A few days ago, my Arabic teacher invited to attend her brother's friend's wedding. My whole class was pretty excited because this is a once in a life time chance, when will we ever get to attend a wedding in a Bedouin village? She tells us to come with empty bellies, and high expectations.
My entire class has no idea what to expect, but we were all more excited for the food than anything else. Abeer (our Arabic teacher) told us that there would be "endless foods", and to come ready to eat and eat.
We have to take the metro to Helwan station, which is an area in South Cairo, and upon arrival at the station, Abeer had a van ready to take us to the wedding. The fifteen of us climb into this mini bus and head over to where Abeer was. She was at some random house in the village, we’re not exactly sure whose, but we were invited in to see the horses.
Horses are a big deal in Egypt. They’re very expensive and considered to be a hot commodity if you have one. And this guy had some top notch horses, literally. They were ranked in the country as some of the top show horses.
So after looking at the horses we get into the van and drive further into the village to get to the place where the wedding was. The Bedouin people are known for their nomadic and folkish lifestyle, lots of dancing, singing, and poetry. The families generally stick together throughout the lifetime and are called “tents”. The Bedouins are also known for their honor code, which has three parts: 1) Ird/Sharaf. The Ird is the woman’s honor code, and it basically deals with her intact maidenhood. The Sharaf is the male honor code, and it deals with protecting the ird of the woman, the honor of the tribe, and maintenance of the property. The second part of the honor code is hamasa, which is courage and bravery when it comes to defending one’s tribe. The third part of the honor code is what made this wedding such a good time, it is diyafa. Which is the part of the code that symbolizes hospitality. Whomever enters a Bedouin home, will be served and treated lavishly. And it is oh so very true.
The van pulls up to the home and the first thing we see is colorful lights strung everywhere. We enter the home through an archway, and see a mass of men surrounding a horse dancing ring. We sit down on the edge of the ring and watch the horse dancing. We realize after a while that this is the men only party, and that the women are inside the house.
A man comes up to us and asks us what we would like to drink. We all order tea, but instead of bringing us tea, the man comes out with a tray full of Egyptian beer: Stella. Oh good Lord, is it ok to drink when our Arabic professor is sitting right behind us?
“Yallah! It is rude to refuse the hospitality! Drink!”
Allrighty then, I can live with this. Each of us take a beer and sip on it very slowly. We were then brought sheeshah, tea, Turkish coffee, and sodas. I could seriously get used to this. Apparentely, the man is a millionaire, and spared no expense on this wedding.
Some of the girls decide to go into the house to see what the women were doing. They were all dancing and playing with the children. We got to play with some of the children (I held a newborn!) and dance with the ladies, we also got a chance to converse with some of the Bedouins.
I was talking to my Arabic professor and she explained to me that it is un-ladylike for a woman to go out of the house. If there is an errand to be run, or something needed from outside, the man will get it. She brought this up to me multiple times, so I asked her about her political views.
“I am very liberal, and it causes a lot of problems in my family. As you can see, I am a teacher, which is a sign of being liberality. My husband is very respectful of my views, al-Ham-do-ellah, but it does cause some problems in our marriage.”
I was very impressed by my teacher upon hearing this. I found a new respect for her because a woman with a strong opinion here is not app

Egypt has been a really interesting experience for me. I’ve learned so much about the world by hanging out with political science major, being exposed to new culture and language, and learning about the history of this ancient country.

But I’ve noticed something about Egypt bothers me and I can’t put my finger on it. But upon reading A Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie, I understood what was bothering me.

Christie was describing a sook experience, where the characters were being bombaraded by children asking for “bakshish”. Which litereally means, “share the wealth”. And then it made sense.

In Luxor, my friends and I had just eaten at a restaurant and were exiting to go to our falluca ride acoss the Nile. A few kids surrounded us and were asking for bakshis. They followed us for a while and were persistant, but endearing. Giving us bookmarks and flowers in exchange for bakshish. After a while, we decided to give them each a pound or two.

There were four boys, ranging in ages from 4 to 11. The second we had the pound coins in our pockets, they were all over it. Grabbing our hands and trying to pry our fingers apart to get the coins inside our hands. We eventually just dropped them on the ground and walked away, but were followed and were asked to return the “gifted bookmarks”. Nothing is free in Egypt.

As we walked towards our falluca, we heard screaming. As I turned around, I saw the eldest boy being tossed around by an older man who had a strong grip on his collar. The man was yanking on the boy's collar and thrashing him about the ground. The boy was screaming for help as he was being thrashed about, but no one was doing anything. They simply walked by as if this was a normal occurrence.

People were simply walking away, or walking by as if this was a normal thing. I have no clue why the boy was being shaken as such, but I at least tried to step in. One of my male friends advised me against it, saying that since I was a girl, there was a greater chance that I would get hurt in the process of trying to stop the man. He intervened himself.


Another situation happened similar to this in Luxor. We were walking around the sook, and we saw two men engaged in a turmoil so violent that a man was bleeding from the head. Fists were being thrown, one was beating the other with a stick, and loud words were exchanged. And again, people strolled on by as if it was another day in the bazaar. We found out later that the fight was over one man not fully paying for what he had purchased.


How is this ok? Where are the morals? I see police on every corner when nothing is happening, but at those two moments, I saw not a single police officer.


Egypt is truly a beautiful place, but the downside is, it is a corrupt place where people don't think of eachother as humans, but more or less as a chance to make a few extra pounds. And if you take those pounds from them, al-Ham-do-ellah to you.

I don't have a picture to upload for this, apologies.