At 6:45 pm, I check my mail and see the offer letter attached for the post of a Senior Analyst in one of the most reputed audit firms in the world. The pay wasn’t much of a concern, but what was of concern was the fact that the posting was in this great hinterland - the abode of Muslim faith- The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. I had been in the banking industry for around 3 years then, and the getting into the corporate side of things was a welcome break. Not that I knew what was in store for me, but getting out of the current bank job preceded any other reason.
The next thing that I did, was to Google “Living in Saudi Arabia” and the search comes up results that had a lasting and a profound impact on my psyche. All about Muttawahs (the religious police), the Saudi life style, and the profile of the job, all created a feeling which was reminiscent to the fear, a child gets when he bids goodbye to his mother, who has accompanied him the first time to school.
I board the flight and as I am about to reach King Khalid Airport at Riyadh, I am asked to fill a disembarkation form which has a Skelton – face and two bones criss-crossing each other, and a message that reads, “Death sentence for Drug traffickers”, the message had done its job. An initial jitter had gone through my spine and was thinking that I should have listened to my mother when she had asked me to lock the zip. As a person who had flown to Dubai a few times, air travel had been a piece of cake until that moment. Reached safely and the next day was greeted by a colleague from the Audit firm, who introduced himself as Ahmed Kamran a.k.a AK, and wanted to take me for lunch. It was a surprise as I was not used to any welcome lunch or dinner before my first day in office.
AK was a polished personality tall, half-bearded with his beard finely cut and shaped. He was wearing a black t-shirt and jean (little did I realize then that he always wore black t-shirts, I presume he had lots of those). AK gives me a walk-through on the new employer, their style of working and the people there. True to his personality he takes me to one of the best Italian restaurant in town. An Indian born desi taken to an Italian joint!! Well the closest I had been to Italy was when my mother used to make kheer using pasta for my birthday. But this was turning out to be a totally different experience. Made myself comfortable and the menu card came with words which was a literary delight. With a whole lot of polished words enticing you to try one of their Italian delight. Frankly speaking I went through the menu card twice looking for rice, dal and curd but all in vain.
Well, was getting used to the cutlery and the table manners and the fork fell twice on the floor, and the pastas could never make it to the fork. Had a half- hearted meal and went hungry the whole evening.
AK was a person who wanted the best of things for himself and his friends. Money was of little concern as long as there was quality. He was witty and all his wittiness ended in a sentence and the whole crowd, if they had understood his joke would go berserk. But the only thing that I hated was when he said “It’s complicated” when he wanted to avoid someone. I didn’t realize it then but overtime it got amply clear.
Life went off ok at this new place. Was working under a new manager and a lot of new friends and environment and things went quite smooth. A few months passed away until I came to know from a colleague that a new gentleman was joining in a few days. The man completed his education from Australia and the US of A and was a mallu. Riyyas joined a few days later and was getting adjusted to his new environment. We used to call him bunny for the way he looked and surely was Mr. Cool. He had an air of confidence around him and people were quite happy with him. As time passed the three of us got together pretty well. We had lunch together with the “Bens” (Riyyas couldn’t pronounce Bun) and cheese (low fat as AK was health conscious) and we used to walk along to the nearest supermarket to get them. This went on until summer, after which Riyyas and me convinced our manager to take us to a restaurant or his house in his car.
