Medical Matters

 

In January of 2021 I noticed a small lump near my right ear which was growing. I’d initially assumed that it was something like a pimple, but it got bigger and assumed a “volcano” shape and became crusty.

Eventually, towards the end of January, I went to our local medical center, Alsahafa Medical Centre to get it checked out. The GP took a look and said that I need to see their skin specialist. I did so and he referred me to a surgeon at Dallah Hospital, one of the more expensive hospitals that does not accept Al Jazeera’s medical insurance (because AJ has the cheapest cover available).

A few days later I consulted with the surgeon at Dallah and he was willing to excise the cyst there and then. We went into a side room where he injected the mass with local anesthetic and started the procedure. I had some misgivings when I heard the nurse advising him on how to go about making the incision and afterwards advising him on whether I should be given pain medication.

Nevertheless, thirty minutes later the job was done, the cyst had been sent to a pathology lab for analysis and I was a couple of thousand Riyals poorer. Two days later I returned to Dallah for feedback. The surgeon informed me that the cyst was a squamous cell carcinoma. Nothing to worry about, he assured me, but probably two or three sessions of radio therapy would be a good idea just to make sure no stray carcinoma cells were lurking around. I didn’t feel reassured because on the pathology lab report the recommendation was for a complete excision of the cyst with safety margin. Anyway, Dallah did not have radio therapy facilities, so I needed to investigate where to find such facilities.

A few days later I went to Aster Sanad Hospital, where after registering as a new patient I eventually got to see a doctor. He told me that they had neither an oncology department not radio therapy facilities. He suggested I look elsewhere.

The following day I took myself to the Saudi German Hospital. I first spoke to a doctor in the oncology department. He told me that they did not have radio therapy facilities, but he gave me a list of hospitals that did have such facilities. He estimated that I would probably need about fifteen treatments, again at exorbitant cost. He read the pathology lab report and suggested that I consult with a surgeon without delay with a view to complete excision of the cyst as recommended in the lab report. 

The surgeon at Saudi German read the lab report and agreed that immediate surgery was indicated. The cost would be painful but when you’re dealing with a cancer, money becomes a secondary concern. All of a sudden you become very aware of your mortality.

Meanwhile, the cyst had started growing again, soon exceeding its previous proportions.

While discussing this issue with my friend and colleague, he mentioned that the father of one of his ex-students was highly placed in oncology in Saudi Arabia. If we could contact this person, he could presumably point me in the correct direction. The problem was that although my friend remembered the student's name, he didn’t have his number. He spent the next few days trying to get contact details for this student without success. Then there was an amazing synchronicity: a few days later, while sitting in a taxi at a red traffic light, he heard someone calling his name. And yes, it was the student that he had been trying to reach in a car next to the taxi.

We contacted his father and he set up an appointment for me with a professor specializing in head and

neck carcinomas. He had rooms at King Abdulaziz University Hospital, a prestigious hospital in Saudi Arabia. I was incredulous and relieved when he told me that my tests and treatment would be free of charge. This apparently because his son has an extremely high opinion of my colleague as a teacher, so he was happy to help us deal with my issue. He also told me that he loves to be able to help people.

I had several consultations with the professor, a CT scan, an MRI scan (an extremely noisy process), blood tests and an internal organ scan. The decision was made to excise the carcinoma with safety margin, to remove the right parotid gland and several lymph nodes in my neck.

I checked into the hospital and the following day I had a seven-hour surgery. I woke up feeling very sorry for myself. I had a (uncomfortable) catheter inserted, an oxygen mask, a drip, an oxygen and

respiration monitor and a blood pressure cuff which automatically took my BP every 10 minutes. I also had some sort of inflatable leggings on my legs, which inflated and deflated regularly, apparently to promote good blood circulation. My throat was sore, and I was dying of thirst. After a couple of hours, I was taken back to my room to recover. Several days later I was discharged and I Ubered back to my accommodation.

