- Jonathan Swift
Friends and Family,
Feeling a little better than yesterday but not by much. Too much to write about to skip out on an update.
The big news today, of course, was that I got mail for the first time. I was up in the Detachment Commander’s office asking if I had to register with the APO office to make sure they know I’m here and he told me they knew.
That meant that I had not received mail because I had not received mail.
We talked a little bit more about things we CAN’T get here and Gatorade came up. He said he thought there was some at the Red Sea Mall and he was going there this afternoon but I really didn’t want to go out so I graciously declined.
Maybe later.
As I left and headed back to my villa, I ran into the guy who gets our mail and he was unloading boxes from his car. I offered to help (obviously a weird concept for him since he’s a TCN that’s used to be treated like crap) and then I discovered two of the packages were for me.
One from my friend Jeanie and one from Heather. I excitedly took them home and savored the opening as long as I could before tearing into them.
Ironically, Jeanie sent Gatorade powder so I am set for awhile with that.
She also sent candy, Ivory Soap, Burt’s Bees lip stuff, Kool-Aid packets, a couple of spices and tenderizer, a Starbuck’s gift card, and a cork screw which was the only thing I actually asked for.
She also sent a Cosmo with a note that said “Bathroom reading material.”
That’s Jeanie for you.
The other package was a huge decal that said “U.S.M.C. All Men Die But Not All Men Live” which happens to be my favorite line from Braveheart.
Of course I cannot put this on my car here because it might as well say “Hey, blow me up!”
But I will find a place for it.
Thank both of you for those much-needed morale boosters. They helped. Didn’t cure, but helped.
I also met a couple who hooked me up with a DVD player, although I already ordered one and it’s somewhere in the mail. Russ had an extra (being a gadget guy, he buys all the latest stuff which makes his “old” stuff superfluous and ripe for giving away). He would take no money for it and when I got it home, it played my American DVDs. “300” was the test and it passed with flying bloody colors.
I found it necessary to skip the weekly Saturday night soccer game because after working legs and shoulders, I could no more play soccer than flap my arms and fly to the moon.
Additionally, the Brit Family wanted to take out to the Sook or more commonly known as the Saddest Place on Earth to Buy Stuff. Jamie wanted me to label this blog “Traveling to the Bashee Heartland” and I was going to, until I realized that “Bashee” is very insulting over here.
Before we did that, though, they took us out to eat at Chilis and since our food took a bit long to get to us, I ended up munching on the “chicken nuggets” that the child Brit didn’t want. Granted they were huge but it killed what little appetite I had so when my burger came, I downed about half of it and I was completely stuffed.
I was exhausted (little sleep again last night) and was quiet most of the dinner until we started talking about the differences in words we use. It was a fun conversation and I learned the following translations that they found just as curious:
- “Bullocks” is worse than shucks but not as bad as bull$^&$
- “Wanker” should not be used in polite company
- “Bloody” is kind of like “damn” and can be used by young people
- Our “cookie” is their “biscuit” (Linda thought it was weird we used “biscuit” like “muffin.” They only use “cookie” for the sugary round cookies like Oreos)
- A “dribbler” is a bib.
- I forgot what they called a pacifier but when I called it a “binki,” they looked at me like I was nuts.
Another one I caught them saying when the phone didn’t work was that it had “given up the ghost” which took me a second to figure out. It means it died.
After dinner, Jamie would not let us pay.
Wanker.
If I thought Ali was an aggressive driver, Jamie the Brit was absolutely insane. I love the guy to death but it was obvious that he had lived here awhile and his natural aggressive driving tendency (so his wife told me he drives like this in England) had been Saudi-fied which means his big 8-cyclinder was bigger and badder than any car on the road. Here, that’s the acid test: size and aggressiveness with a willingness to use the horn almost constantly.
Jamie sped through and around traffic, completely ignoring lines, signs, safety, rules of physics, etc. My favorite line of the night was when he blew through an intersection because the turn lane was full, drove about 100 yards, and said “You gotta pull a bit of a dirty yewie….” As he whipped around and came at the turn from the other direction.
Mike and I laughed for the next 2 minutes over that one.
Almost as good as him driving COMPLETELY onto the island in a turn to get around backed up traffic.
By the time we got to the Sook area, we arrived right before prayer which means every vender was trying desperately to make their final sale before everyone shut down.
