The Best Intentions in the World

Chapter 1 – Hawwa-3

We sat at a coffee table. I was nervous, upset. I was constantly reminded of my high school years, when touching meant nothing, when kissing was easy and making love was the most natural thing. I took her hand under the table and held it tight. Moments later, two men came up to us. They addressed Noura, without so much as a look in my direction.

“Show your papers. Is he your husband?”

Noura said no. They asked us to follow them. They took us to the police station in two separate cars. I asked the driver whether I could use my phone. He was not opposed to it.

I called Fahd and told him everything. He took care of it.

A few hours later, I was free.

Fahd was the equivalent of what the Saudis call “vitamin W”.

W stands for wasta, meaning “influence”.

“You won’t survive around here without some vitamin W,” he had told me once. “If you see a woman going about her business uncovered, rest assured she’s got friends in high places. No one would ever even think to bother her.

Noura had her own bottles of vitamin W.

Shortly thereafter, she recounted her police questioning to me. They had asked why she had fallen for a man wearing shorts and jewels—meaning the worthless ring on my finger. I thought that was hilarious. I promised I would only wear trousers. They had also asked her why we were holding hands. The Indians walked hand in hand in public, and the Saudis kept touching each other as a sign of friendship, so what was the big deal? The Muttawa was not amused by that answer. The conversation was cut short.

There were other difficulties during our time together. After dating for many months, we had yet to do it. Noura was not a particularly devout Muslim. She had no desire to stay a virgin before her marriage. She had been with other men. She wanted to do it again. The problem was finding some place where we could do it. Such a headache. It was reminiscent of my youth, when my girlfriend and I could not afford a hotel room and we ended up at the back of the family break, twisted in ways that were not exactly pleasurable.

It felt just the same. Going to my apartment or to hers was simply out of the question. Too many potential witnesses, too many traps in our way. And I refused categorically to do it in the car.

There was this three-star hotel close to the city center, where I had stayed for a few weeks before moving into my apartment. The owner, Afez, was a kind man, originally from Syria. He and I smoked the shisha together. We were friends. I called him to tell him about my predicament.

“It shouldn’t be a problem,” he said with a laugh.

“What do we do, then?”

“Just rent a room like a regular customer, she’ll come quietly through the back door. There’s a service elevator.”

Everything went according to plan.

Noura joined me in the room after having received the signal, a text message sent by Afez once the hallway was clear. It takes accomplices to get laid in Jeddah. First, a good friend acting as a chaperon. Then, some hotel manager willing to look the other way.

Noura threw herself at me. She undressed neglectfully, tossing her niqab at the far end of the room. She had finally found the long-lost key to her chastity belt. We did not bother with foreplay. It had been going on for months, after all. Our embrace was brutal, intense. She screamed, and her shriek paralyzed me. But I was so aroused, I kept moving inside her. She was twirling like a snake with its head cut off. She screamed a bit louder, and I heard knocking on the wall of the adjacent room. I ignored the warning. Noura was letting herself go. She was moaning with pleasure. She was loud—it was her way of making love.

Noura was about to climax when the telephone rang. I did not pay attention to it. It stopped. Noura’s body was possessed, and I could hardly keep up. She got a violent spasm and howled again. Someone knocked on the door. I rushed to the door and eyed through it. Afez was standing there. He had a bad look on his face and seemed rather impatient. I put on a bathrobe and opened the door.

“You have two minutes to get the hell out. I’ve had three or four customers complaining, one of them a religious man on his way to Mecca who said he’d report you to the authorities. I’ve had to apologize. I told them you were a married couple reunited after a long break. I even blamed nature’s call, and the lack of soundproofing. You don’t want them asking you personally where you plan on going for the honeymoon, so be quick about it.”

I briefed Noura. She looked worried. We put our clothes back on and went out through the backdoor. That incident put an abrupt end to our relationship. Noura feared they would identify her. It would bring shame on her family. We could not see each other ever again.

I offered to drive her home. Cabs were scarce at that time of night. We arrived at her place. She stepped out of the car without even looking at me. She was deeply ashamed. She was mentally erasing me from her memory. It was heartbreaking. It had taken forever for us to bond sexually. Yet a minute-long lecture had been enough to separate us for good.

I never heard from her again. I never tried getting in touch. Haunted by the unfortunate outcome of this liaison, I put an end to my nightly roaming. No more rollerblading. No more clandestine meet-ups by the sea. I did go back once as a passive observer, out of curiosity. I did not take the coastal road. I sat on a bench to get a sense of this lovers’ carousel. For the first time, I noticed a different kind of ballet, that of cars with chauffeurs. It felt like walking up the steps in Cannes. An unending trail of black cars parked in front of palaces. Women stepping out, being careful not to crease their evening gown. The niqab stood in lieu of designer clothes and accessories.

