Strangers. Danuta Reah

that got me thinking. The case against Haroun never really made a lot of sense…’

      ‘They caught him with the stuff. That’s all the sense a case needs, here.’

      ‘I know. But it wasn’t the first theft, and I don’t see how Haroun could have done the others…’

      ‘You’re right. He probably didn’t. Amy, they caught him with enough stuff to land a trafficking charge on him. That was the crime that got him. The rest was just convenience. They needed a drugs trafficker, they got a drugs trafficker. They just cleared up anything outstanding. He was going anyway, he might as well take some extra baggage with him.’ He was deliberately brutal. He didn’t want her getting involved any further with this.

      Amy ran her fingers through her hair. ‘It’s a lousy system. You know that?’

      He shrugged. ‘Have you only just found that out?’

      ‘You seem happy enough with it.’

      It was happening already. If they weren’t having sex, it wasn’t long before they were sniping at each other, looking for the weak points in each other’s armour. He knew about the iniquities of the system–he didn’t need Amy to point them out. This was one of the reasons he’d left the diplomatic service. ‘You take their money, Amy. You know the score. It’s just the way it is.’

      ‘So no one’s going to do anything about it?’

      He pushed the sheet off in exasperation and got out of bed. ‘Do what? What would be the point?’

      She was silent, chewing her lip as she thought about it. ‘He had a family. I thought it might be better for them if they knew he’d only stolen drugs once.’

      ‘He got caught once. He might have done it loads of times–and then he got careless. Leave it.’

      She stood up. Draped in the thin cotton sheet, she looked as though she had stepped out of an engraving for one of the stories of the thousand and one nights. ‘Maybe.’ Her tone didn’t denote agreement, just that she wanted to close the subject.

      She wouldn’t leave it. He knew Amy.

10

      KING SAUD UNIVERSITY WEB SITE English Department Student discussion forums Students may post articles or topics for discussion. All contributions must be appropriate and must be in English.

       Topic: Veiled Knowledge

      Ibrahim: Red Rose, why did you post this article for us to read? If you think as a woman in Islam you have the right of leadership, you are totally wrong, because this kind of job is only valid for men.

      For women to read and understand.

      Allah Subhanahu Ta’âla (Az-Zukhruf: 18) says clearly that women are deficient in intellect and understanding. Women are physically weak and unable to fulfil the duties of leadership. It has thus been made the right of men only.

      These are the rules that a Muslim woman should obey and these make her unfit for leadership should she be foolish enough to aspire to such a thing:

      1. A woman should at all times remain in her home, but if due to any shar’ie necessity (eg Hajj, visiting her parents, visiting the ill, etc), then she should cover her entire body including the face.

      2. She must not try to seduce strange men by making her voice low and attractive when speaking with them and she should not walk in such a manner that would attract the attention of men.

      3. Intermingling of the sexes is prohibited in Islam.

      Red Rose, I’ll tell you a real story about an American Muslim woman who worked as a professor; she came to the King Saud University in Riyadh for a lecture. She said strong words to the girls that she saw with their bad behaviour and clothes. She said, ‘I wish that I was born in a Muslim family so I could do as much as possible to bless the great one, unlike you who are wearing unsuitable clothes and behaving in an immodest and foolish way, like the women in my country do.’ That was said by an American Muslim woman. How do you answer this?

      Red Rose: Ibrahim, too many men in our country are thinking like you. I am good Muslim, but I have travelled. I have been to place where good Muslim women drive car, vote and travel without the permission of husband or father. I think it is time we see the difference between Islam and custom in this country too. Maybe you will be liking this article better. This one was written by a Saudi man:

       Women and Islam–a new perspective

       What is perceived as the rise of fundamentalism in the Islamic world has led to the criticism that women pay the price for the reestablishment of faith. Is it true that women are oppressed within Islam, or is this a distortion of what the Q’ran itself teaches?

      When these accusations are made by the secularists, then the Islamists must turn again to the words of the prophet…

      The university was on the main road to the north east of Riyadh. Roisin sat in the back of the car, enveloped in her abaya, and tried not to flinch too visibly as her driver carved a straight route through the weaving traffic. The inside of the car smelled faintly of leather and spices. The chill from the air-conditioning made a disorientating contrast to the hard glare of the sun outside.

      The driver hadn’t spoken apart from a response to her Arabic greeting, and a nod of assent when she told him her destination. He would be driving her three times a week, and she wondered if he would unbend with familiarity, or if they were condemned by custom and protocol to travel this route in silence for the next year.

      They were leaving the city centre now, travelling fast along an eight-lane highway. She could see a haze of green in the distance, and as it drew closer the driver pulled across and took a turn-off, pulling up at a security gate.

      Roisin remained mute and invisible in the back while the driver carried out the negotiations. Beyond the checkpoint she could see a landscaped park with packed red earth, green lawns, palm trees and low shrubs. As the car moved slowly past the barrier, she could see that the grass of the lawns was patchy as it fought to survive in the dry terrain, but otherwise, she was looking at a futuristic arcadia on the edge of the biggest desert in the world.

      The buildings were high with curved, sweeping roofs, lifted off the ground on pillars or pointing, needle thin, to the sky. Even this early in the day, the campus was busy. Students wandered across the open spaces, young men in white thobes with red ghutra. There were no women visible, apart from her, and she was enclosed in the separate world of the car, hidden behind her abaya and headscarf. No one glanced her way.

      The driver stopped at a second gate. ‘Woman college,’ he said. Only the second time he had spoken.

      Roisin made sure her headscarf was in place and got out of the car. ‘Thank you. Twelve thirty,’ she said to the driver, who nodded abruptly and pulled away.

      She stepped through the door into the building that housed the women’s campus.

      Cool twilight enclosed her. She was in a long corridor of high pillars, the ceiling punched with holes to admit the light that fell across the shadows in beams of gold where the dust motes danced. It was cloister-like in its silence. There were no groups of young women passing time chatting and laughing. The few women who were there moved purposefully, their footsteps quiet, their eyes cast down. Even though men did not come here–the male teachers taught their classes over video link–they wore the hijab and long skirts. Roisin hesitated then loosened her own headscarf and let it fall round her neck. Until someone told her otherwise, she was going to leave it off. She shook her hair free.

      She followed the signs along the corridor, thankful that they were written in English as well as Arabic, until she found the office of the professor who would be her supervisor. Souad al-Munajjed was an internationally respected