Gulf Crisis, confidential （１３）　

１３) Off days, continued

We went to carpet market (“souk” in Arabic) in Riyadh twice where they sold high quality silk carpets. Those from Hereke in Turkey and Cum in Iran were considered to be the high end. The price of those high end carpets was of course very high. I got the information about the price from Japanese diplomat who was a carpet collector. I negotiated bullishly, because I knew the reasonable price beforehand. When I found my favorite, I quit the negotiation by saying “I'll buy at another shop.” The owner followed me and accepted my asking price. Japanese were though to be reliable there, the carpet was given first and the shop owner visited my hotel later for the payment. I bought two small Hereke carpets during my stay in Riyadh.

We held a tennis tournament at the tennis court in the embassy yard.
It was a farewell tennis match for Dr. B, medical attache who would be transferred to Vienna. We played mixed doubles matches. We determined our partners by lottery. I played with Dr. B's wife. We
lost the first match unexpectedly, but we were able to continue to play games thanks to the repechage. After the first loss we won 3 times and came the final match at last. The male player of our opponent was considered to be the best player. He used to play tennis at Yanagawa high school which was one of the strongest high school tennis team then. We tried to receive his strokes as
patiently as possible, and attacked his female partner as aggressively as possible. We won miraculously and became the champions of the tournament. The farewell tennis match ended successfully, because the wife of Dr. B became champion.

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