Shopping! in Saudi Arabia

Shopping!

Saudi Arabia certainly has a wide variety of shopping plazas and sophisticated malls to choose from. In the city of Jeddah alone there are now more than 70 modern shopping centers.
www.saudiembassy.net/publications/magazine-fall-97/shopping.html

some shopping malls

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Saudi Mall-Crawlers Shop Till Their Veils Drop - By Susan Sachs
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — When night falls, young Saudis head for the mall. Saudi teenagers have fallen in love with their own imported fad: the mall- crawl. Here many Saudi young people come to shock as much as to shop, to nudge the boundaries of what is considered socially proper and to transform a Western icon into something that fits their own traditions.
Mr. al-Bahri, who is 18 and wore freshly pressed baggy jeans, did not bother with family fun. He had his eye out for the religious police of the semi-governmental Committee to Promote Virtue and Prevent Vice.
www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/mideast/saudmll.htm

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Grocery stores in Saudi are very similar to American stores because many European and American brands are imported into the country. American newspapers such as USA Today arrive a few days late after they have been censored for offending material such as scantily-clad women, alcohol, pork, and religious references (Christian or Jewish.)

www.ils.unc.edu/~lanck/personal.html

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A Canadian Woman's perspective on Saudi Arabia

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Shopping in KSA FEB.2000 http://members.tripod.com/~Bob_Savage/pp3.htm

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There are quite a number of shops selling designer fashions such as Gianni Versace, Dior, Armani, Escada and much more. Note that, you'll seldom find a store that allows you to try on clothes. But the space they show you to might be the storage closet with a mirror!
Many 'women only' stores are now in the Kingdom and they will have a guard sitting outside to ensure that men do not attempt to enter. Inside these shops the women move around freely and without covers.

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March 2004: there are so many new shopping centers and specialty stores going up these days, and just as many smaller shops closing! Almost every area has it's main street being redesigned into a shopping street, too many in my opinion! It's only a matter of time before the land owners realize this and go back to building homes!

my picture, mall on King's road.

It was told in the newspapers that Jeddah alone, was getting 70! new malls to open during 2005!

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Al-Akariah Shopping Centre Akaaria mall is a seven story high, $100 million shopping complex. www.kfshrc.edu.sa/arabian/html/shopping.html

Al-Akariah Shopping Centre

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Artists impression of yet another mall under construction.

http://www.redcoat-3d.com/image_gallery.htm

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What many of the jewelry shop windows look like.

picture: www.aiit.org/j/saudikikou/saudi_kikou/wall/img/culture/jeddah_2.jpg

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Hanging out at the mall, Saudi Style Shopping in Saudi Arabia offers a glimpse of the strict cultural codes that govern the entire society. Here, a Saudi woman passes mannequins in the Kingdom Center in Riyadh that are legal because they have no heads.

www.sptimes.com/2002/webspecials02/saudiarabia/day4/story2.shtml

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Hanging out in the malls is a favorite past time here because it's a large area of entertainment with air conditioning! Families will arrive with tricycles, roller skates/ blades and other kid toys to keep their young busy while the ladies stroll around the stores. Too many accidents must have happened because it's now not allowed for any wheeled toy for kids. It was un-nerving to have a kid whiz by you on roller skates and once by roller blades!

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The Kingdom Center, with the V-shaped hole, and the Al Faisaliah Center have changed the face of the Saudi capital.
The Al Faisaliah Center includes a luxury hotel, mall and restaurants and was built by the Saudi Bin Laden Group, the huge construction company founded by the late father of Osama bin Laden.
www.sptimes.com/2002/webspecials02/saudiarabia/day4/story2.shtml

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Ladies Kingdom: Now the Kingdom Center is trying to turn gender-segregation into a commercial advantage: It is the first mall in Saudi Arabia to devote an entire floor to women. In the Ladies Kingdom, reachable by the Ladies Only elevator, there are boutiques, restaurants, a bank, beauty salon and other stores accessible only to women. All security guards and salespeople are females, dressed in Western-style clothing. Customers can check their abayas -- long black robes -- in the Abaya Cloak Room and wander around in jeans and Spandex tops. www.sptimes.com/2002/webspecials02/saudiarabia/day4/story2.shtml

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