A woman from Egypt had to disguise as a man for 43 years to provide for her family
In Egypt a woman have been disguising as a man to work and earn for the family as her husband died before the birth of their daughter. On Tuesday, March 17, 2015, the 64-year old Sisa Abu Daooh was awarded by the government of Luxor as “the breadwinner mother”.
The courageous mother and grandmother has dedicated her life to her daughter and grandchildren doing men’s work for 43 years. Her husband died when Daooh was pregnant. When the baby girl was born the woman was left without any income. She could not find any job as her local culture was opposed the working women. However, the brave mother found the way out.
She put on men’s clothes and went to the street where she has been polishing shoes and making bricks. Hardships and deprivations seemed to be over when Daooh could marry her daughter to a man. But this was just a break. The daughter’s husband soon fell seriously ill and died. In addition to the daughter the woman now had to take care of her minor grandchildren.
“I preferred working in hard labor like lifting bricks and cement bags and cleaning shoes to begging in the streets in order to earn a living for myself and for my daughter and her children,” Sisa Abu Daooh tells her life story.
In order not to be recognized by local people, the ideal mother has been going to work to other villages. Her will and aspiration to work and earn have always be driven by the eternal boundless feeling of love for her children. Her strong character has become stronger among the men with whom she worked as an complete equal. No one could ever even get a hint that it was a woman working on constructions sites, carrying heavy materials and doing hard men’s work.
Nowadays Sisa Abu Daooh continues just with polishing shoes on the road. She says it gives her “a decent income” that is enough to maintain the family. What really astonishes about this ideal mother is that she has never complained for the situation in which she has had to go through. Moreover she expresses gratitude to all the people who had helped he and her family.