John had bought a Hudl before he came but had little idea how to use it. He took it out of his bag and asked me if I could figure it out and then show him. I set it up on the free wifi first of all and then set the clock. I wanted to put the facebook app on it for him (which I had just assumed existed being Android based) but could't for the life of me figure out how. I ended up using my ipad to Google how to do it which took long enough given the slow connection. Eventually I got my head around it but the wifi wasn't good enough to open the Play Store anyway so abandoned the entire enterprise for the time being.
After a good hour we made our way to the food court and ended up trying a burger place which was clearly a cheap (and not particularly good) rip-off of McDonalds. It tasted fine but I think the appearance was exactly what Matty back home has probably got into his head every real McDonalds burger looks like now (he has a passionate dislike for them and swore years ago to never have one again). We hadn't noticed at first that Serban was already in the food court eating a different burger take away (there are five different burger outlets alone in this one food court I should point out) but he saw us and came over to finish his meal. He'd rang me at half 9 that morning wanting to know if I'd been contacted by Al Hoty about what we were supposed to be doing so I'd sarcastically thanked him for his alarm call. He'd ordered hot and sour soup from the Chinese outlet as well as his burger meal and went to collect it. He came back and started telling us how he was used to soup with most meals and complaining that it wasn't customary here and hard to find - to that point it hadn't really occured to either myself or John.
After dinner we went back to the hotel and sat in the lobby. I finished my blog entry and John set up facebook on his Hudl under my instruction. It was 2 o'clock and Serban decided he wanted to go for a lie down so we arranged to call him just after six to go for dinner. After explaining to John what Google Chrome was and him doing some internet browsing he ended up with a banner advert for "Pilipino girls in KSA". Anyone else would have just ignored it but him being him decided to explore further, clicking on it and studying the registration form. I had been engrossed again in typing, attracting several comments from John about being a computer whiz merely for the fact that I was typing quickly (to be fair as a relative comparison perhaps I am), but he'd disrupted me to ask how genuine I thought the site was and whether or not it was free like I said. Needless to say I didn't think it was the best of ideas to be on it in the first place and told him to play it safe and give up and wait until he can go to Bahrain in three months.
We sat there for a good few hours and ended up going back up to our rooms just after six to dump our things before heading over to the mall again with Serban. John and I had been invited by Carl and Steve the night before for a curry with their big group of English mates but Serban hadn't been present at the time and John had been speaking to an old mate from back home who was working here and had arranged to meet up in the mall so we declined in the end. I could have gone for the curry with them by myself but to be honest, as nice as it was to meet some people from the UK I hadn't particularly been struck on Carl so wasn't too incentivised to spend another evening listening to him painting a disaster picture about everything again - everything he'd told us had so far been in complete contrast to our experiences.
Over in the mall it was notably more busy than we'd seen it previously. We then remembered that this was the end of the working week here and in absence of anything better to do the Saudis clearly flock there. When we got to the food court Serban and John decided to try out an Iranian take away but it looked pretty similar to the other kebab places we'd tried already and I didn't fancy it. Next door though was a Pasta bar offering Lasagne so I thought I'd give it a go. I asked the guy behind the counter how big it was wondering if it would be more snack sized than a full meal and he took out a round foil dish and showed me. It looked a decent enough amount so I paid and sat with Serban who was waiting for his too. John was behind Serban in the queue and had somehow ended up talking to two ladies in full nicabs. We were practically over the other side of the room so couldn't hear anything but we could see him laughing with them and were both a bit concerned about what those around us might be thinking. Numerous reports from various sources have made it pretty clear that men shouldn't talk to women, especially if they're not accompanied by a male relative but right at this moment I suspect Johns desire to interact with any woman he could was blinding better judgement. Eventually he came back and said they were asking him to talk to them because they were learning English. I thought it was good although suggested maybe not being quite so obvious in his gesticulations whilst doing so in future. Serban just wasn't keen on the idea at all...
Five minutes later Johns mate found us and came over, shaking Johns hand and greeting him in a manner that gave me the impression they may have grown up or gone to school together but hadn't really kept close touch, more of a close aquaintence than a friend I'd speculate. I was probably vindicated in my estimation by the fact that Chris (the friend) was a quantity surveyor and had lived and worked in a few places around the world. He had just got engaged to a girl in Valencia which is where he intended to live again when he was done with the current two year Saudi contract he was 5 months into.
Chris seemed the kind of guy who was more up my street than Johns. He had clearly known John back home to be a big party lad, always drinking and getting himself into trouble and jokingly asked a few times how he was coping without a pint. He was working on a project about 110 miles up the coast from Khobar, further than Jubail. He had a company car and had chosen to live in compound accommodation around here paid for in full by his employer rather than live in the local site compounds which apparently were nowhere near as nice. It must be some apartment to choose to add three hours of driving on these roads to your working day! He reiterated what we'd already figured out about how bad they were and said he leaves work early to avoid night time driving in particular. He gave me his business card, me thinking that he might be a handy person to know in future especially if he's only about half an hour further up the road to where I'd be anyway. Plus, like I said he seemed a pretty quiet, down to earth character which I took to far more than I'd taken to Carl or even Steve.
