Belly Dance
Bahraini blogger Emoodz writes about the latest “widely spread “hippy dance” among young khalijis, performed by two or more women as shown on the video with a background music of nothing more than continuous hits on drums with the lead singer chanting “Diqny.. Diqny” (which loosely translates to “Hit me, Hit me”). It is usually accompanied by what I can only describe as a weird outlandish belly dancing technique that relies on shaking the (behind) in a unique way. … Most of those “dancers” actually come out with a Burqa (the face cover) on, dancing exotically with other women.“
I have seen many similar videos as the one above on videosharing sites and Khaleeji blogs and forums, but I never really understood what I saw, thinking it was perhaps some trend to locate such eccentric videos and upload them online, having had no idea that less than 4 years since we moved out of the Arabian Gulf, this overtly sexual dance, called Malaya, has actually become a social trend in that region.
To me, a self-confessed liberal, non-conservative, and non-religious 20-something Levantine woman, the trend is absolutely bizarre, bordering on exotically crazy. It actually reminds me of all the tales written by Orientalists about Harems, the tents of Sultans, and Arab bellydancers portrayed in their paintings and books. It is freaky to me that this is actually reality.
In fact, what comes to mind when I see this dance is how different the values of right and wrong are for different Arab regions and social classes. The fact that these woman have their faces covered makes this very sexualized dance a tad more acceptable in the Gulf than were they to be dancing like this with their faces uncovered, as afterall, this way they won’t be recognized.
Meanwhile, I can’t see a similar veiling of identity happening here, because there is a fair share of women willing to dance while not concerned if they are recognized or not, because in their communities, the values are very different. To me, for example, it is perfectly acceptable to do whatever you want, as long as you don’t cover your face out of fear from being recognized. One of the first values that my parents taught me was “If you are embarrassed about it, then it is wrong.”
Another example of different values is the trend of having Arab men imitate the strictly-for-women bellydance. Often times in the early mornings at school, everyone would be discussing a certain “He” dancer airing on some Lebanese channel the night before, and the comments of the students would all revolve around “Ah, they should send him to us, and we’ll show him how to be a real man!”
In the Jordanian society, it is absolutely not acceptable for a man to act like this, while other Arab societies, though they probably won’t find it normal, will laugh and find amusement in such shows. Khalidah blogged about a similar show a couple of months ago, and you can watch a video and read the comments , she says, “Now honestly; this is so gay and so not cool and so yuck and gross!!!There are certain things (moves) that work only with a woman’s body … I really do not understand how people are cheering for this dude; watch for yourself, that is if you can go on till the end of the clip.”
Naturally, I do not find it funny either, just plain awkward and disgusting.
Last week, I was with a group of young Arabs from several regions around the Arab world, and it was amusing observing how different each is from the other. For example, Egyptians tend to sugar-coat everything they say when talking to the opposite sex, something that is completely unacceptable to Jordanians, to whom even being nice may be very easily mistook as an offensive sign of flirting.
An Egyptian man in the group kept making your typical Egyptian comments, referring to the girls as “honey”, “sugar”, and “hottie”, and randomly telling each that she is gorgeous and that he wants to marry her. Such comments, in my Jordanian opinion, are extremely unnecessary, offhand and vulgar, and I voiced my opinion loud and clear that I will absolutely not tolerate being talked to in such a demeaning manner. The other Jordanian girls in the group were equally offended, and it was made a point to mention that they do not find his humor amusing (not that that put an end to it). Today, it makes me laugh that I, the self-labeled “extremely open-minded individual” ,could not help but let his comments get to me, making me wear my most authentic Jordanian frown, and being quite mean and upset about it, but I just cannot get myself to accept such language from anyone but the human I love. I know that if he was a local, I would have made a much bigger fuss.
The Lebanese girls, with their typical Lebanese charisma, on the other hand, did not seem to mind, and managed the whole deal with such charming simplicity.
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