But deciding to do it was one thing; actually doing it was another. I was filled with a combination of excitement and anxiety. I was about to become even more of a public face. I hadn’t slept much in the preceding two weeks and my small town house was bustling with energetic people who wanted to help with the campaign. It had become our de facto headquarters. We posted updates, but we also delegated. A Brazilian artist, Carlos Latuff, created a logo for the campaign that depicted a Saudi woman wearing a niqab sitting behind the wheel of a car with her hand raised in a victory sign. But I knew that we and I had to be careful. Women2Drive couldn’t be seen as an actual protest movement. I clung to the belief that if I could just show Saudi society that no harm would come if a woman drove, many of the other issues surrounding the campaign would simply vanish.
I selected May 19, just a month shy of the June 17 Women2Drive day, as the day to make my video. I got up early that morning, after having once again slept very little. I didn’t have my son with me—he had spent the night with his grandmother at his father’s family home, which made it less stressful. I hadn’t told anyone in my family other than my brother what I was doing. Neither my parents nor my ex-husband knew, because they would simply try to discourage me. But my brother had supported me unconditionally. Since I had begun working on Women2Drive, he’d been to my house to offer his solidarity and support. I, in turn, felt fortunate to have a male relative who was in my corner, who understood that this cause was much bigger than me.
I called my brother almost as soon as I got up, but didn’t reach him, so I made myself a strong cup of coffee, dressed in the most conservative outfit I owned, and laid my black hijab on the bed. I looked at myself in the mirror, and made a decision not to put on my usual kohl eyeliner. I knew I had to do everything to minimize my appearance so that people would focus only on the driving. After a few minutes, I left the bedroom and sat down at the dining room table, reviewing my driving plan. It would be simple but very visible, and the more I imagined it, the more I excited became. I dialed my brother’s number again. When he didn’t pick up, I texted him: “Where are u? Waiting for you to come. Time to drive!” Although we’d agreed to meet that day, and he had offered to accompany me, we had not arranged a definite time. I was a bit worried because in one of my tweets, I’d announced that I was going to drive that day and post the video on YouTube. I needed to drive, with or without my brother. And then I had an idea. I would ask Wajeha to accompany me.
Without hesitating, I texted her, “What are you doing? Can you drive with me?” She texted back immediately that it was the fortieth day after her mother’s death and she needed to travel to a city about an hour away from Dhahran, where the ceremony would be taking place. A driver would be picking her up. I assured her that we would be finished before she needed to leave. She immediately answered, “Okay.”
In the meantime, Ahmed, one of my campaign friends (the friend responsible for our Twitter account), had come to check on me. Because my brother was not available, I decided to ask Ahmed if he would accompany Wajeha and me: we needed a male driver to clear the security gates at the Aramco exit. Wajeha would be the film crew and Ahmed would be our designated driver until I slid over and took the wheel of my purple Cadillac SRX. I had spent several years saving my money for the car, a car that I would now for the first time be driving on actual Saudi kingdom streets. Ahmed smiled and agreed, promising, “I’ll drive you to my favorite café, get myself some ginger lemon tea, and leave you two ladies alone.” The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea of another Saudi woman filming me. I told Ahmed that we should tweet about it.
After about an hour, Ahmed and I left my house. We drove through the neatly groomed streets of the Aramco compound, past perfectly green lawns. Wajeha lived on the other side of the sprawling golf course, in a part of the compound where many Saudi employees had their homes. By the time we arrived at her house, it was almost eleven o’clock. We honked the horn and I texted her that we were out front, and she practically ran out the door. She looked very different from the day we had met for coffee, and yet she still made a statement. Her hair was neatly concealed beneath a black hijab, but she had on a bright pink abaya. Saudi women rarely wear anything but black abayas in public. When I saw Wajeha in pink, I giggled, thinking that she was even more fearless than me. No doubt she was thinking that if we got arrested, at least she’d look stylish.
As she approached the car, Ahmed moved from the passenger’s side to the driver’s seat so we could exit the Aramco gate. I got out of the car and walked around to the passenger seat. Wajeha sat down in the back, and just as soon as she closed the door, she opened it again. “Oh, I forgot my ID card,” she said. “I better have it with me, just in case we get arrested.”
Ahmed looked at me nervously, and I knew what he was thinking. “Don’t worry, Ahmed,” I said, “we’re not going to get arrested.”
After Wajeha came back, she spoke excitedly. “Manal,” she said, “you’re a genius. This is great, filming yourself driving outside and posting it. I wish I had thought of this.”
Ahmed smiled, looked in the rearview mirror, and turned the key in the ignition. After he turned onto the main street, I twisted my head slowly and looked back at the buildings behind us. As the neat Aramco skyline receded, it was as if I was leaving the safety of all that I knew.
Outside the compound, Ahmed drove nervously, looking at the speedometer and then over at me and up at the mirror to see who might be behind us on the road. His anxiety was contagious, but I also felt a growing sense of exhilaration. After several blocks we passed the local police station, and then at last, we reached the café where Ahmed would get his ginger lemon tea. He pulled into the parking lot but didn’t park until we were well behind the building, out of sight. He got out of the car, but then spent a few minutes chatting with us. Finally I said, “Okay, Ahmed, go drink your tea. We have some places to drive to.”
I moved to the driver’s seat and Wajeha moved to the front passenger seat, laughing. I took a deep breath and sat down inside the car and put my hands on the steering wheel. I still vividly remember the feeling of pulling the door closed and locking it. Although I was enclosed, at that moment, I felt like one of my father’s songbirds, let out of its cage and flying around the room. “Thank you, my friend,” I said to Ahmed out of the rolled-down window. “We’ll be all right, don’t worry.”
As I fastened my seat belt, I could feel my hands shake slightly. I placed the key in the ignition, adjusted the rearview mirror, and pulled my black hijab close around my face to make sure no hair was visible. I reached for my sunglasses from inside my bag, placed them on my uncovered face, and took one last look at myself in the mirror. Then I looked over at Wajeha and asked, “You ready?” I didn’t wait for her reply.