The main side-effects is that up until now my right ear is completely numb as is my cheek below my ear. When I shower if feels like I am washing a piece of rubber stuck to the side of my face. The incision scars are fading into invisibility and the medical report states that all traces of the cancer have been removed. I am supposed to have two or three follow up tests during the course of the year to confirm that there is no reoccurrence.

I do not have the words to express my gratitude to the doctor who made my treatment possible. I would not have been able to afford the excellent treatment I received, either here or in South Africa. I believe there would have been a very different outcome for me without his intervention.

The best way for me to end this entry is with the response I got from the doctor after I sent him feedback and a copy of my medical report:

Excellent...you don’t need anything extra...you are cured...Alhamdulillah...it was early disease and removed completely...you just need follow up..i think King Fahad might charge you more than other hospital.. I think prof. Khalid has a clinic in Dallah hospital and might charge you less for the follow up...by the way follow up is only physical examination and CT scans every 3 to 6 months. Which can be done by any hospital...check with King Fahad first and if they are charging high better you go to Dallah hospital and fix appointment with prof Khalid.. after Ramadan...but believe me Greg. you are really lucky...👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

2021 – Part 1

 

Shortly after the above events, my colleague and I were invited to give a demo lesson for BAE at a Saudi Air Force military base. We were cautioned to be at the visitors’ entrance promptly

at 7am as there was only a 15-minute window for us to be admitted to the base. Accordingly, we took an early taxi and arrived at around 0640. We stood around for a couple of hours and were eventually collected at the gate at around 0915 and taken to the school, about 5 km from the gate. We gave our lessons and in due course we returned to our accommodation.

Several days later we were informed that we had been accepted by BAE and that we would commence teaching on the following Sunday. There were forms to be completed and photos to be provided to obtain a base pass. I completed the forms and submitted edited photos which I had on my laptop. A few days later I was informed that the photos were not acceptable

and that I needed to get proper visa photos.

The next day I consulted Google Maps which informed me that there was a photography studio, Studio Al-Sahafa, about 2km from my accommodation. I took a walk to the given location of  the studio, and after wandering around for about an hour I concluded that the studio either did not exist or had moved. I looked at the next place on Google Maps and found Digital Photo Studio. I decided to Uber to this one as by now I was tired of walking in the hot sun. Happily, this place existed, and I was able to quickly get the photos done. The photos were given to the base and I then awaited feedback.

At this time the recruiter (a Jordanian) informed me that he needed to travel to Jordan for a week to attend to an emergency, but when he returned, we would sort out all the paperwork, including the transfer of my iqama. Soon after he left, KSA entered lockdown again and all borders were closed. A few days after the commencement of the new lockdown, he messaged us that we should go to his office to sign the contracts for our application to proceed and for the iqamas to be renewed. All his colleagues, he assured us, were in the loop and would deal with our affairs speedily. Accordingly, the next day we took a taxi to his office. We spoke to three of his colleagues, none of whom had the faintest idea of who we were, what we were doing there and what they were supposed to do with us. Eventually I told them that, in the circumstances, we would return when the recruiter was back from Jordan, which he had told us he would be that weekend.

As it turned out, the lockdown continued for three weeks, and when the recruiter returned, we had just one week before we were due to start teaching at BAE. That is when things turned even more pear shaped. After assuring me that things were well in hand, a day later he told me that he could not transfer my iqama due to my expired exit visa on my file. Since Al Jazeera had applied for the exit visa, only they could get it cancelled.

I phoned Al Jazeera HR and asked if they would please cancel my final exit. No problem, they assured me, just come in and sign some papers. So I Ubered to Al Jazeera Head Office and

the papers I was required to sign were a commitment to pay Al Jazeera 25,000 SAR (about R120,000 of my retirement money) to renew my iqama and transfer it. I explained that the renewal and transfer would be taken care of by my new employer, all I needed was for them to cancel the final exit. They were not interested – it was an all or nothing deal. Since only Al Jazeera could cancel the final exit and the fact that I was facing severe time constraints, my back was to the wall and I had no option but to sign.

