Gigli's Trip to Another Planet Part 3

Sheraton Al Hada Hotel

The Islamic philosophy about injuries and accidents became evident to me when I received, as a patient, a lady from Mecca who was related to a Saudi soldier. In SA, if you are related to a member of the military, you are eligible for medical care in a military hospital facility. Now, I know that there must have been neurosurgeons in Mecca, but I was glad to see a patient. The chief of surgery was a Turk and a Muslim, so he rode with the ambulance, the fifty or so miles to Mecca. Outside of Mecca, there is an expressway bypass for non-muslins, as only Muslims can enter the city. This patient was to teach me a lot about how accidents were handled in SA under Islamic philosophy.

The idea is that any event that happens is "God's Will", and to interfere with his will is a big mistake. The lady had been injured in an auto accident several days before. How long she remained at the scene, I do not know, but she did lie on a stretcher in a Mecca hospital for about two days without an IV, etc. After that, she was referred to Al Hada because she was an aunt of a soldier. Then it was OK for us to treat her. Well, the poor thing needed some fluids, etc., and then she should have had a CAT scan. The CAT scan was still being installed, so it was unavailable. Therefore, we did it like the pre-CAT scan days. We put in some burr holes on both sides of her skull. It turned out that she had no surgical lesion or increased intracranial pressure, so the medical people took her over. I spoke with her family again through an interperter after the surgery was over. I told the interperter to relay to them that this patient was not likely to make a good recovery, if indeed, she lived. The lady interperter said that she could not tell them all that at once, but that they should be told over several days. That point became moot, as she died some hours later.

Such things as "God's Will" became a source of some relief for me in that unless I were to deliberately do someone harm, as in a criminal act, there was no such thing as malpractice in SA. Bad results are viewed as faultless. Instead, it is God's Will, and nobody would blame God. The hospital had its own mosque, but in SA, no one but a Muslim can enter a mosque. During prayer times, it was common to see men on their knees facing Mecca to pray. I saw one such man in the hospital parking lot. I later bought a prayer rug to take home. It made an excellent floor mat for my car at the time. I don't think that God minded that at all.

Evenings and weekends were free, and since I had no patients in the hospital most of the time, I could go with Handley and Loren (Loren had purchased a classic old Mercedes and gotten a Saudi driver's license) into downtown Taif. Most of the city was in a state of perpetual construction, since in February, it was to be the site of a Pan-Islamic Conference. The areas of the souq and the nearby street where the telephone exchange was located were open to all. The souq quickly became our favorite place. Maybe one should use the word souq in the pleural because it was like a department store. A clothing souq, a money souq, a gold souq, a food souq,etc. This area was much like an open air market with stalls and small buildings holding all sorts of merchandise.

The three of us frequently ate in the souq in the evening. The crowds were thick, but as non-believers, when all faithful knelt at prayer time, we could easily move about and get ahead of people in lines, etc. One of our favorite places to eat was "Dirty Thobes", a hole in the wall joint where a friendly Arab in a dirty thobe (the robe worn by Arab males) acted as a sort of barker out front in the street. I think that he was also the cook. He became familiar with us, even though we could not converse, to the point that he would invite us into the kitchen to pick out what we wanted. Giant pots full of rice, potatoes, etc. were there. Usually this, along with a broiled chicken was fine. He never understood why we always refused the salad. The vegetables in SA are gorgeous, but are fertilized with "night water", or raw sewage. No one of us ever got a GI problem, but we were judicious in our intake. Foreigners must adjust there thinking about flies in SA. They are everywhere, and you can become used to them. Thobe's had asingle cold water sink to one side where we washed our hands before eating. All the Saudi customers ate with their hands and washed AFTER they finished. After a meal there, we could go to another spot in the souq to have a delicious crepe-like dish made of a crepe, bananas, sugar, and butter, all rolled together and steamed. Other dishes that we sampled were a Saudi hot dog, which was what everyone knows now as a Kebap. We found Tabasco sauce in SA along with these. I have often tried to reproduce the wonderful rice dish at Dirty Thobe's place. It had whole cloves, cardamons tumeric, and all sorts of spices in it, and I could eat it by the bowl. Along with our meals we always had alcohol-free beer. I never realized how many beer companies made this beer for export to SA. Try Schlitz, Miller, etc. for example. Dirty Thobe would step next door to a kiosk and fetch it for us. While in the souq, I usually would buy dates and olives, both of which I snacked on out of my room refrigerator. They were delicious!

