International Women's Day: The rough lives of beauty parlour employees

Christian women make up much of the workforce in salons.

KARACHI:

At 10:00 am, Bushra Mehmood steps out from her rickety house in Korangi to head for work in DHA’s Khadda market. A black chaddar over her stout body, she tries to ignore unwanted touching in the bus, the ogling and stares by passersby near her workplace and the taunts from her family when she gets back home.

For this Christian woman who works all day in a beauty parlour to groom and beautify others, life is plain, ugly and messy.

“Just this morning a man physically harassed me when I was getting off the bus,” said Mehmood with a small smile, shrugging off the incident as part of her daily routine.

What really breaks her heart is the taunts from her brothers when she reaches home at 10:00 pm, after changing two buses. “They look at me with disgust, asking if I went on a date with someone,” Mehmood said while styling the hair of a client, a woman in her forties, who loudly snickered.

Financial constraints and a lack of education land many Punjabi Christian women in parlours, where they scrub dirt from smelly feet, remove unwanted hair from places they’d rather not touch and stand for hours curling dirty hair.

Mehmood, who was 17 when she first left home to support her family, is now 25 and the only bread earner of her six siblings and a widow mother. Her brothers have not been able to get decent jobs, leaving the entire household dependent on her Rs5,000 salary.

“We have no money to educate ourselves. When I was young, I wanted to be a teacher to teach the illiterate.”

Shazia Boota Masih, another Christian working at the same parlour, believes that their religion plays a vital role in handing down their fate. “Girls only get jobs at parlours and men as sweepers. Now, no one wants to study,” she says bitterly.

Her owner rudely interrupts: “These girls are uneducated. They can’t get jobs anywhere. Our Muslim girls work in offices.” Masih puts her hands on her back: the long hours and continuous standing give her severe backaches.

At another parlour down the road, a Christian worker Ritu blurts: “We don’t get a day off on Christmas. On our big day, we come in the mornings to work when we should be in church.”

Naseem, who works at a beauty parlour on Tariq Road, has been in the profession for seven years. “Customers, especially the old ones, scream and shout at us. But we can’t answer them back. I hate it when they insult but I don’t let my anger consume me.”

Taranum Khan of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan points out that Christians are mostly hired in beauty parlours for waxing services.

“It is unfortunate that people think that this ‘dirty’ work, such as body waxing, cannot be done by Muslims because it is impure. Since Christians are employed as sweepers and sanitary workers, in parlours their women do waxing services.” She says that women in beauty parlours, especially Christians, do not get respect and appreciation for the work they do. “If it wasn’t for these women, the ones with bushy eyebrows or messy hair would never leave their home.”

To this, Boota says, “I don’t want to do bikini waxes. But I get Rs30 extra for this waxing, and for me, every penny counts.”

All is not gloomy for these women. For one thing, they get to dress up in trendy clothes, which they are often not allowed to do at home. Most importantly, they are more confident than those who sit at home. “I have become independent and confident. I raise my voice when I feel I am being treated unfairly. I love working,” said Naseem.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 8^th, 2012.