FuN in the SanD

Last week, we revisted Thumamah, Riyadh's favourite desert "playground" during winter. The kids had the greatest time while all of us shivered like crazy coz it was damn cold. But I love it! My friends always said Im a crazy woman coz I love the cold weather. Cold weather makes you want to be cozy mozy.... I like! hehehe...

As Riyadh does not have beaches like Jeddah, people flock to the desert for leisure, best time to lepak is during afternoon when its cool and sunny. But by 5pm, its already freezing cold and dark. Last week it was like 5C during the evening. We rented a 'khemah' which cost between 600-800 for half day. Not bad if you share share with 3-4 families. ATVs rental cost like 50-80 riyals per hour depending on their cc and size.

The'khemah"

 Frezzing our B**t off!

It was a fun day and here's to many more desert picnic!

Err can I be a model? Model kasut?!

A Meadow in a Desert

                                     
Last weekend we went to this somewhat 'magical' place 100km from Riyadh; Rowdhat Al Khuraim.
It was magical because it is just like a meadow you find somewhere in Alice Wonderland world. After 4 years being in this desert land and the color yellow is what you see everyday, it was really refreshing to have a picnic in the lush greenery. On that day the wind was pretty cool too so it felt like spring in Europe. The only thing that reminds us we were in saudi was a herd of camels happily grazing the grass...

Saudi women threaten to breastfeed drivers

Now this is what I call CONTROVERSIAL NEWS!

I didnt know about this crazy thing till one of my friend in msia jokingly emailed me and asked if he can be a driver for princesses in saudi... hhmm, men! I asked him why and he said he heard there was a fatwa saying that saudi women are allowed to breastfeed their drivers to make them their sons! This is really crazy and embarrassing!
Off course I googled the news and here it is....

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News Society Saudi women threaten to breastfeed drivers
Jun 20, 2010 at 07:55
Breastfeed to bypass sex-mixing ban -scholar

DUBAI - Saudi women seem ready to adopt a controversial fatwa as they step up their campaign to achieve the right to drive in the conservative kingdom, UAE daily Gulf News reported on Sunday.

The fatwa, or religious ruling, allows women to breastfeed their drivers and turn them into their sons.

"We either be allowed to drive or breastfeed foreigners" will be the slogan of the campaign the women plan to launch, journalist Amal Zahid was quoted as saying in the newspaper.

Zahid said their decision follows a recent fatwa issued by a renowned scholar which said that Saudi women can breastfeed their foreign drivers for them to become their sons.

"As every Saudi family needs a driver, our campaign will focus on women's right to drive," she said.

A Saudi scholar last month suggested women donate their breast milk to men in an attempt to get around the kingdom’s ban on the mixing of unrelated men and women, and his words have sparked controversy.

Sheikh Abdul Mohsin al-Abaican, a consultant at the Saudi royal court, issued a fatwa stating there should be symbolic bond between unrelated men and women who regularly come into contact with each other.

Breast milk kinship is considered to be as good as a blood relationship in Islam, Gulf News said. Saudi woman Fatima al-Shammary, told a local Arabic daily, that the fatwa was "ridiculous and weird".

She added: "This fatwa has become a hot topic of debate among women. Is this is all that is left to us to do: to give our breasts to the foreign drivers?"

Another Saudi woman, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Gulf News: “Does Islam allow me to breastfeed a foreign man and prevent me from driving my own car? I have not breastfed my own children. How do you expect me to do this with a foreign man? What is this nonsense?"

Another woman said the fatwa should also apply to the husbands who should be breastfed by housemaids. By doing so, all will be brothers and sisters," she said.
(this really cracked me up!)
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By the way, it was clarified later that he meant that the breast milk is to be given in a cup, yeah, rite! It came a little bit too late coz this has somehow become a rather sad joke and gave bad impression on muslim women.

As far as my understanding, condition from the prophet are only for BABIES....NOT ADULT MEN!!!! The bonding of families happened only when you breastfeed babies only up to he/she is 2 years old or 3 times until the baby is full. Seriously, not matured adult men! If it involved adult men than thats already like those xxx rated movies!

