This . Manal alsharif why . Tough question. I never thought of writing a book. When i started the movement, i gave a speech. I was invited to give a speech. People cried. People gave me two standing ovations. This never happened in the history of that conference. When i came down the stage, this lady came to me and she said, when are we going to read your story . And i thought, who would ever be interested in reading about my insignificant life . But that really sparked the idea of writing this book. Lamb when was that . Alsharif i gave the speech in 2012 and that is when i started writing it. Lamb where did you give the speech and why . Alsharif it was also a Freedom Forum and it was hosted by human rights foundation. It is based in new york and they invite activists from all around the world to tell their stories of standing against tyrants and standing and fighting for human rights. Lamb lets start from the beginning. Where were you born . Alsharif i am born in mecca in the year of trouble, i call it, which is 1979. Lamb your parents. What are they like . Where were they born . Alsharif yes, mom she is from libya. Thats north africa. She met dad because of faith. She came for hajj and she met my father in mecca. They fell in love. They got married. My father is from mecca. Lamb and what is hajj . Alsharif hajj is a so once in a lifetime, for the muslim who is able, he is required to perform hajj, which is visiting the holy site of mecca and performing certain rituals and that will make your faith complete. Lamb picture on our screen right now of what . What is that . Alsharif that is my hometown, mecca. This is the holy kaaba. One of the rituals we perform, tawaf, seven circles around this holy kaaba. I miss mecca. Lamb and who can go there and why do they go there and how important is it . Alsharif so the kaaba or mecca is for muslims only. So nonmuslims are not allowed to visit the mecca or medina the two holiest cities for the muslims. And so only muslims go there. We go either to perform hajj once in a lifetime or you can go for a visit which is called umrah. Umrah is a small version of hajj that you can do any time of the year and it literally means visit. To visit the holy site of mecca. Lamb do you have any idea how many people have died there at the hajj or in mecca around this this kaaba . Alsharif died . For what . Died from what . Lamb stampedes. Over the years, we have read about them. There are so may there. He did not happen many times. It happened a few times for reasons. I cantned why run or the last time. Over 1000 died. But it is not really often. Security is very strict. Hundreds ofave thousands of people organizing to make it smoother. I did hajj myself as a muslim, as a devout muslim, you have to do it once in your lifetime and it was very small. So accidents happen in big gatherings, when you talk about a million of muslims in a very small city, the size of mecca between mountains. It is a valley between mountains. Accidents happen. Brian what do muslims get out of going there . Whats the purpose . Manal so in islam, you have five pillars of islam and to be full muslims, you have to fulfill these pillars. The first pillar for example is to believe in god. There is no god but allah and the prophet is his and mohammed is his prophet, peace be upon him, and the last pillar of islam is performing hajj. This is why muslims go to mecca to have the full faith to become full muslims i would say. Brian how long do you spend there . Manal for hajj, it depends on how long you want to spend there, but for the hajj days itself, you dont have to be there more than a week, but people like to spend more time in mecca. Brian who pays for it . Manal you pay for it. Everyone pays for himself and we believe that if you pray so when we pray, god accepts our prayers, but in mecca, each prayer you make is worth 100,000. Thats why it is very important for the muslims to go there. It is like you can pray one year and if you go to mecca, you stay there one week. The deeds you get from mecca in mecca, praying in mecca its , being worth years of your lifetime. Brian in your book and the one thing and i read your book, i am not sure, maybe i missed it, but what would you say your muslim faith is today . Manal me . Brian yes. Manal i am muslim. Brian do you believe . Manal yes, of course i believe in god. I pray for prophet mohammed. I am just against radical islam. I am against the orthodox islam that is being taught to us in schools growing up. Manal one of the things that is in your book, every time the prophet is mentioned. The initials pbuh and if you just said it, why do you do that every time you talk about prophet mohammed . Manal its a sign of respect to prophet mohammed that when you mention his name and it is not only for prophet mohammed by the way, so if i mention the name of any prophet, adam, abraham, moses, jesus, we have to mention, peace be upon him. It is asking blessings from god to them for giving us for leading humankind to the faith, to god, to the truth. Brian what is the most important thing to you about being a muslim . Manal a lot of things, but i think the peace that you get being a muslim, the peace that you get believing in god and it is interesting that people have this misconception about islam that it is the ideology faith that we see today and the violence, it is not islam. Islam means submission to god and the first thing when you meet a muslim, they say, peace be upon you. So it is peaceful. It calls for morals. It calls for good deeds. It calls for a lot of good things in any society that they want to have there. What we lost from islam is the preaching and the scholars, they are emphasizing on trivial things that made us lose the essence of islam, which is being in peace with yourself, being in peace with the other, accepting mercy. We lost that, i dont know, somewhere in the when it became political. When it was used as a political weapon. Brian when did that start . Manal throughout history, religion has always been used whether islam, whether any other religion, use desk a political weapon. In europe, the inquisitions and the muslim war when you use one faith against the other and you call them infidel. Any ideology actually use to gain power that is when it becomes dangerous. Brian where do you live now . In saudi. Sed to live i moved to dubai and live five we moved to sydney, australia. Brian that is where you live now . Manal yes, thats where i live now. Brian are you married . Manal i am married with my second husband who is from brazil and we have a boy. Brian and your first marriage ended in divorce and how old is the young man that you had . The boy . Manal abdullah, my first son. Abdullah is right now, he is 11 and my second boy, he will turn three next month. Brian why did you pick australia . Manal long story short, my husband is working there now, but he didnt want to go back to brazil because it is violent and he wanted to go to a country where he can have a better life for our kids, for daniel. Brian you tell us in your book a lot about your divorce. Manal yes. Brian why . Manal not a lot did i talk a lot in the book about the divorce . Brian enough. Manal i just talk about it because it was so difficult for a woman to get divorced because she is not supposed to. I did not get support from the family. They were against it. Although i explained it, it is an abusive relationship and the saudi courts are not a firmly placed to women. Its frowned at from the society, from the court, from the legal system, for a woman to get divorced. Its really difficult. But for me, when i got divorced, it was kind of liberating when i left my exhusband. Brian you talked about how you met your husband in the first place and another relationship you were interested in that did not develop. When did that all happen . Manal you mean my first husband relationship . Brian no, a man you were interested in before you met your husband. You talk about your personal life and all that, but what year did all that happen . Manal actually, my first husband was my first love. I was not interested in any man before. I had crushes on men brian yes, thats what i mean. Manal yes, so i grew up in a society where men and women are isolated. My own cousins, i cannot see them. When i got my period, once i reached when the girl reaches puberty, she is not allowed to see men, so the only man i see is my father and my brother. The first time i see a man or i interact with a man who was different than my father and my brother was when i got my first summer job. I was 23 and i remember 22, actually, and i remember it was interesting to see to find that i can work with all these men and talk to them for the first time in my life after reaching puberty. I dont know if i am pronouncing it right. I got so many crushes actually, but it would last for a week and leave and it made sense later on for me because i was not allowed to be introduced to the men, to know how they talk, what they think of, even just talk to them. You create i would say bizarre situations that lead to bizarre feelings. Brian so what are the rules and where do the rules come from on how a woman lives in saudi arabia . Manal so the first rule for a woman is her best place is her home, not her job, not education, not the mosque, not outside. It is her home. So it is highly encouraged for us to stay home and if i ever i want to leave the house, it should be for urgency, it should be for something really really important. And i have to take the mans permission to leave the house my husband, my father. Also the segregation between the sexes and you find it in all everywhere. If you go to a restaurant, if you go to a bank, if you go to alwaysnt office the men and women are segregated. The schools and the university when i went to university, i have never seen my teachers. Most of them were men. I have never talked to them. I see them through closed circuit tv, cctv. This is how i used to see my teachers. We were not even allowed to talk to them. We had a teacher in the class, she would call them if we had a question and she asked this question on our behalf. So its this is how we grew up. Also, the list of things you cannot do just being a woman was really huge. You cannot dress anything in public, but you have to put on the abaya. It was expected in my city because it was a very conservative city, mecca to cover my face, not to talk to men. It wasnt encouraged to use our first names, so at the end of the school, when they would call my name if my father is outside i am not allowed to be standing outside. They have to call me through the mic, the guard, the security guard. He calls for the gatekeeper. He called my fathers name. He doesnt call my name and the list goes on and on to brian let me just interrupt just trying to show a picture. We have two still photographs i want to show you and have you explain. This is the first one. Manal yes, this is us in saudi arabia, but actually, they are showing their hands, they are showing their feet. Things are different now. We were fully covered and we had to put on the abaya in mecca at least, in my city. This is very conservative. Brian what is the difference between what we are looking at there and the abaya . Manal yes, so this is the millennia. This is new generation. They dont accept to cover their face and now, they are wearing colorful abayas which was something that was frowned at. You can never wear when i worked in aramco in the eastern province, i insisted on wearing colorful scarves and i was totally different than everyone else, but now, more and more girls even wear the colorful abaya and i hope things loosen up. They are pushing the rules to be able to choose the clothes they want. The decent or the modest clothes they want as a muslim, but it should not be black. Brian how much of what saudi arabia requires of women is because the prophet laid down these laws years ago . Manal how much from brian is it from the prophet is this created by the kingdom right now their own rules . Manal okay, there are rules from prophet mohammed for sure, but it is all about the interpretation of these texts that come from the prophet mohammed, so there are as i explained for example, the five pillars of islam that we follow, but there are rules that are imposed that are not meeting the 21st century. One of them i will just give you one example. At the time of prophet mohammed, they expected a woman when she travels, she has a man companion. It makes sense because it was very dangerous when you travel. There will be thieves, there will be killers. There are deserts and you are using caravans and camels, it takes days. Now, you dont need that. I dont need a guy to travel with me to protect me. He is not going to carry a gun and protect me. So the rules when they are taken from textbooks that are 1000 or 1400 years ago, it should be reinterpreted to meet the current situation. Thats the problem we face with the scholars in islam, when they say, you cannot interpret it any way, but it should be done exactly the same way it was done in prophet mohammeds time. For example, cutting hands. You cannot tell me now, you have correctional facilities and we still cut hands. And this is this debate has been going on with the scholars. I am not a scholar, but it terrifies