Holding hands while walking through the Saint Laurent Mall in the east end of the City of Ottawa, Ontario, my boo Tyrone Ferguson and I got a lot of stares. Oh, well. Let the haters stare. Yes, we're an interracial couple, an Arab woman with a black man. Guess what? We're of different hues and we're happy together and the world isn't ending. My name is Amina Alzahrani and I'm a young woman of Saudi Arabian descent living in Canada's Capital. Got one helluva story to share with you, folks.
Tyrone Ferguson and I were casually strolling through the crowded Saint Laurent Mall, just doing some shopping, when I noticed how damn much we got stared at. Understand that the east end, especially the Vanier area, is one of the most racially diverse spots in all of metropolitan Ottawa. Lots of Somalis, Arabs, Haitians, Chinese and other ethnic minorities call this place home. You'd think that in a place like that, we'd blend in. And you'd be totally wrong.
Walking out of Sears, I saw a Somali chick in a hijab and long skirt holding hands with a Lebanese-looking dude. The two seemed very much into each other. And then they saw Tyrone and I...and froze. I looked them up and down and smiled, and then, to really shine them on, I kissed Tyrone on the lips for no apparent reason. Not that I needed a reason to kiss my boo's full, succulent lips, mind you.
You should have seen the look on the Somali woman's face when she saw me locking lips with Tyrone, one of the finest brothers on the face of the earth. I swear, people are okay with interracial relationships as long as there's no black guy involved. Bunch of bigots if you ask me. In Saudi Arabia, I saw lots of women of all hues with Saudi Arabian men.
Seriously, Saudi guys fondness for Ethiopian women, Indian women and Filipino women is almost legendary. And yet you'd never see a Saudi guy allow his daughter to marry a black man, even if he's a good Muslim from a good family. That's one of the many double standards in Saudi society, and the rest of the Arab world, to tell you the truth. It's considered okay for Arab men to date/marry women of any color or culture but it's virtually forbidden for Arab women to date/marry men who are from outside the Arab world.
As a Saudi Arabian woman, I'm not permitted to marry non-Saudi men, although exceptions can be made for men from the Gulf States, such as Kuwaitis, Omanis and Qataris. I think that's bullshit, and it's part of the reason why I left the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. I'm a smart young woman with a mind of my own. I wanted to be more than just the wife of some dude selected for me by my family. I had dreams and goals that went far beyond what's considered acceptable for a Saudi woman in the society in which I was born and raised.
Lots of Saudi women are studying at fine colleges and universities in the United States of America, Canada, England, Australia and other wealthy western countries. When they return to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia with their fancy western education, they're still the powerless daughters and wives of control freaks. All because of tradition and the iron-clad rules of the religion. That's the fate of Saudi Arabian women, folks.
Can you imagine a smart, fearless woman with a Ph.D. taking orders from a man who can barely write his own name simply because, as a man, he is considered better than her? That's the fate of millions of highly educated, beautiful and ambitious Saudi Arabian women. They're all doomed to lives of quiet desperation and lack of fulfillment because of it. I swore to myself that it would not be my fate.