UAE newspaper The National featured an interesting article about the way hijab is perceived in Egypt:
Hadeel al Shalchi
November 14. 2008“Women who wear hijab in Egypt just have a bad reputation.”We were diving in and out of Cairo weekend traffic, heading towards a hotel by the pyramids for dinner, when the driver mindlessly blurted out this comment. I was the only one in the car wearing a hijab.
What made this remark different from previous one-liners about my hijab is that it came from an upper-class, educated Arab. He was old-money, educated in the West and a self-proclaimed liberal. The type who wears authentic GAP clothing, swings Gucci totes and has inherited an exclusive country club membership from grandparents.
I started wearing the hijab 10 years ago, when I was 18, in my hometown, Ottawa, Canada. It was a scary yet exhilarating decision to make. I knew I would be making a proclamation to the rest of society that I was different. At a time when other kids were piercing and tattooing their body parts, I was choosing to become more religious in a faith that was misunderstood – even before September 11.
Read the rest
here.
