I live in a rather shaabi area.
Hijab is not a choice for us, nor is it a sign of piety.
It’s only a way of averting the attention of bastards away from women in the area.
I wore the niqab for a period of time because of all the times people have touched me.
gender violence, hijab, social pressure, harassment, the street

The first time he hit me was the day I found out I was pregnant.
He picked a fight with me when his friend and his wife were having dinner with us,
And I fried the mombar (a kind of sausage dish),
Before the chicken breasts.
He pulled me by my hair,
And dragged me to the stove,
And threatened to set me on fire to get rid of me.

I have no space.
I’m always tired.
I try to blend in.
But I always face the same issue:
I do what people want me to do,
Just to avoid problems.
social pressure

“We can’t have a divorced woman in the family.
What will people say?
Once you’re married, that’s it.
You can’t get a divorce.”

Were women just created for pleasure?
It doesn’t matter what we wear, how we look, or what we say.
Answering back means you’re playing hard to get.
I recently found out that people in our society think married women are easy.

I still can’t forget the look on his face as he passed me by in a toktok after he had touched me from behind.
“Take that”, he said.
That was the first time I was sexually harassed. I was 15.

It was a family outing.
Almost everyone said,
“What’s wrong with your hair?”
“Straighten the frizz out of it.”
“Are you trying to be an eyesore on purpose?”
They were insensitive to my feelings as they made fun of me.
body image, hair, bullying, beauty standards, social pressure

I know that a lot of women unknowingly enter into marriages with similar types of men, and that I was lucky and all that.
But I never imagined that something like that could ever happen to me.

It was me and two or three other girls on the bus.
Two of them were veiled and one was wearing the niqab.
We were all standing in a corner.
We were surrounded by men.
There was a man sitting with his legs wide open and laughing loudly.
It was as if he was the owner of the bus and could act any way he liked.

I don’t want to have a big wedding and spend a lot of money on it.
I don’t want a big dress or heavy makeup that I know I won’t like.
I don’t want to get married in a wedding hall I don’t like and receive gifts I don’t want.