Stories

Na'ima B. Robert is an extraordinary writer, masha Allah (praise be to Allah). She is good at making her stories interesting, like I-can't-stop-reading-now sort of interesting.  One of the books she has written is called, From Somalia, With Love. I enjoyed that book very much.

The book is based on a girl named Safia, whose father comes back from Somalia. She calls him Abo. It is the Somali way of saying “father”. If you never knew your father because he was in another country, you would be happy he came home, right? I would. But in Safia's point of view, when her father came home, it ruined everything.

The subtitle of Michelle Shephard's book, Guantanamo's Child: The Untold Story of Omar Khadr, seems a little misleading. How can this be an untold story when news about the Khadr family has been splashed across Canadian and international media?

But the subtitle is accurate. Though the Khadrs have received much news coverage, especially in Canada, not many know the family's full story.

I had looked forward to meeting Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish, the Palestinian doctor whose book I Shall Not Hate tells his moving story. But when I met him in Toronto he rebuked me, but in a manner that increased my admiration for his character.

Dr. Abuelaish was born in Jabalia refugee camp in the Gaza Strip and that would normally doom him to life-long misery and despair. His book chronicles his sufferings and humiliation ”“ and that of Palestinians ”“ from an ongoing, harsh occupation. But Dr. Abuelaish struggled day and night to become an internationally acclaimed physician and a crusader for a just peace. He made many Israeli friends.

The holiest month of the Islamic year, Ramadan, began last Friday, 20 July. This Ramadan, many Muslims are looking at a new dimension of the month: our impact on the earth. This is particularly important as we learn more about the effects of climate change, dwindling resources and, most importantly, decreasing access to fresh water around the world, which is a growing concern in many Muslim communities and countries.  

As if racial and religious profiling wasn't enough of a problem for Muslims, now with the release of the federal government's new counter-terrorism strategy which lists environmental groups as threats, Muslim environmentalists have it tough.

The newly published document from Public Safety Canada lists environmentalists under “issue-based domestic extremists” who could pose a threat to Canadians.

Last year, we discussed how to make attractive wrappers for our Eid gifts using recycled and reusable materials.

This year, we're looking at Eid cards. We've all tried, and many have succeeded, in making hand crafted Eid cards for our loved ones. Here's a neat ah”¦ recipe for making this year's Eid cards a bit more interesting.

This summer I was blessed to get an eight-week summer job placement with Sadaqa Food Bank as the media/events coordinator, and it reminded me of how important it was to help other people. With a half-finished undergraduate degree in human rights, I have realized that theorizing about poverty will not solve anything.

For around a decade, educators, psychiatrists and social scientists have been raising the alarm that something is going wrong for boys. Poorly served by an education system that privileges female ways of learning, and no longer having access to other sources of guidance and self-development in community settings, boys are falling through the cracks. Boys' scores in school are statistically lower than those of girls, and every year, fewer boys than girls make it to university or graduate. Those who work with boys are finding that they are increasingly disconnected: isolated and unplugged from their social contexts, they retreat into virtual worlds of computer and video games - and in some cases, into negative social groupings such as gangs.

With spring in the air, many are turning to outdoor patios to enjoy good times with friends, food and sunshine. In this mix however, is the unfortunate rush to include shisha.

Of course, one need not wait till the spring; many have access to shisha (aka hooka, narghile) throughout the year thanks to local outlets. It is not uncommon to see families smoke together, with bearded men and hijab-wearing women among them.

All are under the impression that this odious practice is far less harmful than smoking cigarettes because the (scientifically baseless) assumption is that tobacco-free shisha is 100 per cent harmless. But our youth in their rush to be cool, and our adults in their carrying on of tradition, are unwittingly engaging in a practice that is both physically and spiritually harmful. Take a look for yourself at the facts about shisha smoking:

Undeterred by what is arguably a significant hurdle to the pleasures and experiences of daily life, Arshina Kassam, a twenty-six year old Muslim of African background wakes each morning charged with her faith in God and confidence in her own ability to navigate the logistics of living life virtually blind.

