Different

November 22, 2024

A hotel employee greets me with excessive eagerness, insisting on carrying all of my luggage, including the bike box, on a trolley to my room. I insist on carrying something myself, but he seems reluctant to let me help. The room has a kitchenette, but there are no pans. When I mention this, the employee immediately brings me a brand-new set of pans, still in its box. To my surprise, he refuses to accept a tip.

I'm hungry, but after the long journey, I don’t have the energy to cook. I leave the hotel in search of a restaurant and stumble upon a place called "Shrimps Nation." The menu lets you customize your meal with shrimp, rice, and sauces.

However, the dining experience isn’t quite what I expected. The rice is served directly onto a paper mat covering the table, and I’m handed plastic gloves and an apron. It’s time to battle the shrimp.

With the oversized gloves, I struggle to peel the shrimp from their shells, feeling like I’m back at a childhood birthday party where we played games involving oven mitts and chocolate. A waiter notices my struggle, comes over, and graciously peels all the shrimp for me. He then tosses everything together in a plastic bag with a few vigorous shakes. The meal is delicious, but one annoyance lingers: a fly keeps landing on my face, literally dancing on my nose. With my sauce-covered gloves, I’m powerless to shoo it away. By the end, the table resembles a battlefield - or perhaps a chaotic kids' party. I only intended to grab a quick meal, but even this turns into an adventure. Everything feels different here.

The next day, I take things slow. I assemble my bike in the hotel room and repack everything to prepare for departure.

It’s not until the late afternoon that I finally venture out onto the streets. At a nearby café, I see only men playing games. Later, while walking to a nearby supermarket, I spot a woman - fully veiled, of course - working in a chocolate shop that sells a Belgian brand. She tells me she doesn’t know much about Swiss chocolate but offers me a sample of the Belgian kind.

The supermarket is enormous - ENORMOUS! There are countless variations of every product. Navigating the aisles is overwhelming, especially with so many unfamiliar items.

I spend over an hour wandering through this maze, gathering provisions for the upcoming days in the desert.

However, I do find something familiar: Swiss chocolate. On the way back, I bring a bar of Lindt to the chocolate shop worker. She seems very surprised and initially refuses the gift, but eventually, she tries a piece, possibly noticing my slight disappointment. Did I unknowingly cross a social boundary by offering her chocolate? I’m not sure, and it leaves me feeling a bit uneasy. So much here is simply different.

When it comes to social norms, I feel like a child taking his first wobbly steps.

I turn to the internet to research key customs in Saudi Arabia. I learn that men shouldn’t initiate conversations with women, that only the right hand should be used for eating (since the left is reserved for hygiene), and that showing the soles of your shoes is considered rude.

I also notice that my hotel bill is higher than what was shown on the booking website. At check-out, I ask the veiled receptionist about the discrepancy. She looks puzzled and can’t understand why I think I’ve paid too much. Only after showing her my booking confirmation a second time she realized what happened. “This is a different hotel,” she says in broken English.

Wait, what? The taxi driver had dropped me off here, and the place looked roughly like the photos online. I ask her for the name of this hotel. “Different,” she replies. Yes, I understand it’s a different hotel if it’s not the one I booked, but what’s the actual name?

She repeats: “Different.”

She doesn’t seem to understand my confusion. I glance around, hoping to find a sign with the hotel’s name. And then, there it is. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn’t have believed it: the hotel is literally named Hotel Different. What are the odds? I laugh out loud. Of course, I can’t ask for a refund now. Even the receptionist, though veiled, can’t seem to suppress a laugh.

If I can’t even manage to check into the right hotel, how am I supposed to survive the desert?

Flexibility

Arrival