My interest in HIV stems out of a feeling of responsibility since I am in the business of taking young people aboard on youth exchange programs. Hmmm… On a second thought…I am lying!… I have been in this business since 2006, but I had only become interested in knowing more last year.

Why Last year? Because last year I met a young Jordanian guy called Salim. He was 19 when he went on an exchange program in 2005 and came back with the HIV virus (not on my programs thank God). He lives normally. His family still does not know about him, and he is not planning to get married any time soon.

“Teach them how to protect themselves from the virus.” He told me “I did not know, and no one bothered to teach me.”  I remember thinking that his  statement was oxymoronic since his T-shirt had stated “I did not know is not an acceptable answer”

I was devastated after talking to him… it is not often that I passe a nuit blanche; but that night, settling world’s affairs seemed easier than thinking about Salim!  Black ideas about the possibility of young people getting infected on one my programs kept coming screaming in my head. I could not sleep until I promised myself that I had to do the right thing with the group that was about to travel, especially that I was not going to be with them. I had to give them a crash course on ways of protection. (I happen to be an HIV certified trainer!)

The group came back safely…but one of the guys took my course as a green light to spend his time doing the monkey business with everyone who gave him a second glance! His excuse whenever someone complained was that the organizer told them that they had to use condoms!

I knew I was going to be in trouble when I was called to defend myself to a committee of perfectly morbid and ugly human beings a week later! The timing could not have been more wrong… it was one of the busiest weeks of the year… I had to reschedule a few seriously important meetings that could not have been rescheduled… I was truly aghast at this foolish and unnecessary muddle that had suddenly arisen out of nothing.

The committee had one question only…. just what sort of training had been required to produce such a model of logic, and common sense as they saw sitting before them!  This was immediately followed by a stream of angry comments….I tried to respond to their question about the benefits I get from dirtying young innocent ears with such nonsense as HIV! I explained that knowledge would function as a first line of protection, and they retaliated with faith being the first line of protection and not knowledge…. after rounds and rounds of arguments, I eventually had to admit that they were right, however if God forbid, their first line of protection should fail, then maybe knowledge should be the second?

Nothing... I think I would have been more successful if I tried to convince stones...

I think the point of this pointless post is that I need to express my feeling that the vaccine is delightful news since the Middle East is the second fastest spreading HIV epidemic in the world. In the Middle East there are around 380,000 cases, 36,000 cases were reported last year alone… and it seems that knowledge is not about to spread any time soon…

Anyway, she is home, and therefore our TV is almost completely dedicated to two channels… Iqraa and Rotana Music! Yup, I understand the gap is huge… but who am I to object, when she says

 A day for you and a day for God…

So…

I have been watching a lot of Arabian music video clips lately.  Again and again, the audacity displayed there, is mesmerizing… There is a fierce current of resistance against the rigid social rules of 7aram and 3eib  ( حرام وعيب) that govern our lives in the Middle East and that hold us all to higher moral standards. This current revolves around one thing… sexuality!

TV is still the most widely used medium in the Arab world, and the contradictions that are highlighted by this medium are massive. While some innocent girls get killed for honour almost on weekly basis these days, Arab sex symbols slither their curvy bodies and low cut dresses on Arabian national TVs almost constantly to the delight of the masses, which makes me wonder if we are at the threshold of a sex revolution in the Arab world?

There is something taking place, it is new and it is, definitely revolutionary. What is interesting about it is that there has been no obvious evolutionary process involved… it happened swiftly, sometime in last ten years, as a result of globalization and IT revolution. Young Arabs discovered a new sphere that allows them to bypass the strict social rules. Thousands, if not millions, of young Arabs are tuning to cyber forums and social-networking sites such as Facebook, chatting, posting videos on YouTube and Ikbis and writing blogs, most of them with overtly social and sexual themes. (Contrary to what the world thinks..i.e. politics)

The question that poses itself here is how does this revolution affect Arab societies, especially that intellectual discussion about sex is still not afoot with what is taking place in reality?

If I take a quick glance around me, I see that sex education is still not a priority in the educational systems, and if it is, teachers are still not qualified.  Arabs still have a false feeling of safety, which explains why the Middle East is the second fastest spreading HIV epidemic in the world. Today there are around 380,000 reported cases.  Last year alone 36,000 new cases were reported in the Arab world in comparison to 15,000 in the whole continent of Europe! The whole continent with all its liberalism and freedom and sexuality….

