Saudi Arabia, the Country that Changed Me. (Part 3)

Sorry everyone for the delay for getting Part 3 out! I've been trying to have my family send me ALL my pictures from the trip instead of me taking off my Facebook ones. On Facebook I only put up about 80 or so but back home I have over 200. But since it isn't working, I'll just have to add more pictures later! THEY'RE UP! :)

I also need to add a little to Part 2 as my friend Abdulaziz pointed out, I forgot the dancing and acting out of skits that both sides did! I have been reading my account of the trip and I skipped the whole page! But I loved how throughout the week both sides shared their culture with one another! Though, I found the Saudis' dancing and skits more impressive. They showed us how to beat their drums, dance in the sword dance, and have a great time! I will try to upload pictures and videos of this when I get back home in 9 days! THEY'RE UP TOO! :)

Day 3 was another very busy day in Saudi Arabia! We woke up at 6am as always, had an amazing breakfast at our fancy hotel and hit the road by 7am or so. Our first stop was King Abdulaziz's old palace. He is the King that unified Saudi Arabia and really established it as a nation, kind of like a George Washington figure for them.

The Saudi's George Washington.

I'm not sure what to compare this palace to because in America all the Presidents live in the White House, but imagine if every president got his own White House while in office and thats what Saudi Arabian King's Palaces are like. Each gets his own, but the old palace before him is just left as a museum.

A model of King Abdulaziz's Palace.

Across from this palace was a museum all about Saudi Arabian history and culture. I was in heaven! Dr. Qureshi and I were way behind the group because I wanted to read and understand everything! They had so many things that I loved! It was around this time that Dr. Qureshi started telling me that I should look into the Middle Eastern Studies/ Arabic (MESA) Major at BYU. I had already been accepted to BYU, but I didn't know what I would study or major in. Looking back it was around the time of the museum and day 3 that I really started thinking about it!

After the palace and museum we went back to the hotel for lunch and to rest. I was so tired that I just napped through lunch and slept for 4 hours! It was a combination of jet lag, late nights, early mornings, busy days, and the heat which sucks the energy right out of you!

That night we again went to a scout camp where we rode camels, horses, and raced ATVs. The camels were terrifying! To get up or down the camel seemed to want to buck you off, it was almost like bull riding to me!

I pretended I was awesome... I wasnt.

Then with ATV racing, we had a couple people who were very good and a few that were very bad... I was part of the very bad. I like to go fast and speed, but I'm not very good at technical courses, especially in sand.

Racing ATVs.

As you can see, I'm not very good...

After a while the Saudi Scouts wanted to play soccer, much to the American's horror. We said we would play, but when we huddled up to start the game we asked each other if anyone had every played before. Some of us had played in Elementary school, so they were the leaders of our team. I had only played one year of soccer when I was 5 or 6, but that made me instantly "good". Once the game started the Saudi's got 2 quick goals, and after that I'm pretty sure they went easy on us. They even gave us one of their better players...but we still lost 4-1.

After soccer we went into the cafeteria for a few snacks and drinks while we met many of the Scouts from this camp. Soon we were taken to the game room while dinner was being prepared and we had a great time playing foosball, pool, and ping pong. I love foosball and have gotten pretty good since I have one at home, so I naturally went to play that in the room. Soon I had made a team with one of the Saudi Scouts (I really wish I could remember his name!) and we were unstoppable. He was great at goalie, and I got a few shots in and we were the undefeated team!

The Saudi Scouts soon had to pray to Mecca, so us Americans hung out for a little while, but once the Saudi's came back it was dinner time. It was a very traditional meal, and I loved it! I don't remember exactly what we had, but I do remember it was one of my favorite meals of the trip!

We soon were entertained by the Scouts and a Magician. One of the scouts was very good at sound imitations and it made everyone laugh! The magician was very good, and he did tricks that I had never seen before in America! We also looked at some of the scout's artwork and I was very impressed. Soon we had to leave because a sand storm was coming and we needed to beat it back home to the hotel. We exchanged pins and badges, then ran to the cars.

I was pretty scared of the sandstorm, because all I knew of sandstorms was from Hollywood, like Hildago. In the movie a sandstorm is right behind him and all the other people get buried alive in sand. So as we were driving I was thinking me life was in danger, but it turned out it wasn't imminent death. It mostly just got very hard to see and hard to drive. It was like thick fog vision and ice-like slippery roads mixed together.

What I thought sandstorms were like.

I learned a lot about their culture that day too. In my journal I talked about how I learned that Saudis don't celebrate birthdays. (Which is ironic because today is my birthday). I may not have understood this right, but they don't celebrate it because you only celebrate death, so celebrating your birthday is bad luck because they believe you'll die in that year. One of my Saudi friends has informed me that this isn't right. Not sure how I could have mixed that up, but on his comment below he has links to Wikipedia on how Muslims celebrate birthday :)

More things I learned...
-Muslims can have certain prayers. I was talking with Musa that morning and he said that at morning prayer they had a special rain prayer because it had been very dry lately.
-If a Muslim kills someone than you are either beheaded, pay a fine, or the victim's family doesn't press charges and forgives you. I learned this from one of the scouts whose cousin had killed someone. The victim's father asked for 5 million Riyals for payment, and the cousin did so now he is free.
-Also, like many Americans, Bible names are popular for Muslims too. My friend Musa, his name means Moses. And Abraham is Ibrahim. I thought that was awesome!

Musa! (Which means Moses.)

-Saudi Arabian citizens also don't have to pay taxes. The King and Government don't really need more money, so they don't tax the people. That means that most prices aren't fixed, and most trading is bartering and debating.

I hope everyone is enjoying this series, and once again, sorry for the lack of pictures... come look at these posts in 9 days and they'll be tons :) I also hope that through this blog that everyone can appreciate and understand Saudi Arabia more! I love this country and the wonderful people in it!

(Stay tuned for Part 4 soon!)