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Al-Ahram Weekly 20 - 26 April 2000 Issue No. 478 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 20 - 26 April 2000 Issue No. 478
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Heritage Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Danger zone
By Fayza Hassan
"Only at a gambling table can one really know one's neighbour," my husband used to say. Not a gambler myself, I was never fully illuminated by this particular bit of wisdom, but on a different level, I can match my husband's belief with an equally incisive verity: "Only at the wheel of a car can true character be revealed." Few besmirching adjectives describing drivers' behaviour can be considered a novelty today, none in any case that I have not already used at one time or another and in various languages. Now, however, I find myself in the position of discovering an entirely uninvestigated field of car owners' wickedness, which behooves serious psychological exploration. I am referring to people's new parking habits and the aggressive tendencies that are growing by the day, in equal proportion to the diminution of available space. When Menna repeatedly refused to go to kindergarten, crying her eyes out every morning, her mother simply withdrew her. The other women with kindergarten-friendly children looked at her with unconcealed disapproval. "You are ruining your daughter's future," they told her, and shook their heads wisely.
Menna's future was not ruined, far from it; her mother, however, had a hard time finding suitable private tutors who would accept to teach the child at home. Menna's childhood was different from that of her contemporaries. She accompanied her mother everywhere and observed things and people other children did not have a chance to see. By the time she was nine, she decided that she was ready to go to school. Although it was not easy to unearth an establishment in which Menna could rejoin the mainstream, one was eventually found. She did brilliantly, graduating ahead of the other students. She showed no mental scars for having been deprived of communal finger-painting, and went on to lead a particularly successful academic and professional life.
Joe is 23 and his parents believe that it is time for him to choose his future bride. "He is engaged," whispers his mother proudly to her friends who are gathered for their weekly card game. "I am not," protests Joe, while helping with the refreshments. "Just because I like a girl does not mean I want to spend the rest of my life with her." His mother looks miffed. "All your friends are engaged, you are the only bachelor, people will think there is something wrong with you," she says tearfully. Despite his mother's nagging, Joe will not marry until he is 35. By that time, he will have a great career and have travelled the world over. He will choose wisely and have a particularly happy marriage.
Dina is a chemical engineer. She is lucky to work for a good firm where she is appreciated and regularly promoted. At 30, she is still vehemently opposed to the idea of dropping everything to get married. Besides, none of the prospective husbands that her parents dutifully encourage are up to the standards she has set. "Don't waste your time," Dina tells them angrily. "I will never marry a fool just to please you." Dina will never marry. She will have a wonderful and exciting life and will never regret her decision, though she sometimes experiences bouts of remorse for having made her parents very unhappy.
Inji has been married for six years. To the great chagrin of their families, she and her husband are refusing to have children. They share many good things together and don't feel the urge to give them up for the dubious pleasure of changing diapers. "There comes a day when a couple needs more than shared interests to keep them together," says Inji's mother confidentially. "It might be too late then to have a baby." Inji rebels at the implication: "You mean that if we don't have a baby we will be bored with each other, so we should make our life unpleasant as a preventive measure. What is wrong with leaving each other if we are no longer happy together?"
Inji's mother is alarmed by her daughter's logic. She has always considered that one should live by the rules and she has brought up her children accordingly. What did she do wrong? "You are in the danger zone," she tells Inji. "You are rejecting the rules by which society survives and are questioning its essence. You will be walking a lonely path and live to regret it." Inji shrugs off her mother's advice. She and her husband have been spared the joys and worries of parenthood but are nevertheless having a rich and productive time together.
Menna, Jo, Dina and Inji are convinced that there is a universal conspiracy aimed at forcing dissenters to toe the line. "It is not," says Dina, "that they do not see the hardships brought about by the 'system' that they promote. Many older women are proud to recount the miseries of their married lives and the problems they faced with their children. Men dwell on potential careers cut short by the arrival of their first child and the need to provide for the baby. Still, they are terrified of anyone who questions what they have come to believe is the immutable order of things. In a time when life is changing at a dizzying pace, they want to hang on to the old values and close their minds to their resounding failure."
Inji, who has stepped -- albeit gingerly -- into the danger zone of planning her life differently, is happy now to have done so: "At first I thought long and hard about my mother's advice. I feared I might regret my decision when it was too late to reverse it. It was not easy to say that we did not have children simply because we did not like them. There was a strong taboo there that we broke and we made many enemies. Nevertheless, unlike less reckless people I know, I can look at my life today with deep satisfaction."
