Today I tried something new. I washed my car. With soap and a sponge and a hose. Then I vacuumed it. All by myself. I screamed a little when the hose backfired and washed everything within a 10 meter vicinity, I also got a whole bunch of soap in my hair. Then of course I vacuumed a plastic bag by mistake and for a second I thought something was going to explode.
Normally washing a car isn't a blog worthy event. But for me, it represents a different type of lifestyle. I could have gone to the automatic car wash and left dry and in tact. Better yet, if I was in Cairo, I could have paid the guy who works at the gas station 10 pounds to wash it for me himself.
See, that's precisely the problem. In Cairo, it's really easy to fall prey to the 'damsel in distress' routine. The scenario involves a few key ingredients: pretty girl, nice car, a little please, a small smile, a whole lot of 'thank you I didn't know what I would have done without you'. Egyptian men pride themselves on chivalry. Sometimes it goes a little farther than opening your doors, or picking up the tab. They will walk you to your car at night even if it means they are walking in the opposite direction for 30 minutes. If your tire blows, they will call their uncle's cousin's bestfriend's son who is a mechanic who lives 45 minutes away but who can come tow your car anyway and then drive you home during rush hour. If you are haggling with a cab driver over the infamously undecided cab fare, the men randomly hanging out at your destination will usher you inside and then threaten to start a fight with the cab driver if he doesn't leave.
The concept of self-service is non existent. The whole society is based on hierarchical service: the poor service the rich, the men service the women. Even the simplest thing in life like filling up your car with gas - there are gas station employees who do that for you. Your laundry? Someone will come pick it up for you and drop it off. Your groceries? Call the grocery store with your shopping list and you'll have your items in front of your doorstep in 20 minutes. Your kids need to walk to the end of the street to catch the school bus? The doorman will walk them because its 7 am, too cold for you, and you don't want to worry about them crossing the street on their own. Can't take your garbage down to the designated boxes for garbage pick up? No problem. The garbage man will go up all 7 floors to pick it up right from in front of your doorstep. Too lazy to make it to the hairdressers? The blow dryer will come to you.
So my problem is this: I have been brought up based on Egyptian culture. I am a privileged female. I can choose to have two sets of people servicing me, men and the less privileged. Add to that: I have lived abroad all my life. I don't always have contact with extended family or a constant network of friends. I have my parents and my sister. We are four extremely interdependent people just surviving one move after the next. We know that we are the only stable, physically present people in each others lives. The biggest proof: none of you reading this blog are in Switzerland.
Outsiders give different names to our dependence on each other: spoiled, privileged, sheltered...It also doesn't help that I can't cook. But being spoiled isn't the root of the problem. It's the mindset. The culture which promotes the idea of 'damsel in distress', combined with our forced dependence on each other, that's what is blog worthy. That is why I went to the manual car wash. That is why I mow the lawn. That's why I will continue to attempt cooking until I get it right.
Because I'm not a damsel in distress. I'm just someone you are going to have to learn to keep up with.
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