Does My Head Look Big in This?

by Randa Abdel-Fattah

  Fifteen minutes later, our food arrives.

  “Ladies, one pizza . . . apparently with the lot.” As the waiter catwalks away, I raise my eyebrows questioningly.

  “Definitely a plucker,” Leila sighs and Yasmeen nods.

  We dig in to our pizza with the lot minus the lot, then we order dessert.

  “This is nice,” Leila sighs as we lick our gelatos.

  “What is?” Yasmeen asks.

  “This. Hanging out. Chilling like normal teenagers, you know? What’s so bad about this? I don’t get what my mum’s dumb problem is.”

  “Pretty obvious,” I say.

  “Oh yeah? What?”

  “She thinks you’re going to try to pick up. And judging from the way you keep perving on that waiter, I’d say your mum has a point!”

  She kicks me lightly under the table. “He’s all yours.”

  “Oh really, and why the sudden change of heart?” Yasmeen says.

  “Oh, you know how it is.” She shrugs her shoulders. “It wouldn’t work out between us. We’d constantly be fighting over the eyebrow plucker.”

  15

  It’s now two months since the start of term, and it feels like the teachers are on a mission to make VCE the worst two years of our life. The Victoria Certificate of Education is a complete nightmare and I’ve been up studying every night. I’ve got Stalin, the formula for glue, and Pythagoras in my head. It’s an ugly combo.

  It seems like our two-hour class of Biology with Mr Jefferson will never end. When the bell finally rings we all jump up and shove our things away, desperate for fresh air and normal conversation. After I put my stuff in my locker I grab my prayer mat and walk towards Mr Pearse’s office. I cross paths with Adam on my way and stop to talk to him.

  “Where are you going?” he asks.

  “To pray.”

  “Cool. Where?”

  I eye him suspiciously. “Mr Pearse organized a room for me.”

  “Wow! So you actually pray every day, here at school? It’s not sarcastic, Amal. You can drop the eyebrows a notch.”

  I give him a half-smile. “Yeah, I pray every day here.”

  “Is it hard? To keep up, I mean?”

  “Sometimes it is. I get lazy too, you know. But it’s kind . . . kind of like a time-out. You know when – actually don’t worry.”

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  “I hate that what/nothing game. Just say it. I won’t laugh. Jesus Christ, you take things seriously!”

  “You shouldn’t take Christ’s name in vain like that,” I say solemnly.

  “What? Now you’re defending Jesus?”

  “I wouldn’t be considered a Muslim if I didn’t believe in Jesus Christ.”

  He backs away a little, looking flustered but excited. “Are you serious? So you believe in the Trinity and stuff, like me? Come on, sit down for a sec. I want to talk about this. This is weird. Can you pray in ten?”

  “Yeah . . . I guess.”

  We walk over to a nearby bench. My prayer carpet is folded in my lap and I’m playing with the tassels on the end of it.

  “So you and I, we believe in the same thing after all?”

  “Well . . . not exactly. See, we don’t believe Jesus was God, or the son of God. We believe he was one of the mightiest prophets of God, and performed miracles with God’s permission, like healing the blind, curing the lepers.”

  “Really? So Muslims actually believe in that too?”

  “Yeah. I went to a Catholic school you know. In primary.”

  “You didn’t? No way!” His eyes widen and his mouth is confused between grinning and laughing out loud.

  “Yep.”

  “This is freaking me out, Amal. So what were you saying about prayer?”

  I lean back against the bench and stare at him. “OK. Imagine you’re playing one of your basketball matches.”

  “Done.”

  “You’re running up and down the court, doing your lay-ups, shooting hoops, smashing your body into exhaustion. You’ve got nothing on your mind except the game. Nothing is distracting you from it. But when it’s time-out, you get this three or four minutes of calm. You get to drink your slurpie, catch your breath, rethink your strategy, who’s getting in your way, who’s working with you, who you could work with more. How much you owe your coach. What was that tip he gave you? What did he say was the best way to get a goal? Right?”

