Arab News: Blogging About the Saudi Experience

Arab News just published an article which interviewed four female bloggers who blog about Saudi Arabia.

I am honored to be included as one of the four bloggers.

The other three bloggers are my friend Carol at American Bedu, Laylah who writes Blue Abaya, and American Girl, author of Under the Abaya.

It's a really well written article about four women who are at very different points in their lives.

Please have a look.

http://arabnews.com/lifestyle/science_technology/article501623.ece

Painting the Nursery - Pink or Blue?

Ihad a revealing conversation with my sister-in-law Bee and her daughters the other day that got me to thinking about life, and the ignorant and selfish ways people behave at times. One of Bee's daughters, Emmy, is pregnant with her second child - her firstborn is a son who is now two and a half years old. We were discussing her pregnancy, and one of the girls said that my mother-in-law (and Bee's mother) told her pregnant grand-daughter that she should name the new baby after my husband. The girls all giggled a bit and when I asked what was so funny, I learned that Emmy is expecting a girl - a fact that they are concealing from my MIL because she doesn't seem to care about girl babies.

Bee then proceeded to talk about when she gave birth to her first three children more than 20 years ago - all girls - and how her mother did not help out and rarely came to see her after each of the girls were born. But when Bee finally gave birth to her fourth child - a boy - her mother immediately packed her bags and moved in with Bee and her family for a period of time to graciously help out. The girls don't necessarily feel that their grandmother doesn't love them, just that she seems to favor male offspring over female. Emmy even said that once she gave birth to her son, she felt that her grandmother really changed in her feelings and respect towards her, elevating Emmy quite a few notches in status.


Bee and her daughters seem to think that many other women of grandma's generation think this way. I have heard of women here being divorced, tossed aside or looked down upon because they only produced female offspring. It's an idiotic way of thinking because basically, without getting into an involved debate about genetics, science has proven that the sex of a child is almost always solely determined by the male sperm. And not only that, it is yet again, another example of how women are faulted for everything and anything wrong with many societies, irregardless of facts to the contrary. I admit I was a little surprised to hear all of this since I mistakenly believed that this type of thinking was a thing of the past. I don't recall ever hearing something like this in my own culture. In fact, I remember hearing most often that the parents didn't care what sex the child was, as long as the baby was healthy.


So I was wondering about this cultural phenomenon here and if it exists in other places around the world, especially among older women like my Saudi MIL. I've read that boy babies are preferred in many Asian countries and other places, and that throughout the ages, female infanticide was common - which I don't understand because without girls, there will be no more babies born at all, period. In China alone, its "one child per mother policy" has had disastrous results for baby girls, who have been aborted or abandoned by the hundreds of thousands every year since its inception in 1979. It is estimated that by the year 2020, about 30-40 million young Chinese men will have no women to marry and mate with. What does this mean? It means that already young women in China are being kidnapped and sold as a child-bearing commodity to the highest bidder. This is nothing short of sexual slavery. It is harmful to society and upsetting to nature's delicate balance to deny girls their rightful place in the cycle of life.


Yes, I know that all men, deep down, want a son - some kind of macho thing, I'm sure. Boys can carry on the family name, and there's still those old-fashioned notions about boys that they can take over the family business and can support the family, etc., when in today's world, girls have proven just as capable of doing these things as boys - as long as they are given the opportunities. I also know that there are many mothers and fathers out there who cherish and adore their daughters. But I'm wondering if there is an obvious preference for boy babies in your country or culture?



For more information, please read another blogpost on this same topic on My Reflections and Musings by Jenn.

Hospital Visitors

V
isiting the sick is a very important obligation that the Saudi culture follows and it is dictated by Islam. Not only is it good for the sick person in that it lifts his spirits, but it is also a virtuous act which will be rewarded for the Muslim person who visits someone who is sick. There are even guidelines in Islam about not staying too long, about visiting an unrelated person of the opposite sex, and specific prayers (du’a) that are said for the sick individual.

I hadn’t really had much exposure to this aspect of Islam until my husband spent ten days in the hospital recently and had open heart surgery. He had a steady stream of visitors during most of his time in the hospital. Usually family and friends started coming in the early afternoon, and sometimes the last visitor of the day came late, leaving when visiting hours ended at 11pm. I thought it was interesting that during Ramadan, the hospital visiting hours are changed to ending at 3 am (see photo below). I learned that my function was to act as hostess for the visitors, offering them small cups of the traditional Arabic coffee called Gahwa (here’s a simple but delicious recipe for Gahwa), which my sisters-in-law thoughtfully and thankfully brought to me every day in thermal pots, as well as dates or chocolates, which guests brought with them in abundance. The Gahwa is mainly cardamom with very little coffee in it - I still haven’t acquired a taste for it.


