My Indonesian Friend Joined a Charity Run

Charity Run On Multiple Sclerosis Awareness

Al-Khobar cornice, Saudi Arabia

It was a wonderful Saturday afternoon in Al-Khobar cor niche, the venue of a “charity run” organized by our company. The weather was great, perfect for the marathon, at first, I have registered myself to experience this funned event; however, I back out on the last minute and decided to be an expectator. 

The venue of the marathon 

I have stopped jogging for almost 5 months ago; thus joining the event would be quite exhausting I thought. There were thousands of participants from different ages and nationalities including my good Indonesian friend Muhamad. Like me, he also works here in Saudi Arabia in a big international engineering and machinery company.

He lives in Dammam not too far away from my residence in Dhahran, here in the Kingdom you will find and meet people from different nationalities working together in this oil-rich land. Our friendship started when I recently traveled to United Arab Emirates for a short holidays.

KSA Composed of Multinationals Working Together

My Indonesian friend joined the event. 

We booked on the same travel agency going there, that’s how we know each other. At first, I thought he is a Filipino because of his looks and physical appearance. After all, we, South Asians are very similar to each one another. In fact the first ancestors of the Filipinos were the Indonesians followed by Malay and other Austronesian people.

Participants of the marathon taking
 Photos.

Here in Saudi Arabia, some people could hardly tell my nationality others thought I am Indonesian, Thai or Nepali lol. Sometimes I faked my nationality by saying I am from Indonesia and people believed it though. I remember a couple of instances that Indonesian people approaching me and started talking to me in Indonesian language because they thought I am Indonesian.

Back in my previous office I have one Saudi colleague who called me “Indonesi” all the time, for him I don’t look like Filipino, but Indonesian national. Indonesian people are very friendly and accommodating just like Filipinos.

Climate Here in KSA

A local man posed for a photo. 

Expectators watching the event.

After the event, we strolled around the cor-niche enjoying the chilly weather in Al-Khobar City. During the month of November, the weather starts to cool down as the winter season is approaching. When I was new here, I thought that Saudi Arabia is warm and hot throughout the year, I was oblivious that they do have winter here too.

Indian man joined the event.

My friend showing off his
medal from the marathon.

Being in a tropical country we don’t really experience winter in the Philippines, our weather is mostly warm and a lot of rain all year round. I loved here in KSA because it does not rained a lot unlike in our country, rain here is very minimal and only comes during winter season. Other than that, it is mostly sunny with the sun shining brightly.

After our sightseeing and walk along the cor niche we got tired and hungry, so we went down to a Lebanese restaurant nearby to eat our dinner. We ordered both Shawarma, a popular Arabic food here in Saudi Arabia. Do you ever have a foreigner friends? let me know in the comment box below.

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