I had witnessed the same ballet of drivers dropping passengers in front of malls. Fahd had explained to me that Saudi women often dated their chauffeurs—most of them from Pakistan. They were Muslims and kept to themselves. The promiscuity inside the vehicle made things easier.

One of the kingdom’s best kept secrets, according to him.

Women are not allowed to drive, because being able to move freely means paving the way to licentious behavior. One of my clients, Khadija, a wealthy Saudi, was very vocal about her outrage. “We are all Bedouin daughters. Who in his right mind would think that riding camels was forbidden to Bedouin women?” Khadija was among the few public personalities to openly condemn the unequal treatment of women. Her finances lived up to her temper.

The first day we met, she came to greet me in a light-pink Chanel suit. She told me all about her days in California, Europe and Australia. As an ambassador’s daughter, she had been able to confront the Wahhabi’s misogynistic paradigm to the realities of the West. While we were reviewing potential designs for a sofa, she happily digressed to tell me about her student life in Berkeley. It is safe to say that Khadija significantly increased my vitamin W intake.

When lunchtime came, Khadija excused herself and briefly disappeared. She came back wearing an abaya, stood in front of me and shouted “Ninja!”

I would have expected that kind of humor. Her wittiness had cemented our friendship. I wanted to stand by her side in the fight against obscurantism.

Khadija was on every front. As a businesswoman, her social status kept her safe from the Muttawa’s constant harassment. Although she struggled to keep up with this daily farce, she refused to leave for Europe. Often, the stubbornness of the patriarchy upset her greatly: “And to think that in the Middle Ages there were no SUVs, no satellite TVs…”

She was leading the resistance, jumping on every occasion to raise awareness about women’s living conditions in Jeddah. The members of her movement wore flashy skirts underneath the hijab.

“It has to come from Jeddah, because it is so close to the Red Sea. Seaside cities are the most reformist, it’s been proven time and time again. Ships, tankers, merchandises… They open our eyes to the world. Every city should border the sea.”

Khadija enjoyed a powerful network of intellectuals, Berkeley alumni she had met in Dubai. They gave her great moral and logistic support. A small piece in the papers, a provocative blog post, anything was good so long as it furthered the cause of Saudi women.

Every Friday afternoon, I was invited to her villa to take part in debates. What seemed inconceivable in the outside world—women openly engaging and debating with men—was customary in the private salons of this influential businesswoman. I always arrived just in time for drinks.

One day, with all the guests gone, Khadija took me to a remote corner of her villa. She wanted to step things up. “No violence. Just a peaceful, fun way to mess with the censors.”

Her idea was a bold one. I knew right then and there why she needed my help. All dressed in black, some women from the group would have their pictures taken in situations that would upset the Wahhabi code of ethics. I became their accomplice and helped stage realistic compositions that defied what the kingdom so stupidly and vehemently prohibited.

I began by photographing Zeina, a young student, the daughter of Khadija’s friend. She was the boldest in the lot. The prettiest, too.

Zeina wanted to pose as a truck driver.

I requisitioned one of the vehicles we used for delivery. That was the easy part. Zeina and I traveled South. Medina was up North, with Mecca in the East. We had to steer clear from these places. How was one to justify the presence of a woman driving a truck at such a short distance from the most sacred places? Way too much trouble ahead. The French consulate was not exactly swift, and my stock of vitamin W would never suffice were I to be caught in such a compromising situation.

Zeina was dressed like a Pakistani delivery man, her short hair hidden underneath a dirty cap. She had a rough pair of jeans on and an equally rough pair of shoes. She spit as soon as she got out of the truck, but did so in such a clumsy way I almost burst out laughing—it would have been the end of our trip.

With my green eyes and dark skin, I had little trouble looking like a migrant from Peshawar. I had grown a full beard and bought a traditional garb from Pakistan. The resemblance was uncanny.

All we had to do was drive as fast and as far as we could, heading straight towards the desert. Which we did, with surprising ease.

No checkpoints, no controls, no questions—even when we stopped to fill up our tank and Zeina did not answer the gas attendant who spoke to her in Urdu.

We left Jizan highway and took a detour that led to nowhere. Just perfect.

We drove an extra 6 miles and found the perfect spot, an abandoned farm where no one had been in a long time. Behind the farm, a great hill made of red sand kept us out of sight. If a car was to come near, we would hear it from miles away and see it on the main road followed by a long stretch of red dust.

Zeina undressed in the cabin. She let go of her male clothing and put the traditional niqab back on. I could not help but look at her. I could see the top of her back, and her shoulders. Her partial nudity left me speechless. She turned to me and smiled. Her innocence was subjugating. I looked away, thinking to myself: “Dear God, not again.”