I served in Kuwait for a year. It’s fucking horrifying. You’ll be on the Ring Road highways and see a suburban going 80mph plus with 9 little kids climbing around and having a grand old time all unbuckled. Mom is driving but her niqab cuts into her peripheral vision and judging but the way she is squinting and hunched over the steering wheel she probably needs glasses & is merrily driving without them, she is also not belted in.
I shit you not the only people wearing seatbelts in Kuwait are Westerners. I’ve probably seen thousands of cars & trucks on the highway absolutely no Kuwaiti’s wearing one, no TCN guest workers (mostly from the sub continent) wearing them, zero, zilch! Only Westerners wear them.
Then there is the other crazy shit you see on the highway, which has no enforced speed limits by the way. I’d see TCN pedestrians trying to cross the highway on foot every single day, multiple times a day, these dudes wearing fucking sandals trying to run across a 4 to 6 lane highway with no enforced speed limits. It’s fucking crazy. I’d routinely see teenage Kuwaiti boys riding quads on the highway, it’s a Mad Max style free for all on those ring roads. I am seriously lucky to be alive. I’ll never go back there.
Thats just part of it. They are so culturally different then Westerners in terms of their views of life & death, they really do just say “Inshallah” and do whatever the hell they feel like because Inshallah!
Life has little meaning and TCN’s are just completely expendable. If a bunch of laborers die, well Inshallah we’ll just buy a new batch.
There is zero OSHA or safety of any kind of safety anywhere and this is an extremely wealthy highly developed country we are talking about here.
I’ve seen tractor trailer trucks so overloaded that the flatbed trailer is bowed and sagging in the middle. Massive cargos on trucks with a single tie down strap that’s not even properly secured. Its nuts.
I don’t consider myself Christian but I was crossing myself 10 times daily driving on those fucking ring roads.
If roller coaster thrill rides just don’t do it for you anymore then I recommend you catch a flight to a Gulf State and go for a drive
I live in Kuwait. Not only do the kids move around the car, they are usually hunched over the open windows or half outside the sunroof. Mom is usually on the phone. Not talking, but typing/taking selfies, etc. All this...on the highway. You forgot to mention the worst drivers in Kuwait, though - the kamikaze bus drivers. They probably hate their passengers. I know people who lost family members in bus accidents. I witnessed a few (including nasty ones where they ended up on the side) and almost got hit several times because they really do it on purpose.
One of my favs is the N-S route either off of a ring road or maybe its still part of the outermost ring road, I forget, but its out of the city somewhere after you pass Jahra and past the Olympic Shooting Center, it just randomly has speed bumps on it by the big MoI Police Station. Your cruising along at highway speed then suddenly “WTF its a giant speed bump!”
I was always like “who designed this, why would you do this”
Also I remember seeing the blue and yellow highway patrol guys only twice there 2009, not sure what they actually do exactly, clearly it’s not speed enforcement. I’d see black & white MoI police in the city all the time doing normal cop stuff but the white/blue/yellow highway patrol guys did not appear to do anything at all. They drove Crown Vics in 09 whereas the MoI black & whites were Holden Commodores rebadged as Chevies. I think they called them Luminas, completely unrelated to the shitty American Chevy Lumina.
They drive mostly Chargers and Tahoes these days. I've only seen one Taurus with grey police wraps, but I doubt it was traffic. Either way, they're useless and generally only come after an accident happens or sometimes they stop commercial vehicles on the highway. Otherwise, they don't care about anything that happens on the road. You can speed right past them.
The funniest thing I've seen involving the highway patrol was a (slow) chase with a Silverado. The guy was in the emergency lane, cop came behind him, turned on the lights, buzzed the siren, nothing. Cop closed in, Silverado guy started brake checking the cop. Eventually, the cop gets on the next lane, guy starts doing swerve maneuvers towards the cop. Cop puts sirens on, guy starts speeding up, they get on the middle lanes. Several more maneuvers, brake checks and eventually, the cops get in front of the guy. They do a brake check right at a bridge. Guy takes the exit. Cops stop. The guy gets back on the highway after the bridge. My only regret is I didn't film it.
I got a cool story involving MoI Police. We had a US Army LMTV break down on side of highway by the shooting center, the second LMTV stops with it. My buddy and I were escorting them in a pair of Pajeros.
Safety wise we’re in a bad spot. Its 10pm. There’s not much lighting. It’s a straight away but it’s like accident alley.
I call it in to Behring up in Udairi. They ask me if I’m in Jarha three times. I say “no we near the shooting center“. They ask if I’m near Jarha. “Yeah Kinda”. They ask if I am on or near an exit, on or off ramp to Jahra “No I’m near the shooting center, I looking right at it”. They ask if we’re armed “Yes 2xM9 & 4xM16” do you have ammo “Yes of course, not much, one mag each per SOP” I always sneak two extras on my person but I don’t admit that, Good they say “Wait, What, Why” I ask, they say something is going down in Jarha, I ask “what exactly” they answer “Wrecker is dispatched, 4 hour wait minimum”. I request MPs to safety block behind us on road side they say no, I request Kuwaiti MoI Police safety block, they say they’ll call us into MoI.
Over the next two hours 3 separate MoI police cars passing through stop. Same story with all three. They each ask me “is this your truck” Yes “is it broken” Yes “Do you have a tow” Yes, 4 hour wait “OK We’ll be back later”. Then they drive off. One pair (there’s two to a car) lingered long enough to smoke a cigarette with me, but then promptly drove off.
A Kuwaiti family who were camping came over to chat with us and see if we’re o.k. It was really nice. They went back to their camp site.
