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Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, a controversial prince in Saudi Arabia, was little known outside the country until he actually became head of it last year.
BBC News Arabic journalist Rachid Sekkai, who taught him English from his childhood, describes below the unusual experience of having lived life at the royal court during the course of his life. this period.
I was calling in early 1996 in the prestigious Al-Anjal School of Jeddah City.
The governor of Riyadh, Prince Salman bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, had moved temporarily with his family. in the port city of the Red Sea and needed an English teacher for his children.
The man who later became king contacted the school and immediately took me to the palace to serve as a private teacher to some of the children of his first marriage: Prince Turki, Prince Nayef, Prince Khalid and, of course, or Prince Mohammed.
As we walked through the gates, under close surveillance, the car went through an awesome series of houses with immaculate gardens manned by white-collar workers.
There was parking with a fleet of exclusive luxury cars. I saw a pink Cadillac
the royal, was accompanied inside by the palace's director, Mansoor El-Shahry, a middle aged man that prince Mohammed, then eleven years old , liked a lot.
Mohammed seemed more interested in the time spent with the palace guards than in attending my clbades. As he was the eldest brother, these would have apparently allowed him to do what he wanted.
My ability to attract the attention of the youngest princes only lasted until the appearance of Muhammad.
I still remember him using a walkie-talkie during our clbades. He had taken the camera from one of the guards.
Mohammed used the camera to make jokes about me and play with the brothers and guards who were on the other side of the room.
Today, this 33-year-old prince is defense minister and heir to the Saudi throne.
Since he became the Saudi leader last year, MBS, as it is also called, has attempted to position itself as the modernizer of the kingdom.
Faced with the opposition of conservative clerics, he led vital economic reforms and launched a program of liberalization in this conservative country.
He was praised for some of his measures and was also criticized for Saudi Arabia 's record on human rights.
Critics in this regard are due, for example, to his seemingly endless war in Yemen and the badbadination of Saudi journalist and critic Jamaal Khashoggi at the Saudi Embbady in Turkey last October.
Saudi Arabia has accused 11 people of the murder and denies that the crown prince was involved in the case.
On one occasion, I was surprised when Mohammed told me that his mother, the princess, had said that I looked like a true gentleman ".
I do not remember having ever seen it, as the royal women of Saudi Arabia do not allow themselves to be seen by strangers. In fact, the only woman I met at the palace was a nurse from the Philippines.
I did not realize that they were watching me until the future heir to the throne pointed at the CCTV cameras on the wall. From that moment, I started feeling repressed in clbad.
In a short time, I clung to Mohammed and his younger brothers. Although I taught princes in a world of privileges, my palace students looked a lot like others: curious to learn but eager to play.
One day, the director of the palace asked me to meet the future king. He wanted to know how children progressed in clbad.
I thought it would be a good opportunity to talk about Prince Mohammed's antics.
I waited in front of Prince Salman's office, along with the other Prince's professors who seemed familiar with the protocol of the royal court.
When he appeared before us, the teachers stood up instinctively. Amazed, I watched them one by one get closer to the governor of Riyadh, bow, kiss his hand, talk quickly about children and move on.
When it was my turn, I could not tilt like the others because I had never done it before. And before I felt completely frozen, I approached to take the hand of the future king and pressed it firmly.
I remember seeing a slight smile of surprise on his face. However, he did not do any kind of censorship of the gesture, a faux pas that I ended up giving.
I did not mention what Prince Mohammed had done in my clbades, because I had then decided to leave everything and go back to the UK.
Shortly after, the palace director drew my attention for not having followed the etiquette.
Besides Prince Khaled, Saudi Arabia's ambbadador to the United States, his other brothers chose to stay out of the scene.
At the same time that I remember this brief work at the palace as of a remarkable episode in my life, I saw my ex-student Mohammed go on the world stage.
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