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Riyadh: Saudi Arabia's young people are bored in a country that restricts their personal freedom, one of Saudi Arabia's popular bloggers said.
Saudi Arabia may be a model state for powerful clerics who oversee the strict application of the Islamic law, but it offers little choices for young people, said Ahmed Al Omran, also known as Saudi Jeans.
Saudi Arabia has strict gender segregation. There are no cinemas, women are not allowed to drive, and single men are often banned from shopping malls. Coffee shops are men-only zones.
Omran said he has to drive to Bahrain to see a movie. "We are saying 'why are we different, why can't we live the way they do?'," he told Reuters, referring to liberal Arab countries like Bahrain, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
"Single guys are not allowed to enter the shopping malls, that's just for families or women. For young people it's just frustrating. What do we do? Maybe we go to the coffee shop. You just get bored," Omran said.
He also complained about the lack of jobs in the country. "There aren't jobs in the government any more, and you have to search for a job that suits you. People are not quite used to this," he said.
Omran blogs about political and social issues in saudijeans.blogspot.com, which is one of more than 500 blogs from Saudis. He has published his photo to have "more credibility" but "I've now become careful about what I write."
He admits society remains deeply conservative in general, especially with Islamist hardliners fighting against liberal trends in society.
"They are visualising that if we change anything this whole country will be destroyed. They view people who call for changes as people who want to destroy the country and are against religion," he said.
But he added: "You've got this feeling that the day will come when everything explodes. But when it does, will we be able to handle the situation?"
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