Suddenly a Crown Vic passes us and pulls a U turn off of the highway and is now directly in front of us a couple of kilometers up. He turns off his headlights and starts slowly driving directly toward us just off of the shoulder, he is driving toward us on the wrong side of the road. WTF, thats a red flag anywhere in the world, I order weapons hot and put a few guys in position ahead of us and I send one to the rear to pull rear security. The Crown Vic randomly stops 200 meters out directly in line with us. WTF is this guy doing? We’re about to have an international incident here.
Suddenly I see cop lights behind me. It’s an unmarked with recessed lights. The guy that gets out is very, very different from a normal Kuwaiti cop. He is wearing western civilian cloths, 5-11 tactical style stuff, he is absolutely Jack Diesel ripped, I can see part of a tattoo on his bicep which is unheard in this part of the world, he has a very short American style haircut.
He walks up and flashes his badge, in perfect American accented english he says “I’m Colonel Prince Name Redacted MoI Police and you look like you could use some assistance here Lieutenant” Yes Sir “You know you’re in kind of a bad spot” Yup accident alley “You know some shit is going down in Jarha right now right” So I hear “We’ll get you squared away, you got a tow” Yes Sir inbound 2 hours “I’ll wait with you” he produces a cop radio out of nowhere speaks into it and 3 MoI Police cars show up immediately. All stay with us until the HEMTT wrecker finally shows up.
The Crown Vic disappeared as soon as cop lights came on. Possibly nothing because drivers do really unusual things over there, maybe it was something. In the end they disappeared. I reported it when we got back to base but White Crown Vic or Grand Marquis in Kuwait was basically every third car in Kuwait at the time, so it’s basically useless intel.
The Police COL graduated out of Duke and he really wanted to talk March Madness with me. He was really young, my age, I’m from CT thus a UCONN fan so we hit it off and started razing each other, it was like talking to another American, not a Kuwaiti. I find out he went to prep school in the states, then Duke, then he worked on Wall Street for a few years, and he hated it, then he said “ever since I was a little kid I wanted to be a cop, so I came home and they made me a Colonel on the spot”. Super cool, & super chill Police Colonel & Prince.
It can get pretty crazy at night, especially on more remote roads. In February, there was an oil rig move going on, unfortunately outside the fence, on a public road. Just a small section of road though, fairly remote. The convoy was waiting to get inside the fence, but they had to wait at the gate. The gate was welded and security had to cut it. It was around sunset. These guys had 6 or 7 loaded trucks, plus escorts front and back. Some guy in a Crown Vic came speeding along, tried to pass and slammed into one of the trucks. This truck was carrying a mud tank, slightly wider than the wheelbase. Crown Vic slammed with the winshield into it. Driver died on impact. No other casualties.
TCN is US Military slang for Third Country National contract workers. The term “Third Country” is used because they are not Coalition Forces or Coalition Civilian Nationals (1st), they are not “Host Country” Nationals (2nd), thus they are Third Country Nationals (3rd) or TCNs for short. It’s not intended to be derisive, nor is it used in a derisive manner, it is intended to be a factual term for non Coalition, non Host Country nationals that are either working for us on contract or working within the Host Country as guest workers
And if you want a real thrill, try the round-a-bouts. I swear they get four vehicles wide in the major cities. And cars going the wrong way on interstate ramps. Drivers miss their turn so they do a u-turn into oncoming traffic and go up the ramp the wrong direction. I don't miss driving in the UAE or Saudi.
Same as where I am. Kids standing on the centre column of car, hanging out of the open sun roof at 100kph. In the passenger seat, baby being bounced on moms lap - no child seat, seat belts. Nothing. Even a mild fender bender would eject the kids and kill the baby with the airbag. Insane.
Maaan, Kuwait's roads are the wild fucking west, people have the utmost disregard for saftey when it comes to driving, pure aggression, dangerously fast paced driving and fucking EVERYONE tailgates lol. Traffic cops don't care or even notice people clearly breaking laws (not giving right of way, unsafe lane changes, obnoxious speeding, those fuckers that take a whole highway lane trying to squeeze themselves through an exit etc etc) absoultely absent of cordiality and teamwork which just makes traffic flow infuriatingly awkward. There's a very busy roundabout near me with a bike traffic cop porched by it, and they don't bat an eye at people rushing into the roundabout causing multiple cars to brake and cause a clusterfuck which pauses the flow for a good 30 seconds. Drivers do not respect the give way sign unless there's literally no way they can enter the road and have to give it. Cops also drive the exact same way lol.
It's genuinely fucking terrifying how on a weekly basis (literally) there is about 25-30 thousand traffic violation fines handed out, 1200-1500 minor accidents (no bodily injury) and 180-250 accidents resulting in bodily injury or death and NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT IT. I'm probably very biased but genuinely believe we have the unsafest roads in the world when it comes to the number of unsafe maneauvers per minute, I swear if you counted the number of traffic violations in a day you'd fill a goddamn yellow book. It makes me even sadder because I've seen how roads are supposed to be used in NL, it was night and day.
Why you might ask? Well because the only requirments to acquire a driving liscense (besides the laughably easy theory exam) is how to fucking parallel park and most of the time they don't bother with the exam and just give you the liscense any way.
I was waiting for the chance to rant about the atrocious state of Kuwait's road lmao.
Nothing like driving down 40 towards Kuwait City and seeing 5 cars all smashed up because they were all doing 140 whilst being an inch away from each other.
I also love when I’m stuck behind a car, traffic is on the left of me and some dickhead in a ford f150 is 1 inch behind me flashing me to move…. Move where!!
