Reclaiming the 9a7ba (gahba)

Images courtesy of Nour Regaya.

Words by Nour Regaya

The first time I was called a 9a7ba (قحبة : Arabic for whore), I was eight years old playing my favorite online game Pet Society on my newly created Facebook account. In the midst of virtually dressing my digital cat in an adorable pink dress, I got a message from one of my close girl friends Yasmine saying “Bara nayek ya 9a7ba” (Tunisian dialect: Fuck off, whore). 

Having only been alive for about three minutes in a loving and respectful familial cocoon, I had no understanding of these words. Puzzled and innocently curious, I ran to my parents and showed them the message.  I quickly understood from their shocked faces that it was no gibberish play date invitation from Yasmine.

After a long phone call with her parents, the four adults came to the conclusion that the message was sent by Yasmine’s slightly older brother (or cousin:  memory fails me here) through her account. My parents forbid me to use the sentence but provided me with no explanation as to why. So, naturally, I asked for one from my second most reliable source next to my parents: My older cousin. 

“It’s when a woman and a man lay naked together and a 9a7ba is a woman who lays naked with a lot of men” he says categorically.  

“A naked hug. Interesting. What’s wrong with a woman who gives lots of hugs?” I thought, but kept it to myself.

The second time I was called a 9a7ba, I was fifteen (a seven year long break... I am one of the lucky ones!). This time around I was more knowledgeable about the subject as I was a freshman in high school, going through puberty, extremely hormonal and surrounded by angsty teenagers throwing up every possible curse word and insult. I was waiting for my parents to pick me up from school when a nearby conversation between a few of my male classmates caught my attention: It was a lighthearted funny exchange on masturbation. 

They continued their conversation as I got closer and I even got the sense that they liked that I was listening to them: Suddenly, I was surrounded by a group of boys metaphorically and proudly displaying their dicks to me and simultaneously competing against each other. But as I joined the discussion, mistakenly thinking I was welcome to participate and share what masturbation was like for a vagina owner, I was met with an awkward silence and a few uncomfortable laughs. This was a hit to my ego because I was expecting knee-slapping laughter for my excellent humor. I understand now that they had just realized at that moment that I was a human capable of “jerking off” in a way completely different to theirs and yet so similar. This new piece of information was so dizzying they didn’t know how to respond. They found a way sure enough though. 

A few days later, word got around in school that “Nour and her friends are horny 9a7bas who finger themselves” (or something along those lines). When I heard this weirdly specific rumour, I couldn’t help but laugh at how admitting to the “sin” of masturbation as a girl, my girl friends also had to be finger-blasting maniacs by association. I also laughed because I thought “No girl cums just from fingering” (Adult Nour says it’s very possible).

But there was that word again. The 9a7ba. When I heard it this time around, it was different from the first time when I didn’t even know what it meant. This time it was stomach-churning. It sent waves of shame through my body that I couldn’t contain despite my confidence and openness with myself. But it also was gut wrenching because it was deeply unfair: boys were comfortable talking about their dicks every chance they had with no real fear of being called a whore because there is no such word or concept for them. But there is one too many for us…to drown us in shame whenever we seek out pleasure and give us crippling vaginal penetration phobia*. 

The third time I was called a 9a7ba, I was seventeen and I had just broken up with my first boyfriend. I had fallen out of love and felt the relationship needed to end. In response to this, he sent me a long text saying something like “You slut... you won’t have any trouble finding any other cocks seeing how much you like posting your tits on Instagram”. This hurt coming from the guy I not only had loved but also had my first sexual experiences with and who always appreciated how open I was and how comfortable I felt in my skin. To see him change so drastically the minute I ended our relationship was eye-opening: When I was with him I wasn’t a slut but once without him, I ultimately was. This first dating experience promised many more I was destined to have as a girl in a dick-centric hypocritical patriarchal society.

This time around though, there was less of that gut-wrenching feeling and more of anger. Anger was better than shame. I had come to learn Toni Morrison’s words on anger by heart: “Anger is better. There is a sense of being in anger. A reality and presence. An awareness of worth. It is a lovely surging.” My surging was happening. 

The fourth time I was called a 9a7ba, I was eighteen years old and having an online fight in the comment section of a Facebook post (that damned app again!). My debate opponent was a stranger, a man in his late twenties or early thirties who, after I expressed a different opinion to his on God knows what subject (I am less eager to fight strangers online now), sent me a private message calling me an “ugly slut”. I appreciated him for being creative and adding an adjective to the overused insult, but I disagreed strongly, I am fucking hot, babe. And if speaking my mind makes me a “whore” then call me Madame fucking Claude. 

I am twenty one years old now and I’ve been called a 9a7ba on other occasions but it stopped leaving a mark on me because the word simply holds less weight for me now. In each one of those instances, I was doing something right. My life motto is slowly becoming “If a pressed man doesn’t call you a 9a7ba then you are doing something wrong”. I am content with being the whore because I stand by the actions that supposedly make me one. I wanted to tell a bunch of boys that I was masturbating like them, I wanted to break up with my loser first boyfriend because I deserved better and I wanted to voice my opinion and argue with a random guy in the Facebook comment section.

The 9a7ba is an amazing woman who knows her worth, who has no fear of seeking her pleasure and speaking her mind. I almost shiver with pride when someone calls me a 9a7ba now because I am reminded of my journey as a woman, from that confusing feeling of shame to the anger and finally to the peace I made with the appellation. No matter what you do, you are bound to be called a 9a7ba at least once in your life. It’s almost synonymous with “woman” and I am proud to be a woman. Proud to be unapologetic and vagina-centric. Proud to be a 9a7ba.