The Extreme Contrasts Of Saudi Arabia

i'm oscar and i'm dan and today we are in medina saudi arabia if you've seen our last three videos you've been following our trip around the historically secretive country of saudi arabia our 83rd country together our last few days on the trip were spent in three vastly different locations the holy city of medina king abdullah university town and jeddah the country's second largest city come along as we show you these three incredibly different stops on the trip picking up where we left off in alola ah the time has come to leave our beautiful little van and to leave alula and the desert today we have a four hour drive to our next stop in the country our second last we are going to the second holiest city in all of islam medina hopefully the drive there is beautiful we're about to meet up with keith from singapore our newfound friend [Music] so we've got keith we're heading to medina and this landscape is one of my favorites i love desert landscapes [Music] look out [Music] i don't think australia have been anywhere so far where we've just driven on the highway and seen so many camels roaming around [Music] why are they blinking at you because they're warning me that's kind [Music] [Music] here's our little luggage room we're seeing at the intercontinental with points it's very overpriced but it is a nice room it may be overpriced but it comes with quite the view i think a lot of people would pay a lot of money for this view look at this we are right next to the mosque [Music] all right we just left our hotel and we are about to head to the mosque yeah we grabbed some saudi coffee and dates which is like several times a day at this point we just realized we have yet to pay for saudi coffee anywhere because they always give it out for free [Music] so as non-muslims the mosque or the inside of the mosque is off-limits to us but we can still enjoy it from the outside i think until quite recently no non-muslims could even come to medina you still can't go to mecca if you're not muslim yeah we're of course respecting the limitations [Music] right now i'm really just trying to put myself in the shoes of someone who's like dreamt their whole life of coming here you know and finally being here must be such a big moment so i was just reflecting on what it feels like to be here as you know us it's like going to someone's party like a family party and you're not invited you don't know anyone there but everyone else knows each other and you just show up you're like how hey doing that's what i feel like right now we're pretty much the only ones not wearing traditional dress or religious dress we stick out like a sore thumb [Music] so here's the entrance to the mosque right well here is h m and starbucks [Music] look what has just happened we were just like for a few minutes looking at our phones trying to figure out where to have dinner all that type of stuff suddenly we look over completely silently every sun roof has just folded so now it looks like a different place and we're like did we miss the biggest thing to happen [Music] so the sunset or margaret prayer is coming up in about 25 minutes so a lot of people are coming towards the mosque now suddenly this guy comes up to us and goes hey you guys are swedish right we're like uh yes how did you know speaking in swedish he then goes well i'm also from sweden and my friend lives in denmark his friend had said we looked super scandinavia this is the danish guy oh you get it so you were right i mean this guy saw you and he was like oh yes and so we got talking with elmi originally from somaliland living in stockholm where is the home country somaliland when he found out we weren't allowed inside the mosque as non-muslims he instantly offered to give us a glimpse of the inside through other means so we just met elmi this is like the craziest coincidence ever he is also swedish and he's currently going in to pray and he was like i'll put you on whatsapp and i'll show you everything inside he was so so nice we're gonna get an inside tour of what it's like inside the mosque [Music] [Music] asked one of the guards at the entrance about the muslims only policy and we thought it'd be interesting to share his response with you according to him the religion itself has no problems with it but rather it's a policy implemented by the government the guard himself would have no problems with a non-muslim visitor and said no one would do anything to stop people from entering make of that what you will but we of course decided to stay respectful and remain on the outside thank you what a coincidence from somaliland been living in sweden and the uk i think probably we'll have to come he was saying he thought london was international then he came here [Music] this is so crazy in our hotel there are two qr codes on the desk one goes to like the holy quran so you can actually read the whole thing the second one just says youtube we're like what's this just youtube turns out it's a link to the whole quran read out it's a 22 hour long video with 20 million views so you can just listen to the whole quran right now oh my god look at us trying to be all fitness guys good morning by the way this is a five-star hotel you know it's very expensive most hotels have gyms but this hotel doesn't have a gym i assume it has something to do with the location so let's work out quickly in the room what does it say you can translate it everyone we're taking a stroll through medina and we made it to the mosque that is literally right next to the prophet's mosque and it's covered in pigeons or as a italian friend of ours famously said pizzani [Music] so this mosque behind us is actually the last mosque where muhammad the prophet prayed [Music] honestly one of the coolest things to see in medina is just to see all the different interpretations of muslim clothing around the world and especially for women some countries have like just completely black abayas whereas others have very colorful outfits talk about having people from literally all around the world gathering right here [Music] we are approaching the world's very first leaders shut up siri we are approaching the world's very first how about