Firstly, I had to write a request for this expensive and illegal service. I was not given a copy of my document, but I was able to take a photo of it. Then I was coerced into signing a printed "contract" where I agreed to pay Al Jazeera 25,000 SAR. I also took a photo of this 

 document. I was assured that the matter would be finalized by close of business that day.

To cut a long story short, my iqama was not renewed that day and as a result I lost the job I had been offered with BAE. Al Jazeera was in no way concerned about this and made zero effort to expedite matters despite the large sum of money which they had extorted from me. The process will take two weeks, the tin-pot dictator told me when I followed up, reveling in his power over me. He has since ignored my attempts to communicate with him, apart from one email “instructing” me to come to the office to meet someone. I was ignored when I asked who the someone was and why I needed to meet them. Most frustrating is that there is no one to whom I can escalate this toxic situation. The owner of the company has another office and another business to which he devotes all his time, and the COO is in Egypt for an unknown length of time.

So once again, I grit my teeth and hurry-up and wait.

Yet More of 2020

Several days after I posted the above blog, I received some sad news. My brother-in-law, who had been ill for some time, passed away. On the same day I learned that a colleague of mine, who had departed KSA for home a few days previously, had also passed away. Both deaths were a shock to me.

Around mid-October I got a call from a recruiter with a potential job offer. A few days later I went for an interview (British Aerospace) and was subsequently offered a position. The only problem was that the starting date was non-negotiable, and this would entail me breaking my contract with Al Jazeera. I made it clear to the recruiter that my top priority was protecting my end-of-service benefits which had been accumulating for the past nine years. He assured me that there was no way that breaking my contract with AJ could endanger my benefits.

Based on this information I accepted the offer and notified AJ that I would be leaving one week before the end of my contract. A few days later my branch manager told me that if I resigned early, I would lose one-third of my benefits. I scoffed at this until he showed me the Saudi labor law which confirmed what he had told me. 

Accordingly, I sent a link of the relevant law to the recruiter and notified him that I would not be able to start the new job on the required date. He phoned me and spent fifteen minutes trying to convince me to break my contract anyway. Eventually, when I would not relent,  he went away miffed and muttering about wasted time. Since we were looking at me losing a substantial amount of money, I wasn’t too concerned about his hurt feelings.

In due course my contract ended, and I got to spend time in my accommodation with nothing much to do. I share the accommodation with three other teachers, all of whom are waiting for the money owed to them. By this time, my iqama (residents permit) had expired, and my final exit was getting close to expiry. If both my iqama and final exit expire, I become an illegal alien and subject to all sorts of nasty legal repercussions.

A couple of days before my final exit was due to expire, I made an appointment with a lawyer to see if it was possible to get my final exit extended. This would buy me time to find another job. The appointment was for 6pm and he send me a WhatsApp location. I took an Uber to his location, which turned out to be a parking lot. I walked up and down the street for 20 minutes looking for Majid Law 

Firm without success. So, I sent him a picture of the shop I was passing to ask for clearer directions. He eventually came downstairs to find me. He explained that we could not have the meeting that night due to their offices being flooded. There was in fact a large pool of water in the street in front of their offices. I mentioned to him that it would have been courteous to have cancelled the meeting before I arrived at his location.

The following day Al Jazeera summoned me for a meeting for us to agree on the amount of money due to me, this being one-year’s unpaid salary and end-of-service benefits. I sat in reception for about six hours while they calculated (?) and eventually they presented me with a figure that was about 35,000 SR less than my calculations. I gave them the spreadsheet of my calculations and left for the day. The next day they called me in again and after another lengthy wait they presented me with an amended amount which was much closer to my amount. They told me that if I returned the following day, they would give me 50% of what they owed, in cash, and a commitment to transfer the balance to my SA account in four installments.

Unfortunately, since my iqama has expired, my bank account has been frozen, and I now sit with all this cash in my accommodation. I am hoping that I will soon be employed again and that my bank account will be revived, allowing me to deposit the cash and transfer money back to South Africa.

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.