The vastness of the Sinai desert is juxtaposed with the small and hidden spaces that Bedouin women hold. Yet, when one enters these spaces, one realizes that their inner world stretches across the desert, and represents a deeper, multi-faceted and complex world that intersects with our own world. For Bedouin women, part of their heart is inside their home, and the other part is in the mountains and desert. When I stepped inside Um Yasser’s home, I felt only a part of their hearts that held stories and dreams that were much larger than their space. Sitting beside her daughter, Yosra, and her cousin, it did not take time for the conversations to crystallize and for us to connect through common interests and emotions we hold as women, such as our favourite jewelry, fabrics, scents and Egyptian series and films as Souad Hosni was playing on their television screen. Um Yasser is the first ever Bedouin woman to work as a tour guide on the Sinai Trail – Egypt’s first long-distance hiking trail and the leading Bedouin run hiking trail in the Middle East. I only went hiking trips with…
Keepers of the Mountain: How One Bedouin Woman Is Carving a New Path for Sinai’s Tourism
December 22, 2021