that and it's actually prayer time right now so we're at the world's first mosque during prayer [Music] all right we're getting some something for free i don't quite understand let's see what keith thinks he's more experienced no no so in africa they have this uh it's a top brush but i i don't think i've seen the edible one but it has a very uh sort of spicy [Music] so they're selling a very special type of date here it's almost like a raisin i'm wondering if we should buy it but they only come in massive boxes so we're hurrying over to see some new friends in a small commercial sort of town above jeddah but we're just trying to go around this mosque quickly so we can see everything before we head there very hectic day pretty crazy to think that this is where the first people would have gone to pray at a mosque i guess the very first muslims in the world it's time to say goodbye to keith after so many fun days together and awful great days i know we'll see you in singapore or elsewhere elsewhere next time uh molly molly baby followed by chet well we always say see you around the world okay until then see you around the world so we're heading out of medina now this was a really crazy experience it feels so weird to think that we've slept over in medina thinking how much you've heard about it your whole life especially traveling in the gulf the one thing so far this our seventh day in saudi that we've learned is that saudi people are pretty much always so welcoming to foreigners they always want to give you free stuff they're really happy to see you and i guess that's one of the benefits of traveling to some countries that don't get a lot of tourists and others that don't get a lot of tourists people are extremely unwelcoming but this is one of those where people are not jaded and they're just super excited to have you here [Music] well there's an animal we did not know existed in saudi arabia we just drove past a massive family of baboons the whole gang was like climbing on cars standing right by the side of the road it was crazy they were just massive so i'm almost like should we stop the car and see if we get it [Music] that's when we arrived at stop number two before going to saudi we'd been graciously invited by the australian danish family the joes of arabia to stay overnight at their expat home an hour north of jeddah the town was a gated community surrounding king abdullah university of science and technology and to say this was a unique place to visit would be an understatement oh i'm a little bit shy okay okay we don't have to have you in if you don't want it we have been invited into the home of kylie and casper and ella this is absolutely amazing very fun to see this side yeah as an expat exactly well we're really happy to have you both here it's absolutely a pleasure it's really nice to see you in person thank you so much [Music] [Applause] the immaculate streets the beautiful plantations the spacious houses it all gave us serious truman show vibes [Music] so we are here at kaust king abdullah university of science and technology and it is honestly so fascinating because it's like this bubble everything is so serene and peaceful everything just looks spotless [Music] so the university is kind of like a large gated community about 7 000 people apparently live here so it's a huge space what are your first impressions well kylie and casper are selling it very well when you live in here everything is free so they have gyms free beaches with you know chairs it's just like such a comfortable life obviously besides the drawbacks of living in saudi and the summer temperatures but it's just fascinating imagine if everywhere was this perfect [Music] we're getting so much fomo because now that we see how incredible the fish are here we just want to go snorkeling but i guess we'll have to come back [Music] we were lucky enough to be in saudi arabia on the first ever foundation day a new public holiday added this year to commemorate the foundation of the first saudi state since we spent this day february 22nd in kaust we got to witness a more local and intimate celebration [Music] so this is where you usually go grocery shopping yes there we go you meet everybody in tamimi yeah okay the hot spot yes we're heading into tamimi market sort of the biggest grocery store here if you've been following us for a while you'll know that going to grocery stores in different countries is one of our favorite things to do obviously this is far from a typical saudi grocery store but it's still really fascinating to see what it's like here what section is this dan this is the date and nut section we would go wild if we actually had something to do with all this stuff but now we can just look and enjoy [Music] oh my god i've never seen this before they have vegan we always have to like cut this option [Music] they even have khalifa farms here what that vegan ice cream vegan pizza that's very rare good morning from the cows it's such a difference getting outside here today it's insane it feels like florida almost yeah it's humid it's hotter and like a very different way since it's humid from the rest of the trip so now we are heading to jeddah thank you so much to kylie and casper they've been such lovely hosts lovely having you here in great company and we can't wait to see you somewhere else in the world yes [Music] all right so we were just getting gas and i stepped in gum i'm trying to get this off come on that's not really coming off so we've made it to jeddah we are going to a vegan restaurant [Music] this is incredible it's like a tofu vegan mozzarella mushroom tomato so good this is what we've been craving for a long time and to top it all off a chocolate cookie [Music] just like that we've made it to jeddah's historic district called albalad [Music] thank you the kindest man just helped us with the parking for some reason the machine wouldn't accept our coins which we got at the gas station so this guy came up to us and literally paid for our parking without question wow what they have valet vip parking like for the entire historic district that's the first i haven't seen that anywhere else before this is bad jadid which means new gate i think from