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When I used to teach English as a Second Language, I had a friend called Muni, or at least she wanted to befriend me. For some reason, I was wary of her. I found her zealous attempts to reform the ESL program to be too aggressive. And she wasn't as good as she thought she was; I covered a few classes for her and saw her teaching method (I would insist that she give me her lesson plan since I was't going to improvise).
She was a singer, and performed Indian songs with her husband . "We are artists," she told me. Her program always included and "some western songs to make the audience happy" she said. She had musical talent, but her voice was too weak for performance. She invited me to a few of her concerts, including one Eid performance. She was Muslim.
Those days, I was just beginning to understand the slow incursion of Islam into Canadian society. One Ethiopian Muslim, who also worked in my building (he "counselled" "new comers"), once sat me down and lectured me on how the Ethiopian Amhara (the group I come from) mistreated other ethnic groups, including Muslims. I knew his version of Ethiopia's past was wrong, but listened anyway. I didn't have the language or enough knowledge to argue with his adamant lecturing. But I think he lectured me so that I would be a mouthpiece and relate his views to my family, rather than any strong urge to "convert" me. He never wanted an Amhara mingling with his Somali/Oromo tribe.
Canada was also just beginning to embrace multiculturalism with a vengeance, which in my naive way I rejected, and Muslims were going through all kinds of petitions, political and otherwise, it include Muslim holidays in the official calendar. But, it was more insidious, since they were also working on eliminating Christian references, including the infamous "War on Christmas."
Muni always wore long skirts and loose blouses, with flat shoes. I thought it was some musician/artist thing. It looked gauche, like someone going for some look, but ended up looking a little odd. But she never dressed in these "western" clothes for her concerts, rather she wore glittering Indian saris. Her husband, with whom she performed, wore Nehru style shirts to these performances. I think her everyday clothes were her attempt at covering her body in accordance with Muslim dress codes. For her performances, she went back to her Indian (she was Bangladeshi) roots, and wore the beautiful saris. I think her audience expected this of her, despite their Muslim background. Sometimes (very, very few times), culture trumps religion.
They had two children: a son and a daughter.The son was about sixteen when I knew them, and the daughter about twenty three. This daughter always wore super-mini skirts. I could never understand why Muni would let her wear such clothes. "I don't want her to leave us" she said once, without my asking her. The daughter married a Muslim man, and I don't know what happened to her or her appearance after that, although I'm sure it has changed.
Muslim's seem uncharacteristically lenient toward their daughters until they get them married off. The husband is always a Muslim, or a Muslim convert. Then, the duties of a married Muslim woman has to take over, however modern she may seem (like Muni) if she want a harmonious family life. Honor killings are not necessarily for western-fashion attired unmarried girls, but for those who abandon their families for a non-Muslim man, or by conversion to Christianity.
Muni invited me to her home a couple of times. It was a little sparse and conventional for "artists" but I noticed that there were several Islamic paraphernalia, including a koran prominently on a table. After a while, I stopped accepting her invitations (she once started a "friendly" conversation about the Amhara, which I realized was a jab at my Christian background). But that wasn't the real reason I detached myself. I realized that she will always be a Muslim, and that she was reaching out to friendly-looking and friendly-seeming people to inject her Muslim culture, and who will be some kind of ambassadors to relay that image into the larger society.
I don't know what has become of Muni, and her family, but her efforts have not been in vain (not with me, but with Canadians in general). Mosques dot the landscape, Muslim holidays are openly celebrated, hijabed women are on the streets, and any "racist" comments towards Muslims can bring down the iron fist of the Human Rights Commission.
When will the rest of Canada learn?
