Cycling around Riyadh, it’s hard not to notice the amount of walls. What are they hiding? Excessive wealth, frowned upon behaviors, the speedos and bikinis of expats, state secrets, lavish resorts, or just empty spaces? Who knows – the walls are very high. Some are elaborate and monumental. These walls bring to memory Lennon’s words: “Walls keep you in either protectively or otherwise, and bridges get you somewhere else”.
It seems the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is slowly bringing down its walls and opening up to the world; who knows what the country will look like if the government’s Saudi Vision 2030 plan promoting a softer and more secular image of the Kingdom succeeds.
At first though, they should clean up the piles of plastic strewn everywhere, from the streets to the desert, tarnishing the country’s image – at least from my point of view.
This week in numbers:
186 km — distance cycled
1974 — Lennon’s Walls and Bridges album released, topping Billboard’s Top LPs & Tapé