Soon I am standing in front of a man who is handling my personal items. For a moment he is stern, but soon he is chatting cordially, asking questions about my background. He surprises me when he asks, "Do you look like your mother? Do you look like your father?" He listens intently as though I am giving him American state secrets when I tell him, "Neither really, although I have my mother's blonde hair and light eyes."
"That's good," he says with a big smile. "Your father is lucky to have a blonde wife." His eyes sparkle in friendliness. "He is the father of a beautiful blonde daughter, too."
His conversation takes his attention away from his job and he fails to properly search my bags. In fact, four of my eight bags remain closed for inspection. I am taken aback when he questions me on personal matters, such as where I will work and if I have a boyfriend.
The moment grows awkward for me, but the official is happily chatting and doesn't seem to notice that I do not respond to many questions.
Finally, with a friendly wave he wishes me off, "Have a good time in my country." His smile grows wider. "Perhaps I will see you when you travel again?"
I don't respond. I hear my name called and look to see that my travel companions are gathering at the departure area. I point them out to the Yemeni baggage worker as I rush to join my group. We have been met by a cheerful Egyptian named Mousa. Mousa is a giant of a man with a broad smile. He proudly relates that he is the head of the King Faisal Travel Department. Mousa guides us to a bus that has been provided by the hospital.
It's late in the evening and I'm relieved that the drive across the busy city takes less than thirty minutes. I shift my thoughts to consider where I am going to spend most of my life over the next two years. The King Faisal Medical City is in reality a small but self-sufficient city inside the bustling municipality of Riyadh. The hospital is said to be one of the world's most up-to date centers of medical science and technology. The Medical City complex consists of the hospital, residential and recreational areas for the hospital staff, and an engineering services complex consisting of electrical, water, sewer and air-conditioning plants.
We soon arrive, but I am so tired that I notice very little.
When housing units are assigned I learn that I'll live in a three-bedroom apartment in Medical City Village (MCV) with two other unmarried women who have been hired to work at the medical institution. Joy is an attractive blonde American woman who is a skilled medical technician in radiology. Jenny is a nurse, a dark-skinned, beautiful woman originally from Sri Lanka who holds a British passport.
The accommodations are plain but adequate. The unit has a basic kitchen, combined living and dining room, three bedrooms, and one full bath and a half bath. This will do, I tell myself, as I make a grateful mental note that both roommates appear cordial. Despite the necessity to co-exist in small quarters, I believe that we will get along easily. I'm even more optimistic when I learn that both Joy and Jenny are also non-smokers.
We all rush to disappear behind closed doors into our individual bedrooms. My mind is still racing but I force myself to close my eyes and summon sleep.
Chapter Three: Allah Akbar
I am abruptly awakened by the sound of a loud but sonorous male voice. "Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar!" I rub my eyes. Why is a man wailing?
Then I know that I am hearing a muezzin, the Muslim cleric assigned the job of calling the faithful to pray. Evidently there is a mosque very near our apartment building. It is sunrise and time for the first prayer of the day. We have been told that the Saudi government builds mosques in every neighborhood in the kingdom so that the faithful can walk to prayer. With five prayers each day, I can understand the need.
Enormously enchanted by the muezzin's haunting cry, I instinctively know then that I have made the right decision to accept a job in a foreign land. Any previous doubts are pushed aside at leaving my small-town life to travel around the world and live in a land ruled by kings.
I continue to listen to the call to pray, a prayer that is repeated in hundreds of thousands of mosques all over the world:
Allah Akbar! (God is most great!) Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar!
I bear witness that there is no God but Allah. I bear witness that
there is no God but Allah. I bear witness that there is no God but Allah.
I bear witness that Muhammed is the Apostle of Allah! I bear witness that
Muhammed is the Apostle of Allah! I bear witness that Muhammed is the Apostle of Allah!
Come to prayer! Come to prayer! Come to prayer!
Come to success! Come to success! Come to success!
Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar!
There is no God but Allah!
It feels magical to me to know that five times each day, nearly a billion believing Muslims are reciting the same prayer and are synchronized in the same postures, all across the slow-turning earth.
I return to bed and fall asleep. A few hours later, my excitement overcomes my fatigue when I rush from the apartment to join the other new hires that traveled with me from Nashville and London. We are to be taken via bus on a short tour of the desert city.
First we take a quick drive past the hospital, the place I will spend six out of seven days a week. The hospital is built of unusual tawny-shaded stones that have been perfectly fitted to form the exterior wall, giving it a golden hue. A circular driveway takes us past a decorative water fountain. The hospital is surrounded by carefully tended grounds carpeted with immense beds of green bushes and vividly colored flowers, something I did not expect in the middle of a desert.
The King Faisal Hospital and Research Center, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
The King Faisal Hospital and Research Center at dusk
We leave the vast hospital complex and travel Riyadh's main streets, which are modern boulevards. Enormous construction projects are ongoing and fill the skyline with hundreds of gigantic building cranes. The sight of endless building cranes causes a lot of talk in the bus. The shiny exteriors of modern skyscrapers mirror neighboring mud dwellings. Riyadh is nothing like I had expected.
