Life on the other side of the veil

So, I did it. Item one on my bucket list, ticked off...

The other day I spent several hours covered head to toe in nasty, synthetic, black fabric. And when I say head, I mean my face as well.

Yes, I finally saw what life is like on the other side of the veil.

And my first observation is: why can’t you buy them in breathable cotton??? I mean, honestly. And abayas too. Admittedly, I did purchase mine from the supermarket (my tiny friend Fathima’s abayas just weren’t up to my slightly more substantial body) but even some of the high end ones are made from that horrible plasticky stuff. Ugh.

I’ll run you through the day in excruciating detail below. But first a few explanatory notes.

This was a social experiment conducted purely out of curiosity, and with good humour and kindness. My intention was in no way to mock or make light of women who wear full burqa, or niqabs, or head scarves in general. I just wanted to see what it was like for myself. I am grateful that I can choose to do so. If I lived across the border in Saudi Arabia, that choice would have been made for me.

Also, wearing these clothes does not indicate any inconsistency in my Christian faith. If I were a missionary in a more rigid Muslim country, I’d have to wear them anyway. Dressing in full burqa doesn’t make you a Muslim any more than (as the old saying goes) standing in a church makes you a Christian.

Right, now that’s out of the way, here we go…

7am School drop-off

Okay, so I began the day by compromising quite substantially. Great start. But my children had told me that if I dropped them at school with my head or face covered they would never speak to me again (teenagers are so sensitive, aren’t they?). While this was a potentially pleasant outcome, I decided not to go there, and drove them to school in just the abaya, staying in the car so no one could see me, and whipping around the corner into a back street to do my shela (head scarf).

Headscarves take skill.

Twenty minutes later (who knew hair was so slippery?) I rang Fathima’s doorbell so she could supply the niqab she’d found in the back of her closet. She gave me the once over and declared my headwear “quite good.”

The niqab was surprisingly tight. 

Headache on the way, I drove the short distance to the beach path I usually walk along with my heart in my mouth, expecting my peripheral vision to be fatally compromised. 

Au contrare. There are many, many things I don’t like about niqabs (more on that later), but loss of peripheral vision is not one of them. Maybe it depends on the style, but in this case, once I had tugged it down on my nose far enough that it didn’t make my lower eyelids puff up, vision was A-ok.

The sporty look.

8am Walking

I pulled into a shady little spot and swung my feet out to put my running shoes on (not that I run, but it just doesn’t sound right to call them walking shoes). Immediately some laborers called out to me from the wall above, telling me not to park there as they needed the space. This was my first encounter with the actual real-life public, and I was surprised at my instinctive response: total silence. I just swiveled back into the car and drove away. It was as if I thought the niqab was some kind of a gag. It may be just me, and a matter of getting used to having something over my mouth. Mind you, I’ve never heard anyone in a niqab shouting or even speaking loudly in public.

Out on the path, feeling a little self-conscious, I started walking at my normal pace. There was soft breeze to cut the heat, which was a mere 31 degrees (practically cardigan weather over here), so I wasn’t as hot as I’d feared. Though that’s not saying much, since I was expecting it to be unbearable. 

This is me (or is it?), out enjoying the fresh air.

Breathing in was fine, breathing out made my face very warm, but it was the scarf that really did the mischief. I’m a bit of a sweater, so pretty soon the parts wrapped around my neck were uncomfortably clammy. And between the polyester fabric and the too-snug armholes, I was regretting my cheap-o supermarket choice immediately. I could tell that as soon as I was in air-conditioning I’d be wringing wet and cold. Not the best treatment for the head cold I was dealing with, but all part of the fun.

Now to the social aspect. Women walking along the beach path in head-to-toe black, faces covered and sunglasses on are a dime a dozen in Dubai. I didn’t get any strange looks. What struck me, though, is that I didn’t get any looks of any kind. People just didn’t make the sort of cheerful eye contact, half-smiles and morning greetings that I’m used to on the path. The African nanny who pushes twins in a stroller, with whom I’ve advanced to a ‘Good morning!” relationship, walked past unawares. Actually, a woman I know really quite well walked past unawares too. Of course she did – I was completely anonymous. Other women in face coverings didn’t meet my eyes either. And if they did, it wouldn’t have looked friendly. I know they say you can see a smile in the eyes, but I beg to differ. Eyes divorced from their context mostly look blank.

