Arab Girl

-The father wrote the scheme of your life a long time ago, go and live in ahidey hole if you like but you won't run from it. Fear profits man nothing.- Thirteenth Warrior


Parents, they never comprehend the depth in which their words impact those around them, namely, the children. Having arab parents from both sides ultimately defines me to be the absolute, arab child, or in this case in point, arab girl. Though that arab girl imagery is just that, an illusion, an event of which the west can portray those poor locked up women, thus hantaming all their evil machoistic male counterparts without a conscience to their name.

Anyhoo, here I am an arab girl, emotional detached from that portion of my life in which I am duly bounded by, the ties of race, struggling to seek for completion in all the wrong places, from the pasty white characters splash across magazines and televisions screens to the brown, black and yellow minions whom surround my everyday palace and sanctuary. To whom do I acknowledge this lack in feasible race definition to? Parents.

When you tell your child, "You look so dark you could be a tamilan" and "Did you know the roti man dropped you off when you were a baby?" (the roti man in almost all parts of singapore at that time was almost always indian and dark) Anyhoo, I did not mean I don't like being dark, I don't care about skin colour, but if you are arab and a girl, being dark means you can never be known as the pretty one, you'll almost always be called hitam manis. (translated to Sweet Dark) Just another reason why I detest proclaming myself to be an arab.

Well, the roti man story, oh ya, there comes a time when life comes a knocking when you're nine and you've just gone on you're first official chaperoned 'date' (My first ever was with my school friend who I used to play eye-eye with, the second one was with two brothers...yup you heard right two of them, though all of the above are now what some would call eligible...not interested) you start to ponder on the truth of where you actually came from, and at such a youthful tender age, being completely different than your fairer elder sisters, the storyline of cinderella comes to play and life itself becomes much easier to comprehend when your dad is the roti man. Then in comes the measurement of self-worth and value, where countless of people measure strength, attractiveness based upon their own personal deductions due to their 'gila' reactions telling them to base their world upon their memories.

Anyhoo again, growing up with Hindi movies and everyone referencing you to Prieti and Kajol, the curveball that life threw your path seems easier to catch and realisation hits. The lack of arabness in my life ( I don't even know how to speak it) can fully be blamed unto myself and a lil upon the shoulders of my parents. If you want something run until it can be caught and when its finally yours, well nothing is truly yours in this world cause life, and parents their both for rent until the next. So make the best of this rental space, and continually evolve yourself for the better never fearing the consequences but ultimately remember who you are.

p.s. Noura, You Are An ARAB Girl.