Arriving in Kuwait
 NESA representatives from the schools
with Jane in Kuwait. | From the moment Janet Al Ramadhan stepped forward to greet me, I discovered I was not going to be scared in the Middle East. It was, frankly, nowhere near as scary as travel in Africa can often be. “Is Africa scary?” a friend asked. Africa is…unpredictable. It’s full of terrible roads and old cars with no seat belts. Prudent people don’t drink the water. They don’t eat fruits and vegetables that aren’t thoroughly washed. They stay away from stray dogs. The great struggle to survive that grows out of the gaps between the rich and the poor, the lack of jobs (40% unemployment in Addis Ababa, for instance), and the intense competition for a good education, can turn situations oppressively demanding or tense and unpredictable in a flash. The countries I visited around the Arabian Gulf had none of that feeling. |
At the same time, everywhere I traveled, I saw things that reminded me of Ethiopia and showed me how much shared culture and trade connects the two regions. I also saw and experienced things I never expected. In my new and due humility, I offer a few small tidbits of my trip:
- To my surprise, I was never hot. T.E. Lawrence once leaned from the deck of a passenger ship and wrote, “When at last we anchored in the outer harbour off the white town, between the blazing sky and its reflection in the mirage which swept and rolled over the wide lagoon, then the heat of Arabia came out like a drawn sword and struck us speechless.” In some seasons, I was assured, I’d feel the same. This wasn't one of them. In fact, in Kuwait I was glad for my several sweaters, which I put on in Kansas for the drive to Wichita airport in the middle of a snowstorm.
- I was fascinated by the variety of clothing I saw around me everywhere and often wished I knew more about it: the red and white checked headdresses that some men wore, while others wore white. The way some women swept by, every bit of themselves covered up except for their large, dark eyes, while others trotted by in spaghetti straps or–very often–jeans. I can’t say I learned much about people’s varied choices, though, or traditions.
In Kuwait, I spoke in three international schools and mostly to Kuwati children whose parents wanted them availed of an American curriculum. In Oman and Abu Dhabi, in contrast, I met only a handful of Omani or Emerati children because school laws are different in those countries.
Students in Oman |  Classroom in Kuwait |
But in all three places, the teachers in the international schools reported that it was hard to get to know families who, first of all, generally socialize within their own extended families and, second of all, do not work.
The wealth of the oil states is such that the people working in restaurants and hotels and stores have been ushered in, for the most part, from the Philippines, Pakistan, India, and various other countries. Reportedly, they are paid well and have health care, but they often go years without seeing their families, left behind in home countries, and when they reach the age when they can no longer work, they have to leave.
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