The craziest thing I remember seeing was when we drove up to Kuwait City and there would be a bunch of people just fucking sleeping on top of the jersey barriers along the exit lanes like the way Snoopy sleeps on top of his doghouse while the cars you described were zipping by less than 3 feet away.
I was working in Kuwait on one of the refineries and confirm all you say. I had to swerve around a guy that stopt on the right lane of the highway and stepped out of his car will on the phone.
I drove a motorcycle in Beirut probably 7 hours a week in commute for 8 years, up and down the coastal highway. I am from a quiet little town in the woods of USA.
I have no fucking idea how I am still alive. I was the only person wearing armor and a helmet, every time, I noticed.
In a more fatalistic way. It means “if god wills it”.
It’s not that they don’t give a shit, or that they want to die, rather its that they believe in divine will effecting all events.
Seatbelts are a great example. I wear them not just because it’s the law; but because I want to be there for my kids as adults, I want to be there for my grandkids & hopefully meet my great grand kids.
To me its taking an active safety measure that greatly increases my odds of survival in the event of an accident, accidents are a frequent occurrence in USA so I din’t need a law to compel me to wear it, I want to wear it. which increases the odds of me living to meet the goals I described above.
They have and want the same goals. We are all humans, we all put pants on the same way but… and its a big but… when you truly believe your personal actions such as wearing a seatbelt have absolutely no bering or effect on your survivability, because only Inshallah, only God wills it, then why bother with such a contraption, why bother with giving up smoking “if god wills it I will live”, etc.
I loved your story so much that I had superspecial AI Seussify it, so I could read it to my kids later tonight:
>
Buckle up, little ones, for a ride that's quite wild,
On roads far away, where driving's a child!
>No signs tell how fast these cars love to zoom,
With kids piled up high, in a bouncy room!
>Seatbelts? Not here! They just don't seem to care,
As people in sandals with fast cars they dare!
>Trucks full of cargo, held on by a thread,
Wobble and sway, as if they might be dead!
>Maybe they'll make it, maybe they won't,
But a thrill-seeker's dream, this surely won't haunt!
Because what they're doing is illegal, and if they were identified by the police they'll face consequences. Not mentioning that this is looked down upon by the elders of their family.
The police will track them. You can doubt all you want, but a lot of the more famous of these guys were caught already. Police attention gotten higher in recent years. People die from this "traffic infraction", car accidents are the number 1 reason for youth death in KSA. So traffic laws in general became more strict and more enforced in the last few years.
Good luck doing that on roads that don't constantly get covered in sand and are undergoing environment change (ie. winters/summers in the same place, not just desert), which makes it full of tiny holes and uneven.
What a fucking lie, why would I ever work a single day in Saudi Arabia if I can just grab car parts from the desert then sell them on Haraj?
Its not the 17th century where you can tell lies of winged horses existing in a faraway exotic land
I mean, you don't even need to search much
[https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til\_about\_2000\_to\_3000\_luxury\_cars\_are\_abandoned/](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til_about_2000_to_3000_luxury_cars_are_abandoned/)
Why the downvotes? Its obviously not enough to say "full of" of course but ive heard alot of stories from military dudes and explorer posts that talk about how theyd just find some sand or vegetation covered abandoned crazy house im the middle of nowhere from a rich dude and any number of fancy cars would just be around or in the garage. It happens everywhere. Super rich people love to build random shit in random places far away from people. And their so rich they just die and it gets left or they just dont use it and forget about it. Talk about waste right?
Westerners always amaze me by how easily they believe the stories they hear about rich Saudis.
FYI, the average salary for Saudi employees is around $1500-$1700 a month
> FYI, the average salary for Saudi employees is around $1500-$1700 a month
That's.. way more than I honestly expected lol.
>Westerners always amaze me by how easily they believe the stories they hear about rich Saudis.
Why not? Rich people build&buy crazy shit everywhere. Are you claiming Saudi Arabia is somehow an exception and it doesn't happen there? What's so hard about believing those stories?
I’m a westerner, but I know better. I lived in kingdom for a few years. It’s neither of the two things westerners assume it is. You will rarely see people riding camels or living in tents (unless they have gone to the desert for the weekend to camp) and you will only see the opulent wealth with the super cars and mansions in certain places. Many Saudis live in what westerners would consider abject poverty. Especially in the Shia communities.
Years of videos showing it, and still "no no, [that doesn't happen here](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til_about_2000_to_3000_luxury_cars_are_abandoned/)".
Yeah I did notice that but if you YouTube search Saudi Drifting a LOT of the videos feature Camrys
Either way, it's a beat up old front wheel drive car that has no business being that sideways
There’s been a major crackdown on dangerous driving in the kingdom in the last few years. They have an extensive camera system on the roads now. Speed cameras are everywhere.
What does this even mean? Are you able to describe what specifically makes this look “off”? And why is there always someone in the posts of this subreddit accusing every video of being fake? Where do these doubts and delusions come from? How do you guys even function in your daily life? What *is* life?
I came to the comments seeing if anyone else thought this was fake for a couple reasons;
The background looks like it remains flat as the car whips back and forth, cars lean and roll and the outside view looks too steady. They could have an upgraded suspension.
The passenger looks more like he is leaning into position more than being thrown into position by kinetic force, kind of like seeing the stabilized Star Trek footage. He could be anticipating the turns on their 40th run though.
I have done drift racing and the feel inside the car is always more controlled chaos than just controlled but I've never drifted on sandy, straight, flat roads before so my experience may not be valid here.
Overall, my personal experience and history of watching rally and drift racing from inside the cockpit makes this feel off to me. I'm not saying it IS Fake, just that it feels fake.
