American Chick in Saudi Arabia (9 page)

Although she is a mentally bright woman, Asma clearly uses her beauty rather than her mind as the instrument to keep her husband happy.

From what I have learned in life, the opposite approach is more often successful. While most men are first drawn to physical beauty, such an attraction does not last without a more engaging peg on which a man can hang his hat, or in this case, his
ghutrah
.

I nod in admiration. "You look gorgeous."

Her red lips curve in satisfaction. "You will learn good lessons tonight, Jean." She places her hands on her hips. "I am the best teacher. I will teach you how to get a man and how to keep a man."

I suppress my smile. "All right, then."

"Do you like this dress? A French designer made only one. For me."

"It's extraordinary," I truthfully tell her.

Asma's scoop-necked ball gown is a burst of red. The costly dress rises to her knees in the front, cascades longer in the back, and terminates in a ruffled train that flows behind. When she uses her hands to lift her breasts into shocking prominence, I see that her perfectly manicured fingernails match the color of her red lips.

"Khalid loves this dress," she assures me. "He likes me to tease him with my breasts." She laughs. "Of course, I can only wear such a dress if there are no other men present." She tightens her lips and emphasizes with her index finger. "My Khalid is
very
jealous, you know."

"Yes, you told me."

"He likes for me to be tall, as well," she explains, atop three-inch high-heeled gold shoes that raise her five-seven height to a tall woman of five-ten.

I sigh. This Saudi beauty will tower over my five-two form. High heels hurt my feet. I'd given them up a few years back.

The door opens and Khalid appears.

I'm instantly disappointed. Khalid has small brown eyes, a sharp nose, plump cheeks, and a double chin. He's shorter than his wife, who jolts me with her high-pitched greeting.

"Khalid!"

I've never seen a woman rush toward a man with such enthusiasm. The scene reminds me of a rodeo rider rushing to the prize steer.

Khalid appears taken aback by his wife's energetic greeting. Light of foot, he nimbly takes a few steps backwards.

She gushes, "Khalid, my husband, I have given strict orders to the servants. No hands but mine will care for you on this night."

With that, she jerks Khalid's cloth headdress (
ghutrah
) and the black cord that holds it down (
agal
) off his head.

The poor man covers his baldness with his
ghutrah
and now looks momentarily embarrassed in front of a stranger.

While waving his headdress, she gaily asks, "What does my strong protector wish to drink?"

Towering over her husband, she gives me a knowing look, winking and smiling.

Using the lure of her beautiful face and lush body, Asma then swings her body around and in front of her husband, ensuring that he can easily see her cleavage.

With a lift of his brows, Khalid looks away.

She's wasting those huge breasts, I think to myself.

"Ah, Khalid, where are my manners? This is my American friend. The Jean I told you about."

I stand up. I smile.

With a slight frown, Khalid looks at me and nods. "You are most welcome to my home, Jean."

"Thank you, Khalid. Your home is very beautiful."

The edge of his lips rises into a faint smile.

I sense that Khalid is not thrilled to discover a house guest. But there is nothing to be done but to make the best of it, so I settle comfortably on the sofa, remaining a quiet observer of the evening.

Asma rushes to the bar and begins to place ice cubes in a glass. "Do you want your usual? A scotch and soda?"

"Yes, that is good, Asma," Khalid replies wearily.

"Jean?" Asma asks, "What would you like to drink?"

Not wanting to interrupt her full attention away from Khalid, I refuse her offer. "Thank you, Asma. Something later, perhaps."

Asma presents Khalid with his drink without comment before unexpectedly reaching down to the floor.

I am so startled that I glance to see what is going on.

Asma is tugging determinedly at Khalid's sandals.

Generally Saudis remove their shoes before entering their homes, but Khalid has not done so, for whatever the reason.

"Asma? What are you doing?" the bewildered man asks.

"I want to make my husband happy, Khalid," Asma smilingly replies. "Your feet are surely tired after a long day. I will rub them for you. That will make you happy."