So where are we? What are the ramifications of this revolution on our societies? Are we going to catch up with our ancestors in the prime of the Islamic empire, who celebrated sexuality and understood the value of the intellectual debate? And how are we going to protect our youngsters whose first line of protection (I.e. culture and traditions), that had, seemingly, been working for us is failing to protect them?

Now in the spirit of sexuality and HIV, I recommend the movie all about my mother. I have probably written about it previously… but I still think that Almodovar is the only director who can get away with such concepts in such a creative way. It is an interesting watch.

He is an A-hole. He does not respect you, leave him!

Now, my opinion has changed dramatically… it has become:

Where is your self confidence?

Elsa on the other hand used to hate it when her partner (ex-husband now…) used to check women out, especially when they were out and she was with him. This was always the base for an argument… she told him repeatedly that it made her feel uncomfortable, she felt it was not respectful of her as a women… his standard answer was a cold “it meant nothing”

Her mother used to tell her that being upset was not about him staring but it was about being insecure in her relationship…. which obviously she was not… and rightly so, since he ended up cheating on her…
Today, when she is with her boyfriend, she truly does not mind if he checks someone out,… which he seldom does, … and when he does, it is done discreetly and respectfully. Actually, it is ironic, that she would point out that a girl is cute…… what would he do in this case? He does nothing…. absolutely nothing… he might mumble something funny and move on.

So I guess her mother’s comment was right after all…. It really is not about who does what… it is about trust… if you trust the person, if you are secure about the person you are with… checking out other people is fine. The point is both men and women look every now and then… it is no big deal, but what is not normal is for people to stare and comment EVERY time some member of the opposite sex walks in a room. Which really was the case with Elsa’s husband, it used to make all of her friends uncomfortable… he would scan any woman’s body rudely…it was disgusting!

Why do men check out women?

I really don’t want to provide excuses for Arab men…they get away with too much as it is…. but let’s look into evolution here. We need to remember that even though we moved from the caves into modern buildings around Jordan… and we started eating cooked mansaf around tables in different Jordanians cities and villages instead of eating raw meet around the fire in the caves, we still share DNA with animals.

We should never forget that the aim of the human race is to spread DNA for the survival of the race! A guy, having to do little work to give birth to a kid, would be more likely to pass on his DNA if he mated with several women… Is this all? Well of course not. There are other reasons as well.. For example the fact that society celebrates men’s behaviours… I mean it is completely ok for a man to look around, but it would be viewed as completely unnatural and maybe a little sick for a woman to do the same…

I would also imagine that it is because the way women react to it… A friend used to let her husband know how cute the waiter is whenever she caught him looking at other women… she would tip these handsome waiters handsomely, and the sting of spending unnecessary money was enough to teach the husband not to look when she is around!

She still tips people handsomely every now and then, after 13 years of marriage!

Can you think of other reasons why men look at other women??

I wonder who would get upset by this video… Michelle Obama or Carla Bruni?

I had a workshop that revolved around creating a community center there.  The discussion went into the direction of public gardens… since Sahab community was complaining about the lack of public spaces for children. A lady there said that the problem is not in the gardens themselves… even if there are gardens, she (as a mother) would not send her children to a public garden, since there is a lot of drugs activity going on there. …

Obviously that did not go well… people slaughtered her! They were so upset about her accusations for a number of reasons… maybe that she was a woman, maybe that we are not local and it felt like she was showing dirty laundry…. Does not matter…what matters is that public spaces have been used as ideal spaces for predators.

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I got the idea in one of those days that my sisters and I took the kids to a local park… We try to take them to a park on daily basis… truth to be known is that we don’t take them because of any brilliant maternal skills… but that is the most effective way to exhaust the kids to make sure they are in bed as early as possible…!

The thing is… I had noticed that whenever I go to a public garden, ….the demography of adults is something like: 6 Indonesian women,  5 Philippians,  4 Srilankan, one or two Europeans… No Jordanian women what so ever… European women go to public gardens to spend quality time with their children, Arab women send their maids to spend quality time with their children.

