Jeddah

from Google Maps

It's 2015, and I haven't written anything for two years ;) - I've been too busy with my MsEd in Osaka. I survived, finished, and left Japan in early May, however, spending five weeks in Washington DC with my sister and brother-in-law. 

Now I'm back in Carleton Place, trudging through the absurdly complex process of getting another Saudi work visa. I will be returning to the Kingdom in late August, or early September, or...when I get there, to work at a large university in Riyadh...as usual, I'm not sure for how long.

I have a long list of posts I haven't yet gotten to that I will be updating in the near future. I will start with three posts about the Kingdom from late 2012 or so.

Mosque in downtown Jeddah

Jeddah is one of the two main cities in the Kingdom. Whilst Riyadh lies in the middle of KSA, surrounded by desert, and is the Al Sauds' home, Jeddah reclines by the Red Sea and is the traditional commercial center of the country.

Jeddah traffic

The two cities are quite different: Riyadh is a desert city, hot in the summer (50˚!) and cool in the winter (26˚in the daytime, 0˚ at night); Jeddah’s temperatures are moderated by the Red Sea; there’s usually a nice onshore breeze blowing, but it's quite humid and warm (30-38) all year round, though cooler at night in the winter months.

I've only been to Riyadh a couple of times, and to me it seems huge, and hostile to walkers, with bad sidewalks and crazy traffic. Jeddah is smaller, and the downtown is like older towns I've seen in KSA - dirty and smelly, but less dangerous to walk in – and I find it much more interesting.

Jacob in a covered street in the souq

Al Bilad is the old Souq, or market, downtown near the port and bus station. It is the biggest remaining traditional souq in the country, covering perhaps 3 kilometres square. You can buy lots of odd stuff here, from jewelry to frankincense to oud. Frankencense is tree sap from the mountains of Oman. Old Bedu men chew it, claiming it’s good for the digestion. I chewed it like gum – it was ok, but a bit bitter tasting.

agarwood - from wikipedia

The word oud means wood in Arabic, and is used to refer to a guitar-like instrument, as well as to a kind of incense made from spalted (half rotten) wood from specific species of Asian trees. It is processed either as wood chips, or as an essential oil, in which the chips are fermented, boiled, and the oil taken off. The oil is very expensive, and the most common form of agar wood in Saudia seems to be as dried chips. Incense is a very historically important substance here and people still burn it for many ceremonies as well as to perfume their clothes. 

In Jisan other kinds of incense, made from a mixture of different kinds of Frankincense, Myrh, bark, and...well, I don't know what all, can be bought and give delightful, wild results when they are burnt in the common electric or charcoal burners. I remember buying incense in a small shop with one wall of bins of different incense mixtures of this kind, run by a Sudanese man.

The streets in Al Bilad are very narrow (often too narrow for cars) and twist and turn in all directions. Occasionally two or three will open up into a square with a large tree and a cafe, and some old houses lining it. 

Many of these houses have a special architecture not seen anywhere else in the kingdom, with walls made of coral from the nearby reefs in the Red Sea. Once I stumbled onto an old mosque dating from about 700 AD (just after the time of Mohammed). It was being excavated and renovated. The old floor was about 3 metres below the present street.

Stones taken from a demolished old house

Sign near the Nassief House

Jeddah is about 100 km. from Makkah, the holy city of Islam, so for the last 1400 years or so it has been the port where people came ashore on their Hajj, or pilgrimage, to Makkah. As a result, it has always been the most cosmopolitan of KSA’s towns and cities.

The city is also held to be the location of Eve’s grave. It is located near the old souq, in a Muslim cemetery. Non-Muslims are forbidden entry to Muslim cemetaries, so I couldn’t go in and photograph it. But I found an old photo of her grave on the internet. It is reputed to be 36 metres long and 8 metres wide – that’s how big she was supposed to have been!

from St. John Philby, 1922 - Wikipedia

I visited the city several times, once by bus with my friend Rishat, and later with my friend Jacob, driving up from Jizan in his little Corolla. It was a nice drive, along the Red Sea. During the first trip, I stayed in a small hotel near the souq. It had no restaurant, so we ate at a small hole in the wall place around the corner - wonderful foule! I bought a new camera at one of the shops near the bus station for a reasonable price.

When I visited with Jacob, we splurged and stayed at the Red Sea Hotel, about a kilometre from the smaller hotel, right near the water. 

Restaurant at the Red Sea Hotel

View from my room

It's quite reasonable, I think about 400 SAR ($US 108) per night, with a nice restaurant. We spent most of our time walking around, exploring.

East Gate 

These gates are all that remain of the ancient city walls.

West Gate

Of course we also sampled the local Al Baik chicken. Al Baik is Saudias' version of Kentucky Fried Chicken. My students tell me that some young men fly from Riyadh, where until recently there were no outlets, to Jeddah just to pick some up and go back! That's about 900 km. each way. 

Another really cool old building, restored.

An old house.

There is also an Ikea (tables! work/study lights!) and a book/ school/ arts/ computer supplies store called Al Jarir, where I could pick up computer and camera stuff, and plastic modeling supplies, including air gun painting gear, as well as the occasional book in English.

To the east of the old town is the Corniche, which is a roadway that goes along the beach for some 40 km. 

A fountain on a Corniche roundabout

This beach and road is one of the nicest features of Jeddah, though parts of it were closed when I visited due to extensive construction. Inland from the Corniche is the area where the wealthiest of Jeddah’s citizens live – some of the walled estates are a small city block in size.

If I had to choose between Riyadh and Jeddah, I'd take Jeddah any day!