I managed not to cry at all the whole time Adnan was in the hospital – I felt that he needed me to be strong and positive, and I was! I have heard many times since moving here that Saudi women have a reputation for being very dramatic and emotional. Now I’m not saying that they are, just that I have heard it often enough. So I thought it was rather amusing when I was saying goodbye to Adnan right before they wheeled him into the operating room that a small group of women employees turned around to watch me, as if to see whether I was going to break down or not.


Adnan initially didn’t want his own mother even knowing about his surgery because she, for one, IS quite emotional, but it reached a point where that was just not practical. So she was finally told that he was having more than just tests and procedures done. She came to the hospital to see him a few days after the operation once he was out of ICU - and she cried the whole time, which I could see was tough for Adnan. But the funny thing is that when she was leaving, she got after me about what I was wearing – one of Adnan’s long loose shapeless thobes with elbow length sleeves and a huge billowing colorful scarf over my head (properly covering my hair) that hung loosely down past my wrists. But when I served coffee, she could see part of my forearms from underneath so she didn’t think I was dressed properly. She thought I should have worn a long sleeved dress, but I told her that I would be way too hot dressed that way and that I was comfortable in what I had on. She knows how I complain about being hot all the time. But she said, “Not hot.” It struck me as funny because here she was crying her eyes out because her son had just had heart surgery, but she was still worried that a man might have seen my sexy middle-aged forearms! I know she means well and it is actually a compliment that she cares. She is just from a different time and a different place…


The third day Adnan spent in the hospital, which was also the day before his surgery, was a Friday – the holy day in Islam when it is customary for men to go to the mosque to attend the Jumu’ah prayers, comparable to Christians attending church services on Sundays. After the prayers ended, men well-wishers dressed in their crisp white thobes and flowing headgear began appearing bearing huge floral arrangements (one was almost as tall as me!), plants, chocolates, or cologne and I finally abandoned my hostessing duties because there must have been 12-15 men in the room all at once. Many of them I had never seen before even though some were my husband's cousins - but because of the way the society restricts interaction between unrelated men and women, I had never had any opportunity to meet most of them before. I went out for a walk down in the beautiful park adjacent to the hospital, but it was a bit warm, so I wandered around the hospital for a bit before returning to the room.


Each day, except for the three days Adnan spent in ICU where limited visiting hours were strictly enforced, visiting guests streamed in and out of the room, some calling before coming, others showing up unannounced. When a couple of his previously-unknown-to-me cousins came calling, they were SOOOO incredibly handsome that I almost spilled the coffee on them! And after almost every visitor left, Adnan would tell me that the friend or family member who just left had offered to foot the entire hospital bill, and he would remark, “This system is so much better than insurance.” All in all, the total bill for everything came to about $18,500 US – for an angiogram, triple bypass open heart surgery, ten days in the hospital including three days in ICU, our meals, doctors’ charges, medications, etc. I have no idea what the same might cost in the States, but I’m pretty sure it would be considerably more.

Adnan continues to improve a little bit every day. He’s still in some pain, has good days and bad days, and is a tad impatient to feel better sooner, but overall he’s doing very well. The doctors are pleased with his progress and the long incision down his chest looks good. We still have a way to go, and both Adnan and I are looking ahead to the day when this will all be behind us. Many Thanks to all of you who sent your well wishes and prayers – I could see that Adnan was quite touched as I read them to him. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

A Child's Custody

When divorce is involved, in the vast majority of child custody cases in the Middle East, custody of the children is almost always granted to the father. But what about when divorce is not the issue, but instead the father dies? One would think that the mother of the children would get custody of her own kids, right? Not necessarily so, especially in the Middle East.

One case that has made international headlines recently is the case of Adam, whose mother is British and whose Qatari father passed away in 2005. In early October of this year, Rebecca Jones, Adam's mother, was talked into visiting her deceased husband's family in Qatar with her ten-year-old son Adam. The boy was a virtual stranger to the family, having lived in Bahrain most of his life. But what was supposed to be a family visit has turned into a family's desperate fight over the custody of Adam. The Qatari family promptly kidnapped the child and Adam's 77-year-old grandmother has now been awarded custody by a Qatari court.

This family did not rip him away from his mother out of love or concern for him at all. Some reports have indicated that his Qatari family's motivations are based on the child's inheritance. Apparently Adam will come into a large amount of money when he turns 18. Adam doesn't even speak Arabic and his grandmother doesn't speak English.

The boy, like many children of Western women and Middle Eastern men, holds dual citizenship - both British and Qatari. Rebecca's deceased husband's brother, Fahad Al-Madhaiki, whom she trusted, tricked Rebecca into signing a document written in Arabic, that in effect allowed the family to challenge her parental rights to Adam. Rebecca, who has remarried and lives in Bahrain, has been denied visitation by her dead husband's family. To make matters worse, Adam suffers from a condition called dyspraxia, which affects developmental motor skills such as balance and coordination.

