It seems that Bluetooth-enabled cell phones and other devices are helping Saudi men and women get around the taboos that separate them in public.
With Bluetooth, men and women can safely flirt at malls, restaurants and even traffic lights.
For the most part, the messages are innocent. But for this conservative society, it is pretty bold stuff.
Many images feature babies — some blowing kisses — perhaps because women consider them cute. Animated cartoons doing belly dances, dreamy Arabic songs and sappy, sentimental messages are also popular.
“Last night I sent an angel to watch over you, but he came back soon,” said one message. “I asked him why, and he answered, ‘Am not allowed to watch over other angels.”‘
Some are more forward: a picture of a woman covered in a cloak and then another one of her in a white top, looking coquettishly from beneath the rim of a cap; an image of two women kissing; a woman taking off her trousers while suggestively shaking her hips.
On a recent warm night, Abdullah Muhammad sat in front of his laptop at a sidewalk cafe waiting for his computer’s Bluetooth to pick up nearby users.
“I use Bluetooth to meet girls,” said the 24-year-old businessman. “The religious police cannot catch me.”
It may not be the Declaration of Independence but it is a sign that, public appearances aside, the Saudi people, like people everywhere, want to be free to live their lives.
