Sandstorms: Days and Nights in Arabia

Wonderful book. I lived for several years in Saudi Arabia but Theroux offered many insights which gave me an even more in-depth understanding of this fascinating country and its people.

Riyadh had a throng of foreigners in it. There are alien confrontations. Saudi Arabia has never been colonized. The author, serving as a reporter in Riyadh, wrote about business, oil, and official visits. Previously he had pursued a Masters Degree program at Cairo. Richard Pederson, President of the American University in Cairo, had been a diplomat. In the beginning Theroux considered having a career in diplomacy, but as time passed he realized that he could not see himself explaining to others the deeds and misdeeds of a very large country, the United States. After the peace accords President Carter was scheduled to visit Sadat. (Egypt truly was made to feel like a pariah by the other Arab countries.) Theroux taught English to a group of teenagers. Half the faculty at American University was American. The students were Egyptian, African and American children of diplomats, wealthy Arabs, and two dozen students on their junior year abroad from the University of California. The university had been founded in 1919. AUC was a serious, neutral, clean-cut college. Refugees from the American University in Beirut arrived. Their stories were sickening. The Lebanese groused about the absence of croissants and having to live in an Arab city, Cairo. Next came refugees from Iran--the era of the hostage crisis. They were not as adamant about seeking employment since they had been well-paid under the Shah. Cairo's winter had bitter cold and rain. There was a community of Gulf Arabs in Cairo. Seeking adventure, Theroux traveled to Saudi Arabia. Reporters on English language publications in Saudi Arabia were generally American or British because it was believed bilingual Arabs would stir up trouble. On the author's paper, the head office was at the port of Jeddah. Theroux was assigned a job at the Riyadh Bureau. Most of the royal family lived there. It was the center of political power. The founder of OPEC was from Riyadh. The Saudis banned foreign news bureaus. Reporters were allowed only the briefest of visits. The overseas publications had to rely upon local stringers. Peter Theroux lived for one year at the Riyadh Intercontinental Hotel. His privacy was compromised by the Interior Ministry. In 1980 Iraq was preparing for war with Iran. After the passage of several years Saudi Arabia was less flush since the price of oil had declined. It became a pattern after the early 1980's to hire foreign menial workers from non-Arab countries since they were deemed to present fewer political difficulties. After five years in the country, the author decided to leave. First he went to Iraq and then returned to Egypt. He was there when he learned of the kidnapping of Terry Anderson. Later he went to Jerusalem. Returning to the United States, he translated volume one of the trilogy, CITIES OF SALT, by Abdelrahman Munif, and relates how he went to Damascus to visit Munif. The metaphor of cities of salt refers to cities in the

This book is entertaining, and also offers a different perspective about the political climate in the Middle East. It was written when the Iran/Iraq war was the big issue, before Desert Storm in 1991. Interesting to see that the Saudi attitudes toward the US haven't changed much, and a read of this book should serve to describe culture in a long-term perspective. Highly recommended for anyone that wishes to learn a little more about the differences in our modern cultures.

Peter Theroux offers here an understanding of the Arab mindset not to be gleaned from any other book. In particular, of course we all know from Freud that we're all obsessed with sex. But the double standard in Arab culture was truly amazing as revealed throughout the book, particularly in the passage where an Arab, in the most vulgar terms, talks to Theroux about procuring foreign women. And, Theroux, finally fed up with his harangue tells the Arab man he has just the kind of women the women he wants....and they are Arab. The man never spoke to Theroux again.-The best part of the book is in Chapter 9 where he parodies ignorant visiting reporters' accounts of Saudi Arabia as if an Arab had come to report on New York City: I'll just quote a few lines from it "Lucy Ricardo might not recognize New York today....Business fluorishes with the intersection of Broadway("broad" signifying impure woman).(and 42nd) This district is known as Times Square, after the Jewish-owned New York Times newspaper. A few blocks away in Fifth Avenue ("fifth" is a measure of whiskey)...The officials....like many Americans whose intellectual capacity has been diminished by a diet of pork and alcohol....were sluggish and incurious when asked why a five cent piece is bigger than a ten cent piece:"-That's drollery at its best, Peter. The reason I'm only giving the book four stars is that it seems to me that Theroux can't decide whether he's reporting or writing a personal journal. He's obviously doing both. But this combination leads to some awkward transitions and not too swell writing at times. Personally, I think he should stick exclusively to the autobiographical. It's much more interesting and, in the end, tells us much more about the author AND about Saudi Arabia than mere reporting.

Theroux has a particularly valuable vantage point: he has spent more that 7 years in this region as a journalist. In this book which serves as a memoir, Theroux splendidly tells of this little understood region and its people. In an age when we hear of nothing but the fanaticism of this race of people and their intense religiosity, Theroux, I feel, manages to bridge the gap and bring a sense of humanism into his observations. Theroux systematically and humourously deconstructs our hostile stereotypes of Arabs and casts them in a light that is much more realistic and much more interesting to read. Throughout this book, which reads very smoothly and very effectively, he shows us the cultural and social elements of Arab life that few of us have bothered to considered. And, through this, one is able to understand the percieved fanaticism of the Arabs in a more appreciable way. I found that his obervations were, while precise, still very evocative. I wonder if being a journalist is particularly suited to this style of imagery.