While Asma's beauty redeems a multiple of faults, she is reaching her limit with Khalid. He pulls his wife's hands away from his feet. His voice is edged with irritation. "I
will
be happy if you sit, Asma. Sit and talk with us."

"After I get your favorite snack." Asma stretches to pick up a servant's summoning bell and gives it an enthusiastic ring. Two small Indonesian women must have been waiting by the door, for they make an abrupt appearance. One is balancing a golden tray laden with expensive beluga caviar. The other maid is carrying a tray holding all the usual condiments.

"Khalid's preferred food," Asma explains with a broad smile. "I order it by the pound from a special supplier in Switzerland." She rubs Khalid's shoulder before preparing a small plate filled with caviar and then insists that Khalid listen to a short poem she has composed in his honor.

"You can save the poem for later, if you like," the increasingly polite Khalid suggests in a low voice.

"No! No! Jean must hear this. I insist!"

She clears her voice. Just as Asma begins to speak, her pet cat comes running into the room and jumps into his mistress' lap.

Asma's face contorts with her shrill words.

"Oh Khalid! Oh Khalid! Oh Khalid!

See my lips, how red they are!

Oh Khalid! Oh Khalid! Oh Khalid!

I am blessed by your love!

Oh Khalid! Oh Khalid! Oh…"

Asma's cat begins to meow loudly.

To my ear, the cat's cries are in perfect rhythm with Asma's words and voice. Dear God, I tell myself, even the cat is beginning to meow in verse. I'm so embarrassed that my cheeks flush.

As Asma's voice grows louder in tandem with the cat's noisy meows, Khalid jumps to his feet. "Asma. Enough! Thank you. That was very special."

The evening deteriorates from that point. After an awkward dinner during which Asma attempts to hand-feed the tense Khalid, she insists upon a game of backgammon.

I know that Asma is a champion backgammon player, but she allows Khalid to win every game.

I play a few games but am not skilled enough to win. To my mind, Khalid is a man who desperately needs a feminine challenge, someone who will defeat him at parlor games and match him in intelligence.

As the evening stretches on, I become exasperated while viewing the energy Asma expends to entertain her husband.

Khalid is wearing a suffering look of boredom tinged with annoyance.

I imagine that I see a line of bitterness growing from Khalid's nose down to the corners of his mouth.

When the frazzled man retires for the evening, Asma walks him to the door with promises of joining him soon. She teases him with whispered words that I am unable to hear.

With Khalid out of earshot, Asma turns happily toward me. "Jean, see how happy I make my husband?"

I am speechless.

"Well, did you learn anything?"

"I did, Asma. Yes. I did," I answer mildly.

"Well, now you know. That's how you
get
a man, and that's how you
keep
a man."

I think better of sharing my opinion and say nothing.

Unsurprisingly, Khalid departs the following morning before Asma wakes. He leaves a message with the servants that he has been summoned to Spain by one of the royals to attend an emergency meeting.

Oh, my! He's fled the country, I think to myself. This is not good.

The next morning a happy Asma waves good-bye, convinced she has presented me with skillful lessons that will change my life. For the next few months she calls me frequently to see if I have yet to implement her techniques for husband catching. Asma is sweet-natured and genuinely concerned about my single state. Although I do not agree with her tactics, I know I am lucky to have such a concerned friend.

Then one morning I hear from a highly agitated Asma.

Her voice thick with anger, she shouts, "May Khalid be boiled in oil!"

"Asma? What?"

"Khalid is taking a second wife!"

"Oh, no!"

"He said I cackle like a hen all day!"

"Well...I..."

"He insults me! He claims I cackle so loud he looks to see me lay an egg!"

"What brought..."

Her voice is so shrill that I hold the phone receiver away from my ear. "Khalid says my voice is so noisy that his mother can hear me in her house! Jean! His mother lives in
Taif
!"

"When did this happen?"

Her proud temper is shining. "God is counting my tears!"

"What..."

"Khalid will suffer at God's hands for every tear!"

Her voice breaks, "I wish I could cause his death with one glance!"

"Asma, listen..."

