Sunday, February 27, 2011

"..Those Saudi "shebabs" who were dancing & cheering for the King's return, they didn't really care about the King ...they are are bored!"

 'Your fingers lickin'-$35-billion-good'...for now'
"... As in Egypt, there are real issues indeed for the Saudi mass: the country shows huge discrepancies in wealth in this vastly rich Oil Giant. Although Saudi Arabia has risen in stature to become one of the G-20 countries, there is much poverty in this country. Just like Egypt with a mass of unemployed youth, Saudi has a huge population of youngsters: nearly half (47%) of the Saudi population is 18 years old or younger. Although the national unemployment figure stands at 10%, the jobless rate is nearly four times higher (39%) for Saudis aged 24-24 years. And if the Egyptians and Bahrainis complained about the absence of liberty in their own country, these countries seem clearly liberal in comparison to Saudi in terms of freedom of the press.Despite these possible sources for unrest,....  Saudi seems a bastion of stability in the midst of the Middle Eastern turmoil. But one can never be sure about these things...today a Saudi friend explained his own fears: "those young teenagers [the "shebabs", the same Arabic name for the Somali pirates] who were dancing in the streets waving Saudi flags and cheering for the King's return, they didn't really care about the King, These kids are bored. This isn't Cairo or Bahrain, there is nothing to do here. They have no movies, they have no means of having fun, they don't work, how can they pass their time? So they were dancing in the streets, not for the King but instead to have fun. Blowing off steam. Who knows what they will do next.

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