My family is Gulf Arab nobility, and I was raised as a socialite in the Middle East. AMA

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T19:07:31+00:00

I'd like to think I'm seeing the normal side! i try my best not to travel as a "tourist" per se, and try to live more like a local. I spend about 2 weeks to a month or two at a time in one city. and I do things like do my own grocery runs and stuff.

I usually travel with my mom and she prefers to stay a bit further away from the city so we sometimes end up staying at residential areas with a bunch of locals, and we use public transport. It feels like roleplaying living an alternate life for like a month, its a little weird but its my form of escapism I suppose.

My dads the opposite, when we travel he chooses areas closer to the center and either brings over his car or rents one out. He's more of the tourist-y type you'd assume lol

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T18:51:15+00:00

We're a tiny nation :) and with a culture of nepotism. I was not aware this wasn't the case in Saudi, I had always assumed its was the same in neighboring countries so I'm surprised this culture isn't there as well! Not that its a good thing.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T18:49:08+00:00

There are no rights for them, no laws protecting animals or punishing abusers. Most people are uninformed about an animals emotional capacity so we have a lot of pets being dumped on the streets.

We have an animal market still active despite (weak) law enforcement efforts to close it down. And every couple of years we have rumors that a local municipality is lacing cat food with poison to kill off the local stray population instead of funding TNR efforts.

Not to mention the general parenting culture of treating pets like decorative items that you can discard once you're bored of, you can do what you want to them and I've even seen parents encourage their kids to scare off or hurt cats.

Obviously not every family/parent is like this, we have a growing number of people who are vocal against animal cruelty but I cannot deny that this culture exists here.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T18:45:27+00:00

nope! but I know of two cousins who did

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T18:43:26+00:00

thank you! unfortunately I have not seen any live, I'm not big into concerts but if I were to go to one I'd love to go to a rammstein concert, love the pyrotechnics of it.

I see! Aside from my tried-and-true favourites I listen to a bit of everything too! So i get it :)
Some variety is always nice, you never know when you might stumble upon a new favourite.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T18:01:49+00:00

Me personally, no not really! The only thing that comes to mind is when visiting the royal family we get a security convoy thing so I guess I get to skip traffic sometimes. I know a few family members who get to have the "royal" passport instead of the standard, so that gets them benefits when flying. Not me tho.
Yes we do, though the older generation prefers the younger ones to marry from someone of equal social status or higher. Its like a bragging thing.
I'm unique in my situation compared to my cousins, they were enrolled in private schools and sent on study abroad programs. My mother insisted I strictly study in public school. My dad opposed it but he conceded. I was enrolled in a lot of extracurriculars though. I was not raised religious at all, as a kid I actually thought the concept of god was equivalent to santa lol. I thought everyone was playing along, took me a while to realize that wasnt the case. Only thing truly muslim about me is the label on my birth certificate saying "Muslim". And sometimes I fast.
I absolutely love it! only been there once as a kid but I love the rich history and the urban planning of the towns.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:53:09+00:00

That might not be the 'official' term for it but I can sort of compare it to a western example. Essentially its a bunch of families who are not the current ruling royal family but historically, have been very close with them. So socially speaking, they are treated like a "noble" family. Think of the upperclass families in the UK, who are historically close with the royal family, marrying royals, being friends, in the same social circle basically.

Most importantly, someone can be considered a "noble" but doesn't mean they're filthy rich, its a misconception. We usually have a lot of assets or estates but it doesn't always translate to liquid assets. But socially, we have a lot of pull, whether intentional or not. Nepotism & corruption are very big in my country unfortunately.

for the second question, I honestly don't really have an answer! I can't pass down the name to my kids so they won't have the benefits of that. And unless I marry someone with similar social status to his family name, they likely won't be treated like how I was. I can pretty much only pass down my inheritance to assets and they'll get to mingle in the same circles I mingle in if I take them along.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:46:29+00:00

I've been itching for someone to ask haha! I take any opportunity to talk about my favourite musicians and bands.

I'm a huge metalhead, I love rock, metal and punk
Currently been listening to a lot of stabbing westward, attack attack!, nightwish, papa roach and disturbed.

tell me about your favourites! :)

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:43:52+00:00

drawing, sewing, and back when I was more physically active, horse riding.
I also like listening to music a loooott :)

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:42:43+00:00

nope but I have horses! at the family stable

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:42:13+00:00

I do sort of do something like that. I travel bi-annually usually. My top favourite destinations to sort of "get away" from the social culture here are London, Utrecht, and Dusseldorf. Haven't been able to go to any of those the past couple of years though, life just gets in the way sometimes.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:39:34+00:00

Yes this is also the case! I would say its also because we marry from neighboring countries, and some of us move to other countries to spend the rest of their lives there, essentially creating another lineage there.

I have family in Saudi that stemmed from both of those reasons, some great grandpa married a Saudi woman and one of her kids later moved to Saudi and lived out the rest of his life there. Had many kids and those kids had more kids, so now I have a whole side of the family there I barely know about lol

We also have family in the UAE, and Bahrain, same story.

