Version
COMMENTARY
ET CETERA
DISPATCHES
LISTS
FEATURES
CORRECTIONS
MAILBAG
REVIEWS NEUNER
OLEAR
RICHARDS
STERNE
MASTHEAD
CONTACT
SUBMIT
SUBSCRIBE ARCHIVES
WATER WATER NOWHERE
Third country nationals and the Saudi economy
For the record, I want the American taxpayers to know that I am working my butt off here in Saudi Arabia. Even though CNN only covers us when we drop bombs on Baghdad, our military operations in Southwest Asia run around the clock, as they have for more than ten years. I am what we call in the business a “staff weenie” or, in more colorful parlance, an R.E.A., or “rear-echelon asshole.” Really, this is okay with me. I’ve done my time on the front lines, so I am more than happy to spend most of my long days preparing sexy Power Point presentations and finding new and innovative ways to become absolutely bat-shit frustrated with Excel spreadsheets. (Side note: Microsoft Office is perhaps the most effective weapons system that the Pentagon has procured since the end of the Cold War). Despite the fact that freedom requires constant vigilance, I get a day off every now and then. Like many busy people, life’s small details often get away from me, so my day off often becomes errand day.
My most important errand by far is my weekly trip to the Water Nazi. Saudi tap water contains all sorts of creepy-crawlies, so fresh drinking water is a hot commodity. And the only place you can get it is from the Water Nazi, an otherwise pleasant man from Bangladesh who makes Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi look like Kris Kringle. Several thousand people work on my base and the Water Nazi seems to know them all. If the Water Nazi sees your face at the water supply station more than once a week: no water for you! You must trade in an empty water container to receive a full one, which seems reasonable. Except that the Water Nazi will agonizingly scrutinize your empty container for cracks, dings, and other defects in workmanship that cannot possibly be your fault. Still, if your container doesn’t pass muster: no water for you! Want to pick up some extra water for a friend? No water for you! How a man from Bangladesh, a country that is constantly in danger of being wiped off the map by monsoons, could be so stingy about water is beyond me.
The rest of my errands are less harrowing. Once a week, I stop in to see Mr. Al Iqubal, a quiet gentleman from Pakistan, to pick up my dry cleaning. I get my hair cut by Rolando, a slightly effeminate man from the Philippines who finishes off every haircut with an excellent shoulder massage. I stop for coffee at a java bar run by an affable man from India. And when the day is done, I have a leisurely dinner in the chow hall, staffed by a small army of cooks and busboys who, like the Water Nazi, are mostly from Bangladesh.
The Saudis are very protective of their conservative Muslim culture, so I didn’t think that Saudi Arabia would be a hot destination for poor immigrants seeking a better life. However, more than thirty percent of Saudi Arabia’s population is made up of “third-country nationals,” people from countries like Korea, the Philippines, Egypt, India and Pakistan who come to work in Saudi Arabia on group contracts for specified periods. These immigrants make the equivalent of $200-$300 per month, with as much as half going to the person in their home countries who arranged the contract. This amount may not seem like a lot of money, but it’s a small fortune compared to what they would make back home. For the Water Nazi, being stingy about water is big business.
According to the website www.arab.net, Saudi Arabia’s “economy is almost totally dependent on [the] foreign labor” of third-country nationals. Initially, this assertion may be hard to understand, since Saudi Arabia boasts a population of well over 17 million presumably able-bodied people. But very few Saudis actually participate in the nut-and-bolts of their economy. The reason is simple: they don’t have to.
When Standard Oil discovered huge petroleum reserves on the Arabian Peninsula in the late 1930’s, this country of mostly nomadic herders was instantly transformed into an extremely wealthy nation. Today, more than ninety percent of the nation’s economy is based on oil. Big believers in trickle-down economics, the Saudi government doles out huge oil subsidies to their countrymen, ensuring that most native Saudi Arabians are financially well off. Put simply, most Saudi Arabians do not need to work, especially not at menial blue-collar jobs. But a modern economy, no matter its wealth, requires cooks and trash haulers and ditch-diggers. The Saudis are more than happy to allow third-country nationals to take care of this sort of dirty work.
By one way of reckoning, this economic system is enviable. Indeed, many unskilled jobs in the United States—-hotel maids, janitors, busboys, general laborers—-are filled by immigrants from all over the world who seek better economic opportunities than are available at home. Those who have the means to pay someone else to do these tasks are simply reaping the benefits of their own economic success. But there is a marked difference between how Saudi Arabia and the United States view the status of these immigrant laborers. To illustrate my point, I’ll use a personal example:
When my great-grandfather immigrated to the United States from Germany, his first job was clubbing cattle over the head as they were led into the slaughterhouse. Hardly an enviable way to make a living. But his industriousness, coupled with an ethereal notion that there was “something better out there,” led, four generations later, to me: comfortably middle-class, university educated, broad horizons. This rags-to-riches story may sound poignantly trite. Presumably, the Hispanic woman who cleans my house and the Asian short-order cook who flips my hamburgers can look forward to similar results. At least that’s how the theory goes.
Not so for the Water Nazi and his fellow third-country nationals in Saudi Arabia. They cannot hope to one day share in the economic wealth of their host nation. The strict Saudi culture simply does not allow it. In an effort to protect this culture, third-country nationals are made to linger on the edges of Saudi life. Indeed, checkpoints staffed by Saudi soldiers around the outskirts of Riyadh ensure that third-country nationals stay safely corralled within the geographic confines stipulated in their work contracts. And once those contracts are complete, third-country nationals must return to the poverty of their own countries. Otherwise, they must renegotiate another contract at great expense. These contracts ensure that the hired help remains exactly that.
It’s presumptuous to think that third-country nationals in Saudi Arabia are looking for anything but a chance to make money, at least more money than they can make at home. Freedom, in one form or another, is not a carrot that’s been dangled in front of them when they sign their work contracts. But without the labor that third-country nationals provide, Saudi Arabia’s economy, despite its wealth, would collapse. That wealth, incidentally, is not the result of hard work and ingenuity. Rather, the Saudis’ wealth is the result of a lucky break: the huge oil reserves under the barren sand. We should all be so lucky. But the desire to protect their culture, it seems to me, makes the Saudis unwilling to spread the luck around. I wonder if the Saudis have asked themselves this question: what happens when the third-country nationals decide to seek their fortunes elsewhere? For now, I’m stuck appeasing the Water Nazi, my friend from Bangladesh.
--Jeremy Neuner is on assignment in Saudi Arabia.
By Jeremy Neuner
032001