Shopping and Salons—Wedding Prep.

Selma came in to my office and said, “Let’s go shopping! All the girls are going. We want to buy clothes for the wedding.” This meant that I could leave the office about 30 minutes early and get an appropriate outfit for the wedding, so I said yes. They said we’d be gone about an hour, but I should have known they were underestimating.  Ten minutes into the trip, I remembered that shopping is not one of my favorite things to do, and I was ready to say yes to any thing I was told to buy. We’d pop into one shop, and I’d see a thobe in an acceptable color (a thobe is a long piece of cloth like a sari but wrapped differently), and I’d say, “I like that one.” Then I’d be informed that it was for “big” women, not me. Does that mean “big” as in “old” or “big” as in “tall” or “big” as in “plus size”? I never figured it out. Eventually we landed on a piece of cloth that met with everyone’s approval, and I grabbed at the chance to be done, so I accepted. I thought we were done, but that was only the beginning.

I amused myself by admiring other merchandise. Observe the social-media abaya (long black dress for conservative girls). That Zuckerberg guy is working the advertising here in Khartoum.

 

Horrible photo of
 inside the market

First, we had to go get that piece of cloth chopped down to a length appropriate for my miserable size (too young, too short, or too skinny—still don’t know) and hemmed. Then the real hunt began—I had to get appropriate clothes to wear UNDER the thobe. At this point, the girls began to realize just how helpless I am.  I suggested just wearing a white tank top and leggings under it—that suggestion was met with horrified looks. White? With a green and gold sparkly thobe? Impossible. Cease to think it. It can ONLY be warn with a gold or green top over a black or olive-colored skirt (also, this shopping excursion was totally useful as a refresher course for the appropriate Arabic names for various shades of colors). And now that we had specifics in mind, our search became nearly impossible. I just gave up and followed them around as they imperiously informed shop-keepers throughout the entire market of our needs. They were going to make me buy shoes, but I was kind of having fun horrifying them with my terrible fashion sense by suggesting various types of shoes that I saw, ranging from comfortable ones that I probably would wear even though they wouldn’t match at all to terrifically ugly ones that I would never wear that would also not match at all. They gave up on me for the shoes. But I was not allowed to leave the dang market until I had bought an appropriate skirt (which no one will see anyway, since it will be under the those).

Dumb thobe photo of me

We rode home in a Bajaj because those guys are EVERYWHERE

After buying appropriate clothes, the next important thing to do is go to the salon. Maybe because we went on Thursday afternoon (their equivalent of Friday afternoon, i.e. weekend party preparation time) or maybe because it is a popular place, but that salon was packed to the gills. Women were fluttering around getting henna applied to their hands and feet and having their hair brushed and oiled and braided and henna-tattooing eyebrows on and applying extra slimy facial goo. I caused a stir as the lone foreign woman getting some appropriate black hair dye (what they use for henna tattoos here) drawn all over my hands. I also let them thread all the unwanted hair off my face, which amazed them as they don’t really have much extra hair anywhere, lucky ladies…

It PEELS off--better than nail polish. Definitely as good as peeling strips of dried glue
off your hand, if I remember correctly from the last time I did crafts ( 20+ years ago)

  

The scariest thing was the gas burner in the middle of the room, heating all the hair utensils—curling irons and straighteners. True confession time: I have never owned a curling iron because I have never successfully used one on myself or anyone/thing else. Although, I can cleverly snap it open and closed like a crocodile devouring its prey (and it occurs to me suddenly that maybe THIS is why I associate curling irons with pain and death? Or maybe it is being accidentally burned by them when Mom used to insist on curling my hair for church?). Forget straighteners. I won’t even pretend I know what to do with those, not that my hair needs help being straight… One time I did buy these travel hot rollers because, well, they were TRAVEL SIZE (that is an almost irresistible trait that can convince me to buy things I would never need because-hey!-they fit in my suitcase, so why not?). After several months of using them exactly NEVER times, I gave them to my sister who is not mystified by metal pins that fit somehow over plastic cylinders of electric heat death.  So, I no longer had something extra I had to fit in my suitcase (travel size or not) and she had some travel-sizeable hair accessories that she could fit in her suitcase—win/win. Anyway, these ladies were using some serious fire-powered hair tools that scared the crap out of me. It really terrifies me to see steam rising off people’s hair. I just don’t see how that can be OK.  Hair is flammable, right? At least no one caught on fire on my watch. I even got a few sneaky photos of the whole set-up for you, dear readers. And getting photos in a salon full of Arab women, terrified of being accidentally seen on someone’s social media and then snagged and put in a pornographic film somewhere on the internet, is not an easy feat. But I did it. See for yourself.

 

So, properly henna-ed, depilatoried, and outfitted in a sparkly thobe, I was considered wedding-ready. Just got to drive 5 hours to get there…

Me, admiring the finished product in the car on the way to the wedding

Wedding picture preview