A funny thing happened

HAHAHAHAHA! Today, I visited a Kuwait Police station, for the first and inshallah, last time during my tenure in this country.

The day went as follows. ..

I went in to school, though we got two extra days off as declared by the ministry. I was not terribly productive because I was preoccupied by my need to go to the washroom. This normally is not a problem when you are not responsible for kids, but today, the water was turned off for some reason. So when my friend Jenna called to see if I was ready to go, I said I was definitely ready. We stopped by a downtown mall on the way home to run an errand, and to kill time before going home. Also to use the functioning toilets....

Carrying on, we were driving along a fairly busy road and traffic was bad, though not as horrible as it often is. Then a man in a black SUV was moving over into our lane, so Jenna honked her horn. He still moved on over, cutting her off, though at a fairly slow pace. And so she lost her temper and gave him the finger. Bear in mind, Jenna has been telling me for awhile you can get arrested for flipping the bird, not that we have heard any specific cases of it actually happening. So the black SUV pulled to a sudden halt in front of us, the door opened and out stepped a man clad in desert brown pants and shirt. No kidding, it was a cop. Our jaws were literally on the floor of the car as he walked toward us.

Jenna opened her window and he yelled at her to take out her license. He then grabbed it from her and we had to follow him to a nearby police station. In the meanwhile, I began to call Arabic speaking friends and got ahold of our Kuwaiti friend Hamad. Al Hamdullilah (thanks be to God) Hamad was able to ditch work and meet us at the station within a half hour.

I knew from other friends' experiences* that most Kuwaiti police do not have a strong grasp of the English language and this proved itself true as the men started to talk to her. We just waited for Hamad and he was able to smoothe things over and chat up the guys in charge. Jenna was pretty worried, I was pretty calm and mostly cracking jokes (what else can you do?). At one point the investigating officer mentioned "your embassy, a case" and "jail" in the same sentence. Actually, the men were just flexing their muscles in order to intimidate. Afterwards, Hamad explained there are many American military personnel who flaunt their U.S. passports and expect dimplomatic immunity when in the wrong. Essentially this was a case of displaced anger and Jenna was the scapegoat for arrogant Americans with whom Kuwaiti policemen have had bad experiences. It was a pretty crazy hour and a half, though it makes for a good story. And so, ladies and gentlemen, the moral of the story is...keep your hand gestures under the dashboard.


*I have several friends who have been in little fender benders here, and you must always report any form of car accident to the police station. Most police officers are educated in Kuwait at government schools (Arabic only) and do not have the opportunity to learn much English. *

I wanted to take pictures at the station but reckoned that would be pretty inappropriate...words alone will not do justice to the situation at the station but think Fawlty Towers crossed with the Kids in the Hall "gotta stay on top of my life, gotta stay on top of my list" skit.

The last thing we decided, as Jenna was dressed in shorts (a bit haram) that we should have emergency car kits here, like we do in Canada or the U.S. in her case. The emergency abbaya kit, we will call it, so you can cover up quickly.

And that's the story of the week...