A Network for Muslim Women in London

Imaan Networking was launched by a very innovative young professional a few months ago. Having just moved to London, and realising that it was difficult to meet like minded women she simply put an ad in one of the many websites for Muslims in the UK (I think it was islamic events something). Her ad requested that Muslim women professionals in London contact her should they wish to create a network. The idea took off, and several dinners in London restaurants were arranged, where the Women got to know the organiser and each other.

In Ramadan Imaan Networking organised iftars in members houses. A member would volunteer to host an Iftar, and registered guests only would receive the address. A bit risky, but since many had met each previously, the host knew at least a few of the people destined to show up at their doorstep. As a guest you were expected to bring a dish to share. The atmosphere at these events was amazing, over 15 people showed up at each, and we quickly got to chatting. The women were from various backgrounds and professions (film makers, IT managers, accountants, psychologists, teachers, lawyers, oh and a cosmologist I had some explaining to do at these events ), and the converstaion flowed.

The Network has expanded, and now have a website (www.imaannetworking.com) and a blog (www.imaannetworking.blogspot.com). They are now organsing theatre evenings, Eid parties, and trips abroad!!! The latter I am really excited about!

I think this is a neat and innovative way of making new friends

Women and Men in the Workplace

A few weeks ago a well respected and successful friend of mine made the comment that Men made better work colleages than Women. She deemed Men to be more professional than Women and hence it was easier to deal with them. Trust me to have had an alternative experience …

Granted in my area of work, Women are a novelty and as such when we come across each other we practically embrace each other at the first meeting. But on the flipside, there can be the risk that Women in such an environment who have succeeded have done so with alot of effort and can in theory become harsh and difficult to deal with. Luckily I have not encountered this phenomena, but have heard from colleages that it exists. I have worked for and with Women in other fields of work, namely admin, and I do feel it involves different dynamics. I tend to become friendly with women alot quicker than I do with Men, and as a result work issues are dealt with in a similar manner to the way personal issues are dealt with… gently. However, this was not the case with one of my Women bosses, she kept her distance and we had a very much superior-junior professional relationship, she was assertive and great to work for.

My negative workplace experiences have been with Men. Naturally since I have worked with more Men than Women, it is statistically more likely for me to have experienced more negative and positive experiences with Men. I want to focus on the negatives. The danger with Men, when you are one of the token Women, is that sometimes assertiveness on my part is not taken too well. These Men are what I deem to be stuck in the toddler stage of their emotional development. They are ‘hurt’ easily and cannot handle even a hint that they have made a mistake. For example, a colleage of mine a while back did not attend a work engagement that he had to attend, I knew he had made a very lacklustre attempt at finding a replacment, but the the upshot was that I was forced to cover for him. I was advised to submit a formal complaint, but decided against this because 1) I dont want to be a ’snitch’ and 2) I did not want to make a mountain of a molehill. I decided that the next time I saw him, if I felt ok (i.e. not angry) I would approach him directly. The opprtunity arose, and finding myself in a good mood and hence in a position to bring up the event in a rational manner, I seized it. I caught him while he was away from people (no scene thank you very much) and said that I had noticed he had not shown up to the event and that in future he should arrange a replacement. He said he had tried (emailing people who were already going to be there), my response that he could email person X who is in charge of such events. At this point he has already broken eye contact and was looking to the side, he replied that he had received permission from the convener of the event. I repeated what I said before, and continued to explain that I had been left to deal with double the people I was supposed to deal with. He walked away mid-sentence.

I was angry with this, but calmly got my things and proceeded to a class I had. Upon returning to my office an hour later, I was surprised to find an email from him to the convener of the event, with all other members of staff who were there, essentially asking for clarification of what should be done in future so that he could avoid such ‘unpleasant’ statements that I made to him!!!! I had clearly hurt his ego, maybe because I am slightly junior to him, or maybe because of the gender thing, who knows? It was clear to me that his reaction was a rather feeble and childish attempt to intimidate me, ‘put me in my place’ and assert himself to other members of staff.

I have also been disrespected when attempting to give a short lecture to students, where other members of staff have continued talking to the students while I was talking. Clearly very rude of them. I have yet to tackle this issue, but somehow I have a fear that even a polite request that they wait till I finish to resume their conversation may result in a temper tantrum such as the one I mentioned above.

Another (possibly unfounded?) fear that I have is being labelled a ‘cow’ or ‘bitch’ if I am to stand up for myself. I have heard these terms levied at Women who assert themselves and do not take any rubbish from people, and stupidly I fear of having such statements made about me!

In summary, this post is a bit of a rant on my part and also to point out that in the workplace, Men too can be emotional, irrational and total git-faces.

The end.

* ok not quite the end, I really should mention that I received tremendous support from my colleages for the fall out of the event

The House of Wisdom and the Legacy of Arabic Science

*A summary of the lecture given by Prof. Jim Al-Khalili, theoretical nuclear physicist.

**italics are my own take

The lecture kicked off with the Prof. explaining what prompted his interest in the legacy of Arab science. Born in Baghdad to a Iraqi father and English mother he was raised in the UK, and when he got older he became interested in the scientific history of his ancestors. He felt it may something he should be taking pride in, and wanted to promote knowledge of this era of scientific history which neither the West nor the Islamic/Arab east knew much about, or at least an era whose significance in modern-day science is under-appreciated.

Arab science is often viewed as merely presentational, the scientists of the age are assumed to have only translated and kept the scientific discoveries of the Greeks, then passing them on to Europe once it began its emergence from the Dark Ages. The Prof. aimed to present an argument that the Arabs did more than this, and that in fact they can be credited with the foundation of many of the theories and philosophies that drive modern day science.