What’s more, I felt entirely unable to initiate the same kind of casual friendliness. It was partly a function of the niqab itself (muffled speaking voice, hidden expression), and partly a psychological reaction to it. I felt utterly set apart from my environment, like Harry Potter in an invisibility cloak. A black ghost among the living.

On the upside, I didn’t need any sunscreen!

9am Out for coffee

Fathima (who wears an abaya and shela, but no niqab) had offered to come out to a café with me to give me some tips and just generally enjoy the spectacle. My goal was to drink a coffee and eat something without removing the niqab (naturally). Also to make normal conversation with Fathima.

One of the reasons I’d decided to do this little experiment was because I didn’t think I’d have to explain myself to anyone – because no one would recognise me. Of course, the first thing that happened in the café was that Fathima saw another mother from school, a woman I knew slightly by sight, who she greeted, then turned to introduce me, her voice trailing off. 

“This is… Michelle… oh, this is tricky,” she said. We had both started laughing, to the confusion of the other poor woman.

Harder than it looks.

But the biggest problem was when the coffee came. I tried to hold the niqab out in front of my face with one hand, while delivering the cup to the vicinity of my mouth with the other and simultaneously keeping my lower face hidden.

Result: coffee all over the niqab, down the front of my abaya and even, somehow, on my headscarf.

I compromised by yanking it to the side (not how it’s meant to be done), revealing my face but providing proper access for coffee and a blueberry pastry.

Fathima, who has a degree in psychology, found the whole event both amusing and fascinating. We decided we needed to do another day together, both in niqabs, to see if our different coloured skin got us different reactions. And also that I should perform this experiment alone when I was in Australia.

I imagine that will be a vastly different experience.

Conversation wasn’t too hampered by the face covering, though I was aware of vocalising what I might otherwise have expressed with smiles or grimaces. Fathima noticed that my body language was different, but that could just have been the discomfort of unfamiliar (and badly fitted) clothing.

10am Shopping

I grabbed a few things in the small shopping mall where we had coffee, and felt pretty normal actually (apart from my clothing reeking of latte). I had taken the precaution of wearing contact lenses so I didn’t have to try to wear glasses inside, and I’m very glad I did as they would have added another layer of challenge (While my big sunglasses looked almost jaunty wi

th the niqab, my spectacles are smaller so should they go inside or outside the niqab? If inside, will they fit? If outside, will they slide off?).

Then I headed to the Mall of the Emirates (which suddenly felt way over-heated). I wanted to buy something in an ordinary store where I’d have to interact with sales staff, so I found a cheap shirt for my daughter at Forever 21. Everyone was perfectly polite but once again I felt unable to hold up my side of the social compact. Was it because I felt I had to speak more loudly than my normal rather quiet voice? Was it because I couldn’t show anything with my expression, and that crippled my ability to communicate? I’m really not sure. But I felt cut off from the world.

It made me feel uncomfortable, too, that none of the cues I was used to giving off could be picked up by anyone. Veil advocates suggest one of the benefits of covering up is that no one can judge you. There is a leveling effect to sameness (like a uniform) that is not all bad. But in a society where not everyone is dressed the same, people still make judgments about women who are covered. In my case, all of them were wrong (admittedly, because I was a total imposter). This was kind of fun for a one-off but I would hate it in the long run.

Also, my head cold had (as expected) freshened up. This necessitated a lot of nose-blowing under the niqab, which wasn’t nice for anyone.

This was really the end of my adventure. I needed to get home to grab a few things before school pick-up and when I walked in the door and pulled off my disguise, my hair was plastered to my scalp with sweat. I felt the clammy wetness of the shela and I just couldn’t bring myself to pile it all back on again for the next stage of my day. My experiment, I felt, was over.

I’m not really sure if I can make any conclusions from my little jaunt – it’s not like I was conducting a clinical trial. I’m just a naturally inquisitive person and I wanted to see what it felt like to be the one in black. Job done. 

I can say that I rather liked the fact that I didn’t feel compelled to wash my hair that morning. Also that choosing clothes that day was a doddle (sports top and running pants as it happens – definitely not in the spirit of the game but I was VERY worried about overheating). 

I was very aware that anyone would looking at me would make certain judgments about me, almost all of which would be wrong. There are many reasons why people present themselves as they do, or behave in certain ways, and we mostly cannot know what they are. It’s better to withhold judgment, and maybe strike up a conversation instead.

