Mayada, Daughter of Iraq [antikvár]

A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR Distant places have always called me. So when I received an opportunity to travel to one of the most exotic and dangerous parts of the world, I accepted the challenge. I was a young woman in 1978 when I left the United States to work at a royal hospital in Riyadh, where I remained until 1990. While living in Saudi Arabia for twelve years, I developed a strong network of friendships with Saudi women. Through these friendships, I began to understand what it meant to be a woman in a male-dominated society, with little recourse or protection from individual acts of violence and cruelty. Since that first trip I have traveled throughout the Middle East: Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Israel, Palestine, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq and Kuwait. Everywhere I went I would speak to women and children. I would visit the hospitals. I would visit the orphanages. I would attend parties. Thinking back on my success at getting to know the locals, I believe they were as intrigued by me as I was by them.