The Continuing Crisis in Saudi Arabia

From Arabian Business comes this shocking story of fraud and chicanery:

Camels disqualified from Saudi beauty contest over Botox

A dozen beasts have been thrown out because their handlers used Botox to make them more handsome

The dromedaries paraded down a dusty racetrack as judges rated the size of their lips, cheeks, heads and knees. Crowds of men watched from the bleachers, hooting when the beasts representing their own tribe loped down the track.

A dozen beasts have been disqualified from this year's Saudi "camel beauty contest" because their handlers used Botox to make them more handsome.

"The camel," explained the chief judge of the show, Fawzan al-Madi, "is a symbol of Saudi Arabia. We used to preserve it out of necessity, now we preserve it as a pastime."

Much is changing in Saudi Arabia: the country is getting its first movie theatres. Soon women will be permitted to drive. The authorities eventually hope to diversify the economy away from the oil that has been its lifeblood for decades.

But as they seek to transform the conservative kingdom, the Saudi authorities are trying to smooth the path for reform by emphasising traditional aspects of their culture. And for the Bedouin of Arabia, nothing is more essential than the camel, used for centuries for food, transport, as a war machine and companion.

The typical old desert caravan had a string of 100 or so baggage camels with two or three white racing camels at the back, which served as entertainment before TV, radio and cell phones. When caravans crossed at ghelts (water hole depressions) or at an oasis, they were raced for money, pride, or even for the camel itself.

The Arabs invented the first IUD birth control (a rock up the uterus) to prevent racing camels and baggage camels from cross-breeding. One is a truck, the other a sports car. A cross of the two types is a nearly-useless animal.