Holy Kingdom

My visit to Saudi Arabia in March this year was my first visit to the middle east, not counting Dubai and Bahrain airport transits as a visit.

The King Khaled Airport in Riyadh was once the largest airport in the world and the vast landscaped interior courtyards, the huge terminal buildings and the numerous moving walkways are the proof for it.

Tight security and the tough looking airport police greet you at the emigration counters, this in a way symbolizes life in the KSA and you encounter several such situations during your stay.
Riyadh is a modern city, an oasis in the middle of the desert but there weren't many trees around the place, you can sense the urban sprawl with its dull beige colored buildings that dot the landscape.
The Olaya district in the city centre is abuzz with commercial activity, huge malls, commercial complexes line the roads leading to the 302ft tall skyscraper the 'Kingdom Centre'. There is a high speed lift that takes you 99 floors in 1 minute and the view of the entire city from the viewing bridge is breathtakingly amazing.
There is something in this country which I feel is unique..and that is the strict separation of the two genders. They have separate multistoried 'Ladies (only) Malls' , Ladies only floors and Family hours in common entry malls. The food court outlets in the general area are also divided in gents and ladies sections.

Life in Saudi is measured mostly by Sharia, or ultra conservative Muslim law, of which the Saudi version includes women not being allowed to drive, wearing the 'abaya' (traditional floor length long sleeve garment, what we call the Burqa in the subcontinent) at all times, forbidding all alcohol and virtually all other Western “vices”. Cigarettes are about the only vice allowed in the kingdom. There are no theaters, no public bowling alleys and no bars or nightclubs. Some hotels have private bowling alleys, and some larger 'foreigner' compounds have a small theater for movie viewing.
The foreigners also have to abide by the dress code of the land, I would see a group of white women go out of the hotel with the the Abaya and head scarf (the hijaab) every morning however the viel is not required to be worn by westerners the local women were 'veiled' most of the time.

Islamic law dictates 5 prayer times a day; sunrise(around 5 am), Afternoon (around 1 pm), mid afternoon(around 4 pm), and sunset (Around 6 pm) and late evening (around 8 pm). the timings are indicative for the subcontinent, these timings differ as per the daylight timigs for the region. In most Middle Eastern countries when the prayer calls are given the faithful go to the mosque and perform their ritual prayers and then return to work or whatever they were doing at the time of prayer call. Businesses continue to operate, and life goes on as usual.
In Saudi, however, when prayer time comes, the entire economy comes to a halt! Restaurants shut their doors, the streets are deserted, shops down shutters or shopkeepers simply leave them open and go to the mosque when its time for the Salah (Arabic for Namaaz) things come to a complete stop until the prayers are over . People plan their day out in the public or downtown around the prayer schedules. I met a couple of westerners who said they carried a prayer schedule with them at all times. Here I saw more mosques in that 1 week than I had seen in my whole life put together. There were mosques in every lane, every commercial establishment including petrol stations, Banks, Hotels and even shopping malls.

The cars were big, powerful and beautiful and there was a clear sign of a throbbing oil economy everywhere. With a litre of petrol costing an equivalent of Rs. 8, you dont have to worry about the mileage of ur 4.2 Litre SUV. Boys as young as 14 could be seen zipping down the roads in their GMC V8 monsters. There was opulence everywhere..except in the middle class south asian neighborhoods, the narrow, dirty lanes in those areas were like any street in central Mumbai and I felt safer here than I did on those superhighways and upmarket districts of the city.
It was a relief when I stepped into the boarding area of the airport past the emigration counters. this was another world altogether, you could see many uncovered female faces, the expats had shed their abaya's and were back in their skirts and tops, they were ready to go back to the free world !!