Social workers who met with Adam to ensure that he was in good shape told Rebecca that Adam is unaware of the custody battle and was told by his abductors that he is being kept out of his home in Bahrain because of the swine flu.

Human rights groups have condemned the Qatari court's ruling, and Rebecca has received lots of support from around the world, especially from her son's British school in Bahrain.
If you are on Facebook, you can sign up to the group "Return Adam to his Family in Bahrain." Rebecca recently posted the following on her Facebook group on November 18:

"Dear Friends, The minors affairs authority asked us to come to their office for a meeting today. They called Fahad the uncle who took my son and asked him to come in to talk about the fact that I had not seen my son for nearly 7 weeks and this was a violation of my rights as a mother. To see this person sitting acros...s the table for me was very difficult after what he has done but I tried to stay calm because they warned me if I became angry they would not be able to mediate and negotiate a visit to my son. Anyway to cut a long story short after two hours of negotiations he agreed for me to see my son for a few hours at 5pm. I was overwhelmed with joy at the prospect of seeing him, however it was short lived. Ten minutes after I left to prepare for my visit with Adam the minors affairs called me to say that Fahad had called and changed his mind and the visit was off. Truely heartbreaking. Rebecca."


How can this Qatari family, in all good faith, steal this child from his mother, deny her visitation, and think that what they are doing is in the best interest of this child?

For more information about the plight of Adam and Rebecca:

British Woman Claims Son Kidnapped by Grandparents in Qatar

Social Workers Win Access to Adam

ITN Video Interview with Adam's mom Rebecca Jones

Mother in Law

Back in 1950, my husband’s mother Tata was married at age 12 and gave birth to my husband when she was only 13. Adnan’s dad was 21 or 22 when they married. At the time of her marriage, she had attained a 4th grade education. This was not unusual for that era in Arabia, but hopefully it doesn’t happen (much) in this day and age, except possibly among the remaining Bedouin tribes.

(Girls in the Kingdom now achieve at least a high school education. Some are married off then, and others continue their educations and obtain higher degrees at universities or even go on to get their PhDs. Even so, most still do not work outside the home.)

One day when Tata and I were sitting in her living room, she told me in her limited English a little about her experience.

“Me eleffen oh twelf years get married,” she said in her cute thick accent. “Mama and Baba kuh-razy! Me too young. Me baby!”

“Baby Adnan come after one year. Then baby, baby, baby after.”

Well before her 20th birthday, she had four kids.

She did not know her husband when they married. She was still playing with dolls. She told me that even though she had an older unmarried teenaged sister, Adnan's father wanted only Tata as his wife. It was, of course, an arranged marriage. But over the years she grew to deeply love her husband, who was a kind and good man. Adnan is the spitting image of his dad, who passed away right before we met 30 years ago. This, coupled with the fact that he is her first born, makes Adnan very special to Tata.

But Tata herself is very special. This woman with only a 4th grade education, who was married as a child of 12, raised four children who all graduated from college. (My husband has his PhD and his sister married a highly successful man who has his PhD as well.) This "uneducated" woman owns property, has managed her affairs by herself for the last 30 years, has a live in maid, loves to cook and learn, and has a great sense of humor. She is as generous as she is stubborn and strong. Even though my Arabic is very limited and her knowledge of English is not extensive, somehow we manage to communicate most of the time. She and I each try to teach each other new words and phrases. We enjoy each other's company and always laugh together.


Tata has an antique Singer sewing machine that she got shortly after her marriage. It is beautiful - well worn, but has been lovingly taken care of over the years, and it runs like a dream. It doesn’t even have a zigzag stitch, just a straight stitch and reverse. It is black with gold lettering and designs on it. The machine is heavy – it must weigh 25 pounds. I had to prove my sewing skills to her the first time I asked to use it, but now she lets me borrow it any time I need it.

My now-hairy 15 year old son Adam had been bugging us for months to get him an electric shaver. The other day, my husband came home with an old Philips electric shaver in a slightly tattered box, for Adam. The shaver itself is like new and works perfectly. I asked Adnan where it came from, as I haven’t seen any second hand stores around here. I don’t think they exist.

“It belonged to my father. Can you believe Mother has kept it all these years?” he said.

I caught my breath as tears came to my eyes and my throat tightened. I am and always will be a sentimental fool. This gesture, this kindness, this generosity! Surely this shaver was more than just an electrical appliance to her. The fact that she gave it to MY son and not one of her other grandsons spoke volumes to me and touched me in a way I cannot express. Nothing she could have done could have made me feel more accepted as a part of this family.

I always jokingly told people back in the states all those years that I was lucky I had no in-law problems because mine were on the other side of the world. Now that I have made the journey and am living right across the hall from my mother in law, I know what I have been missing.