Researching and Working on the Arabian Peninsula: Creating Effective Interactions, https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-96-5326-3

First, look at the calendar closely – check for Ramadan, Eids, national holidays, school vacations – museums, archives, schools, stores will be shut without notice but at least make sure you are clear from the major closures. If you want to see people at a university, look at the school calendar. For example, many universities have their graduations ceremonies in the fall, not spring, so that means several days of canceled classes and everyone being busy. Check for tourist seasons; short-term rents can vary widely depending on the month.

Pack

• all the documentation you might need, depending on the archive/ university/ research center you might need copies (or originals) of diplomas, transcripts and/ or letters of reference. You also might want to create a file with documents to leave with someone who can scan/ FedEx paperwork as needed. You don’t want to ask someone to search through paperwork or e-mails for the list of classes you took in your Masters program.
• whatever medications you need to get you through the weeks ahead – you don’t want to lose a day or more trying to get doctor’s appointments and prescriptions. Drugs that are over-the-counter in your country might not be available where you are going
• loose cotton/ linen/ flax clothing, make sure your body from elbows to knees will be covered with non-transparent fabric at all times (bathing suits for hotel pools and distant beaches), sunglasses (if you can afford it, get prescription sunglasses) and a hat
• some kind of scent (rose water, orange blossom water or jasmine water are fine)
• if your surroundings matter to you, bring whatever you need to sleep (lavender spray, eye mask, an app on your phone that makes white noise, painkillers/ aspirin/ melatonin) and Blu Tack. If you are traveling on a budget, you may end up in a cement-block room with a LOUD window air-conditioner and/ or a window you can’t open and it’s dark at 8pm. Blu-tacking maps/ fabric/ postcards to your walls can help your space feel less prison-like.

If you are not with a group, politely get in touch with people before hand – use whatever method you want (e-mails, LinkedIn, social media, etc.) at least a few weeks ahead of time. The whole arrive-in-country-and-spend-the-first-night-trying-to-set-up-appointments-for-the-next-morning endeavor is not usually helpful. Once you are in-country and have a few acquaintances, then you need to be ready for last-minute invitations, but try to get some contacts ahead of time.

Get a seat towards the front of the plane, be ready to get in the aisle and move as soon as it is your turn, move as quickly as you can to immigration – immigration can take 10 minutes or 2 hours, get is line as fast as you can.

You want to go to the most important place first but, if possible, try not to meet anyone or go to the archive/ museum/ university/ site on your first day in-country. Unless you already have a lot of experience in the Middle East, the heat/ humidity may be a shock. Give yourself a day to adjust and (depending on your home culture) get used to being stared at constantly. Take yourself for a practice run on the subway/ metro/ bus to wherever you are going to be working, walk around the neighborhood you are staying in, browse through grocery stores, find a café you like, etc.

Figure out what you are going to do for your down time; you can’t always be “on.” Reading, interviewing, translating, searching, walking through libraries, studying, taking photos: all that mental processing in a new culture is exhausting. Take breaks! Go back and forth six times in a row on an abra in Dubai, walk along the beach if you are near one, get a day-pass at a resort and lounge by the pool, read in a hotel lobby, go through the souq and buy cute leather slippers with gaudy, gilt threadwork. Do not try to spend all day every day chasing your research goals. Do not attempt to spend every night writing up notes. Make haste slowly.

Never get into a situation you can’t get out of. Until you have been in-country a few weeks, stay in more public areas and don’t rely on phones, electronics, web sites, apps, etc. to help you the same way as they did in your homespace. For example, if you meet a local, have a great conversation and they invite you to a restaurant for lunch, there are a lot of ways this could go right and some ways this can go wrong. You could ask a taxi driver if they know the restaurant, he says “yes,” you get in, he starts driving, then he confesses that he does not know, you can’t find the location on-line and it’s 30 minutes of aimlessly driving in the general area. Maybe that’s fun; maybe that’s not fun. Or you get to the restaurant, your friend cancels and you don’t feel comfortable in the place alone. Or you have a great lunch, your friend takes off and you decide to walk back to your hostel at 2pm, when it’s 98 degrees with high humidity. By the time you decide to get a taxi, there are none because everyone rests from @ 2pm until @ 4pm, so you have given yourself heat exhaustion and are in bed for a day. Malls are your friend until you are settled.

Judge what is going on by actions, not words. If you are from a culture in which people point out mistakes and/or say what they feel, it may be disorienting to have people tell you what you want to hear, which might have no relationship with reality. If you can, ask “is it better if I do x or y” questions.

Remember that on the Arabian Peninsula, self-control is highly valued. If you are rude, sometimes locals will stay calm and pleasant, so you may not be aware of how big a mistake you are making. If you come from a confrontational culture in which it’s accepted that people argue loudly and with passion, it may be disorienting to have people who won’t engage with you. If you love dashing into political talk (or as one American undergraduate did, met Dhofari women and within a few moments asked them if their husbands beat them) you might find people who are happy to argue, but are always busy if you want to meet them a second time.

Practicalities of Moving to the Arabian Peninsula: Using the Arabic Language

Ethnography – Finding the Middle Ground, part 1 of Discussing Photographs

Bibliography for ‘Researching and Working on the Arabian Peninsula’ (2025, Palgrave Macmillan)

Practicalities of Moving to the Arabian Peninsula: Getting and Sending Mail/ Packages