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Dear Readers,
This is a temporary article that will be removed after
some time.
I am from Norway and feel the need to set something straight.
This is a message to the people of the Scandinavian countries
and to the Muslim world.
In 2006 a Danish newspaper called Jyllands Posten released
a series of drawings depicturing the prophet Mohammed. Later
the drawings were released in a Christian private run newspaper
in Norway.
This of course caused a blast of reactions in the Middle
East and all places you can find Muslims. This is because
of an verse of the quran explaining that you should not
depicture the prophet or any other prophet as this may become
and idol of worship. We also have this in Christianity as
the 2nd commandment. You shall not create false idols and
worship these. Anyway the Scandinavian newspapers defended
their actions by claiming that it is a part of their freedom
of speech. I can say to the Muslim people that these actions
did not have a lot of support from the masses of people
as in Norway it was at the time only released in a fundamentalist
Christian newspaper that goes out to probably a handful
of people. Personally i think that this newspaper did this
to ridicule the Muslim people, not by showing the drawings,
but by showing the reaction of some muslims as a people
with a prehistoric mentality and as a lower standing species.
Ok, so for the freedom of speech part. You may say that
we release these pictures because if we dont it mean that
we do not have freedom of speech. This does not really make
sense. You have the freedom of speech, its just a question
if you want to abuse the freedom of speech to insult half
the world by showing their beloved prophet as a pig, a killer
or whatever. So now that you have done this what difference
do you think you made to the world? Some fundamentalist
burned downed the embassy and they burned some flags which
is ridiculous by it self, but do you think you changed anything
or made the world a better place. I live in Egypt and I
have talked to the people here about the drawings and they
are not angry, they are just upset and sad. One of the workers
here asked me a very important question, he said that it
made him sad and why did they do this. You can compare it
to me taking a picture of our mother and manipulate it into
a picture of her in a sexual situation with a donkey and
releasing it on my web page. Then I can say that this is
very important for me as it is freedom of speech. It does
not make any sense it is just pure childish games and people
feel hurt and it really makes them sad that you put out
pictures in a public newspaper making fun of their prophet.
So to these people behind these newspapers if you really
want to discuss the topic of freedom of speech, you have
your freedom and you took an advantage of it and you didn't
make any point. In Germany it is illegal to claim that Holocaust
did not happen. This is a punishable crime. The president
of Iran could not enter the country during a football mach
because he claims that the Jewish government cheated on
the number for casualties. If you now take your newspapers
and print an article about how the Holocaust never happened
or that the Jews cheated on the numbers to get money from
the different countries involved (I know that the Holocaust
did happen just making a point here). I think many people
in the world would be upset and really hurt ans many people
has families suffering the Jewish prosecution. Then you
also used your freedom of speech and again the only consequence
is that you end up insulting a group of people. It seems
that you think it is ok to ridicule and hurt the Muslim
people, because you think that they are too serious in their
belief. Have you ever thought that this maybe make them
better people in many ways. Please do not do this, this
has nothing to do with freedom of speech this has to do
with an ABUSE of freedom of speech and is mostly used to
create attention like Dagbladet did again 5 February 2010.
Dagbladet is usually a good newspaper, but this was unnecessary
and I hope that the Norwegian people can show their protest
against abuse of freedom of speech and not buy this newspaper
for a while. Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing, but
if you keep abusing it in this way you might en up loosing
it one day.
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Religion, Politics, Taboos, Dress Code and Other topics that
might concern you in Dahab or Egypt.
Dahab as most of Egypt is mostly dominated by the Muslims, but
it is less conservative than most areas like Cairo and Luxor.
Even thou the people are Muslim they do
not really frown upon a tourist drinking alcohol and even many
of the locals here enjoy alcohol sometimes, but this is actually
frown upon.
Dress Code
You can dress like you wish as long as you don't go all the way
and take the top off. When it comes to sunbathing topless i do
not think that the police will take action and even some of the
restaurants would not warn you about it, but I think this is a
sensitive area where the person should show some respect for the
culture of the country you are visiting.