me when they still insist that we cut hands. Manal brian have you ever known anybody who had their hands cut off . Manal the who . Brian their hands cut off . Manal no, i havent known, but it was carried out in saudi arabia. I havent heard about it recently, but it has been carried out in saudi arabia. Brian what if you announced yourself or they find out you are a homosexual, what happens . Manal you get killed in saudi arabia. Brian killed . Manal yes, you cannot announce that you are a homosexual in saudi arabia. Religion is very i try to stay away from religion because i am in peace with every single different faith and belief and sexual orientation, but mention but if i mention these things in my country, it is frowned at. You cannot discuss homosexuality in my county for example. My country, for example. Its something that is a taboo that we cannot talk about in saudi arabia, so i keep these beliefs to myself and i try to push the things without offending the believers, i would say, the things that i believe should change in my country and has no base in islam that you are pushing it on us. Brian would you explain and you mentioned this about your mother and father and your sister and teachers and others that beat you as you were growing up. When you say beat you and your exhusband, what does that mean . What did they when somebody define beating . So growing up, my generation was expected to discipline your kids with a stick. We call it a bamboo stick or kayzuran. It was expected in the school that if you dont behave, you also are disciplined with a wooden ruler, so we were brought up this way. So mom and dad would discipline in the house if they think we misbehaved and the same thing happens in the school. One boy was killed because his teacher beat him badly and then they had to ban the beating in school, but the beating in the houses, it was not criminalized until recently. There was antidomestic violence law that was passed recently. It is not enforced yet, but it is a good start to stop this, i would say, culture of that you can discipline someone by beating them, the physical abuse, i would call it. Brian who beat you the most in your lifetime . Manal my sister. She beat me the most. Brian who beat you where was the most severe beating and i mean, i am kind of leading up to whether or not that was your exhusband. Your first to as manal no, i had my share of beating growing up in saudi arabia, and that ended actually my marriage that time when i left my it was because of the physical abuse, not only the emotional abuse. Brian how would what would his physical abuse be like . Manal physical abuse with the hands. Brian with the hands. Manal yes, punching and brian did you have any place to go when your exhusband was punching you . Manal in saudi arabia, if a woman go to the police and she reports the man, they would summon him. They would ask him to sign. They would not put him in jail, even if she has a medical report. They would summon him and he had to sign a pledge promising not to beat her again. The problem is that she gets sent to the same abusers house and this is the case of a girl who is 29 years old. She was beaten. She complained against her brother who was younger than her. Her father complains and gets her to drop the charges and she was sent to jail and not her brother. The social media went into a frenzy. They let the girl out. Six months later, she is living in an abusive house. She finds a job. She leaves the house. They put her back in jail for the crime of being absent from her abusers house. So thats a problem that we dont have even if there are shelters for women in saudi arabia. It is poorly, poorly, poorly managed because they treat those abused women victims as criminals. They lock them in those houses. And for a woman to leave the shelter, she needs the guardian who is her abuser to sign the papers, so she leaves the shelter or jail lets say. There is also the story of Dina Ali Lasloom who have run away from her abusive family. They caught her in manila. She was on the way to australia for asylum. They caught her in manila and they sent her back handcuffed, duct tape in her mouth, and she is in jail. She is in a correctional facility. This is what happens to the abused women in my country. Brian i want to play for you an interview that i did here in 2006 with Turki Al Faisal who at the time was the ambassador from saudi arabia to the united states. We talked about women in the saudi society. It is not very long, about 40 seconds. Al faisal the most prized woman today in saudi arabia is a woman with a job. She is encouraged by her parents to go and find a job because she brings in income and they dont have to spend money on her. Her siblings look up to her and want to do like her and equally importantly, she is sought after by suitors and i think this is what is going to happen to women driving, to people going to common events together because social change is what will drive these factors. Brian what do you think of what he said . That was 11 years ago. Manal is it . Brian where were you 11 years ago . Manal i was working in aramco. Brian aramco. Manal yes. Brian so what do you think . Manal i agree that social change is the one that will lead change in saudi arabia, and this is the beautiful thing about saudi arabia by the way. The government invests so much in womens education. I get free education. I went to Computer Science college and women are sent now abroad to study for their master degree, phd, even bachelors degree, fully covered by the government. They invest a lot in our education. Our problem is, the frustration when they go back home, when i finish my education, i dont find a job because we are only 14 . It was 11 two or three years ago. Now we are 14 only of the workforce and we are highly educated women. Half of the society, but we cant find jobs. And i believe a woman can reach her full potential cannot reach her full potential unless she gets a good education and she is financially independent from the man, so she can really own her life and own her decisions. I do agree, educated working women is what saudi arabia needs today. Brian i want to show you some video. Its an old video of aramco and then i want you to explain what aramco is. This is another short clip just to give you a sense of what it looks like. His majesty, Abdulaziz Ibn saud, king of saudi arabia. He had faith that somewhere within these far reaching sands was the key to a richer life for the saudi arabs who so long have known scarcity and want. Perhaps this country so unproductive on the surface might contain minerals below the surface, including oil. On may 