The name Riyadh is the plural of rowdhah, an Arabic word which means an area where grass can be found for grazing camels or sheep. To simplify matters, the city became commonly known as "the gardens." Riyadh was part of a series of villages along the Wadi Hanifa. Although surrounded by sand on three sides, it grew into a walled city and a trading post on the historic route to Mecca.
During the drive to the downtown area, our guide provides us with additional facts and figures about the country, the citizens, and about proper Muslim etiquettes.
The monotone of our guide's voice is difficult to follow from my seat near the back of the bus. Her words fade and my attention drifts, my curiosity occasionally piqued by intriguing scenes along the city streets.
White-thobed men are sauntering up and down the sidewalks. Many of the men are paired and walk hand-in-hand. I know from my reading that such intimacy between men is not uncommon in this part of the world and signifies only friendship without any sexual component.
There is only a smattering of veiled women present. I search, but I cannot find a single uncovered Arab female face.
Some women are sitting on the sidewalks, staring at a passing world through the black gauze of their veils. For a Westerner unaccustomed to Saudi customs, the image of veiled Saudi women proves addictive. I really cannot stop staring at female forms covered in black gauze and long cloaks sweeping the streets.
We soon arrive at Dira Square, where the famous clock tower comes into view. This square has been nicknamed "Chop-Chop Square" by foreigners. I'm told that I'm looking at a macabre place where the kingdom's criminals lose hands, feet, and heads. I find it ironic that the Palace of Justice sits on the square. Saudi Arabia is a country that places the welfare of the society above the welfare of the individual. Crime rates are low and government officials attribute their country's enviable crime statistics to the swift punishment doled out to criminals.
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Dira Square, famous in Riyadh as the square where criminals are punished by amputation.
When our guide points out the Musmak Fortress, a dried mud citadel in the center of old Riyadh, my imagination soars, taking me back to the dramatic saga that imbued the dynasty of the al Saud family. I know from my reading that during the raid, a spear was heaved so forcefully that nearly one hundred years later that ancient weapon is still lodged in the doorway. I feel the enthusiasm of a child, wanting to see that spear for myself.
Although the kingdom has benefited by its unification, in many ways the citizens of the kingdom have paid dearly for the victory of the al-Saud, the family that pulled the country together and which still rules it. To succeed with his plans to conquer all of Arabia, founder Abdul Aziz enlisted the religious zealots to his cause, creating a special unit of religious police.
That first-formed unit of fanatics grew into what is now known as the religious police, the Mutawain, austere men with an abominable record of human misery trailing their thobes.
The king and his Wahhabi followers condemned everything they did not understand. Under Abdul Aziz, the harshest interpretations of the Koran became law. Applying the most severe tenets of Islam, these ignorant men even dismantled a highly developed legal system in the Hejaz and shut down the civil courts.
There were many bloody episodes when this band of cruel Wahhabi defended the faith with the sword, plunging it into the unbeliever's belly as far as possible.
Envisioning the violence of sharp swords meeting human flesh, I jump in surprise when someone touches my shoulder and says, "Jean. Let's go."
We disembark the bus to stroll through the old shopping bazaar.
Perhaps I'll see one of the religious police, the Mutawain. I've been told that the merciless men can be recognized by their henna-dyed beards and their ankle-length thobes. I'm also warned that many of the men carry a camel whip or a thick stick to beat people. These are the men who have been appointed responsible for the morals of all people residing in the kingdom, including foreign workers.
I will be on the lookout.
But all thoughts of mean-tempered religious police quickly diminish in the face of the colorful human drama that unfolds before my eyes. A welter of cries in many tongues encharges this new environment.
Unsmiling money changers lounge behind small wooden desks, quietly tidying mounds of international currencies scattered in jumbled piles.
The aroma of the spice souk drifts out of an alleyway, overwhelming my nostrils with unfamiliar pungent odors. A woman in our party generates enthusiasm after purchasing a tiny bag of frankincense.
Multicolored Damascus silks swing from the ceiling, swaying in a light breeze side by side with the black cloaks and veils worn by Saudi women.
Bedouin daggers, tarnished spears, and antique firearms hang along walls. Brightly colored and authentic camel bags conceal silver-decorated wooden chests. Wooden camel milk bowls lie in disorderly piles.
The carpet souk brings to mind ancient tales from The Arabian Nights. In one open stall, a mountain of rolled carpets lies stacked in dusty neglect while the raffish owner sits cross-legged in a corner, his darting eyes filled with cunning, scrutinizing the crowd for sign of a potential client.
We have been forewarned by our guide that we are expected to enter into a lively bargaining process with shopkeepers for any item in the souks.
Our fascinating but brief introduction to the merchant sector of the city ends quickly when our guide says it is time to return to the bus.
I depart without complaint, knowing that I will have at least two years to explore this land, the customs, and the inhabitants.
