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Al-Ahram Weekly 17 - 23 August 2000 Issue No. 495 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 17 - 23 August 2000 Issue No. 495
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Our way
By Fayza Hassan
Last week, Mahdi drove me to Heliopolis in his taxi and, having found a parking spot in the shade, cranked back his seat and urged me to take my time.
When I came back an hour later, Mahdi was wide awake and quite red in the face. He was muttering irately under his breath. I pretended not to notice but he did not seem inclined to let the occasion pass. "I do not know what this country is coming to," he ventured and waited to be prompted. As no encouragement seemed to be forthcoming, he continued. "This woman walked by a few minutes ago," he said slowly. "She was half-naked, I swear, showing her back and even part of her belly. I know it is haram to look but she practically forced me to, I swear," he added, feigning embarrassment. "The boys standing at the kiosk teased her, told her that she was beautiful but really they meant it as an insult, because deep down they are good boys who know God." The rest of the story soon followed as we headed home. The young woman, "almost a girl," could not have been unaware of the reaction she was bound to produce, according to Mahdi. She was Egyptian and therefore knew our ways. In his view she was trying to attract attention. She expected the boys to look, and why shouldn't they? They were poor, therefore unmarried and consequently sexually repressed. "This can't go on for much longer," said Mahdi, shaking his head knowingly. "Something terrible is going to happen to our youngsters."
Mahdi had recently watched a television programme which "informed young people about Eddz [sic], a fatal disease that comes to men who marry foreigners," he explained and waited for an objection. After all, I look rather foreign myself. A young man who had caught it was warning young Egyptians not to follow his example, Mahdi explained. He was unemployed and had therefore had to postpone marriage plans indefinitely. Fate practically forced him into a relationship with a foreign girl who had a good job and asked nothing of him, neither an apartment nor the unbelievable amounts required today even to begin talking to an Egyptian girl's parents. On the contrary, she was very generous with him and catered to all his needs, but she also infected him with Eddz. "This is what foreign girls come here for," commented Mahdi. "It is part of a plan. The big powers in the West know that Egyptian men are strong, and they are afraid of us really. They have to weaken us first in order to carry out their own designs."
There were other young men on the show who related their own stories too: a university student living with an older woman for her money and feeling old before his time; a mechanic who had wanted to marry a "lady" and was now complaining about his wife, the dentist. She liked the material comfort he gave her (as a girl, she had used public transport; now she drove a Mercedes), but thought herself superior and constantly made disparaging comments about his smell; finally, a fallah recounted his life with a city girl who refused to visit his parents in the countryside and let them enjoy the company of their grandchildren.
Poverty, said Mahdi, had made us forsake our traditional ways, which were right, clean and simple, and now we were going to pay the price. This was why the girl had shown up on the street in her outrageous costume. "She could be a dancer in a cheap cabaret or maybe even an 'I don't want to say what'," he whispered discreetly, although there was no one else in the taxi.
"Our girls never used to behave in this shameful way, but now they no longer accept their lot and want to have a life," he concluded firmly. Then, relenting, he mused: "Who knows, maybe this girl can't find a job. She has to earn a living, because her father and brothers are out of work." Still, he was obviously not completely convinced by this last interpretation: "This is a Muslim country. We have our customs, which are strong and based on our religion and must be respected. You know, if that girl dressed like that in America or even Europe, I would not say anything about her, it is their custom; here, on the other hand, we have religion. Her attire is sinful, there are no two ways about it."
His daughter Wafaa goes to university in jeans, he will not deny it; that is the fashion in the English department. She also wears short sleeves in summer, but he insists on the headscarf. He is a reasonable man, who at the same time must protect his daughter from bad influences, so he is intent on following a middle course. When she marries, of course, it will no longer be his problem, but where will he find a young man rich enough to give her what she deserves, he has been asking himself. Should he settle for a mechanic, like the one on the TV show, for his well-educated daughter?
Mahdi was by now lost in his reverie, driving at a snail's pace, but I was in no hurry. "Tell me something," he asked suddenly, unwisely turning around to look at me. "My cousin went to Holland and ended up marrying a Dutch girl. They have a daughter now, and their own house. He came to visit last year and he is fine, he eats like a horse. How come he did not catch Eddz?"