  “Yep.”

  “That’s how prayer is for me. It sounds corny, I know. But it’s kind of . . . like that. Except there are five slurpie breaks a day, and one of them is so early it makes your teeth sting.”

  He laughs and leans back, folding his arms across his chest.

  “You spin me out . . . I’ve never met anybody like you.”

  I don’t say anything and continue playing with the prayer carpet.

  “You know, you shouldn’t pay any attention to Tia,” he says. “She’s just a bitch. Rich, spoilt brat, obsessed with her looks. Fits the profile kind of story.”

  “Racist?”

  “Yeah, that too. But, well, you can’t really blame her. It’s what she hears at home. I know ’cause my dad knows her dad. They’re not friends but they used to bump into each other at the golf club. That was ages ago but even then her dad would see somebody Asian or dark-skinned and he’d hail them over assuming they were a waiter or something. They don’t really mix with anybody outside their circle. You’re probably the first Muslim—”

  “Yes, yes, I’m aware of that,” I groan. “The first Muslim she’s ever met. It makes me sound like an alien. Oh, it was my first encounter with a Muslim! Wow! I even had my camera! Can’t wait to ring the National Museum. I’m sure they’ll be interested in putting on an exhibition!”

  “OK, OK, I get the sarcasm. You need to relax.”

  “I’d be less hyper if people would stop making up crappy excuses.”

  “It’s not an excuse! I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, it’s obvious. You judge people on experience.”

  “Get out of here, Adam! You don’t judge people. We’re not a plural, or some big bloc, all acting and feeling and saying the same things. You judge individuals. Anyway, it goes both ways. I’ve got family friends who think all Anglos are drunk wife-bashers slumped in front of Springer with a stubby in their hands.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yes. Dead serious. Should I make an excuse for them? Oh, they’re allowed to think that. After all they’ve never really had a conversation with a sober Anglo. If it sounds so ridiculous for your background, then why doesn’t it for ours?”

  He runs his fingers through his hair and shakes his head. “You are absolutely the most exhausting individual I’ve ever encountered.”

  “Shall I do a Tia for you?” I flip my head to the side so the tails of my hijab lift to my other shoulder, and he cracks up laughing. After a few seconds of silence he looks at me with a serious face.

  “Hey. . .?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You know when you first walked in with the veil?”

  I’m telling you my lungs start to do step aerobics. I try to breathe evenly and nod my head, too nervous to answer.

  “It was weird. I thought . . . well a lot of people, we all thought you’d been forced by your parents. But a couple of us soon threw that idea out ’cause we thought, well, if you’d been forced you wouldn’t seem so, I dunno, into it.”

  “Huh?”

  “You just seemed to walk around like it meant something to you or you liked it. I dunno how to explain it.”

  I keep nodding.

  “So then we thought you’d become, like, some fanatic. Like what you see on TV, you know?”

  “Mmm.”

  “But you’re not.”

  “Duh.”
>
  “Thanks.”

  “No problem.” I stand up to walk off.

  “Hey, Amal!” he calls out.

  “Yeah?”

  “There was something else that crossed my mind when I first saw you with the veil.”

  “And what was that?”

  “You made for a pretty good-looking fanatic!” He grins at me and then gets up and walks away so quickly that he doesn’t catch my mouth stretch out in a smile so wide I’m in danger of damaging my facial muscles.

  16

  I have a sleepover at my house on Saturday night with Eileen and Simone. Leila’s here too; she’s not allowed to sleep over but my mum managed to convince her mum to at least let her stay for dinner. Yasmeen has some family thing on so she can’t make it and is spewing big time. We’re in my bedroom pigging out on pizza. Luckily, criss-crossing my two sets of friends has never proven to be a disaster as everybody gets along.

  “So I get this massive lecture from my mum this morning,” Leila says.

  “About?” I ask.