Now, because we are on a public discussion forum, I would come to the comments to see if that discussion is happening. If that is something that bothers you, you may want to stay out of the comments and public discussion section of videos online.
Just about everything you described is due to the optical image stabilization of the camera. It’s actually so good that it’s likely just a phone mounted to a handheld stabilizing gimbal. This adds an insane level of smoothness, which creates a sense of “post-production” that simply can’t be matched by any other practical “effect”
Point being, this video is very real, and questioning it’s unmistakable authenticity makes you look like a fool rather than some passenger-seat-experienced thought provoker
I mean, I Said those are the reasons it made me think it looked off not that I thought it was fake, I was looking for discussion on it. You asked why anyone would think it was fake and comment, I have possible reasons and Said I could be wrong for each point.
Your kind of an asshole.
Your [comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/CrazyFuckingVideos/comments/1dejplc/a_normal_day_in_saudi_arabia/l8crfzx/?context=3) in /r/CrazyFuckingVideos was automatically removed because the domain was in our blacklist.
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This is real believe it or not. These guys are crazy as fuck and seatbelts aren’t even a thought. Proof: [Instagram Link](https://www.instagram.com/evil_t7_?igsh=azkxN2JraXI0aDFv)
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I remember seeing a clip of dude doing this wild sht at some sort of a car meet up out there, and the car slid eventually flipping multiple times throwing people out of the car killing and injuring them. Police showed up, everybody scattered ;then the driver and I think the main organizers of the meet up were executed on the spot with scabards to their necks. It’s wild to me that locals still not respecting them hardline Islamic laws.
I remember looking around on the Snapchat world map at random stories all over the world. One that stuck out to me was in the middle of Saudi Arabia. These dudes were jumping giant sand dunes in brand new land rovers and Mercedes g wagons. They were hitting like 10-15 feet of air and slamming em back into the ground. They were absolutely destroying those vehicles and they were laughing
How did the cameraman manage to film through all that, without any breaks or lost of focus or losing sight of what he's filming while under panic, despite the g forces and still managing to keep the shot so steady and stabilised? If it were me, hanging on and trying to survive a potentially fatal crash, would far outweigh the possibility of getting a good video clip for reddit or liveleak and other people's pleasure and satisfaction.
If they don't die doing this,eventually they will kill someone and the government will punish them severely. Even death penalty will be given for such dangerous acts.
Samir, you are breaking the car.
[удалено]
Samir! You’re breaking the car!
Shut up
Trrrriple CAUTION!
Shutup
You are late, sir
Shutup
Bro what?
LOL, thanks for giving me a laugh after getting woke up while on call.
I mean, it *is* pretty rude to fall asleep while talking to someone on the phone/pc..
LOL, on call meaning on call for my job. Worked midnight till 5AM. Back in at 8:30AM
Was hoping to see this comment.
^shut ^up.
Samir, you have to listen to me, Samir? You’re not listening
Don't tell me how to drive.
Sami, listen to my calls!
You sir have won the internet today. 🥇please take my poor man’s Reddit good
Not a single seatbelt worn lol
I served in Kuwait for a year. It’s fucking horrifying. You’ll be on the Ring Road highways and see a suburban going 80mph plus with 9 little kids climbing around and having a grand old time all unbuckled. Mom is driving but her niqab cuts into her peripheral vision and judging but the way she is squinting and hunched over the steering wheel she probably needs glasses & is merrily driving without them, she is also not belted in. I shit you not the only people wearing seatbelts in Kuwait are Westerners. I’ve probably seen thousands of cars & trucks on the highway absolutely no Kuwaiti’s wearing one, no TCN guest workers (mostly from the sub continent) wearing them, zero, zilch! Only Westerners wear them. Then there is the other crazy shit you see on the highway, which has no enforced speed limits by the way. I’d see TCN pedestrians trying to cross the highway on foot every single day, multiple times a day, these dudes wearing fucking sandals trying to run across a 4 to 6 lane highway with no enforced speed limits. It’s fucking crazy. I’d routinely see teenage Kuwaiti boys riding quads on the highway, it’s a Mad Max style free for all on those ring roads. I am seriously lucky to be alive. I’ll never go back there. Thats just part of it. They are so culturally different then Westerners in terms of their views of life & death, they really do just say “Inshallah” and do whatever the hell they feel like because Inshallah! Life has little meaning and TCN’s are just completely expendable. If a bunch of laborers die, well Inshallah we’ll just buy a new batch. There is zero OSHA or safety of any kind of safety anywhere and this is an extremely wealthy highly developed country we are talking about here. I’ve seen tractor trailer trucks so overloaded that the flatbed trailer is bowed and sagging in the middle. Massive cargos on trucks with a single tie down strap that’s not even properly secured. Its nuts. I don’t consider myself Christian but I was crossing myself 10 times daily driving on those fucking ring roads. If roller coaster thrill rides just don’t do it for you anymore then I recommend you catch a flight to a Gulf State and go for a drive
I live in Kuwait. Not only do the kids move around the car, they are usually hunched over the open windows or half outside the sunroof. Mom is usually on the phone. Not talking, but typing/taking selfies, etc. All this...on the highway. You forgot to mention the worst drivers in Kuwait, though - the kamikaze bus drivers. They probably hate their passengers. I know people who lost family members in bus accidents. I witnessed a few (including nasty ones where they ended up on the side) and almost got hit several times because they really do it on purpose.
