Halawa: a typical Egyptian depilatory

Halawa: a typical Egyptian depilatory.  
  

There were two halawas in Egypt: one was the depilatory that came to us from Pharaoh’s times and the other one, the halva, which we in Cairo called Halawa.

Hairy legs, arms or armpits, moustachioed upper lip and other secret

parts were very poorly considered. Foreign women were distinctive by

their hairy bodies. Perhaps the most distasteful sight in summer was to see

long armpit hairs waving in the breeze, not mentioning the stale smell they produced.

My halawa today is a candy sugar depilatory of the very old days. The ladies then were very conscious their appeance, taking milk baths and massaging essential oils into their bodies to make them smooth, desirable and caressing!!

We think that today we have invented all the beauty products or essential oils whereas in truth people like Cleopatra or Nefertiti knew them!

When you have cooked your halawa (recipe on demand here) and it has been pulled and twisted adding a spot of saliva to make it malleable, you stretch it out on your forearm and shutting your eyes, pull it off in one decisive movement. You can suffer it out in a solitary session or have a martyrdom-shared one! Armpits were sore spots and the halawa had to be pulled out correctly and swiftly before the pain hit you. Anyone trying to pull off the sugar depilatory and failing was in for intense suffering.

Sometimes the armpits bled, but that was because the sticky halawa had not been pulled out correctly or quickly enough.

The nightmarish part was the inside of the knees. You had to twist your body to spread out the paste and it was practically impossible to pull unless you were a contortionist in a circus.

To look human and not apish, you stuck the halawa on your moustache and after a quick agonising jerk your smooth upper lip was rewarding.

It is not any worse than going to the dentist’s! 

A fool once said that to be beautiful, one must suffer!