By Bejay Browne.
An inspiring woman living in Paphos is empowering Arab women and is determined to create a better understanding between cultures. She is doing so through a number of ventures including food and education.
Ala Khalil, 36, decided to turn a negative experience from a shop assistant into something positive. She set out to educate the community about her culture in an effort to prevent such judgemental behaviour.
“I call it ‘the look’. You are out meeting people and someone may behave as if they are at a different, higher level than you and they treat you differently from other people, and it made me feel very unconformable. But I kept going back to the shop and changed her attitude, now she knows me and it’s different. But I questioned that initial judgement. Why did she do that? Perhaps, because our heads are covered,” Khalil said.
She is intelligent and engaging, president of the Women Arabic Cultural Club, Cyprus and founder of Alakadimiya Arabic Language Centre. She also organises cookery lessons focusing on Arabic cuisine and oversees another venture, ‘Joud’ catering.
Ala has lived in Cyprus since 2009 with her husband who is half Cypriot and their children. The pair met at university in Jordan where she studied software engineering. She came up with the idea of offering an afternoon school for Arab children to enable them to learn the language. The school now has 21 students aged from three to 16 years.
“There is a large Arabic community in Paphos, and I started being introduced to women as they brought their kids to school. As I spoke to them, I figured out that there are many well educated women here that are not doing anything with their lives, especially the refugees that come here.”
She explained that divides occur within Arabic culture and she wanted the women to come together and celebrate their common culture and not be wary of any differences.
“This is the first time that all of these women from Syria, Armenia, Palestine, Iraq, Jordan and Egyptian have all come in close proximity with each other. But now we are the women’s Arabic cultural club, we all have the same language, we are the same culture, so why not share that to build something together?”
The first meeting in 2017 saw around 20 women from various Arab countries, speaking in different dialects and all getting on.
Ala was moved by the numerous stories, particularly of young women in their 20s who had been studying at university, driving, working and having a ‘proper and fulfilling life’ before arriving in Cyprus. Khalil wanted to empower them.
“I had an idea to do something together, not just to surrender and do nothing. I met two very good cooks and had the idea to introduce them to the community around us.”
Ala started a new group called ‘Arabic cuisine cookery classes’, through the P3A, Paphos third age, a successful club that offers learning activities for residents and regular visitors to Paphos. They have over 800 members and more than 40 groups which cover a range of activities and subjects.
It is now hugely popular and sees her offer three monthly groups with different students in each. Arab women, under Khalil’s guidance, show mostly foreign residents how to cook a different meal.
Each woman brings her own culture and favourite dishes to the classes which have now evolved into a catering initiative, ‘Joud’, an Arabic word meaning generosity. This also provides a way to generate a small income for their families as well.
There is no stopping her mission to educate. The latest initiative ‘Yalla Safar’ is a travel venture which saw Khalil take a group of 22 travellers from the P3A to visit Jordan and learn the ‘deep culture’ of the area. A second similar venture is already fully booked.
“It is a real passion for me, to educate people about my culture.”