The souq held many other things besides food. Handley and I bought thobes for ourselves, as well as the head dress typical of Arab men. There were camel skin bags big enough to carry a small child, all sorts of electronics and tapes. Tapes were openly counterfeited while you waited. Gold at that time was about eight hundred dollars an ounce. In SA gold is sold by the gram, so you pay for the weight and not the workmanship. SA women have arms full of gold bracelets. I wanted a fifty Peso Mexican gold coin to take home, so I enquired around and found a young man who knew where I could buy one. He took me by the hand and led me to a place in the gold souq. I will always remember being led down the street, holding hands with a young man, while Loren ran along behind us laughing. It is accepted in SA, for males to hold hands while walking. That would have never flown in Alabama. Anyway, I got the coin.

In Taif, as in all SA cities and towns, there were small open storefronts with tables and open double tiered seats like bunk beds where men congregated to drink sweet tea and smoke Hooflahs. These contraptions were small to huge and consisted of a column of brass set on a pot filled with water, and a tube leading to a mouthpiece. One puts a sweeted tobacco in the top, lights it, and then puffs away. I found one of these in a souq and brought it and a can of the tobacco home to the states. Phone calls to the USA were at a premium, but once a week, I could go to the phone souq, wait in a room full of folks, and then make a pre-paid call.

The role of women gets and has gotten, a lot of press in the western world. In SA, women are restricted in public. You see no Saudi woman in public not covered, face, arms, and legs. Western women are advised to cover all but the face. A woman's bare legs are subject to being sprayed with black paint by the religious police if seen. Women do not go out in public alone. They must be with other women or a husband. An unmarried woman with a man without a chaperone woman along is considered an adulteress or prostitute, both are which are a no-no. Women do not work or drive cars, and this applies to western women also. In the compounds, this can cause a lot of distress among wives. Unless they have a job teaching, they play bridge. It is a hard existence for them otherwise. On the other hand, I have seen men driving a car with one or more women in the back seat, shaking fingers at him and verbally giving him the devil. You never acknowledge a man's wife either in public or by asking her health, etc. in private. I am told that behind the door of a family home, it is another matter entirely regarding male-female relationship. The woman is boss. The Koran has specifics on men and women. Their children belong to the man. The man is obligated to care for his wives, no matter how many. Divorce is his prerogative, but he should see that his former wife does not go hungry, etc. If she has been unfaithful, that is another matter.

Saudi punishments are severe and delivered by Islamic law. One pays "blood money" for manslaughter. At the time I was in the kingdom, it was thirty thousand dollars or equivalent. Theft is punished by removal of the right hand with a sword. The right hand is always used for eating and shaking hands. The left is used only for personal hygiene, so this is a stigma for life. Adultery is punished by stoning. The person to be stoned is buried up to the chin, and people are encouraged to thrown softball sized stones at the head. If one can extricate themselves before losing consciousness, one if free (but likely has a bad headache). Murder is punished by beheading, always with a confession of the guilty. This is done with a sword and always, as with all punishments, on Friday afternoons after prayers. If the victim's family forgives the murder, the life may be spared. There are no appeals otherwise, and punishment is swift (usually the week of the deed). Punishments are public and youngsters and foreigners are pushed to the front so they may see well. So much for deterrence! The executioner for Taif also happened to be the head gardener at the hospital, so I saw him often in his "other job". He was aid to be an excellent swordsman with a clean cut always. I never saw any punishment, but we christened the spot "Chop Chop Square". There were several beheadings in Mecca and Ryhad while I was in the country as reported in the newspaper.

Regular paydays were held in the hospital, and of course were popular events. On my first payday, I went down to the basement mail room where the salaries were paid. To my surprise, the man in the cashier's cage pushed a huge stack of Saudi Ryals to me. It was more than I could fit into all my pockets, so I put the notes into a sack. There was no way to handle all this, so I took a few hundred Ryals for incidentals and headed off to the bank in Taif. The bank scene reminded me of the Jeddah airport. Total chaos with people pushing and shoving. Jumping lines is an accepted custom in SA, so it is like musical chairs sometimes. Anyway, while all this was going on, Bingo!, it was prayer time. I found myself standing amongst a floor full of praying Saudis. I simply went to the head of a teller's line and grabbed onto the bars at his gate. He arose after praying, and I was number one. He told me that for traveler's checks, I needed to go to the balcony and see another man. This man was an old Arab in a beautiful gray thobe who had good English. He fixed me up with US Dollar traveler's checks and took my Ryals. Then he said that "sometime soon" I should sign the checks. I did that at his desk. Where have you ever taken a blank traveler's check out of a bank without them insisting on this at once? Theft was not likely, but who takes chances?