That particular day, there was a suspicious teenager going around, he would look for young children that are alone and just come close to them… with the maids busy socializing with each other and the mothers busy elsewhere doing whatever that they are doing… very young children are left vulnerable to pedophiles, drug predators, and other kinds of predators…

That particular day, my sister, who noticed this guy went to him and yelled her lungs out, questioning him on what he was doing,  threatening to get the security guard… upon hearing this, the guy dissolved in oblivion… We never saw him again…

So basically, the presence of one responsible local adult, could save the future of a few children… whose duty or fault is it? Government? Predators? Children? Families?  Or us locals who lack any sense of social responsibility and sense of belonging….. ? I wonder….

Speaking of different nationalities and cultures, I have recedntly watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding, for the 18the time  probably… I still think it is the funniest movie ever made. It is sweet, hilarious and completely relevant.….

 H. was telling me today, how she will never pardon her parents for not allowing her to play sports when she was younger… they never explained. They gave her excuses such as it is 3eib for a girl to be playing basketball, or swimming or riding a bike.

She is a very independent, mobile and an adventurous spirit. Her parents have zero objections to boyfriends, camping or traveling.. basically, any of the luxuries that other young women would not even dare request.. this has always been the case.…  but sports were not a negotiable matter… in their case, they trust her.. They know that she will never lose her virginity to a man outside wedlock…

But  sports… oh boy… they are a treacherous enemy!

I have been asking around if sports can indeed cause loss of virginity. Most health professionals I asked, agree that normally, playing sports does not cause a woman to lose her virginity. However, it is possible for a woman’s hymen to become stretched open through playing sports. This is why the condition of the hymen is not necessarily a proof of virginity. Virginity is a state of mind rather than a physical state.

There are many different beliefs about what losing one’s virginity means. Most people agree that women and men lose their virginity the first time they have penile-vaginal intercourse. Or through oral and anal sex for non-straight sex. (even though the hymen remains  intact) so based on this belief, non consensual sex, for example in the case of rape, women do not lose their virginity even though the hymen is ruptured.

Unfortunately, in our side of the world, generally, people think of virginity in a different way. Most people believe that an intact hymen is proof of a woman’s virginity. Which is the root cause of most oppression women get imposed to, including not being allowed to play sports because of the fear that a girl could loose her virginity.  By the way, I just read  in an article that people who start having sex at a younger or older than average age appear to be at greater risk of developing sexual health problems later in life.

I remember few years ago, I was attending a wedding in Boston. I was standing with few people, when this gorgeous lady was introduced to us. The moment she left, one of the guys who were standing commented that she was an ice queen, another guy answered that she has to be an ice queen, she has to have an iron shield to protect herself from all the scum she meets… which was a wonderfully perceptive and sensitive remark considering it was coming from a guy.

Arab women have to have iron shields to survive; they walk on thin ice every second of their lives….  Just walking in shmeisani, or  Sweifieh or Duwar Abdoun or anywhere really makes me feel completely conscious of what I am wearing and the way I walk, some of the comments are just too much to handle!  A girl gives part of herself to a man out of love mind you and she is a whore in his dictionary the day after, I picked this sentence from a book years ago, I am not sure by whom though, it could be Haidar Haidar walima li A3shab il ba7r, or Ahlam Mustaghanemi zakiratu il jasad. This man however, would still consider himself, maybe not a saint, but definitely not a whore! Yes there are men who are whores, although probably they are called something else! And he would still look at himself in the mirror feeling completely at peace with himself. This man’s judgment comes from a society that has several different standards to judge, one for him and one for her… simply because one standard does not work and will never work…

I am not talking about sexuality alone… I am talking about everything, about relationships in the family, about relationships in the neighbourhood, about ethics at work? In the street?

One thing that always shocks me is talking to Arabs outside the Arab world, People who live by the rules of God… praying whenever it is time to pray, preaching when it is suitable and when it is not….yet the only other topic they talk about is how to beat the system, how to create ways to use the loop holes in the system… The holes that could not be covered and are left for people’s sense of ethics… especially when it comes to financial issues….. Ok I am talking very high level here, let me give a very simple example… one of my acquaintances uses the free refill system in movie theatres, he buys the popcorn bag once and then keeps the bag.  Whenever he comes back to the theatre he brings that very same bag and refills it J funny no?  Well this is only one example…. Another one is getting in public transportation for free, and running away from taxes, and living on the welfare programs…. And so many other examples… the problem is not in doing these things, the problem is in feeling that it is ok to do them…

