In the mid-1970s, Saudi King Faisal set his country on the path to modernization. After only a few decades, one of the oldest cultures on earth was miraculously transformed from a nomadic society into one of the foremost financial and industrial giants on the planet. Professionals poured in from around the world to assist in this effort and for a number of years the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia became the crossroads of a thousand cultures. Among the million foreigners that came to the desert Kingdom during that period was young Adam Sneed from Washington, D.C. Adam, a member of a construction team working in Riyadh, would find his experience in Saudi Arabia to be very different from other American expatriates. It started in fact a few days before his flight to Arabia was scheduled to leave Dulles Airport. Merely hours before his departure, Adam learned that Black slavery had only recently ended in the Kingdom. As a Black American, this naturally caused him concern. Nevertheless, his initial encounter with the local population on his first day in Riyadh proved to him that every preconceived notion he had about the country was wrong. From that first day, Adam was forced to look at Saudi Arabia through fresh eyes. Those early months turned out to be only the start of an adventure of a lifetime.
