My business partner in Chicago sent me this article from the Chicago Tribune (pay to view unfortunately) about how Saudi men and women are flirting by using Bluetooth, in order to connect without flouting the Wahhabi Islamic regime they live under. Unrelated women and men caught talking risk being detained by the religious police. Connecting by Bluetooth means contact is not even going through the phone company, so is less traceable. There is little the government can do to control it - it even tried to ban camera equipped phones last year but backed off because cameras have become a feature in most phones.
Bluetooth flirting, which often includes exchanging images such as babies blowing kisses or animated belly dances, sentimental messages or romantic songs has replaced the previous way of flirting which was to toss phone numbers at women through car windows or in shopping malls.
As I said in a previous entry, I doubt, despite what Jeff Jarvis says, that The Religious Policeman is the only Saudi blog in town. So here are some links to the 121 Saudi blogs on LiveJournal (yes, I recognise that many Western bloggers do not recognise LiveJournal as being a legitimate blog provider - tough). Many of the LiveJournal blogs claiming to be from Saudi Arabia are yet once more, ironic American teenagers living in Podunk, others are expatriate American teens living in Saudi Arabia. But here are the ones that seem to be written by real actual Saudis (OK some of them are still teenagers) in Saudi Arabia:
khalidz0r
manfoosha
sahira
rimosa
the cool guy (who also seems to be studying Japanese)
blessedwithyou
Most of them sound like teenagers from anywhere round the world, moaning about exams, friends and their parents, but with "oh another bomb went off" interspersing the hormonal agonies.
Jeff Jarvis has found a Saudi blogger, and seems to be implying it's the first (I bet it isn't - or maybe it's the first written in English, on a 'recognised' Western blog host) but anyway, as he says, it may be "the first crack in the wall".
There's a great post on it about how much Saudis love their mobile phones. Apparently camera phones are banned but are openly on sale. This story was particularly funny:
A Saudi was giving a presentation at my place of employment. Screen, PC projector, Powerpoint, the whole thing. Then his phone rang. He didn't switch it off, he answered it. Just as well, it was his Mother! We sat listening for 5 minutes while he explained why he'd not been to see her for two days. I have to say, some of his excuses were ingenious, I'll use them myself sometime. Finally he resumed his presentation, without an apology.
It's often said in intercultural research and texts that people from Arab cultures will answer their phone whilst having a meeting because they are polychronous in their attitudes to time - nice to have a bang up to date example to cite next time I need to explain the difference between monochronous and polychronous.