29, 1933, after weeks of discussions, there was a meeting at kazam palace on the outskirts. F jetta of jeddah it was there that saudi Arab Government officials representing his majesty signed a concession covering roughly 320,000 square miles. This was the starting point of a new American Business venture abroad. Brian reportedly, that company, aramco is worth between 1 trillion and 10 trillion. Nobody knows for sure. They dont publish it. What is aramco . Manal aramco is right now the name it used to be the arabianamerican oil company. The government in the 80s and the 70s, they bought the old they bought all the shares and it became fully owned by the saudi government. Now it is known as the arabian oil company. Thats aramco and aramco is in charge of producing oil, all oil fields under the control of aramco, they are the largest they used to be until 2015. They used to be the largest producer of oil in the world until america took over. Thats aramco. It was started by americans. Now, it is fully owned by saudis, but it did inherit, i would say the Discrimination Laws against women from the americans and it was not changed in the last 80 years and the company was started in 1933, so you are blaming america for the discrimination against women . Manal this is the interesting thing. When the company started, and i know women who worked in aramco before it was owned by the saudis, there was a lot of discriminative laws by americans in aramco against women in this company. Thats interesting. The saudis inherited it and they kept it, i think. Maybe, they created their own rules, i dont know the history. It is a very secretive company. They try to keep a low profile. They dont like bad publicity and they are going public next year. They like only to say to keep their low profile, but in my book, there is a whole chapter where i bring up a lot of policies that are unjust and discriminating and gets to me for being not only a woman, but also for being a saudi Woman Working in aramco. Brian so when you were working at aramco, what were the years . Manal i worked i joined them in 2002 and i quit my job in 2012. And it was the only place for me we were 60 girls graduating from Computer Science in King Abdulaziz university in jeddah. We were only two girls from that whole 60 class 60 girls class got jobs. I was very lucky to get a job with aramco because for me at that time, 2002, there were no jobs for me to work anywhere. Brian what was the difference between living in the aramco manal compound . Brian compound and living in the rest of saudi arabia . Manal so when i joined aramco in 2002, unfortunately, as a saudi woman, not as a women can live in the compound, but as a saudi woman, i was not allowed to live in the compound and i was not allowed to live in a i was not allowed even to rent an apartment outside the compound because the government wouldnt allow me to rent an apartment as a woman. I was not even allowed to stay in a hotel room because the government also wouldnt allow me to rent a hotel room without a man. It was 2007. Out of policy, the company allowed women to live in the compound. Thats when i got my divorce out. When i found a place to stay, i left my marriage and thats when i think saudi arabia really changing starting 2007 and 2008 in the company. Brian by the way, where is this your son from the first marriage . Manal he is in saudi arabia with his grandmother. Brian not with his father . Manal no, not with father. He took him from me after i got married again and he is living with his grandmother. Brian when can you see him . Manal i always go and see him. I always go and visit him because he lives in the grandmothers house. Brian so you can go in and out of saudi arabia even though you are not living there anymore . Manal no, i wish i can move back to saudi arabia, but my second marriage is not approved and not recognized by the government. For me as a saudi to marry a nonsaudi, if i am a man or a woman, the rules applies to both, i need a special permission from the minister of interior, which they wouldnt grant me until now and i know it is because of my activism, i wasnt granted this permission. So my two sons never met each other. I cannot take daniel hamza, my second son, i cannot take him with me to saudi. He is not recognized as my son. I am still, under the saudi law, i am still divorced, but i am five years married. And my first son, abdullah, he cannot visit me. He cannot leave the country. Brian when can he leave the country . Manal he leaves the country with his father, but he cannot leave the country with me. Brian at what age though is he independent . Manal oh my god, 21st. Brian so you have to wait until he is 21, so he can travel on his own. Manal yes, hopefully, when he is a teenager, he can speak up for himself and he requires and demands the right to visit his mother. Brian how many times have you been in prison . Manal you know what, just one time. I dont know, sometimes, they write that i have been multiple times. No, it is just one time time i was in detention. They arrested me and they released me and the second time, i was sent to prison for driving while female. Brian is that an actual term they use in saudi arabia . Manal yes, it was in my paper. Driving while female. Brian what do they mean by that . Manal it means that its a woman driving a car, as simple as that. Brian why is that a big deal . Manal they will come in and really argue that it is a society issue. Women cant drive, the society dont want them to drive, but when i go out and drive, the society doesnt stop me. I drove. There were other cars there. None of them stop me. The one who stopped me are the authorities. We told them there is no law that prevents me from driving. The traffic status code doesnt specify the gender of the driver license holder, but they insist that we cannot issue you a drivers license even if you go and apply for a driver license. They say it is the custom. It is complicated in saudi arabia. I always think it is a political issue. It has nothing to do with the society or religion. It is a political decision to allow women to drive or not. Brian what year did you do the famous video . Manal 2012. Brian so we are talking five years. Manal sorry, 2011. Sorry. Brian six years ago. Manal yes, six years ago. Brian i want to show begin to show it and i will ask you to explain it. Manal okay. Brian but here you are behind the wheel in saudi arabia, what town are you in . Manal i was in al khobar city. It is 10 minutes from where i used to live in aramco. Brian in aramco. Okay, lets roll it. Language]foreign brian explain what we are watching. Manal a woman