So have you ever seen some thing and it just stuck with you? Me too. Tonight. I was at Winco of all places when this happened. That in itself is strange because I am sure profound things dont normally happen there. I was shopping and went to turn down an aisle and I saw a woman wearing what I would call a burka. It wasnt full length though, just on her head so only her eyes showed. With her husband/brother/father. I was with Terra who had an immediate reaction, visceral really. She whipped the cart around and went the other direction.
Seeing just a flash of this woman has left me in a haze of thought. I was left with my head swirlling with thoughts for this woman, whom I would never have the courage to ask.
For one seeing this in Tacoma is kind of an anomily. We dont have alot of middle eastern people here. Perhaps they dont come out in public much. Or maybe most of them are not that hard core. It was like seeing a lion in the middle of a busy street.
Of all of the questions that I have, here are the few I have that I wished I could get an honest answer to: How would it feel to believe in some thing so strongly that you would cover your face. To me the face IS you. It is the very essence of you and your individuality. How would it feel to enforce that rule? Be it the mother/father/culture. I dont think I could look at my (hypothetical) daughters smiling face and tell her she needs to cover it in the presence of men who are not her family. I wonder if there is a surge of regret and sadness for them like it would be for me. Perhaps not since they are raised with it. But I cant think of any mother I know that would be able to do this.
I wonder if there is a rush of secret empowerment for the men when they see the women doing as they are told. Of being the enforcer of a rule from their god. I know that they see it as a protection thing, that they dont want other men to think lavicious thoughts about their women. Yet still I wonder if they think of it as a victory, in a part of their mind they dont share.
Of course I try to put myself in this womans shoes. I can imagine how it would feel to stick out so harshly in public. To beleive in some thing so much that I would subject myself to that. I would need to steel myself before going out in public. How it would feel to know with absolute certainty that people are staring at you. That they are talking about you. I wonder if it is hard to breath under the fabric. I would hope that I would be able to see it as being so special I have to be hidden away. I hope that I would be able to shrug off the judgement. I would wonder what it would be like to be on the other side, just as I am now.
I read a book called Wanderlust and she lives in the middle east for a year and her and her friend were tired of the filthy comments she got from the local men. So they dressed in the tradiational garb of that region, covering their heads and faces. They ended up getting lost as followed by a couple of men. They eventually did reach their destination of other american friends unscathed. In a frenzy they tore off the head gear and shawls they thought were going to protect them. Im sure she put it perfectly when she called tearing everything off to be free 'quietly going mad'. I am sure countless foreign women have gone through this. I am also sure I would too.
Thanks for reading, if you have a comment please leave one.
Emma