  “How I’m never going to settle down unless I’m more open-minded about her match-making. Boy, she drives me up the wall. She’s telling me this huge sob story about how much effort she takes to find guys she knows I’ll be attracted to and have things in common with.”

  “She tries to set you up?” Simone asks.

  “Yeah, all the time. About once every two months some new dude comes over for dinner. I’m coincidentally all dolled up. Like anybody really walks around the house with make-up and heels. Sometimes I deliberately wear no make-up and the daggiest clothes. Mum goes off at me.”

  “Would she force you to get married?” Eileen asks. “I don’t mean to be rude, but that just sucks.”

  “No! There’s no way she would force me. She just constantly pressurizes me about being so into my studies and not thinking about settling down. It’s weird because my female cousins in Turkey are all at university and their parents, as in my aunts and uncles, would have a fit if the girls wanted to get married before they finished their degrees. It’s like Mum came here all those years ago with the traditions of her village and got stuck in a time warp, while all her brothers and sisters progressed.”

  “I understand exactly what you mean,” Eileen says. “My parents emigrated from Japan about twenty years ago and they’re still going on about the traditions and cultural norms they were following when they left, all those years back.”

  “So your family’s traditional too?” Leila asks.

  “We all speak Japanese at home and my parents made me learn Japanese dance when I was in primary school when all my friends were doing ballet or playing basketball. And my mum wears the kimono on special occasions.”

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  “It’s Japanese traditional dress. What was weird was that when we went for a holiday over there a couple of years ago my aunts, who are older than my mum, were wearing more fashionable kimonos than her! They were really into the latest fashion and styles and there’s my mum with her taste from twenty years ago.”

  “I can so identify with that,” Leila says. “My mum insists on wearing floral-print scarves with lace trimmings. My cousins gave her so much grief about them over in Turkey. They’re all wearing these gorgeous silk and satin materials with funky patterns and there’s my mum wearing what can pass off as a doily.”

  “That’s slack,” Simone says, giggling.

  “Seriously, my mum is in desperate need of a Fab Five rescue.”

  “My mum wears pantyhose with open-toe shoes and draws in her eyebrows,” Eileen says. “They’re always smudged and crooked by the end of the day. Beat that.”

  “Is it because your mum is religious?” Simone asks Leila. “Amal drums it into our head that all those Taliban-type traditions aren’t Islamic but it gets confusing sometimes.”

  “It depends on what you mean by religious,” Leila answers. “Mum’s following her own customs more than Islam. She doesn’t really have an in-depth understanding about the religion, you know? Whereas my relatives in Turkey are all educated about Islam. The girls pray and some of them wear the veil and they go to university and work, because they know that it’s their right to do that in Islam. Mum’s more into following social customs.”

  “Is that why she wants you to settle down and get married?” Simone asks.

  “I suppose. I know she’s doing it because she loves me and in her own head what she wants for me is the right thing. But it’s just so frustrating! Especially her pep talks before a guy comes over!” She stands up and starts to impersonate her mum. “Leila, you are beautifuls and smarts. You can cook the vine leave and pide breads. Don’t let the man inside the lounge room make you feels you don’t deserves the best. But Leila, oh my daughter, please don’t talk smarts like you did the last times so he gets scared. Last times you told the man you believes all men are lazy and can irons the shirt if they try. Oh! No good, Leila!”

  We all burst out laughing and Leila laughs along with us.

  “So there you have it,” she says, plonking herself back on to the beanbag. “My mum, the matchmaker.”

  “I’ll never have that problem,” Simone says matter-of-factly.

  “What? Getting set up?” Leila asks, taking a bite of her slice of pizza. “Wannapieshe?”

  “No, I’ve got this salad Amal’s mum made. The lettuce is especially appetizing.” Simone ordered pizza with us and then backed out when she looked up her pocket calorie counter. My mum made herself and Simone a big crispy salad with fetta cheese and savoy crackers instead.

  “So what’s the deal with your parents?” Eileen asks Simone.