driving. This is what we are watching. Brian who is shooting the video . Manal it was my amazing and inspiring activist friend, which is ironically, i never met her. I met her because of this movement. Brian and what impact did this video have . Manal when we posted this on youtube, it got it was trending, it was number one trending in youtube, not only in saudi arabia, around the world because of the saudi made it trending, everyone was like watching what was going on with this video. I got 700,000 views because of this video. I made sure when we were taking when we were shooting the video, i made sure to show that this is for example, al rashid mall, landmarks in the city of khobar. Because they kept saying, no, women cannot drive outside. It is never going to happen. And we proved, no, it can happen. Brian what led up to your decision to do this . Manal so in 2011, we had the arab spring going on. Everyone wants to bring social change. We have a lot of frustrations laws ruption those corruption, with unjust laws. One of the unjust laws we have in saudi arabia is the ban on women driving. In new hampshire, the live free or die state, i got at the age of 30, i got my first drivers license. When i went back to saudi arabia, i was paying i bought my car in 2007 and it was the year 2011, this one, almost four years later. I finished paying the car loan. I cannot drive it. I have a drivers license, i cannot drive it. I almost got kidnapped walking in the street looking for a taxi because it was late at night and i couldnt find a driver to take me back home. That led all of these frustrations with all of these years, i live in a country where there is no public transportation, where there is no pedestrian city that i can walk, and a woman to leave the house, to do anything in her life, she needs a car, and to function or to drive this car, she needs a man. So the movement was june 17, which is coming in two days, three days actually, and this movement is simple. We said on june 17, we will go out and drive because we want to normalize women driving. You never seen a woman driving in the street in a huge country, the size of three texas. You can put three texas inside saudi arabia and women cant drive. We wanted to change this by this movement, and the movement is going on. It never stopped. We are still campaigning for the right to drive. For us, the right to drive is more an act of civil disobedience because a woman is not supposed to drive. We show that we are able, we are capable of driving our own life and being in the drivers seat of our own destiny by doing this act of civil disobedience. Brian you say that when people saw you in a car, they would yell things like you are a whore and prostitute and all kinds of nasty things. The men would do this. Manal actually that was when i was walking alone in the street at 9 00 p. M. In my face was uncovered. Thats when i got harassment. When i drove the car, no one talked to us. They were looking at us. They couldnt believe that i am a woman driving and they would just talk to his wife or talk to the people around them, and they would let us go. Brian why do the men care so much about women being covered . Manal in saudi arabia, i think it is just men it is a global issue when it comes to the control over the womens body. Is a battlefield for men. You have to be a certain way or you have to cover up because your body does not belong to you. Your body longs to the man who owns you or the men, i would say, how they want to look at a woman. This is what bothers me a lot. Brian how nasty were people to you when you are uncovered . Manal really nasty. Especially in my hometown, mecca. It was so difficult for me sometimes, i would just have to throw my head scarf on my face because they would not approve women walking without covering her face. Things are changing now. I can roam freely now without my face being covered, especially the young generation are helping , stopping the people questioning your belief for uncovering your face. Brian explain this, this is some video from the pbs program, frontline, you probably have seen it. The voice of will lyman, but this is the these are the religious police. We will see this and then i want you to explain what who they are and what they are supposed to be doing. Manal okay. Lyman yasser films the men who enforce the countrys islamic laws, the saudi religious beliefs. Dressed in traditional islamic clothing, they patrol the streets and shopping malls. Their official title is the committee for the promotion of virtue and the prevention of vice. Activists have been filming and sharing videos to expose their practices and to show ordinary saudis standing up to them. [speaking foreign language] they force women to cover themselves and drive people out of cafes to go and pray. These rules are based on a strict form of sunni islam known as wahhabism. It is the religion on which saudi arabia was founded. Brian who are the religious police . Manal who are the religious police . Brian who picks them . Manal the government picks them. It is as powerful as the ministry. The head of the religious police, we call them hayah and it used to be this way. I wrote a piece about it in New York Times called rein in the religious police, what i call to really cripple the absolute power they are giving when they walk in the street, being able to arrest people for reasons they dont understand because they dont have a list of sins that they will check the adherence to following these, i would say laws or the sins they have to check that no one is committing. They did not have that. It is subjective. So they would go on the street, out of the blue, you are sitting and talking to your friend in the, say in a cafe, he would come and attack you and say, your eyes, you are putting so much makeup, if you are uncovered now. He could i remember my brother was once he it was a very crowded place. They were waiting in the mall and he just put his hand around his wife and they arrested him for doing that. Why do you show public signs of public affection in public . And he said, she is my wife. I am just protecting her from the people around us. He was arrested. He was interrogated. So they used to do these things. They chased two boys in their car. They played the music loud on the national day, they chased them. They pushed them over. They forced them to be pushed over a bridge. Both the brothers died on the national day for listening to music in their car. Things changed now. So last year, i think it was last year when they had to take the power of arrest from them. So they have to call the police if they see something that is unislamic. The