Twenty-Twenty Continued

This follows on from my previous blog, Twenty-Twenty.

Eventually, in June we started working again. My weekly hours were reduced from 40 hours per week to 26 hours per week. Also, my salary was reduced by 40%, apparently this being an option offered to

employers by the government due to COVID. As of this week, normal working hours have been resumed, although salary remains diminished (and unpaid). A friend and colleague, who had instituted legal proceedings against Al Jazeera Academy some time back for non-payment of salary and benefits, won his case. This after Al Jazeera failed to attend 4 hearings. They now have one month to appeal the verdict, but they really don’t have a leg to stand on. 

My previous contract ended in the last week of September. My iqama (resident’s permit) expired at the end of September. Al Jazeera Academy told me that they would renew my contract for 2 months, after which I would be given a final exit visa. With straight faces they informed me that they would pay me 60% - 70% of what they owe me before

I leave and would transfer the balance to my South African bank account in the fullness of time. I politely rejected this offer. The way it works in KSA, within a few days of a contract ending, they are obliged to pay end-of-service benefits, which in my case, after 9 years of service, is a considerable amount of money. Also, Al Jazeera has not paid me a salary since November 2019, so in total they now owe me in the region of SAR 200,000.

When Al Jazeera informed me that I would get a final exit in November, I sent an email to the MD and asked him if he would assure me that I would receive all my outstanding monies before I leave and that Al Jazeera would be willing to transfer my iqama to a new employer should I find another position. The response to that email was a phone call from HR to tell me that they would transfer my iqama if I paid them SAR 25,000 (about R110,000). 

They also very cunningly made my contract expire one day before my legal residency in KSA expires, no doubt in the hope that I would leave the country before my ESB come due. So, it seems that the only way forward is to institute legal proceeding against Al Jazeera for my outstanding monies. I understand that one may stay in the country while a legal dispute in ongoing. 

I should also mention that I share an apartment with 3 other teachers, whose contracts expired some 8 months ago, but who are hanging around waiting for their money. Al Jazeera has effectively robbed them of 8 months of their lives. 

Twenty-twenty

After my Christmas vacation I landed back in Saudi on 18 January. At the company’s request I had included two weeks unpaid leave in my annual leave because they were trying to cut costs. To that end I had also not received any salary for December. I learned later that no one else had been paid either.

Meanwhile our company had just lost a big contract and had decided to terminate around one hundred teachers who were assigned to that contract. When a company in Saudi Arabia ends an employee’s contract, the employee is entitled to an end-of-service benefit depending on their years of service. 

Daily, head-office was crowded with employees wanting the money due to them, back salary and end-of-service benefits, so that they could fly home. This process went on for weeks until eventually all had received their dues.

The company had made an offer to a colleague and me that rather than terminating us, we could each work for six months of the year until the company found some new business. This effectively meant a 50% drop in salary for both of us. We both rather reluctantly agreed to this proposition in the hope that soon they would find more business. 

My friend then left the country for six months unpaid leave with a fraction of the money due to him, getting one of the last flights out of Riyadh before lock-down. I continued working at the Academy, still without salary being paid. According to the agreement with the company, I would work till the end of August and then go home for six months while my friend would continue here.

Then in March Covid-19 arrived and on 9 March our students were told not to attend at the Academy until further notice. Teachers and admin staff, for some unknown reason, were still expected to attend

at the office daily. Due to not having received any salary since November 2019 and the cost of my six-week vacation, I found my funds running low. Accordingly, I sent an email to our MD pointing out that I had received no salary for five months and that I would appreciate some of the money owed to me being transferred into my account. He promised that they would contact me soon. I was, in fact, contacted that same evening; I was told that I was required to take unpaid leave until August, while the rest of the teachers were told to take one month’s unpaid leave. This proposition was not met with any great enthusiasm and a letter was drafted to head office, signed by all, rejecting this idea.

Then on 18 March the government declared lock-down for the country with a curfew between 1700 and 0600. In April were told to complete leave forms for unpaid leave for April. Now we are in the middle of May and a leave form for May has been requested. I have now been nearly 6 months without pay and I do not see the country opening any time soon. We are still getting around 2000 new cases daily.

