Princess Sultana's Daughters

Saudi Arabia. Reema’s father happily announced that the family
could now wait out the four years until Reema’s younger sister
reached the proper age, for the man from Saudi Arabia had paid a
large sum for Reema.
    Reema herself forgot her anxieties, even
becoming excited, after her father told her that she was the most
fortunate of girls. Reema was going to a life of leisure, she would
eat meat every day, have servants at her beck and call, and her
children would be educated and well fed. Reema asked her father if
the man might purchase her a doll, one like she had seen in a
discarded European magazine the children had discovered in the
trash bins of San’a.
    Her father promised that he would make
Reema’s request a high priority.
    When the man returned a week later, Reema
first learned the terrible truth, that the marriage would not be
honorable, that it was a marriage of mut’a, a temporary union. Her
father became angry, for his honor was at stake, his daughter
should not be treated in such a lowly manner. He pleaded with the
man from Arabia, saying that it would be difficult to find another
husband for his daughter, who would no longer be considered fresh
and clean. He might be forced to provide for Reema for many years
while seeking a man who would accept her as a second, less honored
wife.
    The man sweetened the deal with a bundle of
bills. He said that if Reema’s father refused, he would be forced
to insist upon the return of the money already paid.
    Reluctantly, Reema’s father relented,
admitting that he had already spent a portion of that sum. Ashamed,
he turned his face to the ground and told Reema that she must go
with the man, that it was God’s will. Reema’s father asked the
Saudi man to find Reema a permanent husband in Saudi Arabia, since
there were many Yemeni laborers working in that rich country.
    The agent agreed that he would make an
effort. Otherwise, he said, Reema could become a servant in his
home.
    Reema said good-bye to her family and left
the land of her birth, haunted by the pitiful weeping of her two
handicapped brothers.
    During the trip, the man promised a homesick
Reema that he would purchase her a doll, even though such an item
was expressly forbidden by the men of religion.
    Like most Arab girls, Reema had full
knowledge of a wife’s responsibilities. She had slept in the same
room with her parents since the day of her birth. She understood
that a woman must submit to her husband’s every wish.
    Aisha said it was the girl’s calm acceptance
of her life of slavery that she found so distressing, recalling
that the girl’s tears belied her declaration that she was not
displeased with her lot. Reema wept for the six days she was in
Aisha’s home, all the while defending the right of Aisha’s father
to do with her as he pleased.
    Aisha revealed that her father’s employee
easily located a Yemeni man who was employed as a tea boy in one of
their offices, a man who was willing to accept Reema as his second
wife. The man’s first wife was in Yemen, and he admitted that he
needed a woman to cook his meals and serve him.
    The last day Aisha saw Reema, the young girl
was clutching a small doll, obediently following one man out of
their home to go and wed another man she did not know.
    Aisha’s mother, a pious Sunni Muslim, became
so distraught over Reema’s situation that she went to her husband’s
family to complain. This desperate deed created quite a furor in
the family, but nothing the man’s parents could say or do convinced
their son to cease the godless act. Their advice was for Aisha’s
mother to pray to God for her husband’s soul.
    I often wondered what became of those
children, the mut’a brides, for it is quite difficult in the Muslim
world to arrange a good marriage for a girl who is no longer a
virgin. As dispensable girls in fortuneless families, they were, I
suppose, eventually married off as the third or fourth wife to a
man without wealth or influence, much in the same manner as Reema,
or of my childhood friend Wafa, who had been wed to such a one
against her will by her own father as punishment for socializing
with men not of her family.
    Aisha’s home life was agony for a thinking
girl, and the stress and strain of her father’s debauchery pushed
her into inevitable teenage decline.
    My daughter, Maha, naturally imprudent, was
captivated by Aisha’s antics. Recalling my own rebellious youth, I
knew the futility of forbidding Maha to meet with