Head, Shoulders, Knees and Elbows

When I was planning to come to Egypt, I was aware of the more conservative dress expected of women. I went to Morocco about 6 years ago and I remember that we all dressed a bit more modestly than we normally would. It was early Spring anyway, though, so it wasn't hot enough for it to be that big of a deal. I knew that Morocco was one of the more laid-back largely-Muslim countries (or it was in early 2001, anyway) and that things might be different in Egypt.

People who didn't know better would try to scare me by bringing up burkas and complete cover and maybe the odd reference to cutting off hands if they catch you stealing. (This punishment comes from "the body of Islamic law," called Shariah, which is a set of guidelines established for dealing with both public and private daily life that was said to come from the prophet Mohammed. These days, most official governments may incorporate aspects of Shariah, but they don't use it as their judicial system. I'm pretty sure there's not a whole lot of hand cutting going on in Egypt. At least, in the media...) Anyway, I decided to ask some women who'd been to other Middle Eastern countries to see what they thought about how I should dress.
These ladies told me that as long as I covered my legs to the knees and my arms to the elbows and didn't show too much cleavage, that I'd be fine. As a result, I bought three pairs of capris, four tank tops and about seven button up shirts to wear over everything. I also brought a few skirts that cover my knees and one that goes to the floor.

What these ladies didn't tell me was that, while no one's going to spit or yell disapprovingly at you in the streets wearing capris and a loose shirt over your tank top (which has happened to some of the women here), you absolutely, without question, still get some undesired attention. Most Egyptian women wear long pants or skirts that touch the floor, long sleeve shirts to their wrists, and cover their hair completely with scarves. A few women go all out with the full-on hijab (women's head and body covering) and wear burkas with gloves and sometimes even a sheer cloth over that so you can't even see her eyes. Needless to say, most expats stand out in Cairo.

Two days ago (when I wrote this, which is about a week ago now), my mom and I went to Carre Four--the Cairo equivalent of a Wal-Mart--that's in a less expatty, more local part of town. I had a longish skirt on and my standard shoulder covering shirt. My mother wore a knee-length skirt and a short sleeve shirt. The truth is that she probably should have covered her elbows, but whatever. Neither of us expected to get so many dirty looks from all of the women. It was like high school all over again with stupid girls, but with more hostility. With women like that, I've taken to looking them in the eyes and smiling very sweetly at them. Every once in a while, one of them smiles back, but I think it throws the bitchy ones off a little and that makes me laugh. Really, there's not much else to do. But the women aren't really the problem. It's the men.

A few days before the Carre-Four incident, I was walking down the street to meet up with my mom who was volunteering at CSA (the organization created to help expats living in Egypt)-- knees covered, elbows and chest covered -- walking briskly, minding my own business and definitely looking down when some guy just pulled up in a car and tried to get me to talk to him. (Sure. That works in America too!) I just gave him the typical annoyed, screw-off look you'd give a lame guy that tries to hit on you at a bar and kept walking. It wasn't really that big of a deal. On the walk back, a car full of teenage guys drove past me and my mother slowly calling out to us and just being dumbasses. That wasn't that anything other than annoying either.

The real issue is that the men in Egypt generally don't respect Western women, and feel that we're easy. And that can cause problems. A few expat women have been walking in my parents' neighborhood and have been attacked by men who tried to drive off with them. It doesn't take a genius to figure out what they planned to do. It's really just not safe for a non-covered woman to walk around alone here. And even if those things hadn't happened, I'd still be kind of uncomfortable. When I'm walking down the street, or browsing in a store, or especially at the gas station, sometimes an ickiness just comes over me and sinks into my gut. I can just feel eyes on me. Creepy lecherous eyes that only a woman could pick up on. And even though I know, at that moment that I'm safe, the feeling stays like an alarm. Like the kind of feeling you get when you know you're in danger. Theresa would call it an alert, I think. That's exactly what it is. And there's not much I can do about it.