The experience did confirm for me, though, that there is a de-personalising effect that comes from covering your face; both for the wearer and the people around her. I don’t know if that would be different for someone surrounded exclusively by this custom from a young age, but it was absolutely the case for me. I felt hindered in expressing myself verbally, but I had no other choice. I was a person without a face. We know babies are wired to recognise faces from day one. You can study face psychology at university. And things that sort of look like faces, but not quite, have an uncanny power to unsettle us (such as dolls or clowns). 

Covering your face takes away our most powerful tool in communicating our personhood.

So the lesson I took from the experience wasn’t only, “I’m so glad I don’t have to cover my face every day.” It was, “Must remember to treat covered women like human beings.” Being a person without a face was a powerful reminder to me to make sure I go out of my way to affirm the humanity of all the women who wear the veil.

My (weird) Dubai Bucket List

This is my life in Dubai... right?

My (weird) Dubai Bucket List

In a few months time I’ll be back in the land of Oz, and our three years in Dubai will feel like a dream. I’ll start to forget about the heat and the rude drivers, and remember only the good stuff – the smell of frangipani by the pool, the taste of freshly made manakeesh and the way you can organise a party without a wet weather back-up plan.

And, of course, the wonderful, funny, kind, fascinating people. (Sob! I’ll miss youse all.)

So, I decided to make a list of a few things I really must do (or do again) before we leave the sandpit for good.

And when I sat down and really thought about it, my list did not look at all like the typical ‘bucket lists’ you see on your Facebook feeds.

I don’t want to have afternoon tea at the Burj al Arab.

I don’t want to spend a day (and a fortune) lying by a pool on the Palm drinking ‘grape and hops’ beverages.

Ditto driving like a maniac over sand dunes (once was, most emphatically, enough).

Probably outside my skill set...

So here are a few things I want to make happen before January 3:

A day in an abaya

I just really, really, want to know what it’s like to go about my day dressed in the clothing of a Gulf Arab – including a niqab (no half-measures for me). This will include a walk on the beach (women do it everyday in abayas, so I will too), a large grocery shop at Carrefour, eating and lots of driving.

I checked with my friend Fathima that this was not culturally insensitive, and she thought it was such a good idea she’s offered me her own clothes. Even though Fathima doesn’t cover her face, she thinks she can lay her hands on a niqab for me, too. So this is actually going to happen – I’ll blog about it when it does.

Initially, I wanted to do it while the temperature was still over 40, so I could get the full experience, but I didn’t get organised in time. I’ll just have to put up with 36 degrees and 90 percent humidity, like it was this week. Oh well.

Have a proper conversation with someone who wears a niqab

Please explain...

This is a long-held intention of mine, but you just wouldn’t believe how hard it is to strike up a conversation with someone whose face is covered. I’ve never made it much past ‘Excuse me’ and ‘Thank you’ in the school corridors and shopping aisles. I’ll do my best.

Have a conversation with someone who doesn’t make their children wear seatbelts

I know you’re out there. I see you multiple times a day, with your toddlers capering about the car while you drive. But I just never seem to have got to know any anti-seatbelters well enough to ask them about it. I don’t want an argument – I just want to hear your views. Please get in touch.

Photo day

I'll never forget you!

When we leave Dubai, we won’t be like the usual ex-pat family who continues to wander the world. We probably won’t be travelling much at all (except for camping in Queensland, maybe) – Australia is just too far and too expensive for us to travel from.

I don’t want to find myself one day remembering how much we loved a particular place, then realizing we never took a photo there. Because there won’t be another chance.

So I have actually scheduled a day in my calendar to spend driving around to all our favourite bits and taking family photos there. They will be a visual reminder for my family of our experiences here – the good, the bad and the very ugly (this last including, but not limited to, the enormous row of electricity thingummies that march through the suburbs). Aah, memories.

It's not too much to ask, is it?

Visit a wadi… with actual water in it

We’ve only managed this once (thanks, Richard Scott) very early on, but our few wadi adventures since then have been mostly dry or full of garbage. This plan may be slightly hampered by the fact we have just sold our 4WD. Hmm. I’ll get back to you on this one.

Just one more time...

Dinner in the desert

Once again, this could be scuppered by our distinct lack of a 4WD. But the evenings we have spent eating under the stars with friends and fires and the occasional crying child with sand in his eyes have been some of my favourites. I’ll make it happen, don’t worry.

