Leafing through a book full of old pictures taken in Saudi Arabia, I found that I had become part of a life that once was but is no more.
I saw old buildings, old souks and people from times past. The buildings — at least some of them — were beautiful, full of character and history; each had a story worth learning and cherishing. From an old school in Madinah, beautifully built, to a mosque that goes back hundreds of years, to the gates and fortresses in our old cities. There were houses with traditional carved wooden windows and many of them looked to be in good shape at the time the pictures were taken in the early 20th century.
I began to wonder why we had not preserved any of those buildings. From that question flowed another one encompassing a larger aspect of our national character: How do we regard our own history? Architecture is a vital indicator and part of a nation’s history and everywhere in the world, historic buildings are treasured. Why then do we not even give a second thought to demolishing a traditional old building and replacing it with yet another concrete and glass monstrosity?
In downtown Jeddah, at least in the remnants of what used to be old Jeddah, buildings are not taken care of; many streets with long and honorable histories are in bad shape, lacking even the most basic care and maintenance. If we want to encourage tourism, should we not first restore our heritage? That is what tourists want to see; they want to see what makes us unique rather than what we have that countless other countries also have. If we modernize in many ways — and it is right and necessary to do so — we still need to keep our backs against the strong wall of our history and culture.
The idea of “let bygones be bygones” is only going to hurt us in the long run. No nation in the world gives up on its history and the remains of its past as easily as we seem to. And it is unfortunately not only buildings that we are getting rid of without a flinch.
Talking with a group of friends, one of them said she had attended a festival which featured old furniture and recreation activities; she reminded us of some of the games we played as children — games that we had learned from our parents and grandparents. While we were indulging in nostalgia, we lamented that many of the younger generation know nothing of our generation’s memories and of what we enjoyed and how we lived.
But then our generation did not have the luxury of modern technology; TV was the only thing we had so we basically had time to spend with our elders, listening to their memories and their tales and learning about a life that we did not know but we still remember now because of their stories.
Today’s younger generation, however, has the whole world at their fingertips through technology but they do not know much about their heritage. I asked myself if this good or bad? It is definitely good to be in tune with the world and to know what is going on.
Then another idea sprang to my mind — “But should all the old ways just disappear and be forgotten? Should we replace them with the common ones found everywhere? Isn’t a combination of old and new the best solution?
A combination would strengthen our culture. No one is recommending that we lag behind the rest of the world but maybe we could merge our old ways with what is new and create something unique which would be our own style.
Tourists would come to experience that style as much as our old buildings and traditions and we, in turn, would develop a more genuine pride in ourselves and where we have come from.
