Married men in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will have to put their creative caps on to think of an original way to woo their significant other on Valentine’s Day this year, as the Kingdom’s religious police have imposed a ban, not only on red roses, but anything scarlet in gift shops.
Why? All under the premise of not encouraging people out of wedlock to have relationships, something that is prohibited and punishable by law under the rules of Sunni Islam — the type of Islam that governs Saudi Arabia.
You have to keep in mind that Saudi Arabia doesn’t even allow unrelated men and women to mix openly, so if you are a local, you would have to rack your brains to come up with a clever strategy to even communicate with someone your heart is pounding for.
Red, blue or green, a gift is a gift is a gift. The particular availability of something red to gift on V-day is a bonus, so how exactly banning the sale of red items would play a role in discouraging opposite sex relations is beyond my understanding.
As for the expatriates living in the Kingdom, every thing goes in their residential compounds so I doubt they would care too much.
Romantic souls will have to live with gifting yellow, pink, white OR rainbow colored (?!) items instead. No big deal, eh?