They should see what it takes—torchbearers of the future. They should know that Daddy is making history, and they can too.
One of the board members complained that Khalid was being heavy-handed. Years later, he would recount this episode with a footnote: “Things got done because Khalid rang doorbells.”
Construction started. Our living room became the forum for meetings with the architect. On my way to work, I would drive by the site, sit in the car, and watch the cranes lift steel beams. It’s actually happening! One morning so very close to the finish line, we ran out of funds. We had wanted to hold the opening on Eid, which was fast approaching. The community coffers were exhausted. Khalid suggested that we reach out to members of the Association of Physicians of Pakistani Descent of North America (APPNA) and ask for a small amount. I typed the appeal letter: it’s Eid, we are inches away, please send us just $50, that’s all we are asking, and we will have a mosque. Families congregated in our living room that evening to stuff the envelopes, hundreds of them. It worked. Checks started pouring in, and we completed the construction. I would later mail the donors a thank-you letter with two photos: the interior of the mosque before your check, and the completed mosque with people praying, after your check. Thank you, APPNA members.
The mosque opened its doors on March 5, 1989, and my children witnessed a dream realized. It had taken three years to bring that vision from an idea to a warehouse to a mosque, and on the way we banged our heads going over many a speed bump.
Meanwhile, I found myself reintroducing Islamic rituals in my daily routines and in my home, compelled not by my religious beliefs, but by my children. And I found myself questioning some of our practices. The edges of the motifs in my prayer rug were getting blurred.
PART FOUR
Rediscovering Islam: Religion or Culture?
16.
Born-Again Muslim
Bringing my children into the fold of Islam had a prerequisite. I myself had to start practicing the rituals that had fallen off my schedule. I retrieved my prayer rug. I didn’t know how to reboot. My children showed me the path—in many ways it contrasted with the Pakistani Islam, some of which I welcomed and some of which I was uneasy with. I had to restart, relearn, reinvent, and question.
Submission
“Mummy, we are supposed to say our prayers five times a day,” Saqib said.
I better start praying.
“It will be prayer time in ten minutes,” Saqib said.
How does he know the prayer timings?
“Asim, have you done your wudu?” Saqib asked.
I saw Asim go into the bathroom and perform ablution, the ritual purification, before offering prayers. If you have had the chance to notice Muslims performing ablution in public bathrooms at rest stops, you will recall seeing them wash their extremities, i.e. hands, face, arms, and feet. I must confess that washing one’s feet in a sink is awkward. I once lost my balance. You also get the floor wet, risking a fall. At rest stops, I symbolically rub a damp hand over my socks—God will understand. Mosques have ablution areas, designed for washing feet while comfortably seated on a stool.
“Daddy, can I give the adhan?” Saqib said.
Oh, my God! My children know the Call to Prayer. Thank you, Sunday school. Thank you teacher.
He stood in a corner, put his right hand to his ear, and called out in a melodious voice, “Allahu Akbar …”
God is Great,
There is only one God,
Muhammad is His Messenger,
Come to Prayer,
Come to Success,
God is Great,
There is only one God.
Saqib was perfect. Oh, God! Thank you.
In Pakistan, no one had ever given the adhan in the house. It was broadcast from the minarets of the mosque five times a day, and if there were five mosques in the neighborhood, you would hear twenty-five adhans a day. I don’t believe I even paid attention to the wording of the adhan. Etiquette, however, required that as soon as we heard the adhan, women would cover their heads with the dupatta and stop talking. As soon as the adhan was over, off came the dupatta, and the chatter resumed. Some men would head out to the mosque; no one in our home went to the mosque.
“Teacher said it is better to pray in congregation,” said Saqib.
“Yes, of course.”
I didn’t know that.
We obeyed. I handed Khalid the prayer rug, a two-by-four-foot rug threaded in red, gold, and green, patterned with an arch, with floral designs on the edges, and a soft and silky feel. Khalid placed the rug facing northeast, orienting us toward the Kaaba, the shrine in Mecca built by Abraham. The teacher had told us that though Mecca is southeast of New York, we calculate the shortest distance between where we stand and the Kaaba, which is over the North Pole. I spread a bed sheet behind him; Saqib and Asim stood behind Khalid; and I stood behind them all, covering my hair.
I have to get more prayer rugs on my next trip to Pakistan. And can someone explain to me why women have to stand behind men? It makes me feel secondary—relegated to the back. What will my children think? How do we explain it to them?
Khalid led the prayer, and we followed in unison. For the first time, we were offering congregational prayers in our home. Khalid recited the opening chapter of the Qur’an in Arabic, asking for God’s guidance, then a short chapter of the Qur’an. We bowed together, kneeled with our foreheads to the ground in submission to God’s will, sat in silent prayer, stood up again, and repeated the cycle until the prayer was over. We said, “Peace,” to the angel on our right shoulder recording our good deeds and to the angel on our left shoulder recording our not-so-good deeds. Holding a tasbeeh, we recited the names of God over the prayer beads, glorifying Him. Khalid raised his hands and began the supplication—a personal conversation with God, in English, thanking him for His blessings, for the health of his family, their well-being, asking for them to be good Muslims, for the children to do well in school. I cupped my hands and silently added a few more items on my wish list to God. We hugged each other, folded the prayer rug and sheet, and put them away until the next prayer.
