Final Meeting

My sixth meeting with Haya (which took place this past Tuesday) went quite well. It had been several weeks since we had met because of a string of inopportune occurrences. I had to cancel a meeting because of an increasing workload in one of my classes and she was sick on one occasion. The difficulties of reconciling two schedules to allow for our meeting at a time other than the normal Tuesday at 3pm prevented any "make-up" meetings.

We talked about what each of us had been doing over the past month, catching each other up through the hiatus in our meetings, before speaking of Saudi culture again, specifically the misconception that women in the Arab world have little power. Haya explained to me that quite the opposite is true. She said that women could be quite influential when needed, but that they typically deferred to men on most decisions because, as she put it, "man is man." By this, I believe she meant that men like to take charge of a situation and steer it towards the expected result. A woman's deference to her husband was not a sign of subservience, but rather an opportunity to allow the man to feel powerful. As evidence of this, she pointed out that before getting married, a man must provide a dowry to the bride's family. After the marriage, the man is then obligated to provide for his wife. In a sense, the wife has power over the husband because he is culturally required to provide her every need. I think this facet of Saudi culture is misinterpreted in Western society and I'm glad Haya corrected my perspective of her culture.

While Haya undoubtedly garnered more from our conversations than I, it was certainly a mutually beneficial pairing. She has come a long way in her grasp of English, with the capability to carry on complex conversations now. I'm sure that cannot be solely attributed to our meetings, but I hope (and believe) they played some small role.

On the other hand, I learned quite a bit about Saudi culture and Islam that I didn't know previously. Haya corrected many of my misconceptions about Muslims and their practice of religion, not to mention Arabic culture itself. Through these meetings, I have gained a new, more accurate perspective of the world--realizing that at the most fundamental of levels, all cultures and countries share commonalities. We live in tumultuous times, but I think the waters would be a little calmer if we all took the time to deeply understand each other first-hand, asking for clarification and keeping an open mind. Maybe that's naive of me to wish for, but surely it couldn't hurt.

Haya and I are meeting for the last time tomorrow to wrap things up. She wants to read all of these blog posts to ensure that I have accurately portrayed her as well as her culture. Hopefully I did, and if not, I'm sure she'll correct me again tomorrow.