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National Geographic : 1982 Mar
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is hard to break tradition, it will take time." Muhammad, an accountant, did not want the change at any time. "It is very nec essary to keep boys and girls apart," he said. "When I first went to university, I could not pay attention to my work because there were women sitting next to me. We have a saying in Sudan: 'Keep the egg away from the stone, and the female away from the male.'" Breadlines and Shortages Even more urgent than women's rights are the country's heartsickening problems of 40 percent annual inflation, lines for bread and gas, and shortages of just about every thing, including power and water. If the economy cannot be put right, there may be trouble for Nimeiri's regime. In Africa it is usually economic troubles, not menacing neighbors, that bring down governments. Compounding the economic problem is the emigration of skilled labor. Practically everyone who knows how to do anything leaves Sudan to work in the Persian Gulf states. In a country where only 20 percent of the population is literate, at least 300,000 Sudanese are working abroad. I met accountants, professors, and taxi drivers who had all been out of the country for several years and would probably leave again. "One month in Saudi Arabia," a clerk named Yahiya told me, "is like two years in Sudan. I just cannot afford to stay." Other Arab countries, even unfriendly ones, exact a similar pull. Last year a Libyan hotelier checked into the Khartoum Hilton as a guest and proceeded to hire away most of the hotel's staff while sitting in his suite. The brain drain, as well as the lack of in frastructure and money, means that even the few projects already in place are sliding downhill. El Gezira, a region that lies be tween the Blue and White Niles, is said to be the world's largest irrigated farm-2 million feddans (2.1 million acres)-growing most of Sudan's major export, cotton. Today it The noonday inferno--110°F is not unusual-finds a Rashaida family seeking shade in their tent not far from Suakin. The Rashaidas, nomads who emigrated from SaudiArabiaabout 200 years ago, roam the eastern deserts. They have a repu tationfor breedingfine riding camels, which they convoy to Egypt for sale. Sudan:Arab-African Giant 375
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