In Pakistan, I never prayed in congregation. That was reserved for the mosques. I would pray in a quiet private area of the house, usually a bedroom. And we prayed facing west, toward Mecca.
“Saqib, how did you know that it was prayer time?” I asked.
“Teacher gave us a salat timetable.”
“Really! Can I have a look, please?”
Sure enough, a prayer schedule for each day of the month, for each of the five daily prayers. Daybreak, noon, afternoon, sunset, and night. Daybreak was at 5:40 a.m. on the first, 5:41 a.m. on the second, and so on. In Pakistan we never used a timetable. One knew it was prayer time when one heard the adhan. In the US, one had to figure out the approximate time by the movement of the sun.
What a great idea to have a schedule! How did the teacher get this information? And for that matter, how did the muezzin in Pakistan know the exact time for the prayer?
Khalid surmised that the teacher must have contacted the observatory.
I learned later that morning prayer begins when the morning light starts spreading horizontally and ends when the tip of the sun becomes visible; noon prayer, after the sun has reached its zenith and our shadow is shortest in length; afternoon prayer, when our shadow is longest; evening prayer, when the upper tip of the sun sinks below the horizon; and night prayer, when the sun loses its redness. In the short days of winter, the interval between the midday prayers is short. If you are out Christmas shopping between noon and 5:00 p.m. in December, chances are you will miss your noon, afternoon, and evening prayers. Likewise, in June, you can come home from work at 6:00 p.m. and still make it on time for your afternoon prayer. I liked the feeling of prayer time keeping us in sync with the cosmos—just follow the movement of the sun across the sky.
“What will happen if I miss my prayer?” Asim asked.
Aha! This I can answer.
One day, the dreaded question was asked.
“How come Mummy isn’t praying with us?” Congregational prayers at home had become the norm—during the evening hours and on weekends. Khalid was left with the task of making an excuse for me. I don’t know what he said, but I do know what he did not say: “She is having her period.”
Don’t ask me why. It is just the way it is. The practice of rituals—in my opinion—has its hang-ups, which beg to be sorted out.
I am twelve, saying my prayers in the drawing room in Pakistan, when I sense my aunt come and stand beside me. As soon as I finish, she beckons me to get up and follow her. In her bedroom, she whispers, “You don’t say your prayers when you are menstruating.”
“Why not?”
“Because you are impure.”
“Can I read the Qur’an?”
“No.”
I didn’t question it.
Isn’t it remarkable how the irrational interpretation of the sacred text—striking a week off the girl’s monthly prayer schedule—goes unchallenged, is embraced, universally adopted, and passed on from aunt to niece? Why did women just accept the edict that they were impure? Did they really believe that God did not want to hear from them? Or were they just relieved to be on prayer vacation? Sorry, ladies, but I hold women responsible for allowing this, including me. If only they had studied the Qur’an. If only I had.
I am happy to report that the position on this practice has finally been elevated from certainty to controversial. Too late for me—post-menopause.
“Khalid, what is this business of women praying behind men?” I asked one day. I made sure the children were out of range.
“It’s all about control. Some men decided that it is best to keep women at the back, and it became the rule.” Others told me that it was to protect the privacy of women while prostrating. What about the privacy of men? Some explained that women prefer to be together in their own space. Did anyone ask the women?
My children didn’t question it openly, but they must have thought about it. Two years later, when we performed the hajj—the pilgrimage to Mecca—we noticed that at prayer time men and women were separated but women were not relegated to the back. Here, in the holiest place in the Muslim world! Can someone explain this discrepancy to me?
Back in New York, I started speaking up. The organizers agreed but placed a moveable wall to separate men from women. We had our own space, in the front, but were visibly cut off and could not see the imam leading the prayer on the other side of the divide, and thus could not follow him in the movements. One evening, in the midst of prayer, we women realized that we had been standing instead of sitting, and bending instead of kneeling. As soon as the prayer was over, I and another woman walked over to the men’s section, spoke up, and spoke out: “Tear down this wall. You have ruined our prayer.”
The wall came down.
A Time to Reflect
“Mummy, Ramadan starts tomorrow. Teacher said children don’t have to fast, but all grownups should fast. Aren’t you going to fast?”
“Yes, yes, of course I am.”
Vacation over. Start fasting.
I hadn’t fasted in a decade. Neither had Khalid. But there we were, an hour before the crack of dawn, having suhoor. Thank you, children, for making Muslims out of us. The first day was hard. It wasn’t the hunger or the thirst; it was the splitting headaches from caffeine withdrawal. The second day was easier, and by the third day, the headaches were gone. Iftar wasn’t until 8:00 p.m. When I came home from work at 6:00 p.m., I would give the children their dinner, and Khalid and I would eat at sundown.
“Can we fast for just a day? Please, please,” Saqib asked.
