When will we adjust to the rest of the World?

I appreciate that we have traditions and values in our region, I really do. I understand that we have principals and ways of conduct around each other, especially in regards to contact between men and women (well, out in the open anyway; behind closed doors, everything goes, but thats not the point here).

It's not considered appropriate for a woman to talk to a strange man, or mix with him in any way; the people in the region appreciate this fact. In certain stores and banks there are separate women sections, the local law enforcement usually has an eye out on certain male/female ways of conduct, etc. The society is adapted to deal with certain situations upholding the values and traditions we hold.

But when you leave the region and visit a country with different customs, you should be prepared for the fact that they probably will not adapt their system to deal with your view of life; in fact, you should be the one to adapt to theirs. If you make a choice to visit another country, then you should have to deal with the consequences (ie, you don't visit Canada during the winter and demand that it be nice and sunny; similarly, you shouldn't visit a country and expect them to adapt their values to you).

So, here we have a totally (in my opinion) stupid stupid backwarded mentality of a person who refused (yes, REFUSED) to get on a plane because his female relatives were seated next to men. Yes. Not in their lap, not forced to go on a date with them, and not forced to interact with them in any bloody way. What's a plane after all; its a number of seats squeezed in a tight small space. Anybody in their right mind who wants to fly should at least have the brain power to expect that perhaps, just PERHAPS, you might end up sitting next to someone you don't know.

So this guy decides to throw a fit, delays the whole flight by three hours (I know all you people used to Gulf Air think this is a normal delay; its actually quite a long one in other parts of the world), gets kicked off the plane, and causes almost 50 people to miss their connecting flights.

Seriously, seriously, please, what have our mentalities come to? If you bloody well don't want your women "interacting" with strangers, then bloody well go buy your own damn plane! It wasn't even a long flight (Milan-London)! Bloody baboons! And then you ask why the international community thinks we're backwarded.

Qatar sheikh delays plane over seating

Fri Jul 27, 9:27 AM ET
MILAN (Reuters) - A Qatar sheikh held up a British Airways flight at Milan's Linate airport for nearly three hours after discovering three of his female relatives had been seated next to men they did not know.

When none of the other business class passengers agreed to swap seats, the sheikh, a member of Qatar's ruling family, went to the pilot, who had already started the engine, to complain, an airport official said.

But the pilot ordered him and his travelling companions, the three women, two men, a cook and a servant, off the plane. The London-bound flight took off nearly three hours behind schedule on Thursday evening and around 50 of the 115 passengers missed connecting flights.

Article

Just go to Saudi for your next summer holiday and spare us the embarrasment!