religious police has been always a problem in the society because you dont feel a normal life there. You always feel you are being watched. Your morals are always questioned and it is always subjective on the mood of the religious policemen, member and where he would insult you, call you names, even beat you without facing any consequences. Brian go to your prison experience. Manal yes. Brian who arrested you and why . Manal in prison . Brian when they originally arrested you and then put you in prison. Who did that . Manal so i was arrested the first time on purpose because i wanted to pass by a police car and get arrested. The second time, i drove. I was with my brother. I proved a point by when i was inside a Traffic Police station, i proved the point that i did not break a law. Ipo i broke a custom and they are not allowed to arrest me, and so i said, i am going out again and driving. The same day at 2 00 a. M. , they sent the secret police to my house in aramco compound because the police cannot go inside the compound. They had to send the secret police and i was arrested and sent to jail without a trial, the same night. Brian what year . Manal 2011 in may, yes. Brian where were you . Manal i was in my house in aramco. Brian where did you go to prison . Manal in dammam women prison. Brian and dammam is where . Manal its like 15 minutes from the dharan where i used to live. Brian and they picked you up at 2 00 a. M. Manal yes, 2 00 a. M. Brian and how long was it before you were in a cell . Manal it was right away. They came at 2 00. I didnt leave with them until 4 00 a. M. And from 4 00 a. M. To 2 00 p. M. , i was in jail, in the womens jail. Brian and how did they treat you between the time they picked you up and the time they put you in a jail cell . Manal so they have these ways ways of interrogation. So the first one, he was like, everything is fine. We are just having some questions. Sorry to bring you this early. Asked questions. The guy disappears and then things changed. They do another interrogation, but this one, they take your phone, they take away your phone. They took my brother away. They took my bag and they brought a woman, a prison guard woman sitting next to me while they are doing the same interrogation, the same questions. I was strip searched when i arrived to the prison and brian by a woman . Manal by a woman and they didnt explain to me why i was there. I said, can i talk to my family . Can i talk to my can i find a lawyer . And they refused to do that. I had to plea and insist because once i am in jail, i dont know. Would people know that i am in the prison . And for what . What was the crime . No one explained to me. It was just interrogation. I had i managed to get a call to my sister in law and when i called her, i said ahmed was the one from my Group Managing twitter, and i said tell ahmed , to tweet about it. She said, what is tweet . I said, just tell ahmed, he knows. And he did tweet about it that i was arrested and sent to a woman prison. Brian so there are men that are on the side of women wanting to be more open . Manal oh my god, of course. My brother was one of them. He was with me when i drove the second time. My dad, he is the one who got me out of jail when he went to talk to the king. Brian but you tell us a lot in your book that your dad was mad at you a lot. Manal things changed. I changed growing up from an innocent person to radical muslim to more moderate muslim and more open and now to an activist. Brian and your family lived in poverty . Manal yes, we did, but once you get a job, once you work and all of us got jobs, the three kids, its much easier to move out of poverty. So there is a way out of poverty in saudi arabia because education is free and once you get a good job, you can move out of poverty and most of my generation, or at least the city where i lived, which is a poor city, it is not a rich city, mostly, my generation, they picked up their family. They moved their family out of poverty. So to go back what was the question we started with . Brian well, you were in well, we were talking about your parents living in an apartment, but the thing i want to get to in the prison experience. Cockroaches. Manal oh yes. Brian describe the cockroaches. It is even a title of one of your chapters. Manal yes, it was prison bars and cockroaches. I hate so much. I think all women hate cockroaches. It was just a when i mentioned cockroaches about prison, it was just to tell you how filthy it was. It was very dehumanizing. It was very humiliating, the situation in the prison and i was deeply shocked at how women are strip searched when they go inside the prison, crammed in these rooms. Brian how many in one cell . Manal i didnt i cant remember, but we had around 12 bunk beds in each cell and these cells were really small, but the 12 bunk beds had more women, more than 12 women, of course, there were women with their kids in jail. They gave birth to these kids in jail. It was sad and it was shocking to me the situation there and they brought it up to the attention because most of the women there were nonsaudis. Brian nonsaudis. Manal yes, most of them. More than 90 of the women there were nonsaudis. Brian they leave the lights on 24 hours . Manal yes, they leave the lights 24 hours. We didnt have the bathrooms did not have doors. They are no mirrors so you forget how you look like. Brian no mirrors the entire time you were in prison . Manal no, i think for security reasons they dont allow it because they could use it as a weapon. There were children with us. There were kids in jail. There was a very the whole situation was humiliating. The first night for me, i slept on the floor because they didnt give me anything. They just pushed me. I was taken from my home, interrogated. I was pushed in jail. No one told me why i was there. No one explained to me where should i sit or go or do it was staggering. It was brian did you sleep manal it was the most shocking experience i went through. Brian how much did you i dont know how to ask this question, did you sleep with cockroaches . I mean, were they crawling all over you . Manal over the foot, over your face, over your hands. Everywhere you are sitting, there are huge cockroaches walking along and like, they live with you to the way that you get used to seeing them around you. Brian how long were you in that cell . Manal i was there for nine days. There was an International Rally that really led to my release in 2011 and i am very thankful for that. Brian how did you have an International Rally . Who was behind it . Manal i think that video got the attention of the world. When i published that