Arshina, a second year Masters student in the School of Social Work at Carleton University, was born in Tanzania with a congenital cataract in her left eye that was not diagnosed till she was a year old. Her family then moved to Toronto where she embarked upon a series of surgeries to extract the diseased lens but following a detachment of her retina, she was left completely blind in her left eye by age two.

“Respond ”“ don't react”. What do these words mean to you? On Monday, Apr. 9, I participated in a YOUCAN Peace Builder Workshop. In the workshop, I learned about responding and not reacting to challenging situations. I learned that if someone is bothering you or bullying you, it's better to respond effectively than react with anger.

A bully will always want a reaction out of you. But if you respond in a self-controlled way, the bully won't have an answer. For example, if someone treats you in a disrespectful manner and you start yelling and screaming back at them; that would be a reaction.

Study also reveals link between educational achievement and the age at which a child learns English or French

Immigrant children arriving in Canada after the age of nine are more likely to drop out of high school than those arriving at a younger age says new study.

According to the study led by Ottawa University Professor Miles Corak, children who came to Canada before the age of nine do well in school, often performing better than their natural-born Canadian classmates.

In the majority of situations in Canada, individuals marry people they grew up with or people they meet in social settings such as work, school or on the internet. However, in various religious and ethnic communities such as Muslim, Sikh, Hindu and South Asian communities, arranged marriages where the parents choose their children's spouses, are still common.

Ottawa has announced that it will crack down on migrants who use an arranged marriage to fraudulently enter Canada.

It's late on a Saturday evening at the 313 Clubhouse. A couple of youths are huddled around the billiards table, weighing up their next shots. Two brothers are having an intense game of ping-pong at the table nearby. Others sit on the floor couches that line the wide room, watching the Sens game on the projector.

After almost a year and a half of holding weekly Saturday night religious lectures and discussions at people's homes, Ottawa's 313 group finally have a place to call their own. 

In April the group secured a small plot on the corner of St. Laurent and Walkley. By May, they had turned it into a fully functioning clubhouse complete with majlises (traditional Arabian sofas), billiards and table-tennis tables, a mini library, and a projector to watch things like last season's Stanley Cup playoffs.  

Haneen Alhassoun recently won second place this month at the Ottawa Youth Poetry Slam. At 16, the Brookfield High School student is both humbled and excited about her win as she has been working towards it for the past two and a half years.

So I've got to know a handful of the Muslim youth featured in Me, the Muslim Next Door, a visually delightful, intellectually satisfying online series produced by RCI (Radio-Canada International).

I've met Rizwan, the dedicated Canadian of Pakistani origin who has traveled across the country to hear the experiences of Muslim youth first hand, watched him model two very different outfits that represent both East and West. I've looked at university student Suad's wedding photos, watched her canvass for Doctors without Borders all while dealing with a few rude stares at her hijab (headscarf).

Marriage is a sacred bond between husband and wife. The Quran speaks about husbands and wives being garments to each other, saying: "Your wives are a garment for you, and you are a garment for them." (Ch.2, v.187)

Think about it. What is a garment? It covers you. It protects you from the elements. It can make you feel beautiful. It is a source of warmth and comfort. But what if your garment is made out of thorns? Thorns dig into your flesh. They hurt you and draw blood. This is what domestic violence does to a marriage. It changes the comfortable garment into a pain-filled thorn-ridden garment.

For many years now local Algonquin First Nations and local residents have been struggling to win an important debate about whether one of the last green areas in all of Ottawa should remain untouched or be developed.

Clear-cutting has started on the Beaver Pond forest in Kanata to make way for development.  Members of the First Nations and local residents want it stopped and fast.

What does it mean to be a Muslim woman in America today? In I Speak for Myself, 40 Muslim American women share their experiences of growing up in America. Their personal narratives of struggles and triumphs remind us that we share much more in the journey of life than we often realize. 

I Speak for Myself: American Women on Being Muslim, edited by Maria M. Ebrahimji and Zahra T. Suratwala, engages readers in a complex set of emotional, symbolic and social considerations related to growing up as a Muslim woman in America.