For women to walk around in bikini or miniskirt is not an issue
in Dahab as long as you are not Egyptian and this is the working
uniform of many female dive instructors.
Alcohol
Regarding previously mentioned about alcohol its not really an
issue her in Dahab, there are several nightclubs and bars that
are open till around 3AM and liquor stores that are open
til 2AM. Many restaurants have an alcohol license and serve it
to their customers while some others either get it to you from
a store or let you bring from outside. Be aware that there are
not may respectable alcohol brands in Egypt, the good ones are
ID vodka, Stella beer and Sakkara. Many of the brands here are
imitations of other brands, but with spelling mistakes like
Fine landia instead of Finlandia, Tequlla and other attempts to
pass of cheap liquor to a tourist.
Drugs
Drugs is a topic that is getting more and more heated in Egypt
at the moment. There is a lot of drugs, but there is a completely
different specter of drugs than what you find in a European market.
Hashish and Marijuana is quite common between both tourists and
Egyptians even thou they have very strict penalties for Egyptians
caught with drugs. For amounts as small as 10 grams you could
get a sentence as a drug dealer and get a minimum sentence of
one year in prison. This is the law, but things indicate that
they are not as strict in reality, but the police are working
hard to fight the drug trafficking.
There is becoming a problem of abuse of opiates and opium in particular,
but also their chemical relatives. The Bedouins has used Opium
for centuries as cure for fever and pain relief by putting it
behind their teeth and sip tea. The Egyptians on the other hand
have a tendency to use it as an addict and even using needles.
This is not a problem in Dahab, but it is an increasing problem
in the rest of Egypt.
There is not much if any at all designer drugs like ecstasy, cocaine,
amphetamine or LSD. The majority can not afford to import it and
the penalties are so strong that they also would not risk it.
According to quran there is no room to use any drugs, but alcohol
have been ringed out as the worst.
Theft
Theft is not an issue her in Egypt as it is not acceptable in
the quran in any way and by the old Sharia and Egyptian law has
high punishment. If you should get anything stolen from you, you
should report this to the police. The police will investigate
it seriously and can not be bribed by the owner on this subject.
The thing is that you need to consider if you are 100% sure if
it was stolen, because the process they go through to find the
guilty one is quite tough and if a person is falsely accused this
can have quite severe consequences.
Sex in Islam
Sex and Islam is a special subject of its own. This is very hard
on many of the Egyptians, but this is mostly caused by cultural
and religious reasons and not political. A unmarried couple is
not allowed to have any form of physical contact and is not allowed
to share a room. A marriage is a very expensive for the man. He
needs to prove that he can provide for his wife by having a house
and other things that is necessary as well as a certain amount
of money in solid cash. This is often resulting in marriages within
the same family to avoid these costs and still be able to create
a family so a marriage between two cousins is not uncommon even
thou its not fully accepted in the quran. So as a result of this
many people can never have a girlfriend and also can not afford
to get a wife.
What is happening a lot in Egypt at the moment now is that you
have a high increase in sex tourism. By sex tourism I am referring
to may older women comes to Egypt and starts a relationship with
young Egyptian men.
Often this is women who are 40 and above with young men in their
early 20s. There are several reasons for the Egyptians to do this.
First of all it gives them an outlet for the sexual frustration
and it provides them with a financial future and even a chance
to leave the country. The way it usually goes is that a young
man chats up an older woman and usually has a drink. Because of
the laws i mentioned before a foreign woman and an Egyptian man
is not allowed to share a room in a hotel and sometimes not even
a house. So after a long time going out the man declares his undying
love, but they are prohibited by law to spend the night. This
usually starts up on a vacation and then continues in their home
country over internet. These women are often lonely and often
previously married. Often the woman gives him a bit of money to
get their life on track and in very many cases this results in
a marriage. There are different forms of marriages, but to be
able to stay together you need a full worthy marriage registered
in the embassy. Then when they are married the wife then applies
for his Visa and he can go to her country. This is usually where
it ends. This is a sorry fact and it happens all over Egypt, but
specially these tourist places like Sharm, Hurgada and Dahab.