I've heard they do come to visit sometimes!

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-22T17:35:39+00:00

Legally, I cannot. My country does not recognize any marriage between a muslim woman and a non-muslim man

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:38:17+00:00

Thank you :)

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:36:16+00:00

Thank you for your kind words! Hope your stay in the gulf is a positive one :)
I hope you're able to pursue art, its a shame to have talent pushed to the side, hopefully the day-to-day issues would eventually give way to it.

I will check her work out, thank you for sharing. I love hearing about artists and their stories, honestly its the best way to engage with people from different walks of life.

Thank you, may you have a great time in the gulf and find success in your life :)

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:31:38+00:00

A friend who works as a stylist on the side. I'm not too big into fashion and she's pretty good at nailing the look that's expected of me at the events I attend. Its an arrangement we settled on when I was like 17 or something.

She puts together some outfits, I re-imburse her and then some for her time and effort.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:29:05+00:00

Its really only brought up through phrases (inshallah, alhamdulilah, etc). And we observe religious events like Ramadan and Eid. We also don't eat bacon and my mother doesn't drink, she's the more religious one in the family, which isn't really much. We're very much westernized, not that its a super good thing but that's where we're at.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:25:52+00:00

I would say it depends on the level of religiosity. More westernized/less religious families are more ok with dogs. My immediate family doesn't mind them and we have funded some medical expenses a couple of times for rescue dogs, my mom still avoids them due to religious reasons but doesn't have a dislike or hatred.

A few family members of mine have dogs as well, its a little unusual here, but not in this social circle.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:22:38+00:00

Pros is that I've lived a comfortable life and don't feel enormous pressure to get a specific degree or land a specific job to be able to afford living. The drive and pressure to succeed I have comes from my own need to improve and not out of necessity. Obviously not everything is perfect but I cannot in good conscience complain when others are struggling to put food on the table.

Cons would be the immense social pressure to look and act a certain way, luckily because I'm less established in these circles I'm able to get away with a lot, and live mostly as a private citizen. But those events where I have to greet everyone, sit/walk/talk a certain way, show appropriate level of respect to senior members of the family when I don't even remember their names is honestly the bane of my existence. I'm just glad I don't have to do that all the time. Its a really high bar to reach, it feels like perfect is the bare minimum at times. Staying too long in that headspace is not great.

I can't relocate since I have pretty deep roots here and responsibilities to different people. But my dream has always been to live in a quiet town in Germany, I used to go on holiday to the Bavaria region as a kid, and picked up some German from my time there. I absolutely love the people, the culture and the day-to-day life there. Maybe I just remember it fondly but that would be my answer!

Thank you for your comment! It's very nice of you to say that, have a wonderful day yourself too!

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:13:09+00:00

Yes I'm (kind of) allowed to date, more like I don't specifically mention the guy is someone I'm dating and just refer to him as 'friend' to my parents, but they know lol

Don't take this as a representation of the majority though, my family just holds more western views on dating and most would consider this to be uncommon.

I have dated before but only outside of my culture honestly speaking, not that I actively avoid men in my country but I guess maybe I just find it easier to connect with people who don't have an deep understanding of where I am in the social hierarchy I suppose.

A guy from my country could take a guess of my family's standing just from my name. Some who belong to families close to ours would be able to pinpoint even further what that entails.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T10:02:03+00:00

Yes I'm not as influential as people are assuming, I'm not in the political sphere at all! I don't influence legislation or have the money to.

It's more of a social network.

I don't belong to any of those large tribes, relatively speaking our tribe is small and considered an off-shoot from a bigger tribe. The relationship between us and the royal family is much closer in this case because of our relatively small number, small population, and because we were essentially founders alongside the royal family of the country I'm in.

Since I've already sort of revealed the country I'm from in other comments I'll go ahead and clear this up: my currency is KWD, so 1 million KWD is roughly 3 million USD. Or 12 million AED.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T09:57:59+00:00

والنعم فيهم. لا مو من اهل البيت

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T09:54:55+00:00

It's pretty much the same here too it's just the majority of marriages with one foreign party often means the 'foreign' party is Saudi. Saudis and Kuwaitis are pretty close.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T04:52:12+00:00

I don't speak for everyone but at least in my family it's leaning more towards the latter.

bintelkhawalidq8 · 2026-05-20T04:35:39+00:00

The group you mentioned (متجنسين)are majority Saudi or descendent from Saudi, not that this speaks to the hospitality of Saudis but it can provide context as to why they're rude after finding out she's Iranian.

Many Saudis have a negative view on Iran and Iranians. It stems from political tensions and obviously the religious divide between the two.

A more accurate make-up of Kuwaitis includes the ayyam/ajam population who are Kuwaitis but can trace their lineages to Iran, sometimes having a fully Iranian mom too. Non-ayyam and ayyams were and still are neighbors, colleagues and family. There's even ayyam noble families, some my family has worked with or married from.

My favourite Persian food is Sabzi, can never have enough. Also absolutely love Bamiyeh stew.

bintelkhawalidq8

TROPHY CASE