In October of 1933, Lotfia El Nadi became the first Egyptian female to receive an aviation license. Yesterday Google Doodle celebrated the 107th birthday of this extraordinary woman whose achievements paved the way for women in Egypt and the Arab region to enter the world of aviation. Until this day, Arab female pilots look up to her as an idol and a symbol of gender equality and liberation. For a long time, before Egypt even had its own airport, El Nadi was infatuated with the idea of flying. It appealed to her because it represented the freedom and liberation that she and many young women of her time were deprived of. “When something is excessive it turns to its opposite. The excessive pressure forced upon me made me love freedom”, she said in the documentary made about her life, called Take off from the Sand. At that time a lot of female pilots were emerging in Western societies. El Nadi firmly believed that Arab women were not inferior to them and set out to prove it by joining the newly founded school for aviation. The school was created in 1932 as part…
