Christmas in the Kingdom

I almost forgot about Christmas this year.  In any other country in the world, this wouldn't have been possible.  Christmas music and lights and decorations are starting earlier and earlier so that by Christmas, you are hard pressed to find anything that doesn't remind you of the holidays.  But here in Saudi, Christmas is more or less forbidden.  In 2012, twelve people were arrested for "plotting to celebrate Christmas".  And while I don't know for sure if there are any actual written laws against Christmas, the religious pressure keeps it pretty much under wraps.  There are no decorations, no holiday jingles on the radio or in the stores (for that matter, there is never any music in stores since listening to music in public is haram) and no lights or candy canes, not to mention the weather hovering in the mid to upper 70s.  I have not seen, heard, tasted, or smelled anything in the entire month of December that gave me any indication of the Holiday Season aside from the calender itself.

So maybe you can understand my surprise when I looked up one night while riding in a taxi and saw the kingdom tower lit up in green and red.  Normally, the lights on the tower change slowly in a rainbow pattern from red to yellow, to green, to turquoise, to blue, to purple and back to red.  But that night, the lights on the sky bridge were green, while the u shape in the middle was red.  I couldn't believe my eyes.   Of course, it could have been a coincidence.  Red and green are complimentary colors, so it could have just been an aesthetic thing, but there is something so fundamentally Christmas-y about red and green together that I couldn't help but think that someone somewhere was using this iconic Riyadh building to secretly wish the whole country Merry Christmas.  If so, it was a very short lived greeting card.  By the next night, the tower lights had been switched back to the regular rotating colors.

Christmas Contraband

Christmas Dinner

That wasn't my only Christmas surprise.  One of the things I've been most grateful for this year, and especially in the last three months since I moved to Riyadh, is the collection of friends I have been able to make.  Collectively, my friends gave me the best gift possible (short of going home), a wonderful Christmas Eve party.  One of them went around to different stores and found a tiny plastic Christmas tree and some ornaments on the black market.  Another friend who works at an embassy procured some candy canes.  Someone else had brought a Santa hat from the UK.  Another friend made tiny delicious quails for dinner, and I attempted to make my brother's famous twice baked potatoes and an apple pie. Together we gathered around that tiny fake tree, ate, talked, played cards and listened to Christmas songs from the internet.

At work the next day, I gathered with my new co-workers around a big traditional Saudi breakfast with humus and beans and bread and falafal.  No one mentioned any reason for the sudden generosity and impromptu get together, but I think we all noticed the calendar said December 25th. When we were finished and everyone was cleaning up and heading back to work, one of the Arabic editors leaned over and whispered a clearly carefully memorized phrase: Merry Christmas.  I gave him a huge smile and he smiled back, proud that he had shared this secret with me.  Later that night after class, one of my students hung around after the others had left and said, teacher, Merry Christmas.  I gave her a hug.  Those two greetings meant more to me than a lifetime of automatic holiday greetings from salesmen and clerks in the US.

It wasn't most the traditional of Christmas's, especially having to work, but I can't complain.  Maybe I missed all the build up to Christmas, the cold weather, the carols, the cards, the annoying advertisements.... but maybe I got something better.  Maybe when you have to look for it, when it isn't on every street corner, when you have to dare to celebrate, and weigh the consequences if you do, you think more about what it really means and what really matters.  Like winning at cards.