One of my favs is the N-S route either off of a ring road or maybe its still part of the outermost ring road, I forget, but its out of the city somewhere after you pass Jahra and past the Olympic Shooting Center, it just randomly has speed bumps on it by the big MoI Police Station. Your cruising along at highway speed then suddenly “WTF its a giant speed bump!” I was always like “who designed this, why would you do this” Also I remember seeing the blue and yellow highway patrol guys only twice there 2009, not sure what they actually do exactly, clearly it’s not speed enforcement. I’d see black & white MoI police in the city all the time doing normal cop stuff but the white/blue/yellow highway patrol guys did not appear to do anything at all. They drove Crown Vics in 09 whereas the MoI black & whites were Holden Commodores rebadged as Chevies. I think they called them Luminas, completely unrelated to the shitty American Chevy Lumina.
They drive mostly Chargers and Tahoes these days. I've only seen one Taurus with grey police wraps, but I doubt it was traffic. Either way, they're useless and generally only come after an accident happens or sometimes they stop commercial vehicles on the highway. Otherwise, they don't care about anything that happens on the road. You can speed right past them. The funniest thing I've seen involving the highway patrol was a (slow) chase with a Silverado. The guy was in the emergency lane, cop came behind him, turned on the lights, buzzed the siren, nothing. Cop closed in, Silverado guy started brake checking the cop. Eventually, the cop gets on the next lane, guy starts doing swerve maneuvers towards the cop. Cop puts sirens on, guy starts speeding up, they get on the middle lanes. Several more maneuvers, brake checks and eventually, the cops get in front of the guy. They do a brake check right at a bridge. Guy takes the exit. Cops stop. The guy gets back on the highway after the bridge. My only regret is I didn't film it.
I got a cool story involving MoI Police. We had a US Army LMTV break down on side of highway by the shooting center, the second LMTV stops with it. My buddy and I were escorting them in a pair of Pajeros. Safety wise we’re in a bad spot. Its 10pm. There’s not much lighting. It’s a straight away but it’s like accident alley. I call it in to Behring up in Udairi. They ask me if I’m in Jarha three times. I say “no we near the shooting center“. They ask if I’m near Jarha. “Yeah Kinda”. They ask if I am on or near an exit, on or off ramp to Jahra “No I’m near the shooting center, I looking right at it”. They ask if we’re armed “Yes 2xM9 & 4xM16” do you have ammo “Yes of course, not much, one mag each per SOP” I always sneak two extras on my person but I don’t admit that, Good they say “Wait, What, Why” I ask, they say something is going down in Jarha, I ask “what exactly” they answer “Wrecker is dispatched, 4 hour wait minimum”. I request MPs to safety block behind us on road side they say no, I request Kuwaiti MoI Police safety block, they say they’ll call us into MoI. Over the next two hours 3 separate MoI police cars passing through stop. Same story with all three. They each ask me “is this your truck” Yes “is it broken” Yes “Do you have a tow” Yes, 4 hour wait “OK We’ll be back later”. Then they drive off. One pair (there’s two to a car) lingered long enough to smoke a cigarette with me, but then promptly drove off. A Kuwaiti family who were camping came over to chat with us and see if we’re o.k. It was really nice. They went back to their camp site. Suddenly a Crown Vic passes us and pulls a U turn off of the highway and is now directly in front of us a couple of kilometers up. He turns off his headlights and starts slowly driving directly toward us just off of the shoulder, he is driving toward us on the wrong side of the road. WTF, thats a red flag anywhere in the world, I order weapons hot and put a few guys in position ahead of us and I send one to the rear to pull rear security. The Crown Vic randomly stops 200 meters out directly in line with us. WTF is this guy doing? We’re about to have an international incident here. Suddenly I see cop lights behind me. It’s an unmarked with recessed lights. The guy that gets out is very, very different from a normal Kuwaiti cop. He is wearing western civilian cloths, 5-11 tactical style stuff, he is absolutely Jack Diesel ripped, I can see part of a tattoo on his bicep which is unheard in this part of the world, he has a very short American style haircut. He walks up and flashes his badge, in perfect American accented english he says “I’m Colonel Prince Name Redacted MoI Police and you look like you could use some assistance here Lieutenant” Yes Sir “You know you’re in kind of a bad spot” Yup accident alley “You know some shit is going down in Jarha right now right” So I hear “We’ll get you squared away, you got a tow” Yes Sir inbound 2 hours “I’ll wait with you” he produces a cop radio out of nowhere speaks into it and 3 MoI Police cars show up immediately. All stay with us until the HEMTT wrecker finally shows up. The Crown Vic disappeared as soon as cop lights came on. Possibly nothing because drivers do really unusual things over there, maybe it was something. In the end they disappeared. I reported it when we got back to base but White Crown Vic or Grand Marquis in Kuwait was basically every third car in Kuwait at the time, so it’s basically useless intel. The Police COL graduated out of Duke and he really wanted to talk March Madness with me. He was really young, my age, I’m from CT thus a UCONN fan so we hit it off and started razing each other, it was like talking to another American, not a Kuwaiti. I find out he went to prep school in the states, then Duke, then he worked on Wall Street for a few years, and he hated it, then he said “ever since I was a little kid I wanted to be a cop, so I came home and they made me a Colonel on the spot”. Super cool, & super chill Police Colonel & Prince.
It can get pretty crazy at night, especially on more remote roads. In February, there was an oil rig move going on, unfortunately outside the fence, on a public road. Just a small section of road though, fairly remote. The convoy was waiting to get inside the fence, but they had to wait at the gate. The gate was welded and security had to cut it. It was around sunset. These guys had 6 or 7 loaded trucks, plus escorts front and back. Some guy in a Crown Vic came speeding along, tried to pass and slammed into one of the trucks. This truck was carrying a mud tank, slightly wider than the wheelbase. Crown Vic slammed with the winshield into it. Driver died on impact. No other casualties.
