This is a weird start of the week on
a Saturday with Sunday being off. Daily routine continues nothing
changes except for the fact that yes, Sunday is an off.
Given the extended weekend with just 1 day of holiday...lot of folks were off. Given a bit relaxed time, we left office on time and decided to checkout on Executive Apartments in one of the leading hotel chains. Some of the folks here in team want to cook themselves and wanted a different kind of room experience. We went over, where another member of team had booked in, rooms were decent but I was more interesting to explore the area about a Kilometer away from that names Hara, famous in this part for its confluence of cultures from Sub-continent, namely India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.
On reaching Hara one thing we realized, this was so unlike Riyadh that we have seen so far. It was another place may be from some backlanes of Kolkata or further Dhaka, but I have not seen Dhaka so cannot say. The boards are not just in Arabic and Hindi, shops have boards mostly in Bengali. Some rare shops have it in Malayalam, but its Bengali which predominates in this area. People are roaming in the region like some chaal on outskirts of Mumbai. Cars parked just like that, vegetable vendors extending shops like they do in sub continent and am sure a local resident from Saudi will feel like a foreigner in this place. Long unwinding lane of gridlock traffic and a herd of human bodies jostling for space, this when its not even a weekend. Eateries dishing out Sub continental fare (finding anything else was difficult)...this place was overcrowding and over flowing with masses everywhere and small nukad groups at every corner. We were not even sure if they all were legal immigrants. Some good food, but lack of choices if you are vegetarianian in the region.
We headed back to the serviced hotel room of the friend shortly and after a coffee back to our hotel. Roads as on other days later in the night packed, but more so today as tomorrow its Saudi National day. People and kids on car tops, sitting on doors waiving Saudi flag and shouting all along the route. Driving even for a distance of 6-7 Kms is not easy. We reached hotel and were off. We know tomorrow evening we can watch spectacular crowds on streets, particularly Thahiliya, Olaya etc and have booked a table in a road side cafe to watch this. Staying in central Riyadh just a few steps away from Olaya street allows us to experience this luxury. Lets see what tomorrow brings.
Given the extended weekend with just 1 day of holiday...lot of folks were off. Given a bit relaxed time, we left office on time and decided to checkout on Executive Apartments in one of the leading hotel chains. Some of the folks here in team want to cook themselves and wanted a different kind of room experience. We went over, where another member of team had booked in, rooms were decent but I was more interesting to explore the area about a Kilometer away from that names Hara, famous in this part for its confluence of cultures from Sub-continent, namely India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.
On reaching Hara one thing we realized, this was so unlike Riyadh that we have seen so far. It was another place may be from some backlanes of Kolkata or further Dhaka, but I have not seen Dhaka so cannot say. The boards are not just in Arabic and Hindi, shops have boards mostly in Bengali. Some rare shops have it in Malayalam, but its Bengali which predominates in this area. People are roaming in the region like some chaal on outskirts of Mumbai. Cars parked just like that, vegetable vendors extending shops like they do in sub continent and am sure a local resident from Saudi will feel like a foreigner in this place. Long unwinding lane of gridlock traffic and a herd of human bodies jostling for space, this when its not even a weekend. Eateries dishing out Sub continental fare (finding anything else was difficult)...this place was overcrowding and over flowing with masses everywhere and small nukad groups at every corner. We were not even sure if they all were legal immigrants. Some good food, but lack of choices if you are vegetarianian in the region.
We headed back to the serviced hotel room of the friend shortly and after a coffee back to our hotel. Roads as on other days later in the night packed, but more so today as tomorrow its Saudi National day. People and kids on car tops, sitting on doors waiving Saudi flag and shouting all along the route. Driving even for a distance of 6-7 Kms is not easy. We reached hotel and were off. We know tomorrow evening we can watch spectacular crowds on streets, particularly Thahiliya, Olaya etc and have booked a table in a road side cafe to watch this. Staying in central Riyadh just a few steps away from Olaya street allows us to experience this luxury. Lets see what tomorrow brings.
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