We found ourselves in a very narrow street with just enough room between the cars for our vehicle to fit.
If that wasn’t bad enough, the center lane of this opening was completely full of people, animals, and more people. It was as though we had driven into a street festival and were trying to get through with our huge SUV.
And no one seemed to mind.
Except Jamie who had enough of the stopped routine (my biggest Force Protection nightmare. An ambush waiting to happen and nowhere to go) and to my shocking horror, opened his car door, stepped up to see what the holdup three cars ahead was, and started yelling at people.
Mike and I thought that would be the final straw and we would be in the middle of a mob scene with a Brit, a woman, and a toddler.
Eventually we got out of there and I could somewhat breath again.
Jamie took us on a little tour where we got to see Chop-Chop square. This is where they…stand by to be shocked… this is where they do public executions in front of big crowds. Anyone can come and watch heads being lopped off, mostly for drugs. But there are also the occasional limbs chopped for stealing.
Jamie pointed out that it used to be just down the way a few hundred yards. Where the big PLAYGROUND now sits.
“So what you are telling me that they built a playground on the old execution site AND then only moved the spectacle a few hundred yards down?”
“The tykes must have somewhere to play while the parents are at Chop-Chop.”
S
H
I
R
T
We parked on a corner and I asked what the painted curb indicated. It looked like some kind of no parking spot but I was informed they don’t have “no parking” areas in Saudi Arabia. Furthermore, no meter maids to enforce them if they did.
Much like just about everything about this area, it’s either super strict or anything goes. As Jamie likes to say, they are 8 hours and 25 years behind the rest of the world. No more was this evident than when I saw a toy store and all of the toys were from when I was a kid.
I’m almost 40.
They had stuffed Pink Panther dolls. And their Barbie is Arab Barbie: she’s wearing a full agama on the box. Only her face is showing so obviously, she has Infidel tendencies.
Anyway…
At this point, we were on foot and I was more than a little aware that I was with a woman, a toddler, another Westerner, and a fellow Marine.
Head on a swivel because EVERYTHING was foreign and traffic quite literally could come from any direction.
We were in old Jeddah which was pretty much like the worst slums in Tijuana. Leaning buildings looking like they were about to fall over. A/C units just slapped on the outside. Exposed electrical wiring everywhere.
When I peeked into an open door, it looked pretty much like a crack house.
And it was about 100 degrees.
The last prayer started and all the shops closed down. We kept shopping, skipping over things like wooden twigs for brushing teeth, multi-colored chicks probably spray-painted different colors (bright pink, green, etc.)
What Linda (Jamie’s wife) was looking for was a bong.
Yes, a bong.
Well, that’s not what they call it but it’s what it looks and acts like. It has a glass tube and then a tube running off it to smoke flavored tobacco that I was assured contained no drugs, not even nicotine. It’s just for flavor.
Shirt.
I also got to see the Saudi bargaining process work and it unfolded just like they told me it would. They quote some outrageous price, we counter, they come down, we don’t and they wave us off. Until the second we hit the door and say we are going next door and then they agree. But then Jamie, of course, asked for something else thrown in and it all starts over again, all the way down to the point where we don’t QUITE have enough on us to cover the agreed upon price. They take it in disgust and we leave.
Out on the street again, we saw slaughtered animals hung up by hooks and I wondered when they actually cleaned those hooks.
And when I asked Jamie, in jest, when the street cleaner comes out and cleans up, he answered, “Oh, ‘bout every 2000 years.”
I could just never one-up him on comments and you all know me. I said “You gotta love a place where sweating profusely is socially acceptable” and he never missed a beat, adding “Apart from the bedroom, of course, aye Mate.”
Street after street I saw something that I would have never believed. It was a constant parade of sights, sounds, and odors that assaulted my senses. It was a bit much to take in, especially since I was still feeling pretty low.
On the way home, Jamie once again did his Speed Racer routine and when he dropped me off, I just had to smile and shake my head.
Crazy Brits. But what wonderful, caring people.
Free Advice for Today: “Today, I was sitting in my room watching TV when I heard my mother obnoxiously yelling for the dog. Minutes later she stomped into my room, swatted me over the head, and yelled at me for not answering when she called. She actually got my name mixed up with the dog's. FML.”
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