Welcome to the ninth interview in my Adjusting to Expat Life series.  I’ll be running two interviews a week over the course of six weeks, writing about my own experiences adjusting to expat life in Peru, and rounding up the best expat resources on the web.

Today I’m talking to a returned expat, Mandy Rowe, about life as a trailing spouse in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia between 1996 and 2002.  She’s home in Australia now, where she’s set up the boutique bed and breakfast, Minnies, in Gippsland, Victoria.

I found this a very balanced but honest portrayal of life in what I imagine must be one of the most difficult countries for expats – especially with two children.

What made you choose to live in Saudi?

My husbandʼs work took us to Saudi Arabia.

How did you make a living?

I used to be a psychologist. I now run a bed and breakfast in Sale. My husband worked for British Aerospace as a pilot. He worked with the Saudi Air Force.

Have you lived abroad in other countries before? Where? Was it easier or harder to feel at home?

Yes, I lived in England for 2 years before the children were born. Once again my husbandʼs work took us there. England was very easy to live in. Apart from a few things (ie the food) it was very similar to Australia. A very different experience from our time in Saudi.

Were you part of a close-knit expat community, or were you closer to locals?

We lived on a compound with 61 villas. The compound community was comprised of families with young children from Australia, the UK, Canada and New Zealand. I made close friends with a number of these families. In fact I had known a number of these families from my time in the UK.

In some ways I had instant support when I arrived as I knew one family very well. I donʼt know if that helped too much. I had to find my own feet and get my own confidence leaving the compound. Only I could do that.

It took me about 6 months to feel comfortable shopping and getting taxies on my own. Saudi is very much a closed society. It is very hard to get to know the locals. However, I am an artist and ended up painting with a number of Saudi women. Through them I got accepted into the Saudi world and gained some unique glimpses of it. These times were very special to me as I love looking into other peopleʼs worlds.

I remember one weekend my Saudi friend took our art group 3 hours north of Riyadh, the capital. We stayed in a palace built into the red sands. The weekend was amazing; food, swimming pool, date plantation, sunsets over the desert. I got to understand how the desert could be so beautiful.

We went back to my Saudi friends farm a year or so later and her staff cooked us an amazing lunch on the red sands.

Did you think about Saudi Arabia as home?

Saudi was so foreign to me as a country. Apart from the geographical differences, being an arid rocky desert, there were the massive cultural differences.

I really yearned for green grass, gum trees, Australian birds, beaches, rivers and mountains. With hindsight I also missed my freedom.

Women were not allowed to drive which meant we relied on our husbands a lot, especially for the grocery shopping. We also enjoy wine but that was banned so we survived on home-made wine which was fairly ordinary. However, I did grow to love the classic red sands and desert. I had a chance to visit Ayres Rock (Uluru) a few years back and it made me slightly homesick for Saudi.

What were the greatest differences you noticed when you first arrived?

Having to wear the abeya. Not driving. The intense heat. The houses were made of concrete and had high walls around them. Very little vegetation. The men wore white and the women worn black. All the restaurants had an entry for men and an entry for women and children and families. My husband and I could not hold hands in public.

The TV was tragic. No news of Australia ever. Having to fit in with the local prayer times. Shops would close at prayer times so if you hadnʼt completed your weekly grocery shop then you were kicked out of the store and had to wait 20 minutes for it to reopen. With young children and at times 45 + degrees heat this was untenable.

The five calls to prayer could be heard over the city throughout the day/night which I grew to like actually. The kids had total freedom on our compound which was pretty amazing. They could not get off the compound which meant that from a very young age they could go and visit their friends. The only restriction was that they had to be home at the sunset prayer (we had a mosque next to our compound).

The traffic was crazy and dangerous. I was afraid of doing the wrong thing and being chased or scolded by the religious police.

What are the greatest differences you noticed when you left?

With hindsight I was an anxious expat in Saudi. I did not cope very well with the talk of war from the north (Iraq) and ended up coming back to Australia for months on end when I thought the threat got too real, I was very concerned for my children. If I didnʼt have children I somehow think it would have been less stressful. Iʼm sure it was a mother thing.

I also felt the impact of 2001 and felt my children were at risk. Not all expats mums were like me. Some probably thought I was a bit too paranoid. However, the true Saudi spirit came out one day (Sep 12th 2001) when I was teaching my Saudi friend how to fabric paint at her family compound. Her husband came into the room and apologised profusely for the attacks in NY. I told him I was worried for our safety as we were seen as Americans in Saudi. He told me that if I felt at all threatened then to get in our car and drive straight to his family compound. He then went to tell his guards to expect us 24/7.

They are a hospitable race of people in fact the Bedouin hospitality is legendary. What was equally compelling was that his wife, my artist friend, was feeling sick with worry as her 2 eldest children were studying at a university in America. We were hearing about revenge attacks on Muslims in the US and Iʼm sure her fears were well grounded.

The synchronicity of this experience never fails to amaze me. Here was I a Westerner in a Muslim country worried about my children: and here was a Saudi women with children in a Western country worried about her children. Interesting times for us all.

What did you like most about Saudi?

I donʼt want to harp on the negatives too much as I did have many years doing great stuff. I started painting when the kids went to school, which was my saving grace, and ended up running a small art company called Hot Art. My first project was to write and illustrate a childrenʼs book called My Arabian Childhood. It was such a process getting it published (getting permission from the Ministry of Interior ) then finding a printer. However, it was such a buzz to see it residing on the bookshelf of one of the cityʼs main bookshops. It seemed very popular especially within the expat community. It spoke of the great memories my children would have “…deserts and dallahs, hummus and dates, maamouls and halalahs, aren’t memories are great”.

