In the Land of Invisible Women (44 page)

Zubaidah's beaming smile came into view, morphing into Ghadah's impish Onassis grin. I saw Imad's clear eyes and patient, handsome brow. I remembered Mu'ayyad's rakish smirk and smiled in response. Dr. Fahad's fist of courage crumpling up faxes of fatwas returned to my memory, and Faris's gallant sadness and clumsy generosities touched me once again. In my mind's eye, I could see the warmth and elegance of Maha, her enormous bravery unique to those under life-long oppression, that dazzled alongside the quiet pathos and courage of Reem's silent loyalty beside me in this special moment.

I gave thanks for the humility and trust of my nameless, countless patients to whom I could never speak and prayed I might one day have a fraction of the dignity of Haneefa the Meccan maid who had memorized the Quran. As I sat and stared at the Ka'aba, Samha and Sabha, the Arabian horses who had kept my solitudes at bay, nuzzled my heart, injecting me with warmth. The tearful compassion of Hesham the bereaved father, the innocent death of his son whom I never knew, the wit and warmth of Fatima the hopeful divorcée, the defiance and courage of Manaal in the face of leering Muttawa, the simple kindness of Nadir the surgeon… the images were dissolving into one another.

The Kingdom of Strangers was disappearing. Instead, this country had opened its private sanctuaries to me, imbibing me inward until I was compelled to drink from its mysteries and finally unlock the secrets of Islam, which had eluded me until now. A journey that had begun as excluding and withholding and rejecting, had become inclusive and embracing and accepting. I had been improved, uplifted, and strengthened by my time among the Kingdom-dwellers. I was leaving them, altered as a woman, as a physician, and above all as a Muslim.

I thought and saw this and much more as I gazed upon the Ka'aba, wishing I would be allowed to return once more. At last, we had to leave, and with a final farewell as if to a beloved, I reluctantly tore myself away. Even with my back turned I could feel the Ka'aba breathing, beating, living. The compulsion to return was enormous, but this visit had reached its end. I left with head high, heart full, and hopes raised.

Completing our rituals, Reem suggested we eat. Buying a shwarma from a street vendor, we picnicked just outside the mosque, completing the last morsels of food just before the sounding of cannon that marked the beginning of the fast. Reem and I had shared an especially auspicious Umrah on this, the eve of Ramadan. We felt fortunate, privileged, and enormously blessed. Returning to the car, we raced away on the smooth, Cadillac glide. The sky was lightening. The flat roads carried us back to Jeddah and finally to the airport. After a very long hug that said more than any words ever could, I left Reem and returned to Riyadh. It was time to go.

Shipping containers packed, a small army of Filipino men arrived to take my things away. A Sudanese veterinarian came to retrieve Souhaa and ship her overseas to my next home. The apartment was quiet. All farewells had been said. I gazed out at the illuminated tennis courts, once my first view of a barren world that had gone on to yield such enormous fruit. I pulled on my French suit and quickly disguised it under my dying abbayah. I called Imran a final time, confirming I was ready.

“But I wish I had got to see Imad tonight,” I mentioned plaintively.

“Call him, Qanta. Just dial the number. He can't call you anyway because you don't have a mobile. Maybe he is back from his meeting?” I looked at my watch. It was three hours before take-off.

“OK, let me try him.” Dialing the familiar number, I waited for the phone to switch into voicemail.

“Allo?” Instead came Imad's voice.

“It's me. I didn't think you were around,” I began.

“I am just about to take off from Jeddah, heading to Riyadh.”

“Oh, what time do you get in?”

“One a.m.”

“And I take off at two a.m. Let's meet at King Khalid,” I found myself saying, suddenly excited.

“Yes, Qanta, let's do that. I'll be there. I'll look for you and we can talk until take-off. I have to go now.” And with that he hung up. Filled with excitement at the prospect of a final romantic farewell at the airport, I ordered my ride out of the compound, my ride to my next life.

Arriving at the marble airport, I felt elated. Yes, I was sad to leave the exoticism behind. I wondered when I would smell the hybrid of heat and dust again, when I would hear the casual staccato Najdi Arabic again, when I would scurry around in an abbayah once more, when I would drink mint tea on a veranda behind high walls, or when I would ride horses who understood Arabic under the same starry skies that had bewitched Lawrence almost a hundred years earlier. Yes, I wondered when I would next have tickets to my Maker in my pocket. But I knew I would be back. I knew next time, no longer a stranger, I would be welcome.

Tonight I moved easily and without fear. But Imad was nowhere to be seen. I waited for what seemed too long, until finally I had to go through passport control. I searched the airport from the elevated departure area but couldn't spy the lone Saudi in khakis anywhere. I found myself heavy with disappointment. Hours later, connecting in London, I would learn in an email that he too had been searching for me.

I boarded the plane and settled into my seat. Like other women in the cabin, I tore off my abbayah and unceremoniously bundled it up in the overhead bin. Eventually, hours and continents later, I landed at Kennedy. I gathered my items, preparing to step out in the beloved city that was my cultural home. I decided to leave the abbayah in the cabin. I would never wear it again.