He said he spent every other weekend in Bahrain when he had a two day weekend and gave us the low-down on the hotel and travel prices etc. The hotel he stays at isn't a particular good one he said but only costs about £27 a night which he's happy with - it seemed strange that he was quoting sterling after days of converting the other way. There are many other more or less expensive places but this was the best value for money he'd found in the price range he wanted to pay. The toll for the causeway was about £20 and and there was a mandatory £25 insurance policy if you were taking your own car. A pint costs about £4 give or take which considering what the demand must be like was less than my expectation. All in all though, he said if you could live without the beer then there really was nothing to go there for. There were prostitutes (which John seemed to like the idea of) but not many ordinary women compared to the number of men and Chris said he preferred the bars that were just really for drinking - though being engaged thats no suprise. Overall then, with the traffic getting over the causeway it was a lot of hassle for a pint and I have to admit I'm not that particularly enamoured with the whole idea of it - unlike John who's now living for the end of our 90 day probationary period when we will be allowed to leave the country (already after only 4 days... concerning). I unfortunately now face the dilemma of whether it's worth my paying the $570 SAR for the multiple entry exit/entry visa which lasts for 6 months or just to apply for single ones at $200 SAR for each of my holiday periods. The only reason to get the multiple really is to go there but I'll cross that bridge (perhaps literally) when I come to it later anyway.
Once we'd finished our food we started to make our way back to the hotel. By this time it was about 10:30pm and a lot of the shops were still open. I'd noticed a music shop on the ground floor of the mall earlier in the week and decided I wanted to go and find it to see how much a guitar would be. As we got to the ground floor exit I turned left to begin my search. In typical fashion, had I turned right it would have been right in front of me but I ended up doing a full lap of the downstairs before looking on the map and realising what I'd done. On my travels though I unfortunately found the Tiffany store Kirsty had been posting about on my facebook wall. Deciding to take a picture as there was no one around to accidently capture and possibly offend I took a quick snap on my phone and sent it to her on whatsapp. Only as I took it did I realise that on the balcony above was a Tag Heuer outlet and made a mental note to go and have a look sometime. On my list of stuff to buy is a new watch as I left my others at home, having stainless bracelets and knowing in the heat they'd bring my wrist out in a rash due to my Nickel allergy.
Unfortunately the music shop had closed so I headed for the exit I'd begun my search at. I text Serban to see where he'd gone after leaving him in search of a wooly hat (I kid you not!) and he text back to say he'd meet me shortly. John had dissapeared and ringing him, he said he was by gate 5 (we were at gate 7) and would meet us back at the hotel across the road. Serban and I decided to stop in at the coffee house opposite the hotel again as we had done the evening before. John came and found us as we finished ordering too and he decided we should sit outside and watch the football on TV. Unfortunately it turned out to be an Arab version of MOTD and hence not really being too interesting to any of us.
John had been a bit down the entire afternoon ever since looking at facebook on his Hudl. I'm not sure why and I didn't want to ask but Serban and I both wondered if there was a girl back home it had something to do with. He'd already asked me how to block an ex on it for ignoring a comment he'd put on a picture, or so he thought because when I looked I pointed out she'd actually liked it. Whatever the reason anyway, other than while Chris was there he'd not been particulary cheerful, spending most of his time looking at his phone and I was kind of glad to go back to my room.
Having now discovered the hotel did have wifi and that their router had been turned off for some reason up until now I'd got the password off the front desk man. I thought I'd give facetime a go. Being 1am now here it was only 10pm back home and I thought Mum and Dad would still be up. Sure enough, reliable as ever Mum had her iPad right in front of her as I called and it connected fine...
2 hours or thereabouts of catching up, giving them a tour of my present dwelling and seeing Hugo and Ralph chewing numerous toys having no idea of my presence really I said goodnight, arranging to facetime my Grandparents the following day when my Mum was there. I do miss the dogs quite a bit. Watching them jumping up on Mum and Dads knees to be stroked (or just given a treat in Hugo's case) I was quite envious. I decided to chance Stu too, just to pass on a message about the hot tub that was still at full temperature in the garden and had been since before I'd left really. He answered and we had a good half hour catch up. I even gave him the virtual tour down through the hotel and showing him the view of the mall opposite the hotel from the lobby.
It was getting on for about 2:30am here and therefore 11:30pm there and although I didn't have to get up early Stu did so we said our goodbyes and after browsing through my films on iTunes (which I could do with the wifi connection) I almost immediately fell asleep...
No comments:
Post a Comment