Region | Egypt
Turkish romance distracts Egyptians away from hardships of life
Every evening Sumaya Mahmoud, a mother of three, makes sure she finishes doing her house chores in time to watch "Nour", a Turkish TV soap opera, which has achieved high viewing rates in the Arab world.
- By Ramadan Al Sherbini Correspondent
- Published: 23:47 August 23, 2008
Cairo: Every evening Sumaya Mahmoud, a mother of three, makes sure she finishes doing her house chores in time to watch "Nour", a Turkish TV soap opera, which has achieved high viewing rates in the Arab world.
"Watching Nour and Muhannad reminds me of my happy engagement days," says Sumaya, referring to the two leading characters in "Nour", also known in Turkish as "Gumus".
The show tells the story of Nour, a simple, self-motivated girl whose marriage to Muhannad, a spoiled rich kid, is arranged by the latter's grandfather. However, Muhannad and Nour fall passionately in love and their marriage proves to be a match made in heaven.
"Muhannad is attentive to his wife and encourages her to be more independent and fulfill her dreams," says Sumaya, who got married some 16 years ago. "I remember my husband was so caring in the early months of our marriage. Gradually he has become too preoccupied with his work to remember even my birthday or our wedding anniversary," she adds pensively.
Sumaya's spouse is basically a government employee, who does a second job as a taxi driver in order to complement his income.
"When he talks to me, it is always about price rises and customers' haggling over fares for taxi journeys. Rarely does he talk about emotions. I think my husband and the like have a lot to learn from Muhannad," Sumaya told Gulf News.
Over recent months, Egypt has been gripped by a series of protests against price hikes and low wages. Last April, three Egyptians were killed and scores injured in clashes with police during a protest against low wages in the Nile industrial town of Al Mahala Al Koubra. A 30 per cent increase in public sector employees, declared a few weeks later, has been devoured by soaring prices, say critics of the government.
Household names
Last month, Egypt's official TV started broadcasting "Nour" whose two leading stars have soon become literally household names.
Suad, who has been watching the show on the Arabic satellite TV MBC4, admits she has named her baby boy after the good-looking Muhannad "much to my husband's jealousy."
She says that part of her obsession with the show is Muhannad's tender treatment of his wife. "Nour", dubbed in the Syrian dialect, is peppered with sub-plots tackling almost everything from miscarriage, children born out of wedlock, suicides, kidnapping to drug trafficking. The happenings of the drama run for 150 episodes.
"This series is boring and unrelated either to Islamic traditions or Egypt's present circumstances," said Ahmad Hassan, a father of four and a shop assistant in central Cairo. "As I heard, this series is set in fabulous mansions and revolves around life of wealthy people, who are unlike the majority of the Egyptians," he said.
"People here are literally fighting to get some loaves of bread to feed their children," added Hassan, citing tragic fights in some areas of this nation of 80 million people during a recent acute shortage of heavily subsidised bread.
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