A Night With The Bedouin

We met the Bedouin boys at 6pm, at Mohammed’s house in the Bedouin village. We had brought with us a 1litre bottle of vodka I had gotten duty free and two bottles of juice. When we got there Mohammad had told us that he was convinced we wouldn’t show up, he hugged and kissed Molly when she showed him the vodka. We sat around the table at Mohammed’s having a pre-drink when his older brother came in. His brother asked for a drink so without thinking I grabbed a cup and lifted the vodka from my backpack. It will take me a long time to forget the death-stare his brother gave me before he started shouting at Mohammed in Arabic and stormed out of the room.

Vodka and Muslims… of course! How stupid of me! Mohammed and Lost were so unapologetic about their drinking that I had forgotten where we were. I begged Mohammed to forgive me for outing his drinking habits to his now very angry brother. Mohammed said it was ok but he was silent and flushed and I knew that maybe now he was ok but that he would have more hostility to deal with later.

We got a ride to the local shop for supplies with Lost’s 14-year-old brother. When we piled in the back of his Ute I sat on something cold and hard but didn’t know what it was so I shrugged it off.

We waited out the front of the store for the keeper to return from the local Mosque: “He prayers all the time” Mohammed moaned “I don’t know what for!” We watched as the boys stormed around the tiny shop, picking up frozen chicken and a dozen potatoes and tomatoes from a very saggy, sad looking pile of vegetables. Lost’s brother waited outside to drop us back to Mohammed’s house but on the way back Lost and his brother had an argument. We sat quietly in the back having no idea what was going on.

When we got out of the Ute again, I saw that the cold, hard thing we had been sitting on was a semi-automatic and later Lost explained that they had a fight because his brother was off his head on drugs: pills.

We waited for another ride to take us out to the desert, this time we sat in the tray of the Ute and I allowed myself to get lost in the sensation of the wind in my hair as the sun set around us and we drove further and further away from the lights of the town into the dark wild.

Molly was getting nervous. I tried to absorb the still of the desert around us, to forget for a minute and allow the space to take me away. But my attempts to get lost were obstructed by the sharp pinching feeling of Molly’s claws digging into my arms. She was trying to communicate with her eyes and her claws. I knew what she was saying, but I wanted to ignore her. The longer we drove the further and further we got, not just from the noise of the city but also from safety. I knew that she was right to be apprehensive. I knew that what we were doing was stupid, reckless and dangerous. We didn’t have phones, we didn’t have weapons, no one knew where we were, and we didn’t even know where we were. But we had each other, and for me that was enough security.

When the driver eventually dropped us off the boys collected kindle and made a fire. They pulled blankets out of their bags and made beds for us to lie on. Molly and I peeled the potatoes “don’t let go of that knife” she ordered me. Molly poured the drinks for us, making herself and I very weak drinks so that we wouldn’t lose control if we found ourselves in trouble.

“I have Xanax in the backpack” she whispered to me “if we need to slip it in their drinks we can… two in each drink should knock them out!”

“We are not drugging them!” I protested, but secretly I thought about the logistics of it, how I could do it unnoticed and how long it would take for the effects to kick in.

The boys did everything to try to sit between us and then to try to separate us. It was clear they wanted sex. It was even clearer that Molly wanted to get out of there.

“Not everyone wants to rape you,” I told her, trying to reassure her and calm her down… though maybe these two boys did, I couldn’t be certain.

I told her we would eat dinner with them then demand that they call a car and take us back to town. I wanted to be the brave strong one, but really I had no idea if there was even phone reception out there. I didn’t have a plan B.

We clambered in the dark to the highest point and sat to look out at the desert around us while our dinner of chicken and potatoes slowly cooked on the fire. Despite the potential risk we were facing I managed to enjoy a moment of absolute calm.

We got ourselves in a bad situation, as women, losing complete control over the situation. We were in the middle of nowhere with men we knew were trying to sleep with us. I still believed that although sleazy the guys we were with were not violent and thus not dangerous… perhaps I was being naive.

Molly was getting visibly more agitated and continued to glare at me and pinch me when she had the chance. The boys could tell we wanted to leave: “If we wanted to rape you we’d just rape you” Mohammed came right out and said to her. He then got her in a headlock and pretended to strangle her. Although he was being playful his actions confirmed that he was ignorant to how vulnerable she was feeling. Either that or he did know and wanted to show us just how vulnerable we were.

“You think we are bad people! We are trying to show you a good time. Why don’t you trust us? We have done nothing bad to you, and yet you think we are bad people.”

I was torn. If they really did have the purest of intentions then we were being incredibly rude. But then, why did I care if we were being rude? We are women, and tourists and both make us naturally very vulnerable. But more so I felt a loyalty to Molly and a need to protect her. I am not anxious by nature, I am generally too trusting and so although I had no doubt we were in a less-than ideal situation I was not actually fearful for our safety. But I also knew that if something did happen to her it would be my fault for carelessly leading us out there.

We ate dinner and almost straight after I asked Mohammed to call us a lift. He said that he did. He had walked off at the end of the meal for five minutes, I assumed he was peeing but he told us that he had gone to a high point to call us a ride.

We waited impatiently and awkwardly for fifteen minutes.

“You didn’t really call did you?” I accused Mohammed. To prove me wrong he led me back up the hill. I hoped that Molly would be ok alone with Lost, but I didn’t feel like I had a choice but to leave her there. I also know how loud she screams and figured I’d hear her if he tried something.

Mohammed’s ride answered the phone, he asked him to speak in English and tell me when he’d be here to pick us up.

Although it is possible that Mohammed hadn’t called a ride before then I also felt a little bit guilty: ‘What if he was a really good guy and it was all innocent?’ I couldn’t help but continually ask myself.

After another fifteen minutes we saw the headlights on the horizon. Our ride was approaching. At first I felt relief, until the alternative struck me… I don’t know who or what is in that car! What if it was their friends? Or their high brother with his semi-automatic? The potential seriousness of the situation hit me deep in my stomach… ‘Anything could happen in the next hour… maybe my last hour’ I caught myself thinking.

Latino tunes boomed out from the car and the driver (alone and not ready to pounce on us) got out and helped us load the Ute. The boys wanted to dance. By this time Molly was not attempting to hide her disdain and told them in no uncertain terms that it was time to go.

I had felt relief as soon as the vehicle and the Latino music had found us, but I don’t think Molly calmed down until we were safe in the hotel room: “That was one of the worst nights of my life!”  she exclaimed!

I once again felt convinced that not everyone wanted to hurt or rape us, but I also made a silent pledge that night that I wouldn’t lead her into another dangerous situation. Getting myself in trouble is one thing, but getting someone else hurt would be unforgivable.