388
CAIRO TO DAMASCUS
"Men like me are frustrated," he went on, with the same
bitterness. "We know there is some good in the West just as
there is some good in the East. But we cannot say this. The
government is made up of backward politicians who are not
even Arabs, but Turks, Kurds, Cherkez [Circassians from
the Caucasus]. They have neither the soul nor the culture of an
Arab. They are so fanatic that they do not even like us to speak
a foreign language.
"We need a social revolution to overcome our curses,"
Sabaa went on. "Otherwise we are condemned to be ruled by
foreigners, by fanatics, condemned to be backward, condemned, condemned. . . ." He spat out the words. "There is
no truth in Damascus. There is much hypocrisy. Those who
say 'speak the truth' are the first liars of Damascus. Those who
say 'keep pure' are the first to go to bad women. . . . The
men here are hungry for women," he went on earnestly. "I
myself would like to meet one. But it is very difficult to meet
one when she wears a veil: she is afraid to speak to a stranger.
It is haram. It is not pure, and she can be punished for it. And
every woman is hungry for man. When I see a woman my
eyes say: 'I am dying to meet you.' And the girl shows the
same picture in her face, but I don't dare speak to her, and
she does not dare speak to me. . . . Damascus is a small city.
There are no secrets. When I see a man talking to a strange
woman, I tell my friends: 'I saw this man talking with this
woman in secret.'"
"Why do you bother to do that?" I asked, curiously.
"Because I am hungry for the woman myself. I am proud
to talk against her before my friends. I am hungry, very
hungry, and because I cannot have her I do not want them to
have her for themselves."
"But they may be talking innocently. Why condemn them
both?"
"It is true they may not speak evil the first time. But they
will meet again. No man would want to marry a woman who