Thank you both for this informative and entertaining set of comments :)
I thoroughly enjoyed reading your reply. Thanks for sharing and glad you made it back alive!
Was also highly engaged in that reply
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TCN is US Military slang for Third Country National contract workers. The term “Third Country” is used because they are not Coalition Forces or Coalition Civilian Nationals (1st), they are not “Host Country” Nationals (2nd), thus they are Third Country Nationals (3rd) or TCNs for short. It’s not intended to be derisive, nor is it used in a derisive manner, it is intended to be a factual term for non Coalition, non Host Country nationals that are either working for us on contract or working within the Host Country as guest workers
Its the laborers from third world. Third country nationals.
Exactly my experience in Qatar in the early 2010s.
And if you want a real thrill, try the round-a-bouts. I swear they get four vehicles wide in the major cities. And cars going the wrong way on interstate ramps. Drivers miss their turn so they do a u-turn into oncoming traffic and go up the ramp the wrong direction. I don't miss driving in the UAE or Saudi.
Same as where I am. Kids standing on the centre column of car, hanging out of the open sun roof at 100kph. In the passenger seat, baby being bounced on moms lap - no child seat, seat belts. Nothing. Even a mild fender bender would eject the kids and kill the baby with the airbag. Insane.
Maaan, Kuwait's roads are the wild fucking west, people have the utmost disregard for saftey when it comes to driving, pure aggression, dangerously fast paced driving and fucking EVERYONE tailgates lol. Traffic cops don't care or even notice people clearly breaking laws (not giving right of way, unsafe lane changes, obnoxious speeding, those fuckers that take a whole highway lane trying to squeeze themselves through an exit etc etc) absoultely absent of cordiality and teamwork which just makes traffic flow infuriatingly awkward. There's a very busy roundabout near me with a bike traffic cop porched by it, and they don't bat an eye at people rushing into the roundabout causing multiple cars to brake and cause a clusterfuck which pauses the flow for a good 30 seconds. Drivers do not respect the give way sign unless there's literally no way they can enter the road and have to give it. Cops also drive the exact same way lol. It's genuinely fucking terrifying how on a weekly basis (literally) there is about 25-30 thousand traffic violation fines handed out, 1200-1500 minor accidents (no bodily injury) and 180-250 accidents resulting in bodily injury or death and NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT IT. I'm probably very biased but genuinely believe we have the unsafest roads in the world when it comes to the number of unsafe maneauvers per minute, I swear if you counted the number of traffic violations in a day you'd fill a goddamn yellow book. It makes me even sadder because I've seen how roads are supposed to be used in NL, it was night and day. Why you might ask? Well because the only requirments to acquire a driving liscense (besides the laughably easy theory exam) is how to fucking parallel park and most of the time they don't bother with the exam and just give you the liscense any way. I was waiting for the chance to rant about the atrocious state of Kuwait's road lmao.
Nothing like driving down 40 towards Kuwait City and seeing 5 cars all smashed up because they were all doing 140 whilst being an inch away from each other. I also love when I’m stuck behind a car, traffic is on the left of me and some dickhead in a ford f150 is 1 inch behind me flashing me to move…. Move where!!
The craziest thing I remember seeing was when we drove up to Kuwait City and there would be a bunch of people just fucking sleeping on top of the jersey barriers along the exit lanes like the way Snoopy sleeps on top of his doghouse while the cars you described were zipping by less than 3 feet away.
I was working in Kuwait on one of the refineries and confirm all you say. I had to swerve around a guy that stopt on the right lane of the highway and stepped out of his car will on the phone.
I drove a motorcycle in Beirut probably 7 hours a week in commute for 8 years, up and down the coastal highway. I am from a quiet little town in the woods of USA. I have no fucking idea how I am still alive. I was the only person wearing armor and a helmet, every time, I noticed.
Great read.
> Inshallah ??? Is it like their version of YOLO?
In a more fatalistic way. It means “if god wills it”. It’s not that they don’t give a shit, or that they want to die, rather its that they believe in divine will effecting all events. Seatbelts are a great example. I wear them not just because it’s the law; but because I want to be there for my kids as adults, I want to be there for my grandkids & hopefully meet my great grand kids. To me its taking an active safety measure that greatly increases my odds of survival in the event of an accident, accidents are a frequent occurrence in USA so I din’t need a law to compel me to wear it, I want to wear it. which increases the odds of me living to meet the goals I described above. They have and want the same goals. We are all humans, we all put pants on the same way but… and its a big but… when you truly believe your personal actions such as wearing a seatbelt have absolutely no bering or effect on your survivability, because only Inshallah, only God wills it, then why bother with such a contraption, why bother with giving up smoking “if god wills it I will live”, etc.
More like their version of "Jesus take the wheel!"
This was such a crazy comment lol
I loved your story so much that I had superspecial AI Seussify it, so I could read it to my kids later tonight: > Buckle up, little ones, for a ride that's quite wild, On roads far away, where driving's a child! >No signs tell how fast these cars love to zoom, With kids piled up high, in a bouncy room! >Seatbelts? Not here! They just don't seem to care, As people in sandals with fast cars they dare! >Trucks full of cargo, held on by a thread, Wobble and sway, as if they might be dead! >Maybe they'll make it, maybe they won't, But a thrill-seeker's dream, this surely won't haunt!
I love it. Thank You for doing this!
Inshallah
What i hear is that it’s considered an insult to the driver.