I needed to find my hobby and it was Hot Art. I ended up having a very good business painting ceramics (I had 2 kilns running at a time and employed a guy on weekends to help paint). I used to attend big bazars which were like markets and some days would sell out of stock. I painted pillowcases (fabric painting), ceramics, did watercolours and made greeting cards. Towards the end of my last few years I stared going to the junk souqs and finding old pieces of furniture. I would paint miles of fabric, then have stuff covered and gilded. I hand-painted aprons and put tassels on the womensʼ bust – the Americans loved them!

Our time in Saudi meant lots of wonderful travel. My husband was given 3 holidays a year, maybe about 7 weeks a year so we took every opportunity to explore Europe. We would have never been able to afford this kind of lifestyle back in Australia.

To what level did you speak the language when you arrived?

Nil.

How did the language difference affect you?

Not a lot as in the major cities most people spoke English.

How did the cultural and religious differences affect you?

Religion dictated most things. Shopping times had to to fit in with prayer time. I was always on my guard with my headscarf. The religious police could be anywhere and if they caught you without a headscarf then they would yell at you. Some of my friends even had their ankles whipped with sticks.

The religion and cultural restrictions were completely foreign to me. That was never bridged. I found the restrictions to women very harsh and unforgiving. We heard stories of Western women being locked up by the religious police for no real reason. I think it was the complete lack of control that frightened me. Our passports were taken off us by the company once we got back into the Kingdom which was not a good feeling. Especially when wars were brewing to the north in Iraq.

A few times I fled with the children as we thought the Americans were going to start a war, which they eventually did. We were told that there could be chemicals that could drift into Saudi. We did not know if these were lies or truth. Then, after September 2001, expatriate compounds were targeted by a small group of fundamentalists. Things became very nasty and many wives and children left the Kingdom forever.

Did you have a local partner? How does or doesn’t that help you integrate?

No I didnʼt have a local partner. Some of my friends did and their lives were difficult. Some women had met their prospective husbands in the US (while they were studying), married there then moved to Saudi. I donʼt think many were prepared for the culture shock.

Would you have considered taking out citizenship?

Apart from not being allowed Saudi citizenship, I would have never contemplated it.

If you don’t have citizenship, what are your feelings on living in a country where you have no political voice?

I do care about my country but admit Iʼm not overly political. Saudis have no political voice so I always though when it came to politics we were all in the same boat.

I think it was the lack of a proper legal structure that concerned me. If my husband been in a car accident and accidentally killed someone he could have been put to death, even if he was not at fault. The Saudi logic was that he should never have been in the country therefore he was the one at fault. Westerners were always considered in the wrong because of this attitude.

Was there a moment when you suddenly realised the extent to which you had integrated? To which you hadn’t?

We never integrated. That was never encouraged. Unless you get a visa for work then people generally cannot visit there. So integration will probably never happen.

What advice would you have for ‘newbie’ expats? What do you wish you had known before moving to your new home?

Get a hobby, do a correspondence course or try and get work. The lazy mornings by a compound pool can become extremely tedious after one or two days. The thought of spending years trying to occupy oneself can do your head in.

Of interest, it took me a long time to integrate back into Australia society. I thought the people back home were not particularly interested in international affairs as they had no idea or interest in what was happening in the Middle East. Their complaints seemed very petty. With hindsight I was too harsh. I donʼt keep abreast of Middle East politics now. Iʼm too busy being a mum and running a B&B. Maybe because the new Iraq is Afghanistan and we donʼt hear very much on the Israel/Palestine conflict anymore, or maybe I too have become desensitized.

It is probably the latter. Even though I had practiced as a psychologist I ended up going to see one about a year and a half after leaving Saudi. I should have done this earlier but couldnʼt see the signs of depression. I had never suffered from depression nor do I now but I just didnʼt seem to be coping with life. I can now see that I was probably suffered from post traumatic stress. Once identified by the psychologist and discussed openly I resolved the issue.

I love being back in Australia. Love the freedom to jump in the car and pop into town. Love running my own business. Love not living on a compound which was like a fish bowl. I love going camping beside a river and seeing the stars at night, I love listening to birds sing, and I love being able to have a glass of wine each night. I love my kids having pets and playing sport, going to the cinema or catching a train to Melbourne, its great to see them being able to mix with the opposite sex – normal even.

I love my kids having a family doctor and access to a Western hospital (if ever needed), I just love freedom. With hindsight I wonder if I didnʼt have the best temperament to live behind walls for 6 years. I certainly didnʼt have the fortitude to cope with the prospect of my children being in an unsafe environment. So when people ask me about how I felt in Saudi. I say it was a love/hate relationship. I loved painting with the Saudi women, I loved being with my girlfriends, I loved my Hot Art business but I didnʼt like the external threats, restrictions and religious police.

A few things really leapt out at me from Mandy’s comments.  First, the absolute importance of building a life for yourself, by finding your hobby, your passion – doubly important if you’ve moved for your partner’s work, rather than your own.

Above all though, I found her discussion of the challenges of life in a strictly Muslim country fascinating.  I visited my father, who was working in Saudi, when I was 20 and even in that brief 48 hours – the longest visa I could get, after months of wrangling – I noticed all the immediately confronting things Mandy mentioned.  The abeya, the segregated restaurants, the way nobody looked at me, how afraid I was going to be caught by the religious police just as the wind whipped the unfamiliar black covering back from my face.  I’ve never felt so conscious of my gender.

It was a fascinating experience but I was happy to leave – it was great to read Mandy’s account of what its like for those who stay.

I’d also be interested to see how different the Saudi experience is for men – anyone fancy jumping in?