Aat Festival Celebrating IWD

Thank you to all the wonderful artists, supporters, audiences, and sponsors, for making the third annual Aat festival a brilliant success. Much to say and reflect on, but for now, just this.

(Image by Rawia Sabella)

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A letter: Interfaith marriage and crime

Where do I get my inspiration? Different places and times: Sometimes it's from personal experiences and events, sometimes it's from stories I hear or read, with a bit of pepper and salt. Sometimes it comes from nature, dreams, and news reports. Sometimes inspiration just comes, from a place unknown to me. Usually, it's a combination of all those things. Below is a paragraph from my latest performance, "In the Lost and Found", followed by the letter that inspired it. (I apologize for taking so long to publish it Leila .) The letter is set against the reality that in Jordan, as in several Arab countries, a woman cannot transfer her citizenship to her husband (while the man of course can). "They tell me I will lose my inheritance if I marry a non Muslim. He has to convert, otherwise the marriage is false, the kids are bastards, and the wife is an apostate, her "blood is permitted" - with no punishment to the killer. I am obliged to give my husban...

A carpenter named Mahmood

"The Brotherhood won't rule Egypt," he says, "The Coptics were already here when the Muslims came, there are Christians and Churches, ma yinfa3sh ... The next leadership will come from the youth." He is a carpenter from al-Mansoura . His wife is from Marg in Cairo. They live in Assala, a sha3bi neighborhood, poor and under-serviced. Assala: Unpaved roads, no side walks, open manholes; houses with tin roofs held down by junk: tables, strollers, chairs and rocks. All houses seem to have satellite dishes, except for one. Its roof is made of pressed sugar cane mixed in with paper, and rolled out into sheets. The early winter rain has left the roof sagging, with moss for decoration. In Assala, many people leave their doors open; sitting on their sills, they are on the road. Children play barefoot on the streets, and the goats chew on flowers and litter. On the way to the carpenter's house, we pass a corner store. It is a window, opening into a room of a ho...

The sky is purple

Man has always aimed to the sky KItes Planes Rockets And we dig into the ground with a shovel But rock stops us midway or less than mid way We stop sometimes we find a spring or well If we're cursed, we find oil Into the sky What flies is an extension of me There's a thread between us Translucent but sturdy like that of a web The spider crawls from beneath the carpet I squash it -just kidding, it's alive. Ode to the internet So what if it's a window into secrets A spying eye into the files of any self So what.... The way it makes me spy with my little eye something that begins with -You name it, and there it is. Life in 3D ... and the fourth? Five people and two dogs Cirque du soleil on the PC screen, on TV is National Geographic -Abu Dhabi edition On one, a women in red hanging from the sky The other, Omani men dancing with swords Repeat Life goes in a loop But we don't have to We can skip, from one hill to the next in a green car L;-

Arab Woman Talking

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