my limited knowledge of arabic that building is crooked this neighborhood is like amsterdam on steroids [Music] [Music] wow this piece right ahead is pretty incredible [Music] so albalad the old historic center of jeddah is one of saudi arabia's six unesco world heritage sites some of these streets barely look like official streets you know they're like tiny little alleyways and you're like oh that's a street we can go there you know so this place is very confusing to me because on the one hand it's like a tourist hot spot and they have loads of tourist information at the entrance they even have golf carts that can take you around but on the other hand it's super dirty and run down the state of this place is just very confusing [Music] and another heartbreaking thing for us as complete animal lovers is that there's cats everywhere that are injured limping digging through trash so they seem to have a huge street cap problem which i think they need to deal with if this is supposed to be the tourist hotspot of the city it feels a little bit almost like an abandoned amusement park [Music] this behind me is bait nassif which is one of the most famous buildings here in ambala it has a pretty great historical significance in the neighborhood and to jeddah won't go into all the specifics but you can read more about it here [Music] we are about to enter the bedouin market [Music] this is reminding me a little bit of the souk in casablanca morocco actually [Music] so far saudi arabia feels like 10 or 20 countries in one and so far al-balad feels like a completely different side to anything we've seen here so far a little less than two weeks ago we were in dubai with dan's mom and so we were exploring the souk there in old dubai and the very nice benefit of being here in a less touristy soup is that you don't have people like screaming at you and like pulling you in each and every direction all the time here it's a much more local feel so that we really appreciate what's not good this is crazy right here on the edge of our ballad we have what looks like a massive area that's just been demolished we'll show you it's pretty unlike anything we've seen [Music] i'm not sure you can tell how fast this area is behind me but it's just absolutely enormous the whole neighborhood that's just been completely worn down basically these demolished neighborhoods former slums according to some sources are part of an effort to rebuild jedha as a more modern city we won't go into the details of it because there's no way we won't get something wrong but it was definitely a sight to behold and quite the stark contrast from anything we'd seen prior on the trip oh my god so oscar don't look but there's yeah just don't look but there's a pile behind you of just dead cats that i just saw just piled up on each other i genuinely cannot believe that this is the same country that we've been visiting in riyadh seeing how flashy and extravagant and over developed some of the parts of the country are that this is the same place you know [Music] imagine that this is one of the richest countries in the world wow istanbul turkey is famous for the amount of street cats i would say that jeddah so far twice the amount or at least in terms of what you can actually see in the street [Music] so we made it to the neighborhood called jetta waterfront it's definitely a very different vibe from the neighborhood we were just in and there's a roller coaster oh my god oh my god oh like amusement park yeah we're gonna try to find parking and then head out and explore before the sun sets [Music] so we learned something really funny and interesting from kylie and casper but apparently around here in the jeddah area they've actually imported a lot of sand which is just the most ridiculous and crazy thing about saudi arabia of all countries with import sand they've imported it from spain because it's better for like the beach type of sand it's not as like fine and it doesn't blow in the wind as much [Music] one thing we've learned over the past eight days in saudi arabia is that all the sort of tourist gimmicks you see in other countries don't exist here so when you think of you know persian rugs in this region or the different type of snacks they bring to a picnic you know the most cliche type of things they actually have them here everyone is having picnics on these extravagant patterned blankets eating middle eastern suites and it's just so wonderful to see [Music] the following morning it was time to head to jeddah airport and return our rental car we've never been scammed so hard twice on pickup and drop-off by a rental company avoid at all costs you saw the whole scammery when we were picking it up earlier in taboo now they wanted to charge us an extra 350 for the drop-off fee which they said at the time of pickup we'd already paid we absolutely hate to complain but like that was the worst rental car experience we've had in i think i've driven in 13 countries so far 15 yeah it's just at least the new jedi airport terminal 1 is stunning wow look at this [Music] all right the time has come to finally leave saudi arabia after about eight days nine days this is our ninth day yep it's been a wild ride with many ups and downs many emotions i think we can confidently say we've never been in a country where we've seen so many different sides our takeaway is that saudi arabia maybe isn't quite ready for tourism we had a lot of problems in a lot of places well the atm didn't accept international cards literally everything was just shut i woke up today to emails with several fraud alerts perpetual cycle of problems we're also not allowed to go off path or go anywhere else but we're still so grateful we visited we learned so much and especially i think our biggest takeaway is that saudi women are awesome but we've met so many lovely people from faisal to our friend ki to uh the jews of arabia so many lovely people so uh yeah so many lovely studies along the way so on that note until we see you guys again see you around the world [Music] you

Channel: Oskar and Dan

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Length: 26min 11sec (1571 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 02 2022