Jan 6, 2009, 10:00 GMT
Jordan's Princess Haya received dozens of veiled threats when she announced she wanted to become a professional showjumper.
The 34-year-old royal - who is the third daughter of the late King Hussein - said she was highly criticised for deciding to pursue a career as a sportswoman.
She said: "My father's Jordan was a progressive society but even so, for upper-class Arab families to go into sport was seen as not proper. Many people in Jordanian society said, 'Your mother would never have done that'. There was this veiled threat."
It was a criticism that nearly stopped the princess - who lost her mother, the popular Queen Alia, to a helicopter accident when she was just two years old - from pursuing her equestrian dreams.
She said: "I so wanted to know her that it did stop me in my tracks."
But her father encouraged her, laughing off personal attacks and even naming her "the trucker", because she was, and still is, the only Jordanian women to hold a truck licence.
Today, Haya is happily married to the ruler of Dubai Sheikh Mohammed, a keen horse rider she met at the World Equestrian Games. They have a 13-month-old daughter Al Jalila.
The princess loves married life, even though she shares her husband with his "senior" wife Sheikha Hind, who he married in 1980.
She said: "If you'd read me the script of my life 10 years ago, I would have burst out laughing. But falling in love can eclipse a lot of things."
Your Talkback on this Story