Inside Bahrain via...Two citizens

'Mustafa is Bahraini. In the 1960’s his family moved to Al Ain in the United Arab Emirates, where he grew up. After living there for nearly 30 years, he decided he didn’t like the direction the country was headed nor how he perceived their people to be. In 1997 he gave up the big money fast moving Emirates and came back to Bahrain and started a small Lebanese pizza shop (Manaqeesh). He is the owner of one small restaurant with seating for 4 and earns just enough money to live. He works every day of the week directly behind the counter, in full thobe and ghutra (Traditional Gulf attire), and will treat you to one of the brightest and welcoming smiles.'

'Ali is a Turkish man who came to Bahrain a number of years back for employment. He found Bahrain through his future sponsor, a very prominent person in society. He took many favorable gifts, jobs and offers from his sponsor and had a good life for himself. He got married to an expat and had a young boy on the way. His exceedingly lazy, childish, apathetic, and often malignant nature soon shown and his life was as if a mirrored reflection.

He was working at a small Turkish grill restaurant when a beautiful young woman started eating there regularly. He, thinking she was cute, gave her free soup whenever she came. She thought he was nice and soon had her friend go talk to him on her behalf. A few months later Ali had plans to take a second wife.

Ali’s first wife was first brought to Bahrain for the sex trade industry. We can only guess how they met. What is for certain is that he isn’t the type of husband who demands that his wife stop working and stay at home. The money she earns in one of Bahrain’s least respected, most well-known industry is still enough to support herself, her husband, and her new baby boy. She has no reason to quit. Her home is nice, her life is quiet, and she has no reason to complain.

Unfortunately she was also completely left out of her husband’s decision to take a second wife. In fact, she had no idea he was getting married for a second time.

The second wife of Ali, Tess, is from the Philippines. She teaches at a local university and has a very stable life. Her only major misstep was to fall in love with a man who is still a child at heart, but a cruel careless man in spirit.

They flew together to the Philippines for the wedding, spent a lovely 3 weeks on the beach relaxing together, and then returned back to Bahrain. He spends the majority of his time with Tess. Since his first wife spends most nights of the week out working, she does not have any idea how he spends his.

Tess knew all along that he had a first wife. She knew all along that he had a child with his first wife. She still married him.

His childish ordeal recently ended when his second wife Tess, striken by jealousy and guilt, decided to end it all. She attempted suicide about a week ago.

She has made a full recovery and checked out of the hospital a few days after the incident.

I have no further information about them. I only grew to know of his personal situation the last day I spoke to him. All of the details above were gathered from a third party, a friend of a friend.

AIESEC Bahrain NatCo 1

I am here at the first ever AIESEC Bahrain NatCo and I felt the need to give a small update. We are engaged 100% in the AIESEC culture, including roll calls, dances, and loads of noise. We are also learning a lot about the international platform and current realities.

Here are some of the delegates for you to view. More to come, promise!

My heart lies in Bahrain

Today I feel terrible. I know I am taking this all the wrong way, but I haven’t felt this way since I left Tunisia.

There is something about leaving a country where the people care so much and keep telling me “Eric you are Tunisian/Bahraini.” There is also something about saying goodbye without knowing when, or dare I say if, I will be back. It is also more difficult for them to come see me because it isn’t as normal for them to just up and leave behind their family and country to come to me.

Today 6 members of AIESEC Bahrain picked me up at my house (woke me up) and took me out for breakfast, bowling, to the movies, and out for a chat. Wallah it was great.

The kicker is to them it seemed like nothing, like not enough. To me it was so nice. I can’t remember the last time someone actually took the time to plan and get people involved for a going away for me. In the US, Tunisia, UAE, Egypt, nodda. Bahrain, yes.

Best of all, I don’t even leave for like 5 days, yet they still did this so quickly and perfectly. Best of best of all, the people involved were very special ones to me and it felt very intimate.

Worst of all now I am beginning to doubt everything. How can I leave this place? How can I take a job elsewhere? How can I continue on my life as “planned” and miss how my life could be back here?

I guess I have to play fate and try to see where life takes me. If I apply for jobs here and give it ample chance, then if a good job comes up and I stay, it was meant to be. Inshallah.

Eric

Inside Bahrain via...Three taxis

-Late night on a weekend, a Bahraini taxi driver (they are all Bahraini) named Abdullah picked up a random visitor from the other side of the causeway. The passenger was both very wealthy, and very much inebriated. The passenger demanded that the driver take him around town in an apparently bizarre, random manner. Soon after, the passenger forcefully proposed paying Abdullah a large sum of money to continue and take him around for the entire night. A growing argument ensued, quickly escalading to a fight. Abdullah kept his dignity in tact during by kicking the passenger out of the car, to the side of the street with a forceful shove. He then proceeded to scream at the man for trying to use him for illegitimate purposes.

-I snagged a taxi from Adliyah to Exhibition Road (short trip, all in Manama) to join for an AIESEC team dinner/meeting over Mandi and Bokhari. When I got in, I said (in my broken Arabic), “Hello, to Exhibition Road please”
He started driving and said, “You know we don’t like to go to that area.”
I, already aware of the answer asked him, “Why not?”
He quickly replied “Too many people doing bad things, mushkila (problem). Men come here now with too much money and use it for drink and women…”
He then went into a quick rant on how he didn’t appreciate that his country was becoming known for allowing things which are so blatantly against Islam solely for financial gain.

-A few days back Bahrain was hit by some terrible dust storms. They were so bad that you risked saturating your lungs if you went out too often or for too long. On my way home I was trying to get a taxi as quickly as possible to avoid it. I could hardly even recognize that the sun was setting, but I could easily still hear the call to prayer from the nearby mosques.

It is a short walk from our office to a high profile area where we can easily grab a taxi. During this walk I saw a taxi whiz by me at a very fast speed. Naturally, my first thought was that this driver was in a rush to make the Al Maghreb (evening) prayer.

To my surprise he stopped about 50 meters past me and switched his car in reverse. I got in his car and he said, “Hey, I saw you back there and couldn’t let you walk any more in this *expletive* terrible dust storm.”

I said ‘Thank you’ in Arabic as any good student would, and told him to turn around and go toward my home.
He said, “One minute, I need to go pick up some *expletive* beer.”

I was a little taken-a-back, and asked, “Beer?”
He snickered back, “Yah, *expletive*, I will be drinking later on tonight, not now,” as he smiled.

I am still a bit shocked as this was the first I had heard of the generally perceived poor and decent taxi drivers in Bahrain drinking.

Countdown to the future...

As is the norm when I don't post often enough the reason is due to loads of work to be done and uncertainties.

At this point in time I am swamped with trying to both get myself prepared to take on the next challenge which will lie ahead (which is still TBD), and ensure the proper transition between myself and the new AIESEC Bahrain team.

I will save the sap and emotion for a later post, as I still have 22 days to finish up here.

However, with the GCC states becoming less and less occupied while people take their annual leaves, the environment changes drastically.

For now the work will continue and the "heading to the future" will be placed on temporary hold, while I find a way to prepare myself to make the next leap after a very memorable AIESEC experience.

tbc....