The Globe Restaurant offers fine dining that is prepared
11 floors below after the waiter beams down the order wirelessly.
Interesting city, Riyadh: life goes on behind closed doors. The women dress anonymously when they step outside in what looks like black sacks with narrow slits for their eyes (sometimes not even that), but when you look closely, you see what fine materials they are made of, how flowing and elegant they are. There are no cinemas, bars, clubs, and even some malls are segregated, keeping out single males. People rarely look at you, let alone smile, and your doing either is discouraged. But like any people, when they open up to you, they are friendly and have a lot to say. Their city has quite innovative architecture, much of it new, as in Dubai.
The Globe is one of the restaurants at the 6-star Al Faisiliah hotel, the #1 hotel in the city.They also offer a Brazilian restaurant, where everything from baby camel (tough stuff, despite the hopeful name) to elk, bison, alligator, lamb, turkey, chicken hammour (white fish from the area), veal, lamb, venison and much more besides, are grilled and brought around on long spits to be carved directly onto your plate.
Consulting at a palace over the weekend provides an interesting break, and insight into the private lives of the wealthy in Saudi Arabia. There is an apparent disconnect between their worldview and the existence of other people.