She heaves a sob before threatening, "Tonight while he sleeps, I will tear out his eyes with thorns!"

Trying to turn her emotions, I steer her into logical thought. "What will you do?"

Painful sobs rend the air. "I give him my beauty and he declines!"

I repeat, "What will you do?"

"What can I do?"

"Tell him no, that you will not accept a second wife."

"He can do what he pleases. He is a man!"

Knowing this is not the best time to bring up our earlier conversation about the lack of female power and personal freedom, I say nothing of what I really feel. I have learned during my time in the kingdom that the one fear that nearly every Saudi woman shares is the terror that their husband will come home with another wife. The possibility of the second wife keeps most Saudi women insincerely obedient.

I want her to be resolute. "Well. You should divorce him. You are a wealthy woman in your own right. You are very smart. You can own a business or find a job.
Show him
that you are capable of a full life without him."

"I cannot." Her voice drops. "He might take my daughter." Her buoyant spirit suddenly shrank from the contemplation of future suffering. "For another woman to raise? I could not bear it."

"Perhaps not. Ask him."

I know that some educated Muslim men do not always press the issue of custody when the child in question is female.

"Perhaps Khalid will allow you to keep your only daughter."

"Never would he agree!"

"Who is he to marry?"

Her silence hung like a dreaded cleaver. Finally she admits the painful truth. "My cousin. Khalid is going to marry my young cousin. She is only eighteen years of age."

"Oh, my."

"This girl is like a sparrow, never saying a word! I am a songbird! Why would my husband want a sparrow when he has a songbird?"

Never could I speak the truthful words that would so wound my friend.

Finally her sobs become so loud that she is unable to continue the conversation.

I feel so sad. Although I want Asma to make an effort to get custody of her child and file for divorce, I know that Asma will bow to the infallibility of Saudi tradition. She will accept this indignity to her life. The joyous Asma will probably never again know the happiness and pleasure that her naïve nature provided her.

I sit alone with my thoughts for a long time, wondering what possible advice I can offer Asma.

My thoughts turn to Nayam, who is intelligent and educated. Nayam built her hopes around the idea of working in her chosen career.

But her husband said no.

Nayam would have welcomed another wife into her home to carry the burden of mothering her husband's children.

But her husband said no.

Now Nayam will continue having babies until she is beyond the age of childbirth, because her husband says she will.

I then consider the plight of Asma, who is beautiful and wealthy and too accommodating for her own good. Asma has shaped her entire life around the theme of pleasing her husband. Her grasping personality ensured failure. With the collapse of her well-thought out plan, she will exist in a special kind of agony.

Born to live in a land where men rule, neither woman had any control over their own destinies. The right to make important personal choices belongs to their husbands alone.

As the light of the sun turns into the dark of night, I have to confess to myself that I have done nothing fruitful for either Nayam or Asma. I cannot even convince them to help themselves. In Saudi Arabia, the power of men and expectations of culture combined are so daunting that only the bravest of women can find the courage to push for personal freedom.

I realize once more that I have been foolish to believe that I could bring change to the lives of Saudi women. The only certainty I can hold on to is this: When one sex is in total charge of the other, nothing turns out well. Not love, not marriage, not child-rearing, not business, not friendship. In a world where there is no equality between the genders, there is no hope for the future.

This is the hard lesson that I will learn over and over again for the next thirty years. Many exciting journeys will take me to Lebanon, to Bahrain, to Dubai, to Kuwait, to Iraq, to Thailand, and to many other countries. Ultimately I will befriend women who are unafraid to look the truth of their lives in the face, and who will take actions to improve their lives and help other women. I will befriend other women who are courageous and determined. These are the brave women who will become the subjects of my books.

Meanwhile, on this particular night in Riyadh, I prepare for bed. In the distance I can hear the sounds of Riyadh life, the call to prayer, the bustling traffic. My boyfriend, Peter, is at his villa. Tomorrow he will go to work while I will go to my office. We will grow closer in our relationship until we speak of marriage. And I will continue my watchful stance and try to make sense of a complicated country that I have grown to love, a country I now call my home.