I loved playing football when I was ten years old.
I would beg my mother to let me play with them.
And the answer was always,
“You’re a girl. I can’t just leave you in the streets alone.”
social pressure, social stigma, parents, marriage

Why are you late, missy?
What time is it?
You come home every day at 2 or 3 in the morning.

I’m 32 years old.
I’m divorced, and I don’t have any children.
When I turned 32, everyone pressured me into getting married.
I honestly wasn’t really looking forward to it.

Don’t you dare think of pressing charges like those women in the movie did.
A respectable girl would never go into a police station full of men and tell them that a man, for example, grabbed her here or touched her leg.
This country is full of incidents like these, and women never speak up. Don’t you go playing the hero

I’m in love with a man who means the world to me.
We’ve been together for 3 years.
He’s married and has children,
But I still love him.
romantic relationships, gender violence, social pressure

My mother started buying me things for my dowry when I was in middle school.
She got so many towels, sheets, underwear, blankets,
Pots and cups.

“Where are you?
Tell me where you are now.
Why are you so late?
Tell me now.
I’m not going to hang up.
We’ll continue this conversation when you come home.
Right now.
I want you here in five minutes.
I don’t care how.”

Something annoying happens every Ramadan.
As a woman, I’m looked at as a glitch in the Egyptian societal system.
I’m seen as a problem, just because I don’t cover my hair.
social stigma, social pressure, hijab, hair, harassment, the street

All girls are born with something and it’s taken by their husbands.
You were destined to get married since the day you were born.
This thing you have, he is going to take it today.

I wish I could stop worrying about every word I say and every move I make.
I wish I didn’t have to hide parts of myself.
I wish I didn’t care about what people think.