To answer the original question, do Arab women sleep around? From an Arab woman’s perspective, between the answers of some of my single friends who don’t have boyfriends at all because it 7aram and it is shameful, and those who save themselves to the moment prince charming will show up on his white horse, and the others who leave their boyfriends because they ‘started playing with hands’ and those who carry their boyfriends’ pictures around and ask everyone to say good night, this actually happened in one of my youth projects, a young girl was carrying the picture and asking everyone to say good night to the picture and the teddy bear, who are her husband and her son! To the other extreme, all those stories you hear about girls going through virginity restoration operations just before their wedding nights…

And my married friends on the other hand, who are so dedicated to their husbands and their homes, they don’t even have time to think about anything outside the kids and the meals and the house and what is left of the career, and those who have forgotten how to chat with people outside their social circles, and yet another group a bit older though, who complain that their husbands are no longer interested in them, because according to them “il la7em bikhawi” yes I did found this expression to be very vulgar it is translated into the flesh creates a siblinghood, after a while they become like brothers and sisters! And all these ladies scattered around the streets of Amman and the Arab world, and in cheap hotels, either because they have no other choice, or because they are driven to it, or maybe because it is their way of resistance….   I feel that sometimes it is better to leave things unsaid, so I choose not to say anything at all.By the way, I just love being an anthropologist, it opened a door for me to be able to discover and talk about worlds that were completely closed to me before, I started believing in the Islamic saying “la 7aia2a fi il deen” which means there is no room for shyness in religion only I started thinking that there is no room for shyness in science and humanity as well.

Violence in the Middle East, like violence elsewhere in the world, is manifested in the hate, prejudice, and selfishness found in all human beings. Unfortunately our spirituality is defined by the same negative attitudes that define our relationships. The competitiveness we have injected into our peaceful religion contains the seeds of the violence destroying our social fabric today (our hello says peace be on you…) . Can it be changed? Gandhi said nothing in this world is impossible to achieve if we have the will to do so.

According to Amnesty International’s 2004 report, we have a high rate of violence, represented in so many forms, political violence, violence against women, Refugee and Migrants.. you name it… however, there is an effort to restore more human rights in the area, more activist groups are emerging and being accepted in different countries across the Arab world.

Now Nawal Sadawi seems to think there is a correlation between violence and sexual frustration; she gives two examples, the conservative American society, where violence is a serious issue. ( Bowling for columbine gives details about violence there… though devoid from this sexual theory) and gives another example the Scandinavian countries where people are not sexually frustrated and violence is very little. (At least against other people… I mean it is reported that the highest suicide rate is in there… I personally think it is because they don’t get enough sunlight!!!)

Speaking of sunlight, it is very sunny outside, so I am going to enjoy the beauty of nature… kite runner turns out to be a good book…I had to stop reading yesterday when the most important thing in the novel happens because I did not want to dream about it. Crescent is ok, the writer made a rather silly mistake… she goes tomorrow is the first day of Ramadan and since the moon is full today… I am going home walking… anyway

Basically while playing with the beautiful internet I stumbled upon a site called Fertility Friend … Which is designed to help women have a better understanding of their bodies… since unfortunately we don’t …. Especially that our teacher in school had enough wisdom to skip the sex education chapter in biology or science as it was called then…because it was dedicated to “ ilet il adab” according to her. I am willing to bet that the same happened in many schools in Amman and to many many generations! And if you were Lucky enough to be in the Adabi (Literature branch) in high school, then you are doomed…since only the ilmi (science branch) had to study this stuff in our beloved Tawjihi year and we spent half the time giggling anyway so we did not get all the details.

Now to go directly to the point, it is a personalized database, where each of you can store information about her body from month to month, where it indicates clearly all the signs that our bodies scream to tell us when to expect our periods or when we are ovulating to help getting pregnant or to make sure not to get pregnant, it is really very simple really.

It is a bit confusing at the beginning, but honestly the amount of information at the website is amazing… and the more I read the more fascinated I am with human beings as creatures… how our bodies are talking to us to tell us how to live better only if we listen and understand the signs and clues…. And the only thing I can say is Sub7an Allah.

I was inspired by my father to write this entry… he is helping me figure out what to do with my life and suggested studying sociology ( he knows how fascinated i am by people) and sex education directed by islam ( as my dad is quite religious) to help people have better lives and better understanding of one another.