Most of all though, and I feel this almost goes without saying but I’ll include it because it’s good to cover your bases, I want to spend as much time as I can consolidating friendships that I hope will last across the continents and over the years and through tough times. Let’s have coffee (at Tom and Serg, of course) while we still can…

It’s hot. Don’t fight it.

As a self-proclaimed warm-weather-lover, I came to Dubai from Australia with what I thought was an advantage. I already liked the heat (by which I meant anything up to mid-30s. Aah, the naivety). That had to put me ahead of those who preferred warm coats and log fires. Right?

Well, predictably, no.

Wrong.

I’ve come to believe that people who grew up in freezing cold climates, who are used to shutting themselves in for half the year, are at a massive advantage here in Dubai.

Close the doors and windows, turn on the air and sit tight for the day? No problem. The only outings you can take are to air-conditioned malls? Hey ho, we’re used to it. Organise ‘indoor play’ for three active children for a weekend? Sure, got this. A week? A month? An eleven-week summer holiday block at 50 degrees, with Ramadan thrown in for triple points?

Well, no one likes it, but some people manage better than others.

As in, me. They manage better than I do.

But I am – slowly – learning. So as I approach my third hot season in Dubai, I decided to share a few things I’ve come to understand about surviving summer.

Don’t fight it

After I arrived, as the weather warmed up, I persisted in doing things my way. Windows and doors always open for ‘fresh air’. Dinner at the outside table. A morning trip to the beach.

The trouble is, an open window can’t catch a breeze that was never there. And even if it was, the houses are designed to be unbreachable bunkers of refrigerated atmosphere. Air-flow is the exact opposite of what they promote.

And no matter how much iced water you drink, dinner in the garden at 38 degrees is no fun for anyone. Ditto swimming in the intensely salty, bath-like waters of the Arabian Gulf in July.

Just give in. You can’t win.

Sometimes more is less

To my mind, a floaty summer dress is just the thing for a hot day. Uh huh. Rookie error. If you actually have to do anything – walk, carry stuff, drive a car – you will sweat. A lot. And sensitive Celtic skin like mine (and my children’s) will come out in every kind of fiery rash you can think of. So now I try to dress to absorb sweat. T-shirts with fitted sleeves to protect my underarms, leggings to protect my (ahem) legs. I even get a rash from the rubber strap of my flip-flop. (I’m Australian, so I want to say ‘thong’ here, but then everyone will be wondering about my rash from another kind of thong, and I really don’t want that.) I even have to make sure there is fabric between my décolletage and my seatbelt if I don’t want a terrible itchy blotch just under my neck.

Over-sharing? Just telling it like it is…

Re-invent exercise

I could probably just sit in stunned silence for the five very hot months, but the kids don’t really go for that. And it would give new meaning to the words ‘sedentary lifestyle’. So we have developed some strategies to keep active.

For instance, every summer my eldest son turns the dining table around against the wall and uses it for table tennis. Genius. I couldn’t care less about the inconvenient angle, the marks on the wall (they wash off) or the endless tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock of the ping-pong ball. At least he’s keeping busy. And he’s like a dog – he needs ball sports at least once a day.

I try to walk or swim as early in the morning as I can, except for the very hottest months. It’s about the only way you can connect with nature during this time, and its good for the soul.

Also, I’ve forsaken the expensive local gym to do stretch classes at home via my laptop instead. At least two of my children have pledged to join me daily when the holidays begin. That’s exercise, an hour or so killed, hopefully a bit of fun, and it’s free!

My friend Inga told me that last summer, heavily pregnant, she would sit in the empty mall (it was Ramadan) drinking water (which she was allowed to do because she was very obviously pregnant) and say to her two little boys, “Run!” They would peg it up and down the halls of commerce for a couple of hours, then go home tired and happy. So clever!

Finally

I've learned you can never drink too much water, but I still haven't learned not to set up elaborate indoor play my kids are too old for (e.g. something from here - I really want to do that Entrapment break-in scene one).

So what is your best strategy to cope with the weather?

Top 11 things I have learnt from living in Dubai (so far)

I haven’t been here long (in the scheme of things) but, boy, it’s been intense. I can only compare a couple of years lived overseas to the first year or two of being a parent: a crash course that exposes your own ignorance and personal failings while cramming your head full of stuff you never thought you’d want to know.

So here’s my off-the-top-of-my-head list of things Dubai has taught me, to date. And given how quickly things change here, I’ll probably disagree with myself in six months’ time…

1. The bidet in my bathroom is an excellent place to wash my feet. I acknowledge the copyright of my friend Allison for this idea. (I still don’t understand why you would use it for its proper purpose. Who wants a wet bum?)

