Maha Gargash
An Etihad Airways stopover on a recent flight from Asia to Europe prompted the third destination in my journey to read the world: the United Arab Emirates. Although not available in Singapore, The Sand Fish was widely available at bookstores, tourist shops, and even at some newsagents in the UAE. I picked up my copy as I exited the airport into the dusty haze of Abu Dhabi and made my way to sand dunes of the interior.
As the book was originally written in English, I had the impression that The Sand Fish was intended for outsiders looking in. In the afterword, the author states that this was indeed her intent, but not as I might have suspected, for foreigners reading about Dubai. The discovery of oil brought such monumental and rapid changes the UAE, that the 1950s world described in the book is as foreign to Emiratis today as it is to armchair readers anywhere.
As the book was originally written in English, I had the impression that The Sand Fish was intended for outsiders looking in. In the afterword, the author states that this was indeed her intent, but not as I might have suspected, for foreigners reading about Dubai. The discovery of oil brought such monumental and rapid changes the UAE, that the 1950s world described in the book is as foreign to Emiratis today as it is to armchair readers anywhere.
The Sand Fish proved an interesting reading experience as I found the protagonist rather unlikable. I kept waiting for Noora to save herself from herself in a classic (Western) narrative of self-discovery and emancipation. But, of course, the whole point of reading the world is to get away from the tried-and-tested structures of well-rutted literary paths and be exposed to different ways of being. Looking back on Noora's tale, I recognise that self-discovery and emancipation would have been in short supply for an uneducated woman in 1950s Arabia. Such story simply would not have rung true. With that realisation, the veil dropped – as it were – and The Sand Fish offered an beguiling insight into Noora's life and lifestyle, and why "unlikable" might have actually been "realistic" instead.
