by Shyima Hall
But after I had been with my captors for a couple of years, I had the growing sense that this family had their own troubles. The Dad had been “away” a number of times for lengthy periods, and while nothing specific was said to me, I overheard conversations between family members or servants when they talked about him being in trouble with the law.
“He’s coming home soon,” the cook commented one day.
“She wants a big to-do when he gets home,” added one of the maids.
“That’ll be more work for us, mark my words,” said another.
Just as some of the servants had predicted, when The Dad returned, there was a huge party. There were a lot of people at the party, so he must have had a lot of supporters.
Then there was a day when one of the servants left, then another. A short while later The Mom and the kids began packing their things, and I realized they were moving away because of work or personal trouble The Dad had. These goings-on were a major change from the sameness of my days, and I watched out of the corner of my eye with avid interest. I was excited! We were down to just a few servants who were helping close up the house. Could this possibly mean I was going home? The thought was exhilarating; I barely dared to think about it.
I couldn’t wait to see my family—especially my baby sister and my other siblings. It seemed like an eternity since I had last seen them. I didn’t know if my family still lived in the same apartment, but I didn’t care. If I could be with my family, it didn’t matter if we lived in a hole in the ground.
One day not long after that The Mom said, “Your parents are coming tomorrow.” I was so eager to see them! When my mother came, she gave me a hug, but both she and my dad arrived with cautious expressions on their faces. We all went right into the kitchen where The Mom said, “She is not yet done paying off her sister’s debt. Our family is moving to the United States, and we need to bring one servant with us. That person will be the girl.”
The girl, of course, was me. I had no concept of what this meant. I was ten years old, but I had never been to school. I didn’t know what the United States was, or where it was. For all I knew it could have been a two-hour car ride away. But the distance didn’t matter. I was devastated that I had to stay with my captors. Most of the other people who had worked or lived in the house had gone home to their families. Why couldn’t I go too?
I was quite apprehensive about going to the United States. The only thing I had seen of it had been on the news. I didn’t understand that it was another country, but I did realize that it was different from where I was now. Over the years my captors and their family and friends had often said what a bad place the US was, and I wondered with some unease why we were going there.
The Mom then handed my parents a pile of paperwork. “We will be gone only a few months,” she said. Then I was asked to leave the room while my parents and The Mom talked further.
• • •
After my parents left, The Mom sent me out to have my hair cut. This was the first time I had ever been to a salon. In fact, I didn’t even know such places existed. The experience was traumatic for me because my hair at this time was quite long and fell almost to my knees. After the haircut my hair came only to the middle of my neck. Then, because my hair is naturally curly, they chemically straightened it—possibly in an attempt to alter my appearance.
I cried and cried because I loved my hair. I didn’t want to have it cut, but the lady at the salon had received instructions from The Mom, which meant I had no options. Back home The Mom saw my tears and told me to “get over it.” Then she dressed me in a shirt that belonged to her youngest daughter. The shirt was red with tiny flowers on it. I never have liked the color red. Finally, I was introduced to a man named Aymen, who said, “Okay, let’s go. Let’s get started.”
I had no idea what he meant. Get started for what? Where were we going? I was nervous when I left with him, but what else could I have done? My parents, The Mom, and now this man had tried to explain what was going to happen, but I had no concept of the ocean, airplanes, different countries, or customs other than what I knew in Egypt. My knowledge of life beyond my own was limited; there was no possibility of me understanding what was going on, other than that I knew I was not going home to be with my family. That’s what I knew for sure, and for me that was the only thing that mattered.
Here I call the man by his first name, Aymen, but I think of him as “The Man That I Came With.” First he took me to his house and showed me his daughter’s room. The house was an average house, and the room was quite generic, as young girls’ rooms go.
“When you get your passport, if you are asked anything, you are to describe this house, this room,” he said. I didn’t even know what a passport was.
Then we went to the home of a man who felt sneaky to me. I can’t say why, exactly, other than that he had a dishonest vibe about him. I can no longer describe what he looked like, but I still sense the extreme unease I felt at this place. Aymen said to the man, “I am the girl’s godfather and am in the process of adopting her.” While the words were news to me, I didn’t believe them. I knew Aymen said them so he could get what he wanted, which apparently was for the man to take my picture—after money changed hands. After some discussion Aymen handed the man more money and we left with a document that I later found out was a three-month visa to the United States. Aymen then took me back to the home of my captors.
Soon after that The Mom and the kids left for the United States. Several weeks passed during which The Dad, an older servant woman, and I were the only people in that huge, huge house. I began to wonder what was going to happen to me.
One day I was surprised to find my parents at the door. My mother packed my meager collection of clothing into a suitcase that had been obtained for me, and she added a photo of my family. Then my mom and dad spent the night with me on the fifth floor. I was thrilled that my mom and dad were there. Maybe we were going to stay together after all!
The next morning I got into a car with them and we went to the airport in Cairo. I had no idea what was going on. I didn’t know I was permanently leaving the palatial home of my captors, or that I was going to fly halfway around the world. I also didn’t have a clue that it would be the last time I ever saw my mom and dad.
