Hail, KSA

Dearest Pau,

I am not sure if I flew to the KSA directly from India or not, but I guess I did.

I landed in Ryhad and called your grandmother. I know she does not like me, but it is always good to hear her voice and to know you, mum and Aunt Susi are well. I do appreciate that much from her.

At any rate, I took another flight to Hail. It is in the morthern province going towards Iraq. We stayed on a compound. The security was pretty tight. There are all sorts of eliments in the Kingdom and spooks to boot. There was a truck outside the road with a gun on it and guards with automatics, there was a barracaded road that winded back and forth. Then a house of soilders with two more trucks with a machine gun on it and a half odzen soilders, then a gate and then another gatehouse with more soilders and another gate. It was a producion getting in and out to say the least. The compound itself was not that special for Saudi standards. It only had a mosque, a pool and a library. The room was really nice with brand new appliances. It was huge. The rooms in Saudi are quite big. I had a huge bed room that was like half the space of the whole house. There was a living room with TV and sofas, etc...There was a big kitchen and a big restroom. My closest neighbor was this 70 something guy from Iran. He was really nice and took me out when I first got there. He played chess with me and was really good. He could beat with a few pieces and could just look way ahead, but I guess that comes with time. I always dreamed of playing chess with you.

The town was small with mountain ranges all around it. It was very conservative and the religious police were always checking to make sure the foreign woman were covered and the men did not wear shorts. We could go into town on the shuttle, but the prayer time was like two hours there instead of half and hour or so like in Jeddah. We were not able to do anything as all the shops closed almost after we got there. About the only real entertainment was a computer in your room or other. You really had to be able to live in an isolated atmosphere.

The students were really funny. They were sort of like rednecks in the states. They all seemed to have access to certain recreational stuff, which really surpirsed me given the strict code of laws in the Kingdom. They took me out a lot with their trucks and drove around. We went on a picnic one time and they had these yellow lizzards which they kept tied up and made fight each other, then they killed them and put them on the fire and we ate them. I think of all the strange stuff I have eaten in other countries and prefer your grandmothr's cooking.

They had this final exam one time and they all had the answers. There were six hundred students in the room all looking at their cell phones and arms and under their hats. They were so obvious that it was comical. We had to give the exam again due to their cheating and they did it again. We discovered an Egpytian Professor was selling the answeres for a lot of money. Again, we called them back after a week and tried again to no avail, so we gave up. Cheating is just a part of the culture here and the schools tolerate it, because that is just the way it is. There is really nothing the foreign teacher can do. I think your mum would have a hard time.

We hd to wait the whole month of June to get paid, it was good that we got paid for a month in June, but not good we had to wait the whole month for it. It was summer and I was itchy to get out. I was looking into German courses in Austria. I decided on the Diplomatic Acedemy in Wien and learned the Waltz(not).


Big Warm Hugs,

Pops