“Tell you what. How about if you fast for half a day on Sunday.”
“Yeah!”
So every Sunday, Saqib and Asim would wake up at 3:00 a.m., have breakfast, and break their fast at lunchtime. They loved it. At Sunday school they would show off.
“Half-a-day fast is not fasting,” said one of the boys.
“My mother says it is for children.”
That’s right. Stand up for your mother.
“What happens if I eat when I am fasting?”
“If you eat accidentally, because you forgot, then just ask God for forgiveness and continue with your fast. If you intentionally eat, then your fast is broken, and you have to make up for it.”
Please, let them not ask the next question: how do you make up for it? I have no idea. How am I going to make a good Muslim out of them if I don’t know the rules?
I called my friends. I got three different answers:
You have to fast an extra day;
You have to feed the poor for a day;
You ask God for forgiveness.
The right answer? None of the above. The teacher confirmed that if you deliberately break your fast, you have to fast for two consecutive months or feed sixty people. If you don’t have the means, then give whatever charity you can.
You live and learn. Take your fasting seriously.
The time of the day I relished was after suhoor and before the daybreak. I would curl up with the Qur’an and recite it in Arabic and study its translation. The house was quiet, it was still dark outside, and I could feel the power and beauty of the Qur’anic verses. God revealed these verses to Prophet Muhammad. This was God speaking to me, urging, comforting, and guiding me. The verses gave me pause as I reflected on the simplicity of the message. By the end of Ramadan, I had completed the recitation of the entire Qur’an. My mother told me that we fast so that we know what it is like for those who live in hunger. For a child, that was an appropriate answer. But I was beginning to see that Ramadan was much more than an exercise in restraint, that if you can control your appetite, you can control other impulses. It was a time to appreciate the blessings we take for granted, and to give to those in need. It was a time for reflection, a time to spiritually cleanse oneself and connect with the divine.
Fasting at Work
This wasn’t going to be easy. Daylight Savings Time was in effect, and the fasting days were long. Each evening, Khalid and I would make our silent intent to fast the following day, set the alarm for 3:00 a.m., drag ourselves out of bed, prepare breakfast, force-feed ourselves with cold cereal—remember, who has an appetite at 3:00 a.m.?—wait for the clock to strike 4:15 a.m. for daybreak, say our prayers, and then head back to bed at 4:30 a.m. Now that we were fully awake, good luck falling asleep.
I have to get some sleep. I am not used to lying in bed with a full stomach. If I don’t fall asleep quickly, I will be dozing off at my desk, or fade out in a meeting. Stop thinking—just blank out and let your mind rest. Count camels.
An hour later, I would fall asleep, only to have to rouse myself at 7:00 a.m. Rush hour: get dressed, wake up the children, get them breakfast, off to school, off to work. I’d walk into the office looking like I had been up since 3:00 a.m.
At lunch time, my colleagues invited me, and the conversation went something like this:
“Want to join us for lunch?” my colleague asked. I was now working at the Health and Hospitals Corporation in Manhattan.
“No thank you.” Should I tell them?
“Having a late lunch?”
“Actually, I am fasting. It’s Ramadan.”
“Oh, I am sorry.”
So polite!
“Maybe tomorrow?” she asked.
“Actually, it’s for a whole month.”
“A whole month! You can’t eat for a whole month?”
“It’s not like that. I break my fast at sundown, and then I can eat until daybreak the next day.”
“It’s a long day. Well, at least you can drink.”
“No. I can’t drink either. No eating, no drinking.”
“Not even water?”
“Not even water.”
�
�Bless you.”
And No Sex
What? I didn’t know that! Fasting was “No eating and no drinking.” Where did “No sex” come from?
I was at Sunday school and had dropped in on the adult classes. The teacher was giving a lecture on—you guessed it—Ramadan. “From daybreak to sundown, Muslims refrain from eating, drinking, and marital relations.”
All those years in Pakistan, nobody ever told me that. Not my parents, not my grandparents. Of course, they didn’t. It wasn’t applicable. Unmarried girls and boys didn’t have sex. Why bother telling them to abstain from what they already abstain from. I could not picture my parents and grandparents waving their finger at me, “And no sex.” Besides, talking about sex was off limits. What confounds me is that my friends didn’t tell me either. Girls talked and eagerly imparted any new information on the forbidden topic. Every now and then, a steamy book was brought into the hostel—Valley of the Dolls was a favorite—and we girls talked about the dreaded wedding night, yet no “wise” girl ever offered this bit of information. We were not just naïve; we were ignorant. To test my hypothesis, I did a poll while writing my memoir. I got on the phone and called my friends in the US.
Voicemail.
I left messages.
“This is Sabeeha. I have a juicy question. I cannot say it to voicemail or text it. Just call me.”
In minutes, my friends were calling.
“What’s the juicy question?”
“Tell me, when we were in college, did you know that sex was forbidden during fasting?”
Pause.
“Let me think. No. I didn’t know. How could I? Sex was already off limits.”
Threading My Prayer Rug Page 14