local entertainment

I've developed a weird friendship with a local guy who works for the parent company of the company I'm consulting with. Well, he has a "job" there, but he doesn't really do any work. He's related to the sheik though, so he was given a position because he has a lot of wasta.

I'll call him Habib. He's a year older than me physically and about 25 years younger than me mentally. I first caught his attention in a meeting (he had only come in to the room to get some cookies but ended up staying). He said he was interested in me because of my hair. In fact, he once asked me to give him a lock of my hair. I told him to stop being stupid, and he got so mad at me he didn't talk to me for a few days.

Habib is interested in all things western. Even though he's super rich, he's barely done any traveling and has never been to the US. We started hanging out because I would show him pictures from my travels that I have up on the kodakgallery web site. He especially likes to look at pictures of my house (he's never seen a "real", that is not movie, house with brick walls or wood floors, shockingly) and asks endless questions like "where did you get that?" and "why do you have that picture on the wall?" I bet if someone broke into my house I could send him pictures and he would know as well as I do, or better, what was missing.

He used to call and invite me to meet him for dinner. At first the invitation was for a restaurant in my hotel, and the invitations kept escalating to fancier and fancier places. Finally a person at my customer site told me Habib thought I was turning down his invitations because he wasn't inviting me to a nice enough place. I had a long talk with Habib to explain that, even though we are friends, I'm not going to dinner with him alone because I don't want to get myself into some weird situation. He was mad at first but seems to be fine now.

He takes xanax every day. I asked him why and he said it's because he can't control his mind. He first became depressed when he was 14 because he watched a movie about a guy who couldn't sleep. That night, he suddenly thought that maybe he had the same disease as the guy in the movie. For six months he couldn't really eat or sleep. Finally he talked to his grandfather who said the disease in the movie wasn't real, and he was instantly better.

He got depressed again in his 20s. He met a woman that he really loved and they dated for 2 years. But he couldn't commit to marrying her because of his family (she was local but not from a prominent family). She ended up marrying her boss.

Habib then told his mom to arrange a marriage for him and he married his cousin (that's one of the few things he's said to me that actually shocked me - I was like "your cousin? your real cousin?" and he said "yes, she is the daughter of my mother's sister" - it's common to marry like that here which is why many of the locals end up with rare diseases). Although he has 4 kids the marriage, according to him, is unhappy because he hates his wife. He said that even on the first night of their honeymoon they fought (he called it a "hellmoon").

After getting married he woke up one day and thought "what is the worst thing I could ever do?" and suddenly the thought "F*k God" popped into his head. For the muslim culture this is the worst thing you could ever think. But then he started thinking it all the time and couldn't stop. He said he would be sitting in his car in traffic and inside he was screaming "F*k God" over and over again, thousands of times, and he couldn't stop.

He tried to become super religious in the hopes that would help. He began praying 10 times a day and studying the koran, fasting when it wasn't required, going to the mosque every evening, and he completely quit everything that is haram (he used to drink alcohol and smoke cigars). But that didn't help either.

So he went to a doctor and said that he was having trouble sleeping. The doctor has, over the years, given him various medications but none seemed to help. Habib did some research on line and finally decided he needed xanax. So he made up some fake symptoms that didn't make him seem crazy and the doctor gave him the prescription. He said the drug helps him "not think about things I shouldn't think about".


After taking xanax and getting un-depressed he decided that being super religious was a waste of time. He doesn't pray or go to the mosque anymore except for special occasions. He drinks alcohol and smokes cigars. But sometimes he gets anxious that he is going to hell. I keep reminding him that the koran doesn't say that alcohol and smoking are forbidden. Sometimes he asks me if I think God likes him. I used to say "I don't know". Then he would say "well if you were God would you like me?" I used to think this was a backhanded way to get me to say that I liked him, but then realized he was being serious. So now when he asks me I pause, and then say "when you asked me that question I just had a feeling that God was telling me to tell you that he likes you". This makes Habib very happy although it's crazy, really.


He was thinking to divorce his wife when we met. I suggested marriage counseling and he looked at me like I had suggested he run naked through the streets. He said "we don't do THAT here". I gave him the names of some books he could read but he is too afraid to buy them even on amazon for fear someone will find out. Then I suggested he just marry a new wife that he likes. So he's been asking my opinion of some potential candidates for his second wife. All of them are very young (some not even 20) and sound just as lost as he is.

I've introduced him to rap music, jazz, the word "angst", and some of my favorite bad word expressions. I also translate western culture for him. The other day he was reading a gossip magazine (he reads Hello magazine while he's getting his manicure and pedicure, but he would never have that magazine in his house or lower himself to buy it) and he called me up to ask me "when the magazine says these two people are dating, what does that mean? are they having sex? do they live in the same house?" He also read an article somewhere about women getting raped in the US; part of the article mentioned a woman who went to a bar, got drunk, went home with a strange man, and got raped. He was surprised that the man was charged. Then he wanted to know, in detail, what happens exactly when a rape occurs, how it's proven that the woman was raped, what the legal proceeding is for handling rape, and how much time men spend in jail for rape. Here 4 men have to witness the rape for the woman to get any justice and because of the huge social stigma even if men witness a rape they will rarely report it.


He watched the sex in the city movie, and that sparked a whole other series of conversations. He wanted to know if gay people really have weddings in the US. He asked me (and I assume this is from something in the movie, which I haven't seen) "do women in the US really visit each other and talk about their vaginas?" And: "I'm not ever going to recycle because recycling was invented by gay people and I don't want people to think I'm gay". I pointed out to him that I recycle almost all of my trash (except here because they don't recycle) and that I'm not gay. His response: "well, that's because you try to be nice to everyone, even gay people".


Habib left yesterday to go on holidays in Jordan (he wanted to go after looking at my pictures). He's getting depressed that I'll be leaving soon and he wants to come visit me in the US. His idea is to come to the US, learn how to swim (again, I'm shocked at how few people here can swim - I've told him to take lessons but all he ever wants to do is have me demonstrate how I move my arms and legs when I swim - then he spends 5 or 10 minutes doggy paddling in the air, which he thinks is going to help him if he ever ends up in the water) and to "go to the rocky mountain" (I've stopped correcting his perception that there is one giant mountain that takes up the whole state of Colorado). I pointed out to him that he has to get into shape to go hiking and he told me "I'll just take a donkey up". I told him there are no donkeys to take people up the mountains and he said "well I will buy a donkey and then ride it up the rocky mountain".

I'm going to miss talking to Habib while he is on vacation, although I've already gotten 10 text messages from him complaining about various things that have happened on his trip (the airport in Amman smelled bad, he can't find a KFC which is his favorite place to eat, his driver is egyptian, the hotel put the room for his kids and wife right next to his room so they are driving him crazy, etc.). I have to admit I'll probably miss him when I go home as well. I never thought I'd be friends with a local, and he comes up with so many crazy things he makes me feel that I'm actually normal.