00:02The Arab Spring was a time of great political awakening in countries all over the Middle East.
00:08And nowhere exemplified the spirit of that movement more than Tahir Square in Cairo, Egypt.
00:15But just as the Arab Spring brought about both new freedoms and new tensions,
00:20those political gatherings illuminated an issue that almost every woman in Egypt already knew.
00:25A growing number of sex attacks against women protesting in Cairo's Tahrir Square has alarmed women's groups in the city.
00:35Out on the streets, the threat of sexual violence is always lurking just below the surface.
00:41So we're headed to Cairo to meet the brave women who are fighting back.
00:54To be a woman in Egypt is to live with the crushing inevitability of sexual harassment.
01:00Just leaving home can be a daily nightmare of navigating obvious stares, unwanted comments and outright advances.
01:08Egypt was ranked the worst Arab country for women.
01:1199.3% of women reported being harassed.
01:18It's that sense of fear and helplessness that drove one woman to speak out.
01:22To start to document just how widespread harassment is here.
01:26We are on our way to go and see Reem Weil.
01:29She is the Deputy Director of HarassMap.
01:32We're going to speak to her and her colleagues about sexual harassment.
01:35HarassMap is the only organization working in Egypt solely on the issue of sexual harassment.
01:41Hey!
01:42How are you?
01:43How are you?
01:44How are you?
01:44Can you explain to us more about all the elements of HarassMap?
01:49HarassMap is a map online that women can go on and they report harassment.
01:55And when it started in 2010, the idea then was people were completely denying that harassment exists.
02:01If you go in the street, they would say there's no harassment.
02:03HarassMap has developed an easy to use online reporting app to collect data about thousands of instances of street harassment
02:10that happen every day.
02:12The data collected paints a detailed and vivid portrait of what it's like for women on every street in Cairo.
02:18We were wondering if you could kind of break down for us what the climate of street harassment is really
02:24like here.
02:25It's quite widespread.
02:28It affects the decisions that women make every day.
02:30So what they will wear depends on where they will go.
02:33So if they are planning to walk in the street at all, they might wear something different than like if
02:38they're planning to just go to work.
02:40All the excuses that we hear are very much related to the woman's image and the woman's place and why
02:48is she going out alone.
02:49And like her conduct, like she's laughing this way, she's walking this way, she's dressing this way, she's out alone,
02:54she's out at night.
02:55But all these excuses are very much related to women's image in society and what she should be doing.
03:07It's disturbing enough to see the magnitude of this problem on a map.
03:11It's another thing entirely to come face to face with it out on the street doing something as simple as
03:16walking from one place to another.
03:20Today we will be filming what it's like to walk down the busiest bridge in Cairo as a girl. Enjoy.
03:34We are headed to go pick up Teenie Von Loon who is a documentary filmmaker here in Cairo.
03:40She created the short film Creepers on a Bridge that went viral.
03:44It documents the experience of women walking across Cairo's busiest bridge.
03:53So what inspired you to create the film Creepers on the Bridge?
03:58I think most people, especially outside of Egypt, they can't understand that staring is a form of sexual harassment.
04:04You know, they're like, what do you mean? Come on, like staring is so innocent, it's nothing.
04:07But when 80% of the men in the street are staring at you the entire time you walk by,
04:12and especially when those men are in groups,
04:14it's really intimidating.
04:16Colette actually films everything secretly using an iPhone, and the entire clip is filmed in one five-minute walk across
04:24the bridge.
04:25So, it was pretty intense, and we were actually kind of very shocked ourselves at just how intense it is.
04:31As we near the end of the bridge, with Tahrir Square just beyond, we can't help but think about the
04:37bigger consequences of this daily battle.
04:39Harassment can escalate to violence, a tool to displace women from the public space entirely, and from political discourse.
04:48When a woman is in Tahrir Square, for example, even when she's with her friends who, you know, should be
04:54able to protect her,
04:56these men find a way to separate.
04:59You know, they choose a victim, and they kind of circle around her.
05:05And then slowly, like, more and more men start to close the circle.
05:13With these circles of men, you start to lose sight of the girl that's in the middle.
05:31Honestly, for me, my greatest fear are these mob assaults.
05:34The fact that they're politically motivated, it completely works, because I am never going into a busy protest,
05:40because I am terrified of that happening.
05:42One thing that we are taking away every day that we walk in the streets is that this is where
05:48life happens,
05:49this is where the conversations happen, and this is where progress is going to happen.
05:53So for women not to feel like they can come out and use their voices and be a part of
05:58the change is, I mean, just such a tremendous loss.
06:03Despite recent laws which criminalize sexual harassment, the culture of tolerance for this behavior is, for the moment, still winning.
06:13But 21-year-old Basma Elgabri isn't waiting around for the laws to make the streets safe and welcome.
06:20Feminism, to me, is not the idea that women have high position or high ranks in the governmental states and
06:30this stuff.
06:31That is not feminism for me. Feminism means equality.
06:34So I think the idea of equality comes when people start to believe in equality.
06:39The important thing is what people think.
06:47Basma is carving out her own safe space, avoiding city crowds and the potential to be victimized from behind the
06:54handlebars.
06:56When I started riding the scooter, I didn't, I haven't been into any sex harassment actually.
07:03I feel like I'm in a strength situation on a scooter. I feel like I'm the one ruling.
07:11After discovering her newfound freedom, Basma launched her own organization, Girls Go Wheels, to help other women learn how to
07:19buy and ride scooters.
07:21In Egypt, women riding scooters and motorcycles is generally considered taboo.
07:26But Girls Go Wheels offers the kind of support it takes for women to get started.
07:31My vision is not for Girls Go Wheels. My vision is for the Egyptian girls.
07:35So my vision for Egyptian girls is to break the bad taboos, to break the unnecessary traditional that make us
07:46go nowhere.
07:53It's hard to see in this footage how big of a deal this is, but to see a group of
07:58young women all riding together is a revolutionary act.
08:03While riding on the back of the scooters with these daring women, we started to truly understand the kind of
08:08freedom Basma is creating.
08:11This woman here just saw all the women and was inspired, so she's getting Basma's information to learn how to
08:17take lessons.
08:19Whenever or wherever a girl wants to buy a scooter, I have to help her.
08:24We just want to share this joy and this experience.
08:28Sometimes feminism is a collection of small right actions that add up to measurable progress.
08:34We always encourage people to stand up to harassment, whether by standards or the harassment.
08:44When you look the person in the eye and say, this is harassment, it makes them think about it next
08:53time.
08:53Victory!
08:57The struggle for women in Egypt is serious.
09:00It's about finding their place in democracy and keeping the promise of the Arab Spring.
09:07It is a heavy battle.
09:10But what we discovered is that there are so many brave women on the front line creating real change.