Lock-down, as everyone knows, is no fun. I take a daily walk to the local shop to buy the necessities and to get some exercise. The rest of the day is spent in my room. I don’t know when we will work again, when the airport will be open again or when our company will again be a going concern. I am sharing the accommodation with one colleague so at least I am not entirely isolated.

On the plus side my potted plant, purloined from Bandos, is doing very well. Also, I have completed all the little chores that have needed doing for so long, getting a lot of reading done and my accommodation is pretty well spotless. My cooking is becoming
more adventurous and my NFS skills are being sharpened. I’ve watched some good movies on Netflix, as well as some crappy ones, and my Kindle is proving invaluable. The supermarkets are not busy so shopping is a breeze. And I am still healthy and reasonably sane.

So now we wait for the COVID-19 chaos to play out. I somehow doubt that life will ever be "normal" again.

Transfer to Arar

Returning from my Cyprus vacation (see my previous blog), I had a layover in Istanbul. While waiting for my flight, I received a WhatsApp from our HR department to inform me that I was transferred to Arar, a small town about 60km from the Iraqi border. I was told that our company had been contracted to teach preparatory year English at the Northern Border University. I was to pack as soon as I arrived back in Riyadh as I was to fly out again on the Sunday.

Accordingly, I packed up all my belongings into boxes and suitcases and by Saturday I was good to go. I kept out just a change of underwear, socks and trousers and shirt. The company bus was due to drive to Arar early on Sunday morning, so I loaded all my belongings onto the bus on Saturday night.

Arrangements tend to be fluid here, and upon inquiring about my flight and ticket, I was told that I would only be traveling on the Tuesday morning. That made life a bit awkward since I had no change of clothing or underwear. I had also packed up all my kitchen stuff so I couldn’t cook anything either. However, Uber Eats came to my rescue and together with take-aways and sandwiches I was able to survive.

Tuesday morning at 0300 my driver arrived to transport me to the airport and I set out on my new adventure.

I was met at Arar airport by our driver and taken directly to the university for my interview. After my interview, the manager of our English department (who speaks no English) sent me and another teacher to our accommodation so that we could settle in and get ourselves organized. Unfortunately, our driver did not yet know his way around Arar and after an hour he still hadn’t found our hotel (our temporary accommodation). 

We decided to stop for something to eat at a fast-food joint. Arar is basically a large village, and according to my till slip, I was customer number 3 for that day – things were apparently not hectically busy at the eatery.

We eventually found our way to the hotel. Initially the hotel intended to assign both of us to one room (non-native English speakers are expected to share rooms). After we, as native English speakers, had strenuously registered our objections, it seemed that the hotel had no available rooms. They were concerned that other teachers may arrive and that they would have no accommodation for them. Eventually, after about 30 minutes of loud discussion, things got sorted out and we were assigned separate rooms and we got ourselves sort of settled. 

For the rest of the week we attended at the university but nothing actually happened. One colleague (also a SAFFA) and I found an empty classroom and spent the days there reading and doing crosswords. We ate lunch in the canteen which served up pretty decent and tasty home-cooked food. There were also dozens of Sudanese teachers milling around the building, all hoping to get a teaching position at the university.

On Thursday, on the way home, the bus stopped to allow some teachers to do some shopping. After thirty minutes of sitting on the bus getting bored I thought “fuckit” and looked for an Uber. The gods were with me and an Uber was available. It turned out the driver spoke perfect English and had obtained his Master’s degree in Australia. Chatting on the way home, he mentioned the name of my company and said that he had heard that our company hadn’t landed the university teaching contract. This was more information than we had received from our company and we spent the weekend mulling over the implications.

The weekend I decided to explore the local mall and supermarket to get some provisions. There are no cooking facilities in the hotel but I had my microwave with me, so I was hoping for some microwaveable meals. When I accessed the Uber app I noticed that there were very few Ubers in town, but I was able to get one and off I went to the local mall.