This is starting to getting referred to as MMID (My Mohammed Is
Different) as this is what these women tend to think. If I take
I wild guess around 2% of these marriages have a happy ending.
Be careful.
Murder
Murder is also something you never heard about. I have lived
3 years in Dahab and I have never heard about a murder happening
here even in the past. Occasionally you hear about some family
tragedy in Egypt where some young women or man has been killed
by their family for reasons such as family honor like coming out
as gay or a woman sleeping with another man wile she is married.
Terrorism
Terrorism is something that has happened in the past, but its
not really a factor. Many people have probably heard about the
suicide bombers in Dahab 2006. This was an action condemned by
the mosques and absolutely not tolerated between the Muslim groups.
This was not aimed towards the western tourists, but this was
a time in Dahab when you had a lot of Israeli tourists here and
the terrorists was coming down here from North Sinai. Every man
in the town from this area who was in Dahab was caught and interrogated
and they got the people behind it. This happened in the middle
of the day. There were 3 suicide bombers who detonated their packages
simultaneously. They were said to be nail bombs set of by a time
detonator. 23 people died and around 80 was wounded most of these
Egyptian.
There has been several terrorist attacks in Egypt over the years,
last one happening in Cairo last year. They are not frequent and
as a temporarily citizen of Egypt i do not consider this a threat.
Sabbath and Ramadan
The Sabbath in Egypt is on a Friday. It does not have that much
impact on the daily life here in Dahab as the only effect is the
volume of the speakers from the mosques going up a notch and that
the stores are closed from 10 to 12. What they usually think here
is that it is the holiest day in the week and you should sin less
than other days. Your priers in the mosques are worth more and
not going to the mosque on this day his frowned upon by other
people if you are a Muslim.
Ramadan is the holy month and is basically their name for September.
Some people might say that it is not a good time to go to Egypt,
but i tend to disagree. For the tourist you dont see that much
of a difference and the difference you see is a good experience
and will give you a deeper insight in the Muslim culture. They
are not allowed to eat or drink between sunrise and sun set and
this is the time set by Mecca time. This is for them quite tough
as it is a time when it is quite hot in Egypt and the urge for
drinking water is high. This is considered a trial and is an occasion
for the people to show god that they are good Muslim and not only
their fellow man. Everyone can see that you pray and that you
don't do the sins that are punishable, but that you suppress your
urge to drink and eat is between them and their god.
There are some exceptions for the Ramadan and in most cases you
can do it later when you are able to do it. This is for example
if you are pregnant, menstruating, seriously ill or if you have
any condition that requires you to take medication as you are
not allowed to swallow pills either during this time.
Ramadan is also a time where you are required to give your offerings
to the poor and needy. If you can you should give one tenth of
what you own to the less fortunate this is also one of the reason
why you are enduring this trial so that you can understand the
poor and hungry and that god has given you what you have.
Politics
Politics is a sensitive subject i Egypt and i do not recommend
discussing the subject with any Egyptians or Bedouins. You can
talk about it with you fellow travelers, but don't discuss it
with the locals this is because you don't understand how it works
and if you do then you understand why you should not discuss it.
You can discuss the law, the culture and the religion, but avoid
politics.
Sex offenses
I have heard many traveler stories about people who have been
sexually assaulted. In most cases this is not true. I know one
time last year there was an attempted rape, but there was a story
behind it where the woman invited the man for drinks, as a person
who do not drink he got very drunk and completely miss understood
the situation. The police picked up the man the same day and he
was sent to prison. This is the only serious case i know about.
The other case i know about was a girl who went home with a man
to have a drink (Alcohol) and during that time in his house the
man touched her breast. She panicked, left and reported it to
the police. The man was arrested and sentenced to jail. Now if
this was in Europe and a man invites only one girl to the house
to have a drink he might think that he is getting lucky. Especially
if the man is a 23 year old virgin and don't know how these things
work. The sentences for sex offenders in Egypt are very strict
and are something they most likely will not even try to attempt.
The girls feel safe here walking up a dark ally alone at 3AM and
that is more than what you can say for any European city.
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