“In parts of Riyadh, the Saudi capital, it looked like creatures from a haunted house had escaped to take over the city,” reports The New York Times after a “Horror Weekend” organized on Thursday 27 and Friday 28 October for the second consecutive year.
Given “strategic ambiguity” that the authorities maintain about “societal changes sweeping across the country”, strictly speaking, it was not a question of celebrating Halloween. But the fact is that the dates opportunely fell just before this holiday that Americans are increasingly managing to export to the rest of the world.
“Everywhere there were monsters, witches, bank robbers and even the naughty French maids”, testifies Vivian Nereim, the correspondent in Saudi Arabia of the American newspaper, who sees in it a sign of the enormous changes which have taken place in recent years in the country.
Not so long ago, “celebrating non-Islamic holidays such as Valentine’s Day, Christmas or Halloween was taboo”, recalls the newspaper. “In 2018 again, the police [avait] stormed a Halloween party and made arrests”.
Entertainment but no freedom of expression
“It was not part of our traditions, concedes Yasser Al-Hazzazi, a 21-year-old Saudi. But we like to discover new things.” Last week, the young man dressed up with a “blood-stained compress around head and face” to join, with his cousin Yahya, dressed in a white robe stained with the trace of a bloody hand, “a crowd of people decked out in devil horns and rabbit ears”.
Celebrations, fairs, giant concerts and festivals of all kinds have multiplied in the kingdom since the announcement of the economic diversification plan by the crown prince, Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS), in 2016. They largely satisfy the Saudi youth, who were “thirsty for entertainment”, recalls the newspaper.
“But privately, some lament that this entertainment push feels like a distraction from economic challenges, such as unemployment, or political ones, such as the lack of free speech.”