2. Speaking of bidets, the mess they make in public toilets has provided employment for thousands of women from developing countries. (So there is some point to them after all.) No public toilet is complete without two or three attendants, whose main function is to mop up, post-bidet use.

Not all bikini-wearers look like this...

3. Australian women are far more modest than I realised. One-piece swimsuits are reasonably common and available from all good swimwear retailers (unlike here). Everyone else – I mean everyone (except for covered Muslim ladies, naturally) – wears bikinis. Old, young, thin, fat, no problem. I have seen Russian grandmothers in skin-coloured bras and panties at the beach. I have seen obese German women wearing g-strings. Some cultures just don’t seem to have any hang-ups about their flesh... This is both a good and a bad thing. But hey ho, now I feel comfortable wearing one too. (It’s taken me this long to realise that no one is looking at me.)

4. Australians really do make the best coffee.

Poor effort. I've seen three...

5. Fast-talking Scots have the most impenetrable accents out of all nationalities (that’s you, CA), closely followed by Indians (especially over the telephone).

6. It is possible to pull up to three lawn mowers behind a bicycle.

7. Yogurt really does go with everything – bread, meat, fruit, vegetables...

8. You can never own too many pairs of cheap sandals. (I brought several pairs of heels with me from Australia and I haven't worn any of them. Not once. Meanwhile, I am keeping Carrefour in business by purchasing tons of crappy sandals and flip-flops (thongs for those of us who speak Australian). But don't tell my husband.

9. Dubai would never have been built if air conditioning hadn’t been invented. That is the plain fact of the matter.

10. I am really, really good at finding my way through strange places. I never knew that about myself until I came to a place where everyone else gets lost all the time. Suckers!

11. You can actually fall asleep while floating in very salty seawater. (Don’t ask me how I know this. I just do, okay?)



Dubaians, what have I missed??

It's in the bag: 5 things I can't leave home without

Living in Dubai has changed many things in my life, ranging from the obvious to the surprising. I expected that my days would be different (no job!), but didn’t expect I would spend them mostly driving (my least favourite activity in the whole world, behind even watching sport). I thought I’d dress differently, but didn’t know that would mean my jeans would go unworn for a year. I expected we would eat differently, but how could I have anticipated such things as cinnamon buns that come in cans?

And I gave no thought to what would become of the contents of my handbag. Of course, my wallet, phone and sunglasses are still there. Ditto the occasional discarded muesli bar from the kids and about a thousand receipts.

But there are now a few things I never leave home without, things that rarely featured in my handbag at home. Fortunately, it is a generously proportioned and capacious receptacle, with room for:

1. A water bottle, preferably filled. In Australia, there’s always a tap or a bubbler handy. I’ve long been a big hater of paying for bottled water (it’s about scrooginess as much as environmental responsibility), so would happily cup my hands under the nearest tap. And to be honest, I didn’t regularly spend whole days away from home/work/a friend’s house, where water was always available. Now that I roam the malls and streets of Dubai for hours at a time, I have to byo water or pay for it (the tap water here is iffy) and contribute to one of the worst recycling problems in the world. And if I don’t, the possibility of actual dehydration is very real. Bloody desert.

2. A scarf. Moving, as I do, from blasting desert heat to glacially arctic interiors, I often need protection from either the evil Dubai sun (scarves can shade your head as well) or the evil Dubai air conditioning. And there’s no predicting where you’ll get funny looks for daring to bare your shoulders.

3. Serious moisturiser. I’ve finally found it – the face cream that’s cheap, effective and doesn’t leave you feeling greasy. Nivea Crème. It’s so dense that it’s a bit like rubbing Sudocrem into your face (that’s nappy rash treatment, in case you don’t know), but it’s solved my lizard-lady problems like nothing else. Now it travels with me in case of a dry face emergency.

4. Talcum powder. The less said about this the better. All I can tell you is that heat rash can strike here at any time and talcum powder has proved a powerful weapon.

5. Small change. Oh my goodness. If I had a dirham for every time I was asked if I had a dirham… For some reason, everyone from the supermarket check-out chick to the assistant at the most upmarket fashion store (like I shop there all the time – ha!) is desperate for my small change. “Do you have coins, ma’am?” has to be one of the most common phrases uttered in this city. Get it together people.

Has anything changed in your handbag as your life changes around you?