, who is finishing his government-financed education in
His cousin, Omar Ali, 24, a high school dropout who works as a technician in an electric company, readily agreed: "They always think the foreigner is better at any job than a Qatari, even if the Qatari is perfect at the job."
In many ways, they appear to be right about how they are perceived.
"Qataris are very spoiled," said Mohammed Saffarini, a non-Qatari Arab who serves as research director for health science at
On the surface,
"It's all a sham; it's all a veneer," said Dr. Momtaz Wassef, who was recruited from the
Dr. Wassef's wife asked that he not be quoted until he left
Qataris do not see themselves as coddled. Sure, they do not have to pay for electricity, water, education or health care, and they are given land and low-cost loans to build houses when they marry. They are eligible for public assistance if they do not have a job, often receive generous pensions and acknowledge they will not take any jobs they do not consider suitable for them.
But they also complain that they do not get paid as much as foreigners, and that foreigners get most of the top jobs in critical industries, like finance, higher education and the media. There is also pervasive frustration that English has become the language of employment, not Arabic, and that local hospitals, restaurants, markets and streets are always crowded with foreigners.
"There is a crisis here," said Muhammad al-Mesfer, a political science professor at
The tension in
"There are about 300 employees at my work and only 4 or 5 Qataris," said Mr. Ali, the technician at an electric company. "I walk into work and I feel like I am in
He said that the foreigners were never willing to teach him new skills, so he had lost motivation.
"I have been working there for three years, and I still haven't fully grasped the work," he said. "I go to work to drink tea and read the paper."
During a seven-day visit to
"I am Qatari, and this country is for me," a driver shouted as he forced his way into a parking space that a Canadian driver had also been trying for. "This is my country."
Part of the frustration appears to stem from the lack of an effort to address the differences. People here said that when complaints had been raised, those who spoke up got punished. Foreigners get sent home and local people lose their positions, they said.
Qataris and foreigners alike described a social contract that offers material comfort and financial reward in exchange for not challenging the government's choices.
"To be honest, I'm comfortable and the salaries are good," said Ibrahim al-Muhairy, 29, a Qatari high school dropout who said he earns about $41,000 a year working for the government as a security guard in a mall. "Everyone is getting what he deserves and more."
But there are plenty of others who are unwilling to ride away silently in their Mercedes sedans, like Ahmed J. Abdul-Rahman Abdul-Malik, a former news anchor. He said he was furious that he had not been hired to read the news on Al Jazeera, the popular satellite news channel that broadcasts from here. He has written opinion pieces for a local newspaper complaining that Qataris are now treated as second-class citizens in their own country.
"I met with my friends last night, we joked, we are all 'ex,' that means unemployed," he said, as he climbed into the driver's seat of a Mercedes sedan. His diamond-crusted watch glistened beneath the parking lot lights.
Moza al-Malki, a family therapist, said she was angry, too. She said that she had lost her teaching position when she complained that an Indian woman was hired to run a counseling center that she said she had set up. "We are all angry for staying at home," she said.
A moment earlier, she turned to the Filipino woman walking one step behind her — a servant carrying bags — and told her to go look around the mall they were in while Ms. Malki ordered breakfast. Ms. Malki ordered a croissant with cheese, sent it back because it was too hard, and then settled on an omelet.
Mona El-Naggar contributed reporting.
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