Browse Items (218 total) Browse All Browse by Tag Search Items Browse Map of 5 Sort by: TitleCreatorDate Added noura, imbaba, cairo Amélie Losier May, Maadi, Cairo Amélie Losier Samah, Imbaba, Cairo Amélie Losier Mona, Ibaba, Cairo Amélie Losier Dounia, Imbaba, Cairo Amélie Losier Rawiya, Tunis el Fayoum Amélie Losier Nada, Downtown, Cairo Amélie Losier Nadia, Madinet el Salam, Cairo Amélie Losier Angie, Maadi, Cairo Amélie Losier Zeinab, Maadi, Cairo Amélie Losier Heba, Ataba, Cairo Amélie Losier Umm Malek and Malek – Qalanfil, Delta of Egypt Umm Malek lives in a small muslim village in the Delta of Egypt. She got circumcised at 10 years old and remains profoundly scared by the trauma of that day. « You can easily forget what you’ve eaten on that day, or how the weather was. But you can’t forget the trauma, the pain… » Malek is now fully conscient of the long term consequences of such practice on her mental health as well as in her married woman’s intimate life. « What we tend to ignore is that many divorces happen because of that barbarian practice. Women and men come become unsatisfied, it leads to a lot of frustration and anger. ». After giving birth to a daughter, she started attending awareness sessions lead by a local NGO in a nearby village. The consequences she was facing herself combined to these sessions convinced her for good that she couldn’t perpetrate that practice on her daughter. « I simply couldn’t inflict such misery to my own daughter. I want her to be happily married. » At first, women of her village pressured her to circumcise Malek, threatening that she would never get her daughter married if she didn’t. « But I took these women to the awareness sessions with me, and since then, five of them decided to not cut their daughters ! » Chloe Sharrock Marsa and Barbara Anna –El Bashra, Upper Egypt Marsa also comes from a Coptic community, where circumcision is still widely spread. When she was inflicted with FGM at a young age, she suffered from severe bleeding, and had to remain in bed for more than a week. Complications such as infections, HIV or severe bleedings are common in such rurale areas where FGM is practiced with non sterilized razor blades or knives. Tales of women being told to sit in buckets of hot water to heal the wound is also regularly recalled, attesting of the absolute lack of medical attention these young girls receive. While growing up, Marsa couldn’t get rid of the trauma and the fear of that event. Thankfully, women in her village were slowly giving up on that tradition following the public discourses of the local priest taking position against that practice. Chloe Sharrock Mariana, Yoanna and Febroina – Mallawi, Upper Egypt Mariana was circumcised on the same day as her sister and a dozen of young girls taken to the same house, one day after school. There, they were circumcised one after the other by a local da’ya (a village midwife). « Everybody was screaming, some girls tried running away… It was absolutely awful, and we weren’t even told what was happening except that it was for our own good ! » But a decade ago, Father Aghethaton, the coptic priest of the village, started militating against that practice. Through preaches at the church, awareness sessions and discussions with the mothers of the village, he slowly started eradicating that practice. His successor is now following his path, while almost half of the women of that community has supposedly abandoned the practice. Social pressure and religious arguments are often the two main barriers to the eradication of FGM. Chloe Sharrock Irine and Monika – El Bashra, Upper Egypt Irine comes from a small Coptic village in Upper Egypt. She was circumcised one day after school, when she was 12 years old. She doesn’t have much memories of it, but says she’s still deeply traumatized by the violence of the event. She got married at a young age, and gave birth to six kids. Two of them died during the delivery. Consequences of FGM are indeed going way beyond psychological trauma, since obstetrical complications can occur to the victims, such as post-partum hemorrhage, need of episiotomy, tearing of the tissues or flesh, while the rate of death among new born babies is higher. After the birth of her first daughter, she had long discussions with her husband about FGM. « He actually supported my choice, I think he understood it didn’t have anything to do with religion and could only arm Moneka. His family, however, didn’t accept our choice, and still pressure us today. » Chloe Sharrock Sohyl et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mohamed et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mahmoud et sa mère Denis Dailleux Sarwat et sa mère Denis Dailleux Shaban et sa mère Denis Dailleux Ahmed et sa mère Denis Dailleux Hussein et sa mère Denis Dailleux Michael et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mahmoud et sa mère Denis Dailleux Amr, Mohamed et leur mère Denis Dailleux Emad et sa mère Denis Dailleux Ramy et sa mère Denis Dailleux Islam et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mahmoud et sa mère Denis Dailleux Bilal et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mohamed et sa mère Denis Dailleux Boutros et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mohamed et sa mère Denis Dailleux Ali et sa mère Denis Dailleux Aïd et sa mère Denis Dailleux Mahmoud et sa mère Denis Dailleux A 12-year-old girl at a women‘s group in Manial Sheiha, run by the charity Plan Egypt. At the moment she faces a grim future of poverty, underage marriage and female circumcision. Women‘s groups in Egypt hoped the 2011 revolution might bring positive changes to women‘s rights but now fear the opposite is true Gary Calton An anti-government protester yells in defiance as teargas pellets are fired into the crowd by supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood during clashes at Mokattam in Cairo Gary Calton Anti-government protesters pick their way through a dust storm en route to a demonstration outside the Muslim Brotherhood HQ in a housing district at Mokattam Gary Calton Anti-government protesters run as shots ring out and missiles fly during an ambush on the marchers by supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood. The demonstrators were on their way to join a bigger protest outside the Muslim Brotherhood‘s new HQ in Mokattam Gary Calton Anti-government supporters clash with Muslim Brotherhood supporters (in foreground) during a demonstration at the Brotherhood Mokattam HQ Gary Calton As clashes between the two sides begin to break out near Mokattam mosque, anti-government protesters pick up stones to hurl at the opposing crowds Gary Calton Cairo‘s Manial Sheiha district Gary Calton Daily life in Manial Sheiha Gary Calton For the wealthier women of Cairo marriage comes later but they fear the scrapping of the legal marriage limit will start to affect their lives and rights too. A newly married couple wait to have their wedding photographs taken in a studio in Giza Gary Calton Ice-cream seller in Manial Sheiha. Few women are allowed out of their houses without their husband‘s permission and behind many doors are dozens of tragic tales of young women whose lives have been destroyed by the effects of early marriage. Gary Calton Inside the Ezbet Khairallah district. Young women are scared that their rights will be stripped away by conservative forces in post-revolution Egypt Gary Calton Karema, 19, who was forced to undergo female genital circumcision aged 13. Her mother bribed a doctor to perform the procedure without anaesthetic. Although both FGM and underage marriage are presently illegal, they are widespread across the country. An estimated three quarters of females aged from 12 upwards have been subjected to FGM. The present government has indicated FGM is a „family matter“ and proposes to reduce the legal age of marriage from 18 to 13 Gary Calton Rasmia Ahmed Emam was 17 when she was married to a 50-year-old stranger. Not an uncommon fate for an Egyptian woman but Rasmia‘s family had been conned. She had been married to a Saudi sex tourist who left her and the country after two weeks. „My life is over. Everyone thinks I am a prostitute and my only option in life is to become one. But I will not do that.“ Gary Calton Wedding dresses in a store in Giza are only for wealthier families who can afford to allow their daughters to marry a little later although there is still enormous pressure on girls to marry young and to think of a life inside the home rather than outside of it Gary Calton Browse All Browse by Tag Search Items Browse Map of 5 Sort by: TitleCreatorDate Added Output Formats atom, dcmes-xml, json, omeka-xml, rss2