That’s so funny but amazing I love it
"I'm not insulting your driving, its everyone else's driving I'm scared of"
They did remember to wear face masks though.
i don't understand this part. Why wear masks while drifting? so dumb lol
Because what they're doing is illegal, and if they were identified by the police they'll face consequences. Not mentioning that this is looked down upon by the elders of their family.
highly doubt the police would track them down for a seatbelt violation and traffic infraction, especially in the third world
The police will track them. You can doubt all you want, but a lot of the more famous of these guys were caught already. Police attention gotten higher in recent years. People die from this "traffic infraction", car accidents are the number 1 reason for youth death in KSA. So traffic laws in general became more strict and more enforced in the last few years.
They probably stole that car. I don’t think that drifting was intentional
They removed the seats' headrests for extra points
Inshallah
It's a simulator.
I thought that it looked like something
Honestly I don’t know if it would’ve helped.
I've visited both Oman and Dubai. I learned that any car can be a high-performance car when you don't give a shit.
Good luck doing that on roads that don't constantly get covered in sand and are undergoing environment change (ie. winters/summers in the same place, not just desert), which makes it full of tiny holes and uneven.
Saudi drifting is some next level shit. All done in some beatup old front wheel drive Toyota Camry
Nah. They roll big body Crown Vics and Town Cars with the plastic still on the seats and the dealer sticker still in the window.
Right? The desert if full of broken lambos, Ferrari's, and even higher-end luxury sports cars, just fading away in the sand.
What a fucking lie, why would I ever work a single day in Saudi Arabia if I can just grab car parts from the desert then sell them on Haraj? Its not the 17th century where you can tell lies of winged horses existing in a faraway exotic land
I mean, you don't even need to search much [https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til\_about\_2000\_to\_3000\_luxury\_cars\_are\_abandoned/](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til_about_2000_to_3000_luxury_cars_are_abandoned/)
“Dubai”
Why the downvotes? Its obviously not enough to say "full of" of course but ive heard alot of stories from military dudes and explorer posts that talk about how theyd just find some sand or vegetation covered abandoned crazy house im the middle of nowhere from a rich dude and any number of fancy cars would just be around or in the garage. It happens everywhere. Super rich people love to build random shit in random places far away from people. And their so rich they just die and it gets left or they just dont use it and forget about it. Talk about waste right?
Because this is saudi arabia and that doesn’t happen there
Westerners always amaze me by how easily they believe the stories they hear about rich Saudis. FYI, the average salary for Saudi employees is around $1500-$1700 a month
> FYI, the average salary for Saudi employees is around $1500-$1700 a month That's.. way more than I honestly expected lol. >Westerners always amaze me by how easily they believe the stories they hear about rich Saudis. Why not? Rich people build&buy crazy shit everywhere. Are you claiming Saudi Arabia is somehow an exception and it doesn't happen there? What's so hard about believing those stories?
I’m a westerner, but I know better. I lived in kingdom for a few years. It’s neither of the two things westerners assume it is. You will rarely see people riding camels or living in tents (unless they have gone to the desert for the weekend to camp) and you will only see the opulent wealth with the super cars and mansions in certain places. Many Saudis live in what westerners would consider abject poverty. Especially in the Shia communities.
Years of videos showing it, and still "no no, [that doesn't happen here](https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/14993vo/til_about_2000_to_3000_luxury_cars_are_abandoned/)".
Thats actually a hyundai.
Yeah I did notice that but if you YouTube search Saudi Drifting a LOT of the videos feature Camrys Either way, it's a beat up old front wheel drive car that has no business being that sideways
Fr
You should see Saudi Drifting gone wrong
Dude did a pretty good job...jeebus
Nearly killed it.
That dude needs to sign up with the Hollywood Stunt Driver's Union.
ngl, that was some pretty impressive steering wheel control. being able to turn it mid-slide like that.
He could drift all of Tokyo in one ride.
I know this sounds stupid, but damn, this looks like fun.
I once read a very accurate comment about these arabian crazy videos “This is what happens when you don’t have alcohol and women”
Drifting is fun, especially if done in a closed controlled environment and not public highways.
imagine the nausea
Been in a crash while the car spun like this after hitting a patch of ice. there was no nausea. Maybe the adrenaline helped.
There’s adrenaline and it’s fun if you ignored the stupid life threatening shit of doing this on public roads.
Damn
Abdul, crank the Nasheeds!
Abdul-who?
Those Saudi’s sure know how to drift. But why the facial cover ups?
There’s been a major crackdown on dangerous driving in the kingdom in the last few years. They have an extensive camera system on the roads now. Speed cameras are everywhere.
They also sure know how to do public lashing.
Inshallashing.
Lol that's not funny. I still chuckled
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That’s what I thought. Guys didn’t shift in their seats hardly enough and a steady camera.
[saudi drift inside view 240km/h (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W-8CsawAAXw)
Insane
Yea that’s obviously the 1996 Toyota Camry simulator right there!
Right? Something looks off
What does this even mean? Are you able to describe what specifically makes this look “off”? And why is there always someone in the posts of this subreddit accusing every video of being fake? Where do these doubts and delusions come from? How do you guys even function in your daily life? What *is* life?
I came to the comments seeing if anyone else thought this was fake for a couple reasons; The background looks like it remains flat as the car whips back and forth, cars lean and roll and the outside view looks too steady. They could have an upgraded suspension. The passenger looks more like he is leaning into position more than being thrown into position by kinetic force, kind of like seeing the stabilized Star Trek footage. He could be anticipating the turns on their 40th run though. I have done drift racing and the feel inside the car is always more controlled chaos than just controlled but I've never drifted on sandy, straight, flat roads before so my experience may not be valid here. Overall, my personal experience and history of watching rally and drift racing from inside the cockpit makes this feel off to me. I'm not saying it IS Fake, just that it feels fake. Now, because we are on a public discussion forum, I would come to the comments to see if that discussion is happening. If that is something that bothers you, you may want to stay out of the comments and public discussion section of videos online.
