The marital ideal in the West is to meet someone who makes you happy; maybe even someone who takes your breath away (if you’re lucky). To court for a while, and then have a relationship proposal. To do romantic things together. To share friends. To share experiences; travel. To integrate with one another’s families and then after some years, more...
17-01-09 was the day I decided to start wearing a scarf; it was two weeks before I took my shahadah. I felt so lovely and exotic, covering up… I looked at myself in the mirror and was proud of the lady looking back, draped in scarf and sparkly eyed. I felt as if God had enveloped me; that that cloth was like God’s hands, keeping me safe more...
Two days of fasting remain and my head is positively reeling from all that I’ve learnt this month. I feel as if I’ve had a cultural hiding… okay that’s a bit dramatic, but I do feel overwhelmed by all the alien information I’ve had to ingest. Why didn’t I have these experiences last year? I don’t know. Last more...
This is my second Ramadan. It is Day 12 and I have hardly even had time to feel sorry for myself (oh, you have no idea what kind of self-pity went on last year). I know I’m not supposed to say this but the idea of starving myself every day for a month was absolutely mortifying. I started counting down 90 days before Ramadan 2009, psyching myself more...
What can I say. Shame? Sorry? Uhm. Here’s a tissue? Who would have thought a little crit could render a grown man such a wreck. If he wasn’t snorting and banging so hard on his keyboard I’d give the dude a hug. Goodness knows he needs it. I’m 22. The internet is just a place I come to send emails and download shit; it’s more...
My best friend’s favourite thing to do is to make predictions – about everything. From the detailed merits and drawbacks of her business ventures, to the hairiness of my future husband. These fortune telling sessions irk me to no end because whether she’s ultimately right or wrong is seemingly irrelevant; she’s always an apparent more...
Over the past year I have read some brilliant articles, opinion pieces and commentary on the pending European niqab and burqa bans; each one presenting strong and well reasoned arguments. I could rehash the best of them but there is no need to convince anyone who values their freedom that limiting the rights of others, specifically a minority group, more...
I was driving my brother to a club in Observatory when I first told him that I was considering embracing Islam. I just looked over at him and said, “I think I want to become Muslim”. He laughed uproariously, and then proceded to tell me that I would never be able to change my life like that. Secretly, I half agreed. But there was something more...
