In general, the good seems to be outweighing the bad here. I'm definitely not a huge fan of the food (I'm tired of oil!), and yesterday I was almost groped in the crotch, but I saw it coming and managed to dodge it in time. I appreciated the reaction of one of the boys in our program, who was walking behind me, and immediately asked our head of the program how to say "How would you like it if someone did that to your sister?" in amiyya (Arabic colloquial). Like I said, I appreciated that, and I appreciate how chivalrous the guys on our trip are being in walking us home at night, etc. but I still haven't been able to figure out this part of Egyptian culture. Men here are so protective of their sisters, but there's daily harassment, catcalls, whistling, etc whenever you leave the house. It's definitely not all men, but I'm not really sure where the need for this arises from. Maybe it just helps release...frustration...because they're usually separated from women in this society. And women are so withdrawn when they're out on the streets and usually don't respond to harassment, but when you're inside the home with them, it seems like they have a completely different personality. The Egyptian girls in my dorm are extremely personable and loud all hours of the night. Strange...
Anyway, like I was saying, there are good things as well. We visited Montazeh the other day (the President's summer residence...there's a huge house there, beautiful gardens, and a beach), I had the best juice of my life, which turned out to be some sort of coconut and milk concoction (I'm not really a fan of coconut and wouldn't have ordered it if my friend had explained to me what it was before I drank it but it was AMAZING), and was only 1 guinea which is the equivalent to 20 cents, and we watched the Egypt vs. Mozambique soccer match last night in a cafe. That was pretty crazy...Egyptians are very into soccer. I'm happy that Egypt won.
Today was our first day of classes. I'm lucky in that there are two classes at my Fusha (classical Arabic) level, and I ended up in the one that has a manageable homework load, whereas the other class has hours and hours of it. My professor seems nice, and we only have 6 people in our class. I also had my Amiyya and Media Arabic classes today, so it was a long day.
All right, I suppose that's enough of an English break for now...
I have a friend who traveled extensively through the Middle East, among other places, for years, and she had the same comments about the behavior of the men. You've hit the nail on the head with your assumptions about why they behave this way. From Anne, I learned the following: The men can't have sexual relations until they're married as any woman who would "entertain" them would immediately be subject to the punishments of a society that, as you realize, requires that women remain covered from head to toe and not dare display the most minor affections towards males in public. However, most of the men have seen American movies in which the woman are AT LEAST either scantily clad or engaging in suggestive behaviors; suddenly they see an American woman walking towards them in their own country and think, hey, THESE women might relieve their "frustration," as you called it. According to Anne, this behavior didn't stop even when the men knew she was married, and even when her own husband walked right beside her! So, yes, you DO need to be vigilant and watchful. But, you sound like you have a great attitude, and I hope you have a wonderful semester. Enjoy!
ReplyDeleteIt's good to have a multi-cultural approach towards travel. I wonder what your Egyptian female comrades might say on the subject.
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