Groom-less bride takes Cairo by storm

Samah Hamdi causes viral frenzy, featuring her in a wedding dress, questions stigma attached to unmarried women

It’s unlikely that you will come across an unwedded woman clad in a wedding dress, casually taking a stroll down your neighbourhood. But Egyptians have been witnessing what most haven’t. A young unwed Egyptian woman, dressed in a white wedding gown, has been walking through the streets of Cairo. But she is not devoid of purpose. She has embarked upon the mission of putting an end to the silence over, and breaking free of, the stigma that casts marriage as a dominant role for women to take up in Egypt, reported Al-Arabiya News.

In a viral, award-winning video, Samah Hamdi, 27, is seen going through her real-life daily routine, from walking down the street and taking the subway, to arriving at her office, to window shopping, to meeting up with friends at a restaurant — all in wedding attire, reported Ahram Online.

The unmarried Hamdi was “tired of being put in a pigeonhole by her family.” She was allegedly pestered by her family over how she is ‘late’ for marriage. “I just want to appear in the way my family and mother, a microcosm of society, have always pushed to see me in,” Hamdi, an interior designer who is pursuing a Master’s degree in performance arts, was quoted as saying.

According to statistics from the state’s survey agency in 2011, almost nine million Egyptians had reached the age of 33 without getting married, nearly half of whom are women. “[Society] believes that any other women’s plans or aspirations should serve that end: become a doctor or pursue a Master’s degree so you can land a doctor or a better prospective groom; you dress this way so you appeal to and attract men, etc,” Hamdi said.

She regretfully admits that societal norms dictate if one isn’t married, one is flawed. “No matter how accomplished you are, it won’t count if you aren’t married or haven’t undertaken the mission you were purportedly created for: getting married and establishing a family,” she lamented.



Her video has certainly been an eyebrow-raiser for many passersby. While some were seen whispering about the bride whose groom seemed to have run away; others took pictures of her. Vendors called her a zaffa (a musical performance staged before the entrance of the bride in common wedding ceremony), and men jeered her with sexual innuendos. Hamdi has even faced insults within her own family over the project. Her mother thinks her daughter, whom she views as a ‘spinster’, played a role in the video which she has “failed to accomplish in real life.”

But undeterred, Hamdi feels her biggest accomplishment has been to push young women of her age into coming forward, reconsidering marital stereotypes of women, and speaking out against them. Her project came to light when it was shown in the Cairo Opera House’s ‘25th Salon of Young Artists’ in November last year. There was a screening of the video at the event, with photos displayed on an adjoining wall, coupled with twin-texts representing Hamdi’s replies to the negative conventional image of unmarried women. The video art project comprises a five-minute-long video and 56 photographs, which were shot in three days over a span of almost a year. The project won the Ahmed Basiouny prize for video installation.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 20^th,  2015.

Like Life & Style on Facebook, follow @ETLifeandStyle on Twitter for the latest in fashion, gossip and entertainment.