Just about everything you described is due to the optical image stabilization of the camera. It’s actually so good that it’s likely just a phone mounted to a handheld stabilizing gimbal. This adds an insane level of smoothness, which creates a sense of “post-production” that simply can’t be matched by any other practical “effect” Point being, this video is very real, and questioning it’s unmistakable authenticity makes you look like a fool rather than some passenger-seat-experienced thought provoker
I mean, I Said those are the reasons it made me think it looked off not that I thought it was fake, I was looking for discussion on it. You asked why anyone would think it was fake and comment, I have possible reasons and Said I could be wrong for each point. Your kind of an asshole.
what?
It’s not real, it’s a fake car with screens
can you prove this or are you just saying “cause of the pixels”
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This is real believe it or not. These guys are crazy as fuck and seatbelts aren’t even a thought. Proof: [Instagram Link](https://www.instagram.com/evil_t7_?igsh=azkxN2JraXI0aDFv)
Your [comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/CrazyFuckingVideos/comments/1dejplc/a_normal_day_in_saudi_arabia/l8crtia/?context=3) in /r/CrazyFuckingVideos was automatically removed because the domain was in our blacklist. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/CrazyFuckingVideos) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I like when the gene pool voids warranties
When playing Mario Kart in real life.
Gotta go, no time Kuwait
I love how the passenger never once even thinks about grabbing the "oh shit" handle
I wonder if they can steer a plane like this?
It's normal the way no one is scared in that car
Is the equivalent of the Kia boys?
With all four wheels on the road? is this a new trend for the kingdom?
At least they had their safety scarfs on.
A normal day in a Hyundai Sonata
The interior of that car tells me they are driving a Hyundai Azera.
Never would do it but it would have been hell fun, almost dying with homies.
Clean drift tho as dangerous as it was. Kept it under control
Im all for this type of Darwinism
This is squeeze Benz isn’t it?
I’d like to know how they didn’t flip.
Dat magic carpet ride
Yeah crazy no seat belts
Hyphy movement
He's telling him "Kafo" which literally translates to Efficient, but locally it means something like good job or you can do it.
I would have such a massive anxiety attack that I would've passed away in the back seat
They better thank the brilliant engineers who designed that car's center of gravity. A shit car would have somersaulted 10000 times by now.
Sucks that they saved it. Kinda cool that they saved it
Well, they don´t have Jesus to take the wheel. It has to be Jamal.
*Jafar
They think they'll respawn
This looks like animation to me, no?
No just middle eastern driving.
My sister worked in hospitals in Saudi and the UAE. Horrific deaths and injuries from car accidents were a daily occurrence.
Ah yes the country with large open roads in desert and where traffic laws are mer suggestions.
I’m hoping they wore their brown pants that day.
Accidental arab drift?
buddy on the right smoking a j and driver just about done this 50 times
Stupid lvl 1000
Wonder how many muchentuchens that cost?
🤌
seatbelt: im a joke to you?
Lighting inside the car doesn't match the outside when the car swerved and the camera guy is filming way too smooth. Come on, you need to do better.
Where can i get this goat simulator DLC
Why are the headrests missing?
"wooooo" at the end , aka "I shit my pants, but at least we're not dead"
I remember seeing a clip of dude doing this wild sht at some sort of a car meet up out there, and the car slid eventually flipping multiple times throwing people out of the car killing and injuring them. Police showed up, everybody scattered ;then the driver and I think the main organizers of the meet up were executed on the spot with scabards to their necks. It’s wild to me that locals still not respecting them hardline Islamic laws.
Highly dangerous and idiotic thing to do, but at least he had the skills to back it up. This time.
I remember looking around on the Snapchat world map at random stories all over the world. One that stuck out to me was in the middle of Saudi Arabia. These dudes were jumping giant sand dunes in brand new land rovers and Mercedes g wagons. They were hitting like 10-15 feet of air and slamming em back into the ground. They were absolutely destroying those vehicles and they were laughing
Fun fact: Saudi men find wearing a seatbelt culturally unacceptable.
Pulled out the gta driving skills
10/10 the guy filming
I thought for a moment that they wanna die
He 1 hands the wheel the entire time fuck me
Everyone in New York also went to the same driving school as the gentleman in this video. I was on the parkway, and it was WILD.
We're going to die
They gonna get a ticket if they don't put on their seatbelts. Very irresponsible
Old
These dudes must be responsible for 20% of the micro plastics in our bodies from drifting their cars alone.
Is this that Saudi drifter that goes by the name hitler or something like that
Idiots....
Samir is an Arab drifterrr 🔥🔥🔥
Allah, take the wheel.
You know I can’t do it anymore…I don't know how I'm going to live without her
How did the cameraman manage to film through all that, without any breaks or lost of focus or losing sight of what he's filming while under panic, despite the g forces and still managing to keep the shot so steady and stabilised? If it were me, hanging on and trying to survive a potentially fatal crash, would far outweigh the possibility of getting a good video clip for reddit or liveleak and other people's pleasure and satisfaction.
You can’t fix stupid
If they don't die doing this,eventually they will kill someone and the government will punish them severely. Even death penalty will be given for such dangerous acts.
Fake
Now this, but they occasionally blow up. Welcome to Kabul, Afghanistan