video, i got the attention of saudi arabia and the woman behind that video was sent because we were a group of women. It was i meant by the way, it wasnt only me. But i was the face. I was made the face because no one wanted to do the video. I was crazy enough to go out and drive and i became the face. And the world knew this is a girl who drove. She is sent to jail for driving. That brought the attention of the world. My tweet, i talked to the cnn by the way before at 2 a. M. When they came to my house, i picked up the phone with the reporter who did an interview a week earlier and i told her, there are people. I have no clue how they are. I dont know where they are taking me. Please write about this. And she did. She wrote about it. Brian so where do you get i dont know what you call it, i shouldnt use the word hoots, but that would be the wrong word, but where do you get the strength to do all of this . Learn how to do all this . In other words, get the attention of the media, find an agent, write a book all of that. Where does this come from . Where did you learn this . Manal i didnt even know i needed to find an agent. I knew i wanted to write a book. I think when you know what you want, things just manifest in your life. I wanted to drive because for me, driving is a way of emancipating women because i believe that driving is the key to change our situation in saudi arabia and to end the male guardianship in saudi arabia. This was my belief. I just didnt show up and i had no clue that the driving will be the symbol of resistance in saudi arabia. We used it as a symbol of resistance. The book agent, i had no clue. I wanted to write a book and i had no clue what to do, so i talked around me for activists one friend, he said, you need a book agent. And he introduced me to a book agent. Peter bernstein, my book agent. Brian peter bernstein. Manal yes, yes. I met his dad first, Robert Bernstein. He ran the Human Rights Watch and the first thing he told me, you should write a book. His father, my agents father. Brian Robert Bernstein. Manal he said, you should write a book. I told him, you remember, you planted that seed that i should write a book and i just said, who would read my story, really . Brian you gave credit to lyric winik, who is she . Manal i had five different collaborators. The your to be successful in writing a book, you need two things. The first one, finding the right agent who believes in you who would be always there, which i was very blessed to have peter and Amy Bernstein as my agents and finding the right collaborator. I had very disappointing experiences with the previous collaborators and i had to sit down and i told peter, peter, i am going to write the book. I am done with collaborators. I do interviews for six months and they disappear. They dont give me a single word. Because all my life, i have always i have always wrote. I blog. I wrote diaries. I wrote stories. I wrote it in arabic, translated in english by a native speaker and then, lyric showed up as my fifth collaborator after i wrote most of the book, which is the good news, she had the transcript of the interviews before plus my written translated chapters. And she did a fantastic job. I didnt have faith in her at this time because i was mad at all the previous collaborators and had no clue that she would do she did a fantastic job. Brian lyric winik is the wife of jay winik, have you met jay winik . Manal no, i have never met her husband. Brian he is a historian we see here all the time, but the interesting thing you just the name Bernstein Peter bernstein, Robert Bernstein is a jewish name. Is there any irony to this that manal interesting right . Brian a jewish agent. Manal i have no so this is my best friends really are the jewish friends. They are the most successful. They are the one who make things go, make things and they are most connected and i have i am very proud that i have them as my friends. One of them is daniel pink, he is actually who introduced me to someone who introduced to my agent and then daniel pink is friends with the American Jewish committee in new york. Brian why do you think that is . Manal i think they have been because they have been prosecuted in the past. They have been blamed for all the evil in the world and that made them that made when you really corner someone, when you prosecute that someone, that makes them choose one of either two. Become radical, adopt the faithfaith. I wouldnt call it the ideology faith or become very successful. Thats the beautiful way of resistance i think the jewish did here. Most successful friends that i have are the jewish friends. Brian i want to ask you about a couple more things. One of them, i want to show you some video of your hometown of mecca. A very rich place in saudi arabia, lots and lots of money. Why in the world would mecca look like this . I am going to show you how people live here. Yasser brings his hidden camera to a slum on the edge of the holy city of mecca. People are living in real misery here. Children selling things. Look, it is a dump. Look at the sewage. The way money is spread, its kept among the ruling family. It is not spread to the people. Only what is left, the crumbs are spread to the people. Brian thats from frontline in 2016, the name of the program is saudi arabia uncovered. Manal agree and disagree, ok. We get a lot of benefits for free. By the way, i disagree with getting benefits for free. I want to pay taxes and i want to get these benefits because i am paying taxes. I dont want any giveaway from anyone. I agree that we have over 66 slums in the holy city of mecca. I lived on the skirt of one of these slums and we have because of the faith, a lot of muslims come from very poor countries to mecca and they stay, Illegal Immigrants. And most of these Illegal Immigrants when they stay legally, they build their houses in the mountains illegally and their kids dont go to schools and that end up in creating all of these enclaves of Illegal Immigrants, a lot of crime, a lot of poverty there, but also, the meccans, like me im from the original people of mecca, from abraham time. The meccans didnt themselves do we neither had a park for example. We didnt have infrastructure in my city. And mecca makes so much money out of the religious tourism, the umrah and the hajj and this money does not go to mecca. It doesnt go to build the infrastructure in the city, to make it clean, to make it livable by its own people. People are too afraid to speak up against this because in a country with an absolute monarchy, speaking about the distribution of wealth, about the corruption could get you in jail. Could get you