CAIRO: Because boyfriend/girlfriend relationships are still somewhat of a taboo in Egypt, some couples resort to virtual relationships, hiding behind their computer screens as they get to know one another. A recent survey conducted by Cabinet's Information and Decision Support Center (IDSC) showed that 82 percent of internet users in Egypt viewed internet relationships as "deceitful, however, half of them admitted to having at least one. The term "virtual relationship is relatively new in the Egyptian pop lexicon, according to Khalil Fadel, psychiatrist and member of the London Royal Psychiatrists College. "We are not acquainted with couples who interact only over the internet, yet many believe that such a milieu could be a good start for proper face-to-face relationships, he explained, "Chatting on the internet can serve as a warm-up period before both parties meet in real life. Others are against the idea of online relationships, saying the internet is not the proper venue to find love. "No relationship between a man and a woman exists without the sacred link, love should be honest, but it is never found in [shady] circles such as on the phone, in chat rooms or on websites, said Amena Nassir, professor of religion and philosophy at Al-Azhar University. In her research, Injy Galal, teaching assistant at the American University in Cairo, found that 50.3 percent of her sample resort to the internet to find romance, with no evident differences between male and female respondents. "Internet affairs are novel to traditional societies such as Egypt. Many believe that it might have a strong effect on the love and dating scene and provide a genuine opportunity to dramatically change the traditional form of relationships, she said. The dramatic increase of internet users in Egypt - from 650,000 users in 2000 to 9,170,000 users in 2008 - raised several debates around this medium. Hisham Attia, journalism professor at Cairo University's faculty of Mass Communication, highlights the role of the media in shaping the nature of relationships among adolescents. "There are many factors that affect relationships among adolescents, including western lifestyles that are presented in soap operas and movies as well as Facebook, online forums and websites all marketing the idea of friendship and love, he said. Noha Samir, 32, is a member of a Facebook group named "Hob (Love) where users look for their perfect match. However, she claims that cyber affairs are useless, unless they turn into actual face-to-face relationships. "Dealing with him or her in the real world would be an entirely different experience than dealing with them online. It's the only way to guarantee the certainty of your feelings for one another. If you don't have any plans to meet, a cyber relationship becomes pointless, she argued. In her study, Galal said there are many obstacles to taking virtual relationships to the next level. Only 36 percent of her respondents said they turned it into real-life relationships, while 56 percent said they did not take that step. Galal discovered that reasons for making the transition from online to "real-life varied significantly between male and female respondents. While females do it for emotional reasons, such as falling in love or finding intimacy, males do it because they get bored of the medium. "Online relationships move gradually to real-life, telephone conversations usually come before the couple meets, she said, "ironically females seemed more inclined than males to venture 'offline' without this phase. While cyber relationships are acceptable by peers, they are kept from families who are expected to frown upon such relationships. In Galal's study, 33 percent of the respondents said their families were unaware of their cyber relationship, and 22.7 percent said their families were against it. Only 9 percent said their parents accepted their online relationships. However, some of the online relationships do end happily. On an online political forum, Hossam met Nada who would soon be his wife. "Our relationship began in a political forum, where I was frankly looking for a wife, I believe in the effectiveness of the internet as a search tool for life partners and with the possibility of finding love anywhere, why not online? Hossam said. On her end, Nada said that "fate played a large role in the transformation of this friendship into a serious relationship. Hossam admitted to facing challenges when it came to convincing their families of this unusual way of choosing a life partner. "But once they saw us together and saw how [committed we are to one another], they agreed, he said.
