Eid Feter Celebration

July 28, 2014

Eid Mubarak (In English word, Blessing)! After Ramadan, Muslim's have this 1 week of vacation as a celebration for the the end of the fasting month, Ramadan.

Since there is no work for 5 days, I have a time to explore some part of Saudi like Al Khobar and some beach in the Kingdom.

Tuesday morning (July 29) 

One of my travel during the vacation week is trip to Khobar, before we reach our destination, we got lost for almost an hour since they are looking for some kind of markings near the mall. But there is an ongoing construction near the area, it was been blocked. in order to locate the mall, we use the google map. 

Al Khobar is a city in the kingdom which has a known mall called Al Rahmaniyah Mall where lots of Filipinoes roam around there, sometimes they call it a mall for the Filipinoes. Outside the mall there are stall like in Divisoria but not like Divisoria, it is much fewer and much organize. They have bargain clothing's outside the stall, discounted garments and alike. When we arrive at the mall, we eat at the Cabalen Restaurant, its not a eat all you can restaurant like in the Philiipines but it is a restaurant for the Filipinoes and serving Filipino dishes like Adobo, togue, pinakbet, ginataan, beef steak and other dishes. They also serve halo-halo for dessert. After our lunch, we go to the stalls to find some garments like jeans at a lower cost and bought some.

Ukay ukay in Khobar (Manila Shopping Center)

Stalls outside Al Rahmaniyah Mall

After some shopping spree at the area we return to the mall to have a tour and rest (Hindi USO sa mall ang mga guard before ka pumasok sa loob). the mall is open, no guard checking bags or things at the entrance like in the Philippines. Guards just roam around and check the peace in the area. After some window shopping in the mall, going to the cellphone stores, gold store and watch's we decided to go back to the compound in Hofuf, Al Hasa.

Inside Al Rahmadiyah Mall, Al Khobar, KSA

Thursday (July 31)

Another vacation in the holiday is going to the beach, time to experience the sea in Saudi Arabia. One of the known beach near our town is the Uqair beach, it is located at the eastern part of Al Hasa. We leave the compound around 5am in the morning to go to the beach. Uqair beach is almost 1hour 30 mins from Al Hasa. We arrive at the beach around 7am.

Uqair beach, Al Hasa

The sea is much salter than the Philippines. The beach salt content has a higher concentration since you can see the salt residue after you leave the sea as soon as it dries. Since it is also hot in the area, the evaporation rate of water is much fasting leaving salt in your body or in your cloths in a short period of time. 

Selfie in the beach

Playing in the beach and sea

Some structure near the beach (Cottages)

After 2 hours of swimming in the sea, and the heat of the sun is around 45C, we decided to go back to the compound and rest. 2 hours of stay at the beach side is enough since its already hot. We reach the compound around 11am and took a long rest.

The 5 days vacation ends on a Friday, Aug 1. This last day of vacation, I decided to go to the town to buy some food and supply for the upcoming week. I bought some vegetables and kapsa (roasted chicken with fried rice) for our dinner. End of vacation, get back to the reality and start of work again on a Saturday.