Outside the airport, at the drop-off area for departing flights, we met up with Aymen.
“Good-bye,” my mom and dad said. “We love you. We’ll talk on the phone and we’ll see you soon.”
I never knew if my parents intentionally lied to me or if my captors had not told them the truth. I was leaving Egypt forever.
• • •
After a long flight Aymen and I landed in New York City. Aymen had not sat with me; he’d been in the front of the plane and I’d been in one of the last seats in the back. No one had taken the time to explain about flying to me. I had understood the concept. I had seen planes fly overhead before. But I hadn’t known about the change in the cabin pressure as the plane rose into the sky, or that you could hear and feel the wheels clank as they slid back into the body of the plane. I had been bewildered during the flight, but hadn’t known enough to be afraid.
Too, I hadn’t expected the twenty-plus hours of travel time or the enormous size of the endless ocean. I didn’t know how to read and had no toys to bring with me. With nothing to do, I’d soon fallen asleep. The entire experience had been too much to process and I had worn myself out.
After we landed in New York, Aymen and I transferred to another plane. On the way to the new gate, we walked past rows and rows of windows, but I barely noticed them. Instead I was overwhelmed with the bustle of the airport and the odd-sounding language that I later learned was English. And the clothes. I could not believe my eyes. I was astonished that women in the United States wore pants and also that they did not wear head scarves.
What most amazed me, though, were people of Asian descent. I had never seen an Asian person before. I didn’t know any such kind of person existed. I had see
n a few white people on the news when I had walked by one of the many television sets my captors had in Egypt, but the enticing, exotic look of people from China, Japan, and other Asian countries was a thing to wonder about. Being in the airport was like being dropped into an alternate universe, America was that much of a change for me.
Maybe I could have spoken up in the airport. Maybe I could have tugged on the pant leg of one of the scarfless women I passed and told them of my plight. But I spoke no English. I was afraid to leave Aymen’s side because I had been told bad things would happen to my parents, brothers, and sisters if I didn’t obey him. That’s why I did not look for any kind faces in the airport, why I didn’t tug on any pant legs. I was resigned. Resigned to go with the flow, resigned to this new country, resigned to a life of drudgery.
I can look back now and see how terribly wrong everything about my situation was. A ten-year-old girl should be bubbling and full of life. She should have masses of friends, learn important things at school, and be tucked into bed at night by a parent who loves her. I missed out on all of that. I guess it was a good thing that I didn’t have any concept of what was lacking in my life.
The flight from New York to Los Angeles wasn’t as long as the flight from Egypt to New York, but it seemed as if it were. I again sat in the back while Aymen sat in front. When we landed in California on August 3, 2000, I somehow knew we were done with the flying. I was glad of that, as the entire trip had taken almost a full day and night.
I had never learned about time zones, so I was doubly disoriented with jet lag and the change in time. Depending on whether daylight saving time is in effect, Cairo is either nine or ten hours ahead of Los Angeles. The flying time between Cairo and New York is almost twelve hours. The time spent getting to the airport, the two flights, and the wait time between the two flights meant I had been traveling for at least twenty-two hours.
Before we could meet up with The Mom and her oldest daughter, we had to go through customs. There, while we were passing through, a customs official looked at me oddly. He took an extra-long time with my passport and visa before he asked me a question.
Quietly Aymen said to me, “Smile.” I smiled. Later I learned that Aymen had explained to the man that I did not speak or understand English. That much was true. Then he told the official, “I am adopting this girl and taking her to Disneyland.”
I have wondered many times where life might have taken me if that customs official had questioned me, detained me, or sent me back to Cairo. Would I have ended up back with my family? Or would my parents have sent me back to my captors? If so, would my captors have tried again to get me into the United States? Of course I will never have answers to those questions, but for many years I batted those ideas around in my head.
• • •
My captors’ new home was in an exclusive gated community in the city of Irvine, but it was nothing like the home they had left in Egypt. Instead of five floors this stucco home had only two. Instead of many acres, there was only a small lot. Rather than endless bedrooms, this home had only four: the master, a room for the two oldest girls, a room for the twins, and a smaller room for the youngest daughter. I slept in a tiny, windowless storage room in the three-car garage.
My room had a queen-size mattress that sat on a low metal frame. There was no place for my clothes, so they stayed in my suitcase. Because there was no heat or air-conditioning in the room, it was either uncomfortably hot or freezing cold. There was little air circulation, which made it hard to catch my breath, even when I left ajar the door that opened onto the garage. I have never seen any other house with that kind of setup in the garage, and I now wonder if my captors had the room built for me after they purchased the house and before I arrived.
At first there was a light in my tiny room, but after a few months the bulb burned out. I was far too short to replace it. The room was very dark after that. Lying there in the stuffy darkness became a thing for me to dread, and to this day I always leave a light on at night. Total darkness brings back to me those terrible hours I spent in the garage, and those are memories I would rather not have.
