Arib Hania El-Shazli

a beautiful girl with a beautiful name

A little on the short side, Arib has a stocky figure and a fair amount of muscle hidden under her loose blouses and long skirts. She's never seen without a headscarf on, which frames her round face and squished looking nose. She walks with a bounce to her step, and is usually smiling.

#### Music

* Metaphor - The Crane Wives
* Like Real People Do - Hozier
* Ribs - The Crane Wives

## Background

Arib was born to a backdrop of war and a couple who had only just married. Her father demanded a son, saying that a baby girl would have to be abandoned in such uncertain times. But she was born a girl anyway, and too guilty to abandon her baby, her mother ran away from her husband to raise her daughter in her home city of Cairo. She kept the same name for her that they'd planned to call their son—Arib.

Arib grew up in a house of only women, and was part of a society that began to rapidly change in the aftermath of the second world war. This gave her a strong sense of social justice. Unfortunately, not everyone was quite so keen for the radical change Arib welcomed and her efforts to uphold moral standard were mostly perceived as irritating, which led to having few friends. Her only real friend from childhood was a girl named Nafisa who lived in a time travelling bakery that wipes any memory of its inhabitants once they've moved to a different time, so with no memory of her Arib's childhood seems a lonely one.

She was a clever student in school, but rather than pursuing higher education she got a job in the office of one of Cairo's budding film companies to help support her family. She quickly became known as a capable employee and was even given more practical jobs when staff were short, such as working cameras and organising press releases. As she continued working her family and peers began to expect her to find a husband. This was the first time Arib suspected she was gay, and she chose to ignore it.

At twenty three years old, she met Nafisa again and suspicion turned into confirmation. Initially she struggled to choose between starting a relationship and trying to stay the girl her family needed her to be. But after a few months of agonising, she took the plunge and decided it was worth it.

Unfortunately from Arib, this realisation coincided with Nafisa disappearing to another era and all her memories of her time with Nafisa disappeared. Her realisation that she was a lesbian and therefore a disappointment to everyone around her did not. In the next year or two Arib began to feel more depressed and lonely. Then she met a shy man who built cameras for a living and managed to strike up a strong friendship. Convinced that she'd cracked the heterosexual code, she entered a relationship with him despite knowing deep down that it wasn't Like That at all.

## Personality

Arib is a passionate artist, and almost militant in her resolve to be respectful and kind. She is full of innate goodness and belief in other people, which often has people believing her to be naive at first glance, but on closer inspection she is anything but. She's stubborn when it comes to what she sees as unjust, and while she can get caught up in her own thoughts, she makes an effort to listen to others as much as possible. While she seems quite confident in all this, underneath she's deeply insecure and unsure about her choices.