Princess: A True Story of Life Behind the Veil in Saudi Arabia

helplessness. I too had heard
rumors of other condemned women in my country receiving the
punishment of the woman’s room, but I had never had a picture in my
mind of the reality of the drawn and anguished howl of someone I
had known, a woman who had embodied the life and hope of our land,
a woman now living in utter blackness, without sight or sound to
sustain her life.
    I awoke one night thinking that I had
suffered a bad dream. I was grasping for easement when I realized
that the nightmare was real; there would be no relief to those who
knew Sameera and the fact that she now suffered helplessly in total
captivity and isolation. The never-ending question ran through my
mind: What power on earth could release her? As I stared up at the
desert night sky sparkling with stars, I had to conclude there was
none.
     

Chapter Eighteen: Second Wife
    Thursday, August 28, 1980, is a day I will
never forget; Kareem and I had just returned to Riyadh from Taif, a
cool mountain resort. I was lounging on the sofa while one of the
Filipino servants rubbed my aching feet. Our three children were at
a camp in Dubai, in the Emirates, and I was bored without them.
    As I looked through the stack of newspapers
that had accumulated during our two months’ absence, an item of
interest leaped from the page of the latest newspaper. One of my
relatives, the governor of Asir, Prince Khaled Al Faisal, had
recently taken steps to curb the spiraling cost of marriage in his
province by limiting the dowry costs that a groom had to pay to
acquire a bride in his area. The prince had placed a limit of SR
25,000 ($7,000) as the maximum the bride’s parents would be allowed
to request for their daughter. The article pointed out that the
directive was well received by eligible bachelors, since SR 100,000
($27,000) was the average price of brides in the year 1980. As a
result, many young men of Saudi Arabia could not afford to purchase
a wife.
    I read the item to the Filipino servant, but
she took little note, for she had few concerns of the plight of
Saudi women who were bought and sold. Mere survival was a heavy
burden for most Filipinos. They thought we Saudi women were quite
fortunate to have endless time on our hands and vast sums of money
to spend on whatever we might fancy.
    As the mother of two daughters, I did not
care about the actual price of a bride, for when the occasion came
for our children to wed, the bridal price would be of little
concern. Kareem and I were exceedingly wealthy; money failed to
play a role in my daily frustrations. But I saw a trend of backward
moves by the men of our family. In the confines of our homes, they
spoke eloquently of freedom for women, while in legal directives
they themselves wrote, they kept the pressure high for the status
quo and steadily pushed us back to the primitive age.
    Only the total elimination of dowries would
have satisfied my longing. How many years would it take before we
women were no longer bought and sold as property?
    I was restless and began to feel edgy, for
all of my sisters, other than Sara, were still abroad. My dearest
sister was in the last few weeks of her fourth pregnancy and now
slept most of the daylight hours.
    My life, so well planned in my youth, had not
turned out the accomplishments I had envisioned. Instead, I had
settled into much the same routine as my sisters and the other
royal princesses I befriended.
    Since the servants fed the children their
morning meal and organized their days, I generally slept until
noon. After a snack of fresh fruits, I would soak in the tub in a
leisurely manner. After dressing, I would join Kareem or, if he was
occupied, my sisters for a late lunch. We would lounge and read
after our meal, and then Kareem and I would take a short nap.
Afterward, he would return to the office or visit with his royal
cousins while I spent a few hours with the children.
    I attended women’s parties in the late
afternoon and returned to our palace no later than eight or nine
o’clock in the evening. Kareem and I made a point of eating our
evening meal with the children to learn about their activities that
day. We almost always attended a dinner party in the evenings, for
we were of a most select group that entertained mixed couples.
Generally, our associates were of the Royal Family only, but on
occasion high-ranking foreigners, foreign ministers, and wealthy
Saudi business families would be included in our inner circle.
Since our social freedoms had not