All the Things I've Been Meaning to Write About Living Overseas - Part II
Physically Strong Woman Seeks to Lift Heavy Box in Male Dominated Society
I have always been physically strong. I have never imagined that being a physically strong female was not normal. In the mountains of Colorado, strong women are just the status quo. Most of my girlfriends at home are faster than their husbands, after all. It wasn't until I moved to Qatar that I realized what an anomaly it was for a woman to move her own heavy boxes.
Qatar Academy, where Innes and I have been working for the past two years, has almost as many auxiliary staff (custodians, cafeteria staff, security guards, coffee boys and girls - yes, someone serves you coffee in your office or classroom at QA if you ask for it) as it does faculty and staff. That means there is someone to clean EVERY bathroom, wash every window, stand guard at every door, make all of your copies, deliver your mail and - yes, finally to my point - carry every heavy box that you might ever need.
I work on a staff with three lovely ladies who have this system dialed in perfectly. Their espressos are delivered each morning, their copies are picked up and dropped off, and their heavy boxes are moved all over campus...by someone else. These ladies gently chide me for taking the stairs - literally a 20 second endeavor - while they take the elevator (but I still beat them to all of our meetings).
Even after two years, I can't get used to this system of having a (VERY) low paid worker doing all the things I can do myself. I understand the argument that these jobs are giving people from around the world a chance to make a living and to send money to their families back home in Sri Lanka, India or Pakistan, for example. But the side of me with the German work ethic can't embrace this part of the culture, not just here in Qatar but I think in many parts of the world.
Back to the heavy box: I work in the PR department where supplies and gifts for students, staff, VIPs and VVIPs (Qatar has more than its fair share of VERY Very Important People) are being delivered almost daily. The ladies I work with are shocked when we are all in the store room and I start to pick up boxes. I don't think twice about it, I just get to work. We work on a very large campus and I will often move boxes from one school to the other, just so that it gets done more quickly and also to get me away from my desk. Whenever a man sees me doing this, he invariably tries to help. He will stop whatever he is doing to try to take whatever it is that I am carrying. If a delivery is being made and several boxes are to be moved, I normally jump in and start moving boxes - which creates a great deal of embarrassment for pretty much everyone but me.
A couple of weeks ago, one of the ladies I work with was called in at the last minute to help set up a booth at a huge career fair here in Doha. She really needed to show a video on a flat screen TV but couldn't find a company that could provide a TV stand on such short notice. I knew we had this big ugly glass TV stand in a closet at home, so I went home to get it for her. I loaded it into the back of my car alone and drove it over to the school. When I got to the school, I went inside and asked a security guard to help me take it from my car to the school. He stood at my car and tried to do it alone. When I tried to help him he walked away. I thought he was quitting so I started to pull it out alone when the security guard returned with two other men to carry the stand for me. He stood and ordered them around while I stood and well...watched.
Men are not used to seeing a woman biking or running in this country either. When we first moved here, I started running out in the desert behind Education City. Innes scoped out the route and thought it would be fine for me to be out there alone, but I was still nervous. I also didn't want to get lost. One day I was out running and glancing back over my shoulder every few moments to make sure I knew how to get back to the right street when I saw this police vehicle come barreling out across the desert. These two men pulled up next to me and asked me if I spoke Arabic and then asked me in English if I was ok. They thought I was running away from someone! They both had big smiles on their faces and had no idea how scared I was. I thought I was getting busted for trespassing. I asked them if it was ok for me to be out there or if I was on someone's land and they said it was fine. They said there were no laws against being out there and then they drove off. This happened twice in two years - the second time the police men (called Fazah) took pictures! (They said they were taking pictures of the dog that I was running with but I think they were taking pictures to show all of their friends this crazy American woman running in the desert alone.)
Another time I was riding my road bike down a very deserted 4-lane highway. Innes stopped to get some water and I kept riding. Suddenly this man in a Land Cruiser pulls up next to me and just starts talking. He was so happy to see us out riding our bikes and asked where we were from and why we were there. He said he was an off-duty policeman (what is it with the Fazah?) and then he pulled a bottle of water out of his console and reached all the way across his vehicle - while his was still driving ON the highway - to give it to me. Very nice, but can you imagine riding down I-70 with a man driving next to you offering you water?
A final example I want to share has to do with Wilder. She loves to play football (soccer) and joined a small after-school program at a local football pitch earlier this year. I signed her up, hoping that by playing with a bunch of boys she would get pushed a little harder. Only about six kids went out for the program and she was the only girl. I knew there was something amiss the first time I came to pick her up and her coach said, "I'm sorry but she only wanted to play goalie. I told her it was a very difficult position and she might get hurt, but she insisted. I told the boys to not kick it very hard so she wouldn't get hurt." He was embarrassed and sheepish - I think he thought I would be upset. I laughed and said, "Oh she's tough, she's been playing goalie for years. She won't get hurt." However, the discrimination continued with the coach even telling the boys to run two warm-up laps and Wilder to only do one. Needless to say, she didn't go back after the 6-week session was done. (To be fair, there are some really good football programs for boys and girls here in Qatar where Wilder would never be treated differently. There are even co-ed rugby teams for her age group and believe me, they would never take it easy on a girl.) I am just glad that she recognized the treatment for what it was and that she was upset about it. She knew it wasn't ok.
Ironically, the women I work with and the women I have met over here are some of the absolute strongest women I know. Some have come up from very difficult backgrounds to become well-educated and self-sufficient. While still others have lost fathers and husbands to war in recent years and are managing their households on their own. I have learned a lot from these ladies over the past two years - and I will share some of those stories in Part III.