As I stepped over the raised threshold, the PA rang out with an announcement.

“The lady in seat 32A has forgotten her abbayah. Please return for it. We have it here for you.”

Straightening the sleeves on my navy jacket, I glanced furtively around to see if anyone could tell the offender was me. After an imperceptible pause, I placed a stockinged, high-heeled foot outside of the cabin onto the gangway. The announcer was still appealing for the abbayah-wearer as I strode away. I couldn't help laughing out loud.

I was finally free.

RUGGED GLORY

J
ANE HAD JUST WOKEN UP from major surgery when the alarms rang out announcing a disaster. In the next hours, the same men who had chastised my sadness at 9/11 attended the 178 injured who presented to the National Guard Hospital in difficult, numbing hours. In the same ICU, they too were humbled, broken, and bowed by the terror. I didn't need to say anything. We all remembered. They finally felt the sadness too.

It was Mu'ayyad who had to identify the remains of his friends, including the son of the governor of Riyadh, killed in the May 2003 bombings perpetrated in Riyadh. He told me himself, in wheezy paragraphs interrupted by long drags on his Dunhills as we talked while he commuted home in his massive Benz. Now and again he stopped, placating a worsening smoker's cough. Mu'ayaad's voice descended to a croaky whisper as he described unzipping the body bags and searching for the fragments of his childhood friendships within. Immediately after, he floored his monster sedan, rushing to operate on some of the worst eye injuries and burns he had seen in his storied career. Most of the patients were expatriates; many had been Americans. In true form, he worked without respite for days, and I knew in this Mu'ayyad was bowed in a way he couldn't have prepared for. I believe he now begins to understand the power of hate and through that knowledge he finally attenuates his own hates. On the crackling speakerphone I could hear a new vulnerability in his voice, one which is familiar to those of us who have experienced New York, London, Bali, or Madrid.

On my most recent trip later in the decade, I stayed in a five-star hotel, checked in under my own female name. I ate alone at the Globe at the apex of the al-Faisaliyah Tower. The cityscape unfurled below, flat save for the Mumlaqa, reminding me of a misplaced Vegas. I stared into the glittering Saudi night and found myself thinking of the elusive Prince al-Waleed. Doubtless he was traveling these same skies, flown in private jets by the first Saudi female pilot, Captain Hanadi Hindi.

Later, waiting to descend, an elevator door opened. A Saudi man stepped aside for me to enter. I found myself transiently immobile until I realized he was waiting for me. We shared the slim-line lift until we reached our respective floors. There was no acrimony, no contempt, only courtesy. During the same visit, when I entered a lobby, another Saudi man held open the door, another first for me in Riyadh. I began to find as a woman perhaps I wasn't as invisible as I had felt years earlier.

Some days afterward, returning from Mecca in business class on a Sunday morning, a Saudi passenger retrieved me a pillow. Soon I found myself tucking his card into my handbag. The charming man worked in Riyadh to uncover money laundering cells, one of the millions of Saudis “on our side.” He loved America, having just moved from Boston. We connected, as Muslims, as American migrants, as people.

Unquestionably, Riyadh increasingly feels more relaxed than it did in the years immediately leading up to 9/11. Some of this is due to the increasing access to advanced communication, the new monarch, and the maturation of an intellectual elite that is gracefully pushing the envelope. Something unspoken is slowly easing. People are more confident, hopeful, and progressive. Voices are growing stronger, Mutawaeen perhaps weaker, women emboldened. Now and again, the old ways resurface in the shape of gang rapes and lashings, but instead it is Saudi citizens who call at once for human rights, not only the international watchdogs. Blogging in Arabic and English is burgeoning, unthinkable in the years I had lived there, inviting the opportunity for a collective, public introspection.

Today my friends continue their work inside the Kingdom and often carry their contributions with them to the wider world. We see the Saudi flag displayed at medical conferences in the United States. International collaboration is increasing, academic publications growing, clinical services expanding. Most importantly to me, the Holocaust denier now collaborates with a Jewish academic, his small mind finally widened by the generous experience of a patient American.

Of my Saudi love, all that remain are memories and fragments. Imad and I were never reunited after our foiled meeting at King Khalid International. He is now the father of two and in these intervening years has made a successful marriage of his endogamous betrothal. I feel both proud and poignant as I watch him enter the pressured role of Saudi fatherhood. He has melded happiness of a kind for himself in his country, still disguising his conflicts in a rebellion of Boss and Brioni.

Ghadah is already defending her PhD thesis. She made the local papers in England, where reporters wrote about (and photographed) the beautiful, married Saudi woman who was commuting from Riyadh to study among them. Back in Riyadh, she unfurls the tattered cutting for me to read as we sip coffee in her baroque living room. Her face is beaming with a rare pride and she giggles at her wondrous surgeon-husband who manages the children in Riyadh while she studies for two weeks out of every three, five thousand miles away. Cardiac surgery is less aging, he jokes, than playing Mr. Mom. The wide-eyed girls admire their mother even more. She has grown their world in the realization of her dreams.

