From the Everett Herald:

Women's project offers a comfortable setting to swim
By Katherine Schiffner, Herald Writer

EVERETT -- Nadaa Aliat glances up at the YMCA pool's glass entryway before easing into the chilly shallow end. A long white curtain covers the door and the window beside it. No one can peek inside. Time to swim. This is the only place Alait and most of the two dozen other women in the pool can swim laps, learn new strokes and soak in the hot tub. For religious and modesty reasons, they won't appear in swimsuits in front of men. This swim time, twice a month, is just for women and children.

"Because we are Muslim, we can't show the body to other people," Aliat said. "If this program were gone, we couldn't do anything." Aliat, 30, who moved to Everett from Iraq 10 years ago, wears a head scarf and long black cloak in public. She has come to the Sunday swims for a year now. "Before, we didn't know how to swim, but now we're swimming and enjoying it," Aliat said. "Last time, my daughter was able to float without anybody helping. The kids have learned so fast."

The women-only swim was started by Therese Quinn, leader of Snohomish County's Woman to Woman project, which aims to bring together women from different cultures. Woman to Woman, which also offers cooking classes, discussion groups, sewing circles and roller-skating nights, added the swim time at the suggestion of several Muslim high school girls. The informal gatherings, "give us the opportunity to learn from each other," Quinn said. "One of the women involved in the program had this notion that people from the Middle East were not like us," Quinn said. "After she got to know some of the women from the Middle East, and their children played together, she realized she was wrong."

The swim times are open to all women and young children. Sisters Gerri Johnson and Barb Heckathorn of Marysville say they feel more comfortable doing water aerobics there. "It gives us an opportunity to get out and get moving without showing our rolls to men," Johnson said with a smile.

Women-only swim

The Woman to Woman Project hosts women's swims 9:30-11:30 a.m. on the second and fourth Sundays of every month. Women, girls and young boys swim in privacy at the Everett Family YMCA, 2720 Rockefeller Ave. Suggested donation: $1.