One must say that the rates of unhappily-ever-after marriages and relationships are rising in Egypt. Recent studies show alarming numbers of official divorce rates; an indication of even more relationships that were not officially broken yet. My divorced friends’ bitter discussions about how irresponsible, insensitive, non-appreciating their ex-s turned out to be after a year or more of marriage made me do some critical thinking about it; is it that people became generally worse? Or perhaps the problem is much deeper than that? ‘Better a man’s shadow than that of a wall’ is an Egyptian proverb encouraging women to get married; it is a social mandate for a woman to be respected and honored through marriage and having children. Finding ‘A’ one rather than ‘The’ one was good enough for most women because their main objective was to settle and have children. Accordingly, a happy marriage to a woman meant settlement and having children to ‘tie the man up’ and keep that man’s ‘shadow’, according to Egyptian proverbs. A loving and caring husband was a plus no doubt, but not having such qualities wasn’t a deal-breaker as long as he was fulfilling his…
