A story through translation

Upon piling out of our van we were bombarded with children, mostly boys, who were using straws to drink a brown liquid out plastic bags. “Hi, hi they squealed.” One of them asked my name, English? Arabic? I don’t remember. When I said “Lily,” the gang of them started following me and repeating it, I asked them what they were drinking and they insistently thrust their drinks at me.

The 11 or so others and I, led by Cynthia, were looking for the entrance of a knitting factory involved with Sohbeit Kheir Organization, the NGO we’re working with. We were there to conduct interviews with women workers, the manager and organize products to put on a website to expand their markets and raise awareness about the women, their plight, goals and potential.

A couple women walked out of a nondescript building, shooed the boys away and led us in.

We shuffled into a fair-sized room filled with around 15 tables with built in sewing machines. Women, mostly middle aged and clad in long dresses and head scarves, sat sewing at about half of them. After breaking ourselves into groups—cataloguing, photographing and interviewing, we got to work.

Our first interviewee, the male manager, Ye Hia (sp) stood behind a big table to the side. He spoke little English, though more than every women, so Mary translated mine and others’ question.

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We are still waiting to interview Yesmeena, but here is the story as I currently understand it. Going in, we didn’t know she founded the enterprise

Around 12 years ago two widowed women, Hagga Nasra and Om Amr, needed a way to provide for their children. As residents of the traditional Islamic community ?? where the unemployment rate is estimated at 34 percent, there is no running water or sewage system and illiteracy rates are above 90 percent, finding a way to make a living was no easy prospect.

When Yasmeena, a leader in the non governmental organization Sohbet Kheir, visited the community and heard the window’s plight she decided to help. She saw potential when Hagga Nasra transformed a piece of fabric into a beautiful tablecloth before her eyes. She obtained space for the women to work in, provided two sewing machines and fabric. Hagga Nasra and Om Amr got to work crafting tablecloths, hot mitts and other kitchen ware.

In the small community word of the opportunity spread quickly. Other widows, in need of an acceptable way to make a living, trickled in eager to work. Yasmeen/SKO?? paid for their training, supplied materials and machines. In 2001 the workshop expanded its focus and the women began sewing dresses and beach-ware targeted at female tourists. The products are sold on beaches and stores in Zamalek, Maadi and soon Fustandt.

At first the women were given an allowance, as the factory grew they were paid according to how much they produced, dictated in part by demand. Yasmeena, who travels a lot, brings back ideas and patterns which the women “Egyptianize.”

Ye Hia, the current manager, said the women can fill any orders and the project can grow and invigorate the community. Currently women desperate for work are being turned away because of lack of space and funds for machines.

In addition to producing dresses and kitchen ware, the women take special orders. For example the 15 women recently sewed 2,000 uniforms for Qasrel 3ainy, the biggest hospital in Cairo.

In the future they hope to expand their markets further by reaching international audience. The women pride themselves on their work and independence. Ye Hia stressed they are not a charity and not looking for sponsors, rather they are a self sustaining enterprise looking to grow reinvest and be an asset to its community. Through the work they’re doing, Ye Hia said, the women creating a name for themselves and providing a future for their children.

After about half an hour of questioning we asked to speak with Hagga Nasra. Ye Hia pointed to a smiling old women sewing near the door. Hagra Nasra, who was about 2/3 my height, insisted we interview her in the office. We followed her to a teensy room only half of us fit in. An old desktop computer, opened to an excel spreadsheet with Arabic words and mixed numerals, took up most of the room.

I took out the video camera and stood in the entrance balancing questions with getting a decent shot with poor lighting and little space and other women nearby who refused to be on camera.

During the interview Hagga Nasra smiled and looked curiously at us. She laughed and later had tears in her eyes. I attempted Arabic here and there, understood a word or two and mostly relied on Mary.

Hopefully today, we will finish the history, mission, Hagga Nasra’s story and the products and give it other students putting together the website. I’ll link it when it’s up.

I’m still sorting out the experience. So much happens here; there’s hardly time to process it all. For one, I know I was a bit controlling about the whole thing. The nine of us responsible for the knitting factory met prior to going and I felt my journalism side kicking in….

Being there, squinting at the faces, trying to pick up any words I could, I realized, once again, how important knowing languages is to me. Wherever I am, I hate relying on others, however much I like them, to do things for me, especially speaking and interpreting. At times Ye Hia and Hagga Nasra spoke for five minutes with out pausing. Women spoke among themselves, and said words to us. I asked to take a picture of one and she said no.

There was so much going on beyond my reach.

I can’t tell if I’m over-complicating something quite straight forward and practical or reaching to understand a different systems and way of life.

I don’t know these women, they’re not my grandmothers or teachers, they don’t live down the street. I don’t know what they expected from life or how they feel about what they got.

All of them live walking distance from the factory. They come in wearing shawls and long dresses to craft revealing, western-style-wear out of stretchy, flowery fabric. Sullivan would freak if we wore such clothes in Cairo. If these modest women dream of wearing their products I don’t know. When I asked what they were like on the way there someone compared the dresses to Forever 21s, albeit handmade.

While this is providing the women with a trade, a community, hope and independence, I have so many questions about it….

There is so much context we are missing. Ye Hia said projects like the knitting factory are common….