And Ghadah is also a local force for feminism. The last time I saw her she had built her new house, which was scattered with her busy life amid the Lalique and Versace and Daum. She hosts lunch parties every weekend for her circle of young Saudi marrieds for whom she has become something of a figurehead. Even now she remains the most beautiful woman I know. It is heartening to know they have each other to exchange ideas, discuss politics, and even watch the national obsession—soccer.

Today Dr. Fahad advises the Monarch. He cultivates honey from his own hives and serves it to his guests for breakfast. I can confirm it is delicious. He also raises a beloved granddaughter, Lulu, who at three already has more motorized vehicles than her grandfather. At home he teaches her to swim. She is a brave paddler and an able tricyclist. She will grow into a feisty, enchanting woman, witty like her charming grandfather, but will certainly drive herself in her own car to more opportunity than her mother's generation could ever know.

Zubaidah is, like me, unmarried. This month she completed her Hajj. Zubaidah didn't wait to meet her Maker until after marriage. She moves at her own speed and her life is not arrested by a late marriage. She remains the consummate Muslim and a softly spoken, highly fragrant feminist. I miss her enormously.

Fatima remains a divorcée but still hopeful for love. Faris sends me pictures of his new wife. They smile into the sunlight, squinting atop a hill in Beirut. For the first time in years he looks really happy, and his marriage was to be extremely timely. A few months later his new bride would nurse him after a catastrophic illness. I spoke to her in my fractured Arabic until finally the nurse held the receiver for Faris. For a few sad minutes, I listened to his fluent English replaced by a dysphasic struggle to conquer speech made woolly with disease. Weakened, he is making a slow recovery and he worries to meet the responsibilities of his four unmarried children in this lifetime.

Reem never operated again, instead delivering three daughters. She bought her own house where she lives with her husband and her in-laws. When we talk of medicine she is wistful. I don't believe she will ever return to vascular surgery. I hope she is fulfilled even if her talents are not. She keeps her own counsel, but we both know she squandered her dreams. It makes us both sad.

And what of the Gloria Steinem? Only this morning Maha emailed me with details of the end of the ban on women's driving in the Kingdom. The day is nearing and who, we wondered at once, would teach all the women to drive? Often I imagine I would like nothing better than to drive myself right up to the House of God. Perhaps one day I will, and maybe Maha hopes for the same herself. She continues to be a force for change. Like all women who do this work everywhere in the world, she is not always popular and she is oftentimes alone, but I carry her in my thoughts always, as I know will each reader.

And so the stories continue. Perhaps the storyteller failed to meet her task with justice. No matter how deeply I connect, the Saudis remain enigmatic, their surface a brilliant veneer refractory to insight. And yet I have to admit, I still count the dichotomies: angry divorcées who dream of becoming second wives; conflicted Saudi men who cannot forsake the expectations of powerful matriarchs; womanhood that is both oppressed and liberated by veiling; Saudi men who are feminists and Saudi grandmothers who propagate female suppression; and the women… the women!

It is the women who really opened the door to this society for me. Women who confided, women who guided, women who competed, women who disdained, women whom I attempted to heal and who in turn would heal me, women who were illiterate yet had memorized the Quran, women who could repair aneurysms but could not make a three-point turn, women who were objects of affection from even within their closeted veils.

It is these same women who hold the keys to change, through their daughters and their sons but most of all through themselves. It is the voices of these mothers, wives, sisters, aunts, and daughters that we crave and their voices that narrow men fear. It is women's voices that are becoming audible, women's actions that are becoming visible, and through their actions, Saudi women who are daily becoming more powerful. Nothing is as fierce or imbued with goodness as the oppressed who have overcome their cowardly oppressor. It is these small women, scurrying around in their abbayahs, who will seize their justice from the jaws of extremists and wrest their new place beyond the gender apartheid which is still the Kingdom. The gender apartheid committed in the name of Islam is already dying, rasping its last, soured breaths.

And the other corners of silent observation that somehow speak volumes resound even now. The inscrutable prejudices that are dearly held in the face of rational logic; a firmly held, deep suspicion and simultaneous admiration of the West; a religious attachment to Americana and to the accoutrements of the Bedouin, whether a Dior ghutra or a Bedouin in a Detroit SUV; a rigid Islamic theocracy that cannot suppress the true beauty in Islam no matter how weighty the suffocation. Most touching: the enormous resilience and tenderness that persists in the most unexpected places.

The Kingdom's ability to both infuriate and humble me at once is what I hold dearest, for it was that which I so needed until I could finally see what I had always possessed: a place in Islam no matter how displaced I had become. Inside the Kingdom there was and there remains a beauty in her harshness that stays with me even now. No amount of petrodollars or paneling or polish can conceal its rugged glory. It is for this that I thank the Kingdom, for this that I thank the Stranger I was once within it, and for this that I thank those of the Kingdom Dwellers who made me, and still make me, welcome.

Charleston, South Carolina, United States
      January 29, 2008