When I was ready to go home again, I called up the Uber app which apologized and said that currently there were no Ubers available. This was a problem as I was several kilometers from home, in flip-flops and with an outside temperature of around 40°C. I kept trying to find an Uber but after about 30 minutes I admitted defeat. I downloaded the Careem app and the gods smiled on me. One car was available. The car was a bit of a heap and the driver kept talking to me in Arabic and asking the way and touching me, but eventually I got home.

Sunday morning, when our driver was fifteen minutes late to take us to the university, I sent a WhatsApp enquiry to find out what was going on. I got a message back: “Did Mr. xxx not inform you?” (Mr. xxx being our non-English-speaking manager). The answer was no, Mr. xxx had informed nobody that no teachers were required to attend at the university that day So now we again sit and wonder… are we staying in Arar, will we return to Riyadh, will we be posted elsewhere? Communication is somewhat rare commodity within our company.

Kyrenia, Northern Cyprus

I was recently fortunate enough to spend ten days in Northern Cyprus. I have been there several times before on holiday as I really like it and it isn’t overly expensive – although it is becoming more so. Passable English is spoken in most shops and restaurants on the island although sometimes there can be some misunderstandings.

Kyrenia Harbor

I had noticed a new souvenir shop in the harbor area a few days previously so one morning I thought I would go and have a look at what they had to offer. Instead of walking along the main thoroughfare I decided to take the back street and then cut down to the main area after a couple of blocks. Well, with my lack of sense of direction and the turns and twists of the lanes I quickly became disoriented and by the time I found my way down to the main harbor area I was way past the souvenir shop. However, since I felt that I was very close to the town area I decided to press on and have breakfast in town.

Sadly, I had misjudged again. I was a lot further from town than I had estimated. I walked for another thirty minutes and a couple of kilometers, up some steep hills in the hot sunshine before I got to the town area. I slumped onto a park bench in the shade until I got my breath back and stopped sweating.

Then I made my way to a café/pub that I hadn’t tried before, Windows Restaurant. I started 

with a beer and then I ordered two fried eggs, two sausages and some toast. The lines of

Both my order and
the eggs were scrambled

communication had obviously gotten twisted and I was served scrambled eggs on toast, lots of chips in all the open spaces on the plate and no sausages. On making inquires about the absent sausages I was given an apology and after a few minutes, the reluctant sausages arrived.

After another beer I decided to make my way down to the tidal pool where I spent most of my days. Along the way I stopped at an apothecary (pharmacy) to buy some safety pins. I wanted them to pin some badges onto my backpack. The gentleman in the pharmacy had no idea what I was talking about and he called a colleague over to see if he could assist. He also came up empty and so I drew a picture of a safety pin. They still had no idea, so I drew a larger and more detailed image. Suddenly his face cleared: “Ah! You want condoms!” he exclaimed. Giving up my artistic efforts, I mimed changing a baby’s nappy. They seemed to understand – or else they had just decided to give me up as a lost cause. Either way, they told me they had none and suggested that I try elsewhere.

A couple of days later I decided to go into town for breakfast again. Eschewing Windows Restaurant, I instead went to The George, an English pub/restaurant that attracts all the local English visitors and shows all the English football games on big-screen TVs. I had eaten there before, and I knew the food was good but the service wasn’t great. On that day the service was worse than usual and after being ignored by the waiters for ten minutes I got up and left. 

I went to the pub next door, Murfeys, who had previously given good service and very palatable food. After 10 minutes I hadn’t even seen a waiter or waitress (waitron?) so I got up and left.

I headed on towards the pool and decided to try another pub along the way that I hadn’t tried before, Simit Dünyasi. Sadly they only had menus in Turkish, and when I told the waiter what I wanted he looked at me in some consternation and walked away without a word. A few minutes later another waiter appeared and looked at me equally blankly when I placed my order. Abandoning what I had been trying to order, I pointed to a picture of an omelet and a beer. The beer arrived and a while later the omelet, which was very nice. As I got up to leave, I managed to knock my beer mug onto the ground where it broke. I was really having a bad breakfast day.

I hurried away to the pool where I spent the rest of the day relaxing and swimming and sunning.