Snippets of what I've seen and heard about women here

*Women officers in skirts not pants can be seen on corners directing traffic. There is always a male officer with them.

*A pretty and tiny woman in a veil and jeans waited on us at a Lebanese restaurant downtown. We were a table of professional people including a university professor. While we were ordering drinks he stared at her and said you are so pretty. Merci, she said. Then he didn't let it go. Like a little flower with the petals just opening he went on. Del and I just looked at each other.

*Our translator Nadir came into the office laughing about an incident on the bus coming in from Blida. A woman in a hajib took offense at what she perceived as a young man staring at her. "What," she said to him, "do you want to have sex with me?" He stuttered an apology and she faced him again, "What?" An old man standing up in the aisle then began telling her to quiet down, whereupon the rest of the bus told HIM to quiet down that it was none of his business."

*Some women take the veil by choice and others are forced into it by brothers and fathers. It is common here to negotiate at the time of an engagement whether the future husband will insist on covering.

*Women in hajibs smoking in public -- but discreetly in obscure cafes -- leaning down behind tables for a puff is rather a shocking sight, I'm told, though on this side of the cultural divide good in a subversive way. I am keeping my eye out for this.