  “Well, there’s no danger of my parents inviting people over and trying to get me to go out with their perfectly eligible sons. They’re always telling me I’ll never find a boyfriend until I lose weight.”

  “Oh come off it, Simone!” Eileen cries. “No way!”

  “Mum has her figure even after having my sister, Liz, and me. She is constantly complaining about how I’ll end up lonely and single if I’m not thinner and find myself a boyfriend. She seems to be embarrassed by me.”

  We all stare back at Simone, horrified.

  “When my sister and her boyfriend are over from Adelaide, I get this huge debriefing session from my mum. See, Liz’s boyfriend is really popular and apparently he’s got a lot of friends. So Mum always sits me down weeks before we know they’re coming and tries to persuade me to diet so I lose weight and impress him enough for him to set me up with one of his friends.”

  We cry out reassuring words and compliments but it’s obvious that they don’t mean much in the end. She shrugs us off and continues picking at her salad. So we throw the pizza to the side, put on the radio and pull Simone off the bed.

  “Come on!” I cry. “Let’s practise Tai Box moves. The ones we learnt in aerobics last year!”

  Once the music gets started we spill over each other laughing as we perform our uncoordinated jabs and hook turns. Simone is yelling out names of people we should picture in our minds as we perform our uppercuts. Except she doesn’t really move on from Tia, Claire and Rita. And then Aretha Franklin’s song “Respect” starts playing and we’re dancing like we’re at a Grade Six slumber party, singing like we’re the final act at the ARIAs.

  Simone starts singing at the top of her lungs.

  “RESPECT! Tia needs to find out what it means to me! That snob! I hope she becomes a FATTY. Ow! Yeah! A little respect!”

  I’m sitting in home room on Monday morning fuming over a newspaper article about crime and “people of Middle Eastern appearance” when Tia walks up to my desk.

  “Hey Amal, did you watch that interview with those girls who were raped by those Lebo Muslims? You must feel so ashamed.”

  “Why?”

  “Don’t you have any feelings?”

>   “The only thing I’m feeling right now is that artificial intelligence beats real stupidity.”

  “Funny,” she says sarcastically and walks away.

  Tuesday morning. I’m at my desk in home room, fuming over an article about terror suspects and “people of Middle Eastern appearance” when Tia walks up to my desk again.

  “Hey Amal, how’s it going?” she asks in a sickly sweet voice. “Did you catch that doco on those Muslim fundamentalists last night? You’re Arab aren’t you? It must feel awful knowing you come from such a violent culture.”

  “You know, Tia, I came across a book the other day. The shortest book in world history. It was called My Thoughts by Tia Tamos.”

  For a moment she looks at me in mock-stunned silence, then she flips her hair and walks away.

  Wednesday morning. I’m at my desk in home room, reading an article about Jennifer Lopez’s exercise regime, when Adam is suddenly in front of my desk, smiling down cheerfully at me.

  “Hey Amal, what’s up?”

  “Nothing much,” I answer.

  “There was a mad doco last night on September 11. Man, they were showing how these guys were all religious and holy and shit. Spin out! Did you see it?”

  I’ve had it. I try to think of daffodil meadows. The moment the ugly stepsisters realize Cinderella’s got the prince. Sunsets at the beach, the instant you take a bite of food after a day of fasting in Ramadan, and why people just won’t give me a break. Do they think I’m a walking ambassador, that because I’m wearing hijab I’m watching every single documentary about Islam?

  I take a deep breath. “Look, Adam, sorry to disappoint you but just because I’m Muslim doesn’t mean I’m a walking TV guide for every ‘let’s deal with the Muslim dilemma’ documentary churned out.”

  “Huh?”

  “And why can’t you and other people get that you can’t be very holy if you’re going around blowing people to smithereens?”

  “Sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to offend you. I just thought you might have seen it. I’ll let you chill.” He walks off and I bite my lip, feeling instantly guilty for lashing out at him. I jump up and run after him into the locker area.