Sinai, Egypt: Only Four Camels For Our Daughter?

After Abdul asked my daughter’s age, he was quiet for a minute. The sun was going down over the rough craggy hills of the Sinai, washing them in a dark reddish hue. Abdul continued, “Your daughter is very pretty. I can pay four camels.” My first response was Marriage? She’s only 12 years old! but I collected my composure and asked, “Why only four?” “Four is a good price,” he said, “I am poor Bedouin man.” I wasn’t sure if Abdul was serious or just playing with me, nevertheless, I countered with ten camels, not having any idea if his initial “bride price” was fair or not.

Like most traditions, the “bride price” is rooted in economics. Bedouin boys have traditionally stayed with their family and tended goats and camels or helped in the family business and girls were married off to join a new family. Girls offered more than cooking and cleaning in terms of economic value…they had the ability to generate more boys, thus more laborers who could work for the receiving family. It made economic sense to be compensated for this loss. In addition to labor and food, the camel is a medium of exchange and it's appropriate that camels would be the basis of the “bride price.”

This was all interesting, but what I was dying to know was had I been insulted? Is four a good price? We knew from our visit to the Birqash camel market outside Cairo that a large camel could be bought for $700 (see Cairo Camel Market blog post), so that would put the monetary value of my daughter at $2,800. Later Internet research told me that anywhere between 2 and 20 camels is customary for the Bedouin but, most importantly, it depends on the potential groom’s ability to pay.

Bedouin people have been traditionally poor, but few live like their ancestors these days, especially those who are guiding tourists for a living. Abdul’s ancestors, those of the Muzeina clan, lived in camel- or goat-hair tents and raised livestock, hunted and raided their neighboring tribes. Bedouins of the Sinai are going through dramatic changes and are forced to rapidly adapt to a new way of life due also to the impact of tourism. Since the rise of Islam, Bedouins have acted as 'tourist" guides, leading pilgrims across the Sinai to places of worship: Mecca, St. Catherine’s Monastery and Jerusalem. The Sinai Bedouins are split into roughly 10 tribes. The oldest tribes inhabiting the Sinai desert are the Aleigat and the Sawalha sharing a territory between Suez and Al Tor reaching into the high mountain region around Wadi Feiran and Sarabit el Khadem. For the last 500 years the Muzeina tribe occupies the territory from around St. Catherine to the Gulf of Suez and from Al Tor covering the southern Sinai from Sharm el Sheikh to Nuweiba. The Tarabin Bedouins are located just north of Nuweiba and arrived to Sinai some 300 years ago.

We sat a while longer enjoying the view of Dahab, a fishing village turned into a scuba diving haven for backpackers, and watched the distant lights of Saudi Arabia across the Gulf of Aqaba. We walked over to where we’d have dinner and Abdul brewed us some strong, sweet mint Bedouin tea as he made dinner. Dinner was roast chicken, vegetable stew, rice, unleavened bread and a tasty taboulleh-like salad. Abdul and I didn’t speak again about the camels. He drove us back to our hotel and we tipped him well for his guide services. My wife and I occasionally make jokes about our daughter’s “bride price” but I still wonder, “Had I been insulted?”