A New Me in a New World
Jubail, Saudi Arabia—Hindsight is 20/20, as they say. And it’s true. Because when I look back to our move to Saudi Arabia, I realize it was that thing…that one thing that instantly changed how I saw the world and shaped the rest of my life—for the better.
Yet…
I didn’t want to move to Saudi Arabia. Heck, what 10-year-old girl would, when you’re living the American Dream?
It was only 18 months prior that we had moved from a Boston suburb to a New Jersey suburb just outside of Philadelphia. Housed in a five-bedroom chalet-style home with wall-to-wall shag carpeting, my siblings and I loved our classic 1970s American childhood. We walked to school. Rode bikes in the neighborhood. Played in the woods. Ate at McDonalds. Joined Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts. And watched afterschool TV shows. What would life be like in Saudi?
Do we have to wear veils?
Where will we go to school?
Will we make any friends?
What is there to do there?
Shortly after my dad announced the news of our move, my brother, sister, and I decided to protest. Makeshift signs in hand, we chanted while marching around the house as soon as dad came home from work one night.
“We don’t want to go! We don’t want to go!”
Despite our meager protest (hey, why not try?), in July 1977, we moved to Saudi Arabia. And unknowingly, our resistance quickly turned into curiosity. Delight, even!
Because Saudi Arabia became an adventure. A fun adventure of constant discovery. Adjusting to compound living where clusters of homes were protected from outsiders by a wall and security gate. Making new friends. Attending a new school. Experiencing downtown street life.
And of course, the food.
Arabic bread. Hummus. Lamb shawarma. Falafel. Baklava. At night, we headed downtown to shop, explore the gold souqs [markets], eat shawarma prepared fresh off the spit, and buy Arabic pastries. The streets teemed with people in the evening when the intense desert sun slept, allowing us to enjoy being out and about under slightly less oppressive heat. Shoulders rubbed and arms bumped arms as we weaved our way through dirty and dusty streets and local stores in search of goodies.
Some stuff came to us, like the “Pepsi Man” who came to the compound on weekends so we could stock up on soda. Arriving in a medium-sized truck, he parked in the cul de sac and opened the sliding door at the back, revealing rows six feet high of plastic crates filled with glass-bottled soda on either side of the truck bed. Instead of Coke, Fanta, and Sprite, there was Pepsi, Mirinda, and Teem. Parents and children swarmed like bees at the back of the truck, placing orders.
Wahid Pepsi. Wahid Mirinda. Wahid Teem.
Grabbing one crate of each flavor, the “Pepsi Man” passed them down to reaching hands and took Saudi riyals in return. Excited, we hauled our sand-dusted crates of desert sun-warmed soda back into the house to be chilled a few at a time in the fridge. Equally popular was the “Donut Man”. He sold fresh baked sugar donuts and Arabic bread that were so good we always gobbled them up on the spot.
Soon, we were also introduced to many other international cuisines at the homes of our diverse group of expat neighbors. The variety of people who became our friends and neighbors was so much fun and eye-opening. And I unknowingly came to feel comfortable in a way I had not felt before.
You see, during our years in the primarily Caucasian 1970s suburbs of Boston and Philadelphia, I often felt like an oddball. I wasn’t bullied, per se. But because of my Filipino roots I looked different with my jet-black hair, dark skin, and brown eyes. Despite being born in Boston, I was often asked about my place of origin.
Where are you from?
The Philippines.
Where’s that?
Alternatively, the guess was everything but the Philippines.
Are you Chinese?
Japanese?
Korean?
Eskimo?
I’m from the Philippines.
UGH. It frustrated me that no one knew my country of origin and I hated trying to explain. I was shy and just wanted to blend in. Once while at the playground, I was called “the chocolate girl”.
Hey chocolate girl! Chocolate girl! Hey, it’s the chocolate girl!
I continued to play on the jungle gym, ignoring the catcalls. No one came to my defense. Pretending not hear anything, I soon went home, and told not a soul about what happened.
These experiences, however, are surely one reason our move to Saudi quickly became a welcome change for me. In Saudi, I was no longer “the chocolate girl”. I was one of dozens and dozens of “chocolate” kids, parents, and workers from countries around the world. Saudi Arabia. Egypt. India. Pakistan. Philippines. Indonesia. Malaysia. Lebanon. Vietnam. You name it and the country was represented across the landscape of a newly modernizing Saudi Arabia with the help of thousands of expats. At our school. In the compound where we lived. At my dad’s office. Everywhere.
They were classmates, neighbors, colleagues. Fellow human beings with lives just like ours.
I breathed a silent sigh of relief.
#1world1people
