Leap Year Traditions: Ladies, Did You Propose on Leap Day?

Back in the day, Leap Day was the only day where a woman could propose. A tradition like this might do wonders in the Middle East, where girls still have to wait around to be proposed to. Don't stain those silk hankies just yet, you can always be the first among your friends and propose yourself to that special guy on any other day of the year. Just a thought.

"Men who declined a lady’s proposal had to pay the woman a forfeit, in the form of money, a kiss, or sometimes, a silk dress. The tradition evolved to inspire Sadie Hawkins Day (based on the bold “Li’l Abner” character), sometimes celebrated in November, in which women can take the lead in asking men to a dance."

Academia has been used as a tool to make certain agendas prevalent before. But it is a shame when gender theories have been used to demonize certain aspects of the Arab Spring. According to this Academic blogger, gender justice is being dissociated from the very elements that it needs to correspond with.

"Everyone is gendered, just as everyone, rich and poor and middle class, is “classed.” In fact, the current deployment of a gender analytic is akin to studying the class grievances, backgrounds and anxieties of only half of the Egyptian or Syrian population, for example."

The question usually goes: Do you want to hear something beautiful or something true? For Roba from Jordan, there is no true beauty, no true creativity, without raw honesty.

"It’s hard enough to think about your feelings and thoughts, and it’s super hard to share these feelings and thoughts with the world. But sharing the deepest intangible feelings and thoughts is the essence of creativity. It’s all about taking intensity and putting it into words that others can understand, into an oil painting, into a sonnet, into a scientific law."

Writer, editors, literary fans, get those calendars out. It's time to mark the best of the literary events this spring in the Middle East.