The Mom’s relatives, Nebit and her husband, Sefu, lived in a house that was right next door. They had made the trip with my captor family, but there was no room for them in this house. Nebit came over almost every day, and she and The Mom spent a lot of time together, just as they had in Egypt. Nebit and Sefu did not have a servant of their own, so my job was to be sure both houses were kept spotless, as well as being a nanny for the twin boys.
When I first arrived, members of the family, including The Mom and The Dad, were somewhat kind to me. The kids were doing some regular chores, such as keeping their own rooms tidy. I was told that my only job was to clean all of the bathrooms. But what I was supposed to do and the scope of what I actually did were two different things.
In the morning I got up early, before anyone in the family. No one had ever given me an alarm clock, and in Egypt another servant had awakened me. Now I was expected to wake up on my own. I never slept well, but on the rare occasion when I wasn’t up by dawn, one of the twins came to get me.
When I woke on my own, as I almost always did, I usually had to knock on the door that led from the garage to the house, as the family often locked that door at night. Having the door locked made it difficult for me, as I used a bathroom that was just inside the house, next to The Dad’s office. If I had to use the bathroom in the middle of the night, I couldn’t. I had to wait until morning.
Once both twins were up, I ironed the clothes they were going to wear to school that day. I made sure the twins got cleaned up, and then I woke the youngest daughter. After she had chosen her clothes for the day, I ironed those. Then I made their breakfasts—and their lunches—before I sent them out the door to school. It never crossed my mind that I should be going out that door with them. I was Shyima, the stupid girl, the slave.
By then the two older daughters, who were both in high school, would be up. My first words to them each morning were, “What can I do for you?” Then I ironed their clothes and made them a breakfast of coffee, juice, eggs, cereal, and bacon.
By this time I would have been interrupted at least a dozen times. One daughter would claim I hadn’t ironed something right, and the other would ask me to hunt down her purse or her keys.
After the older girls left for school, I started on the downstairs. I first cleaned the family room next to the kitchen, because when The Mom and The Dad finally got up, that was the first place they’d go. The Dad’s office and bathroom were next, followed by two living rooms that no one used. But The Mom made sure I vacuumed and dusted them every day. She often said, “I didn’t pay good money for the furniture to be dusty.”
Right after noon The Mom and The Dad would get up. My first task when that happened was to run The Mom’s bathwater. Then, before the twins got home in the afternoon, I had to pick up, dust, and vacuum four bedrooms and clean Nebit’s house next door. The Mom and Nebit often had women they had met at their mosque over to The Mom’s house. They didn’t do much but chat away in Arabic (The Mom spoke no English and Nebit only a broken version), but when the women came over, everything had to be even more spotless.
The work was never ending. When I was in Egypt, I’d had the help of the other workers, but I was the only worker/slave my captors had brought to the United States. At ten years of age I had responsibility for all of it.
When the twins got home, I got their snacks ready, and because The Mom always wanted me to cook something, I started getting dinner ready. Only on rare occasions did she cook. When dinner was over, when the family was done eating, I could finally eat my single meal of the day.
Then it was time to get the boys ready for bed. I got their pajamas out and turned down their beds that I had made earlier in the day. I even put toothpaste on their toothbrushes. At midnight, long after the family members were asleep, I was still doing dishes and picking up the worst of their mess. Some nights I was up until
two, three, even four in the morning. Then it started over again.
• • •
There were some variations to my routine, however. My captors often had visitors from Egypt. Most were family members, and when they arrived, the kids would double up in their bedrooms to free up space for the guests. Because it was such a long trip, the visitors usually stayed for longer than a weekend. While my captors were happy to see their relatives, it meant that I had that many more people to cook and clean for, that much more mess to pick up, that much more laundry to wash, iron, and dry. I was always glad when visitors left.
Sometimes the kids had friends over, and when that happened, I was told to stay in the kitchen out of sight. At first I thought the family was ashamed of me and didn’t want to be embarrassed by me, but then it dawned on me that my captors knew that here in the United States my position in the household was not acceptable. That was brought home even more when, on occasion, I was told to hide in the pantry. I both liked and hated this bit of downtime, time when I could rest and relax, but I knew that the work I was responsible for still had to be done, knew that every minute I spent hidden away was another minute I would not sleep that night.
Another reason I hated the pantry was because there was no airflow in there. It was hot and stuffy, and I had to work to relax myself so I could breathe.
Even though I didn’t like the time I spent in the pantry, I had a lot of motivation to go in there. At one point The Mom told me that if anyone outside the family or their visitors from Egypt saw me, I would be beaten, my family in Egypt would be beaten, and I would never see my family again. I soon learned to hide myself if others came into the house. Once in a while I didn’t get hidden quickly enough, or I didn’t know someone else was in the house, and a guest caught a glimpse of me. When that happened and people asked who I was, they were told that I was a cousin who was visiting from Egypt.
Despite all this, I was trusted enough to take the boys across the street to a small park. There was a slide and some swings among other playground equipment, and the twins, who were now about seven, had a great time there. I was not allowed to play, however, and instead had to sit on a bench and watch the boys. I wonder if my captors knew how odd that looked. I was ten, but I was small and looked much younger. I was a kid who should have been playing with the other children, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d played.
