As I ventured into the hotel lobby in Jeddah earlier this week, I was not thinking about the role of women in Islam, but the issue came abruptly into the picture. In my terms I felt pretty well covered in a mid-calf dark red suit with long sleves, but I was quickly conscious of disapproving stares from two hotel porters. One asked me what I was looking for in a way that made it clear I did not belong there.
I knew that women in Saudi Arabia are required to wear the long black robes known as abayas in public places, and I was hoping to find a shop that sold them in the lobby. In the meantime, I thought I would be given a pass in this hotel that catered to Western visitors. It was my temporary home–for me, it wasn't really a public place, was it? The porter's glance told me otherwise.
My abaya search was unsuccessful and I turned to a planned meeting with a colleague (a man) whom I had known for years. We sat down at a café in the middle of the lobby. A waiter materialized instantly, but said that these tables were for men only. There was a "family" section, hidden to one side, where they were willing to serve us. It's been a long time since I felt that combined sense of being unwelcome and disapproved of.
There's a fractured and often tense dialogue going on about the role of women in Muslim societies. Crudely put, on one side are "liberators" who view practices that keep women in "private space" as oppressive and archaic, counter to basic human rights. On the other are some highly articulate Muslim women who view many "liberator" arguments as patronizing and
over-simplistic. They say, first, that they should set the terms of the debate and also cite plenty of faults in western society (divorce rates among them). Facets of the traditional ways have merit, they contend. These are often angry debates and, make no mistake, they matter. At their heart is the question of the role women should play in society.
My colleague loaned me an abaya that belonged to his wife and later I managed to buy one for myself. I wore it from then on as I worked to figure out what was expected and what was required of a non-Muslim woman. The hotel open spaces clearly counted as public and "covering" was expected. At the women's college I visited, students and professors often left their abayas unbuttoned when men were not present. It's a normal part of life for most women but there is, behind it all, the reality that wearing black covering is not a choice but the law of the land. That said, the women I spoke to did not give it much importance–they cared far more about quality education and access to jobs.
I was in Saudi Arabia to discuss education issues and human development and was warmly received and escorted from place to place. So I barely brushed against the complex nuances of women's place in public after my initial hotel lobby encounter. A colleague commented as I set out for Saudi Arabia that they would find me very odd, a woman traveling alone without male
protection (or presumably authorization). But the visit was productive and educational (for me).
As I reflected on that sense of oddness, and the assumptions behind it about women's expected roles in Saudi Arabia today, memories of a time not that long ago in the United States came flooding back. I was then a young woman whose dreams rarely fit the conventional norms. Many women like me worked hard to open doors and indeed, we "have come a long way, baby!" We had to change the rules – could one attend a certain school, compete for specific jobs, hope for promotion, exercise leadership? But we also had to confront that sense of exclusion, the aura of unwelcome. I remember well a time when the prevailing sense was that women simply did not belong, were not welcome, in a world constructed without them. It took a tough skin to enter those worlds and, slowly, change the expectations.
Women in Saudi Arabia are confident that change is coming for them too, that they will accomplish their goals at their own pace and in their own way. I hope so.
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