arrested, could get you in so much trouble. Brian so here is the second question that ties into this, a country that is basically a religious state. Manal yes. Brian how have you kept your faith when you have people that are leading this country, a religious state, that have done all of these things that you have just explained to us. Manal how i kept my faith . Brian yes. Manal my faith has nothing to do with them because i know whatever they promote is not the real faith. It is a diversion of the faith. The ideology of faith that we are fighting back. I have my own faith without needing them because i come from my grandfather is prophet mohammed himself. We had real faith and it was just used in a political way to gain political power. Thats the thing i am against. When you come to this realization that your religion is being used, actually abused and misused, you become angry really and you try to go back to the true islam that is calling peace calling for peace and coexisting. It doesnt matter your color, it doesnt matter your tone, it doesnt matter even your religion, i respect you. I respect your religion. I respect your faith as long as we live in peace. Brian am i an infidel . Manal no, youre not an infidel. So according to the salafi wahhabi, anyone who doesnt believe in their way or their interpretation of islam is an infidel. That includes other muslim faith by the way. The shia, the ismaili, the sufi thats their version of islam. I believe we are all human. It doesnt matter what you believe in. You are hindu, your buddhist or religion should be used to call for peace. We need a dalai lama in each religion. We need a dalai lama in the for islam that calls for forgiveness, for coexisting, for love instead of calling for hate. Brian what do you think the prophet would think today about the atmosphere in saudi arabia . Manal he would be very angry. Brian why . Manal because it is not the true islam. It is not what he called for. Calling for hate, this has nothing to do with islam. It is unislamic to call for the hate of the other. He had the jews living in medina. He married a coptic, who is a christian. What is happening today is using islam to gain political power over whatever, for me thats unholy. For me, thats something really that makes me angry. Brian do you have any idea what the leadership in saudi arabia or even in the muslim countries thinks of this book . Manal they havent read it yet, but finally, after years of being indoctrinated, the government is realizing and is acknowledging they made a mistake. The schools now, all the religious books that we were studying have been changed. They have been they removed the parts about the hate for the infidels, they removed these parts. So they are acknowledging that after it backfired. After sons and daughters backfired. When you have terrorist attack, when we suffered more terrorist attacks than any other part, more than in europe for example, we have people going to mosques and bombing these mosques. Other muslims on friday friday is the holiest day for us in the week. They realized it is a mistake and now, there are a lot of things happening to, i would say, rebel that those ideas, but the problem is not in here really. The problem is we did so much wrong things in the past, how do you go and undo them . When you have the same ideology being taught in for people who come for scholarship, study in saudi arabia and then they go back home with that ideology, how are you going to undo this . This is why you have radical islam being on the rise in very peaceful countries like indonesia, which is the largest Muslim Country in the world. How do you undo this . Thats the important question today for the saudi government because they have a big responsibility for spreading the ideology of love and coexisting as it was before when they spread the ideology of hate. Brian our guest lives in australia right now, married to her second husband. Manal indeed. Brian has a child who is how old is the young child . Manal daniel hamza will turn three next month. Brian three years old and the name of this book is called, daring to drive. Manal alsharif, thank you very much for joining us. Manal thank you. Programs arel q a available on our website or available as a podcast at cspan. Org. Next sunday on q a, professor of Political Science at winterberry college in vermont talks about the reaction of the very students to author Charles Murray appearing on campus in march of 2017. Mr. Murray and professor stanger were physically attacked during the event. That is next sunday at eight 00 p. M. Eastern pacific time. Journal,washington live everyday with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up monday morning, author and Johns Hopkins Bioethics Degree Program director travis reader talked about his new book, a personal struggle with opioids. And we talked with the host of examining politics about his day. St and the news of the be sure to watch washington journal live of 7 00 a. M. Eastern monday morning and catch podcast week; all week on washington journal started at 9 00 a. M. Eastern. On monday, the producer of the daily. Ofthursday, podcast cohost ill tell you what. And on friday, host of congressional dish. President of radio free asia on the impact of your programming in china and north korea. Our coverage begins at 12 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan, online on cspan. Org, or listen live on the free cspan radio app. Has live coverage of the 2020 president ial candidates at the iowa state fair starting thursday at 1 45 p. M. Eastern with montana governor steve will look, followed by former Vice President joe biden. On friday, we are live at 10 00 a. M. Eastern with julian castro, and later, congressman beto orourke. Then on saturday, we are live at 10 00 a. M. Eastern with governor jay inslee, senator kamala harris, senator Amy Klobuchar anarchist angela brand, senator elizabeth warren, and senator cory booker. Watch them live at the iowa state fair starting of thursday at cspan. Was anytime online and span. Org or listen live from wherever you are on the go using the free cspan radio app. The british probably meant in recess for the month of august. Prime ministers questions will tonight. Tuesday, the Senate Armed Services Committee Held a confirmation hearing for air n to serve as hyte vice chair of the joint chiefs of staff. Senator and the nominee address the allegations of Sexual Assault against the general, the investigation and the decision which cleared him of the accusations. His accuser attended the hearing. This is about two half hours
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