It is indeed sad to see how this so called scholar can be sitting on the religious council :-(

On the other hand, I dont really understand why these saudi ladies wants to drive here. I bet many msians women would like to be in their shoes to be driven around by a driver. My msians frens and I are actually enjoying the fact that our hubbies need to drive us around :-)

Rasa macam 'mem" sometimes coz even when you want to buy a loaf of bread, your hubby needs to drive you to the grocery store, heh heh....

Imagine not having the tension being stuck in a traffic jam instead you are at the backseat checking your iphone or chatting with your friends. The fact that you can asked your driver to send you to the shopping mall anytime you want (thats what they do here), wait for you patiently (imagine if hubby has to wait for you-he will be fuming with fire!) pick you up in front of the mall, cool the car before you enter as you sit at the back of your luxury car. Also, as a mom, you dont need to pick up your kids to and fro from school or tuiton class or anywhere everyday! You dont need to go to the market, carry those heavy groceries bags! Its actually a luxurious way of living compared to other women elsewhere! .... Well, people always think that the grass is greener on the other side!

On the other hand, maybe the saudi women wants the freedom to drive because all the other women in the world have the freedom to do so. Well, its gonna be interesting to know their feedback if the day comes. I guess the excitement will be short lived and they may want to go back to being Ms Daisy.

Janadriyah Festival

Since we lived here for the past 3 years, this is the first time we visited Janadriyah festival. At first hubby was reluctant to go esp. when he heard the crowd was huge coz hubby is not a great fan of being hurdled in a crowd. However after we saw pictures posted on facebook by some of our friends, rasa teruja pulak nak pegi. It was the perfect timing as hubby was off on sat.I bet if we had to go during the weekend,(here weekends falls on Thurs and Fri) I would not be successful in coaxing him to go! Sure enuff, the crowd was average on Saturday and we had a very relaxing and enjoyable day.


Janadriyah festival is a rich cultural presentation of the past and present of Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It is held once a year, usually between February and March. During the festival, traditional activities such as folk dances, camel races, arts and crafts exhibits as well as poetry readings are showcased for the entire duration of the festival.

For the first time, we can just snap photos everywhere! In saudi, it is a big no no for you to take pictures in public places. In some instances, men are jailed for taking pictures n public places. So you can imagine our surprise when people there actually wants to pose for the camera!Some kids even asked hubby to take their pictures. Mula mula hubby takut takut jugak nak pakai his D90 but then we saw there were quite a number of visitors clicking their cameras and hps, baru lah rasa confident nak take pictures of the festival.


It is something like those espo in malaysia with exhibition from the ministries, universities, banks and museum. Off course there are souks or markets where you can buy all sorts of 'treasures'. Most souks sell fascinating antiques or replicas of it, traditional items such as pottery, tikar and antiques jeweleries. Food stalls are plenty too.

To me, the main attraction of the festival is the cultural exhibition and the history of the kingdom. It is interesting to see how different states in saudi, has slightly different cultural background.


We went there after asar as it opens at 4.00pm. During the first week of the festival, it is open for men only. Families can go during the second week. It was an awesome experience as this is the first time I felt relaxed being among the arabs. Surprisingly most of the people we met or brushed along the streets are very friendly and people seemed to be in a merry mood everywhere.


I guess being at the festival, shows a different side of the locals....the lighter side of the local people, their warmth and friendliness. Usually in the city, the locals tend to be a little bit uptight and macam sombong sikit but not in Janadriyah. Prhaps it is also because at the festival the people are mostly from outside Riyadh. At the Ministry of Justice exhibition where the Apache heli, tanks and planes are the army guys were very friendly. They painstakingly tred to explain to us in english about the exhibition and helped the kids get up on the tank and heli to take pictures. I am impressed!


We luv the sword dancing show. The men looks more like warriors rather than dancers!
The only music instruments they used are the drums and something like kompang.



One of the best thing here is that at prayer time, all activities come to a halt and all shops and exhibition centres are closed. The activities resume usually after 20-30 minutes of break. Men will have jemaah prayers at almost every corner (they prepare carpets/rugs). As for women, there were also prayer mats placed strategically or you can just pray anywhere convenient for you. Here it is easier as we are already wearing the arbaya, so we can conveniently pray in our arbaya.

Insyallah next year if we are still here in riyadh, we will definitely love to visit the Janadriyah festival again. Tak puas pegi sekali coz there are still so many houses and exhibition we didnt get to see.