Liberated Saudi Youth Wonder Where All the Wahhabis Have Gone

The vast halls of the Dhahran Expo in Saudi Arabia’s oil-rich Eastern Province tingle with youthful excitement. One 28-year-old would-be entrepreneur named Zaid, wearing an immaculate white traditional thobe, says he wants to start a business making sandboards for tourists to hurtle down desert dunes. Female university students stop visitors to show off projects for an innovation class. In fluent English, Shahad Sonbul explains how a floating chair allows the disabled to use swimming pools. Next to her, a group of five seeks funding for a credit card case secured by fingerprints.

Financial markets may be obsessed with the initial public offering of Saudi Arabia’s national oil giant Aramco, which will begin selling shares on Nov. 17 in a potentially record-busting opening of the country to outside investors and the world. But the real essence of economic transformation is the unshackling of the nation from a puritanical brand of Islam that would have made the aspirations at the Dhahran Expo unimaginable. “In two years, the difference is crazy,” says Shoug Alamri, 22, one of the students. “Finally, I can be me.”