Chapter Four: A Hospital Fit for a King
Soon we arrive at the hospital, large glass doors slide silently open as we eagerly push, wide-eyed, through the front entrance to behold the most beautiful hospital in the kingdom, maybe in the world. The finest materials were used; deep plush carpets make you feel that you are walking on air and it's rumored that gold was used in vast quantities through the entire building.
After leaving college, I worked for six years in a hospital in the United States; the hustle and bustle of this royal hospital feels comforting and familiar.
Many Saudi male visitors to the hospital walk through the lobby wearing bewildered expressions, searching for the correct department. A few men are trailed by three or four women. The women's expressions are unknown because they are all veiled.
Main Lobby of the plush King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Centre. A view Jean Sasson saw every day.
All patients were Saudi in national dress, only the occasional staff member clothed in hospital uniform or western dress broke the kaleidoscope of men in brilliant white starched thobes with red-and –white-checkered thobes; the women concealed head to foot in black abaayas appeared like black specters moving respectfully behind their men, their masters.
The King Faisal Hospital and Research Centre is a specialist hospital built especially by Saudi Arabia's third king, King Faisal, to supplement the care provided by existing general hospitals within the kingdom. Other than certain members of the royal family, and employees of the hospital, every patient admitted into the hospital has been referred from another institution or from a high-ranking member of the royal family. The hospital only has two hundred and fifty admitting beds, so medical admissions are at a premium and greatly coveted by all Saudis.
The extended corridor of the hospital seems a mile long, diverging into areas reserved for administration, specialty medical clinics, private patients' rooms, rehabilitation services, dining facilities, and a pharmacy. Because of the large expatriate community, there's a multitude of conveniences for employees, including recreation areas and even a bank. Before oil money flowed freely, there were few doctors or medical clinics in the kingdom. The ill and dying had little hope of receiving up-to-date medical treatment. Popular treatments were often barbaric.
A cancerous tumor might be removed with a dagger.
Abdominal discomfort was treated by drinking the urine of a camel.
If pain became intense, cautery was the only treatment. Bottles or daggers were held over open flames then held against the parts of the body traditional Bedouin doctors' regarded as appropriate for the illness they were treating. Even tiny infants and young children were cauterized.
Ruling a land where a simple flesh wound could deliver a slow and agonizing death, King Faisal dreamed of building the finest medical facility in the world. He wanted every Saudi, rich or poor, to have access to the most advanced medical care possible.
As early as 1965, Faisal donated one million square meters of his own land for the hospital site. Although a thrifty man, no expense was spared for his favorite project. Technology from around the world was imported to build, equip, and staff the sophisticated hospital.
As we walk through the luxurious hospital lobby to those sliding doors, suddenly I am within inches of King Faisal ibn Abdul Aziz al-Saud's face. I stand silently and stare at the official royal portrait of King Faisal. The illuminated portrait in mosaic consisting of lapis-lazuli and other semi-precious stones hang in the already imposing hospital entrance. Faisal, the third king of Saudi Arabia was a somber-faced man. Bushy black brows dominate his deeply lined brow. Heavy lids droop over large brown eyes that appear resolute yet are glazed with a sad weariness. His aggressive nose angles over a gray speckled mustache and goatee. An unmistakable stoicism lines his face, revealing a lifetime accumulation of disillusionments. His hands held before his face in constant prayer silently speak of his devotion to his God and to his people.
Many believe that under King Faisal's watchful eye, Saudi Arabia was more wisely governed than any other time in the kingdom's history. In his determination to pull Saudi Arabia into the modern world, he made thousands of enemies and an equal number of friends. In one of the bitterest moments in modern Arabian history, this dedicated man was shot to death by one of his nephews. Murdered only
three years before, shortly before the grand opening of the medical facility, King Faisal never saw the exciting result of his dream.
A gentle hand is laid on my shoulder. "Jean, it's time to visit a few more departments now." I turn to see a friendly smile freely given from one of my new acquaintances.
Walking past the admitting office, I am a witness to a heartbreaking scene. A young Bedouin girl, who looks to be ten or eleven years old, is squirming while sitting in a wheelchair. The child is in obvious pain. I quickly ascertain that she is an incoming patient waiting to be admitted into the hospital.
She lifts her head.
I gasp and fling one hand over my mouth. Before my eyes is a human nightmare. The child's face is hideous. A grisly mass of blue-and red-tinged flesh covers one eye, her nose, and even edges into her mouth! How is it possible for this child to eat any solid food? I notice that her lips move slightly and silently as though she is praying.
A Bedouin man wearing a soiled thobe stands beside her. A veiled woman stands to the side.
Suddenly the girl's unaffected eye meets my dismayed gaze.
Caught with my expression of horror, I'm acutely embarrassed, yet I can't pull my attention away from this young girl.
I overhear a doctor speaking in English to a translator. "Tell her parents that their daughter's surgery is scheduled for tomorrow. I believe her tumor is non-malignant. After we remove the tumor, she will be scheduled for plastic surgery to repair the damage." He kindly comforts the father with the good news, "She will soon return with you to your village and resume a normal life."