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Much of that echoes with me. I spent a lot of my teenage years in Dhahran as my dad was a UK expat instructor pilot to the Saudi Air Force. Living on compounds

Much of that echoes with me. I spent a lot of my teenage years in Dhahran as my dad was a UK expat instructor pilot to the Saudi Air Force. Living on compounds with swimming pools, endless sunshine, homebrew and smuggled pork products are features of a few of the childhood memories I cherish, that most around me in the UK don't have. We crossed paths with Aramco families occasionally as there weren't exactly many other reasons for Westerners to be there. The US influences were striking to me, while things like segregation in restaurants were a little jarring even as a child mostly sitting in the family section, it gave me an exposure to US brands I still don't have in the UK. We get quite a few McDonalds but Dhahran had Fuddruckers, Baskin Robbins, Taco Bell, Wendy's - it was like being Charlie in the Chocolate Factory to me at the time. These were places I had only heard of from movies, something we still had in Saudi despite the lack of cinemas - one of the houses on the compound had bookcases full of pirate VHS tapes where we'd spend ages choosing from just the titles printed on labels. We left before 9/11. I've no idea what, if any, is left of that life. Odd to read about it here, news coverage of the Kingdom is very one dimensional.

david_draco 7y ago
How did the Saudi attack on 9/11/2001 change your view of the country? Similar to the author of the article?
- cs02rm0 7y ago
  I'm not sure it did, immediately. We'd had the Khobar Towers bombing, my dad was in the first Gulf War and even before that I remember him checking under the car in the UK for devices before we could get in because of the IRA. So I was already aware it was a relatively messed up part of the world, but separately terrorism and plane crashes were perhaps already more part of my worldview than for most people. I felt slightly numb to it compared to those around me at the time if I'm honest. I think it was probably the wider Western reaction to 9/11 rather than my own, that meant I increasingly viewed Saudi as a more isolated, riskier place. Since then overheard comments about how you never saw anyone in a wheelchair have reverberated over the years with more meaning as an adult hearing about human rights records and becoming a father has moved me further from any personal desire to return. I always found the people we met genuinely welcoming and kind though, as is so often the case when you meet individuals rather than succumb to broad strokes. On that level I think the relationship went deeper than oil but we've undone a lot of that. When I hear about things like beginning to issue tourist visas or even just getting the Ruiz Joshua fight it leaves me hopeful that in time we'll overcome the divisions that seem apparent despite talk of special relationships.
zhoujianfu 7y ago
Me too.. I lived in Riyadh in 84-86 and 89-91 as a 3rd, 4th, 8th, and 9th grader, first on the Saudi British Bank compound, and finally at the end in the Diplomatic Quarter. I always thought as a kid Saudi Arabia was one of the "good guys", as allies to the U.S., despite their strange customs and obviously stupid rules about women driving and covering up. Nowadays I wish the U.S. did not ally with any country that is run by a dictator, and/or hasn't separated church from state.

david_draco 7y ago

How did the Saudi attack on 9/11/2001 change your view of the country? Similar to the author of the article?

cs02rm0 7y ago
I'm not sure it did, immediately. We'd had the Khobar Towers bombing, my dad was in the first Gulf War and even before that I remember him checking under the car in the UK for devices before we could get in because of the IRA. So I was already aware it was a relatively messed up part of the world, but separately terrorism and plane crashes were perhaps already more part of my worldview than for most people. I felt slightly numb to it compared to those around me at the time if I'm honest. I think it was probably the wider Western reaction to 9/11 rather than my own, that meant I increasingly viewed Saudi as a more isolated, riskier place. Since then overheard comments about how you never saw anyone in a wheelchair have reverberated over the years with more meaning as an adult hearing about human rights records and becoming a father has moved me further from any personal desire to return. I always found the people we met genuinely welcoming and kind though, as is so often the case when you meet individuals rather than succumb to broad strokes. On that level I think the relationship went deeper than oil but we've undone a lot of that. When I hear about things like beginning to issue tourist visas or even just getting the Ruiz Joshua fight it leaves me hopeful that in time we'll overcome the divisions that seem apparent despite talk of special relationships.

zhoujianfu 7y ago

Me too.. I lived in Riyadh in 84-86 and 89-91 as a 3rd, 4th, 8th, and 9th grader, first on the Saudi British Bank compound, and finally at the end in the Diplomatic Quarter. I always thought as a kid Saudi Arabia was one of the "good guys", as allies to the U.S., despite their strange customs and obviously stupid rules about women driving and covering up. Nowadays I wish the U.S. did not ally with any country that is run by a dictator, and/or hasn't separated church from state.