The “Golden Age” of Arab science began roughly in the 9th century in Baghdad, a city built from scratch as a seat of power for the Abbassid Caliph, Harun Al-Rashid. This Golden Age was characterised by an “obsession with learning and original thinking. Haruns son, Al-Ma’mun, whose mum was a captured persian slave, took over the caliphate after his father. Like his father he had a thirst for knowledge, and claimed to have dreamt of Aristotle. He built what was known as the “house of wisdom”, or Beit Al-Hikmah, which was an academy filled with scholars and books. Today, some western historians try to play down the significance of this house by labelling it as little more than a library, when it was in fact a seat for science and rational thinking.

This interest in science and rational thought without any hint of any conflict with religion contrasts with the more modern viewpoint of some sort of clash between science and religion. 1000 years ago, Muslims took their duty to seek knowledge seriously, whereas today, a minority of Muslims now view with suspicion the advances in science. They wonder why we bother with the study of cosmology when the “Quran tells us all we need to know”.

Al-Khalili then spent the next 1/2 hour or so giving us a crash course on all the scientists of this golden age and their impact on science today. He started with Al-Kindi, a philosopher and polymath who imported and adapted Greek philosophy for the Islamic world. Then he spoke about Al-Khawarizmi, who is credited as the father of algebra, a title which he felt needed explaining since it is known that the balylonians were solving quadratic equations well before he came on the scene. Up until Al-Khawarizmi people were solving specific problems, and even though they used symbols these symbols represented real numbers, and their approach was geometrical and can be classified best as “number theory”. Al-Khawarizmi was the first to treat the symbols as free entities which can be manipulated, which through the algorithm that is used is ‘fixed’ or ‘forced’ to take a value (jabara=forced in arabic). In fact his seminal work in written entirely in prose, no mathematical symbols appear, and as such is accessable to anyone.

He then mentioned Al-Razi, the physician and founder of the modern day hospital. The of Al-Biruni, the persian polymath who provided a very clever and concise measurement of the radium of the earth. And f Ibn-Sina, the persona physician and author of the well known “Canon of Medicine”. Then of Ibn-Alnafis, the Syrian anatomist who first understood that blood must circulate via the lungs and into the heart.

Throughout the talk, Al-Khalili was careful not to over-inflate the contributions of Arab scientists. He was careful to mention that, for example, Al-Biruni was not the first to measure the circumference of the earth, he was beaten by the Greek Eratostheres in 250 BC, and that the Greek Gaelin thought the blood flowed from the right to the left chamber of the heart and that the true nature of blood circulation was figured out by William Harvey. His argument that no science springs out of the vacuum, and that people must stand on the shoulders of the giants that predated them to progress, and as the Arabs stood on Greeks, Indians, Persians and Babylonians, the West today stands on the shoulders of Arab giants.

This brings us to the question, do we call this age the Arabic revolution or the Islamic revolution? He argued that we can’t call it the ‘Islamic revolution’  because the early scientists were not all Muslim, and even though they were not all Arab, the language in which the texts were written in was Arabic. But it was not Arabic culture that prompted the revolution was it? It was Islamic philosophy, so shouldnt we pay credence to this?

He also briefly addressed the issue of the decline of science in Arabia. His reasoning for this was that there was no real answer to it. In the 14th and 15th centuries scholars such as Al-Ghazali came on the scene, he was more orthodox and criticised the early scholars and philosophers for being too pro-Greek (aka Pagan) philosophers. Added to this the Empire fragmented, the Mongols invaded (leading the loss of alot of literature), and the Ottomans took over. The Ottomans were not so much into pure science as they were into architecture (one of the Turkish members of the audience rightly argued that necessity is often the impetus for science and many engineering advances were made from the Ottoman interest in architecture). There was an overall loss of appetite for science, and no one other than Europe to carry the baton of scientific progress. I.e. the natural ebb and flow of life.

Moving on to Arabs today: the Gulf states are really in the best position to ignite another Arabian scientific revolution due to their financial resources, but up until recently they followed the science=technology=economy mentality which left little room for the pure sciences. Now things are changing, and Saudi Arabia for example is building (or has built?) a university dedicated to science for the sake of it.

Who know? Maybe we will shake of the cobwebs and become scientific revolutionaries once more? But will this require political and humanitarian stability in the regio or will it force it I wonder?

When to help a stranger?

Especially when u live in the mad city of London..

I am not new to beggars, I saw some sorry sights in Jordan, especially of little children selling sweets in the street, dirty, ragged, and a surreal combination of childlike innocence and street smarts. Having seen and dealt with that I am largely oblivious to the begging scene in London. Adults sitting under quilts in the street begging for coins just dont pull at the heartstrings like a little child wearing sandals in the middle of the biting Jordanian winter. I am also completely unfased by the fake Muslim beggar women who frequent the Arab Edgeware road in central london… who also make a bee-line for me and point towards my headscarf and say ‘muslim’ then point at themselves and make a sad face, like the headscarf somehow obliges me to help her… am afraid those women have ‘professional beggar’ written all over them…

But what about the other cases? the ones that feel genuine? That when you refuse aid it leaves an impression? An example is the woman I met in the east end of London, she was portugese (?), and was lugging around a back pack. She stopped me, and very politely told me that she had run out of money, she did not know london very well and well she needed some cash to get into a hostel that night. Cerebrally I did not doubt her story, but for some reason I decided not to help her. She kind of huffed off after that. I partly regretted it later, and I still dont know why I said no.

Then there was the case of the highly distressed woman I met in London. From the corner of my eye I saw her being rudely rebuffed by a man, then she approached me , her voice was shaking, and I felt something was wrong, not ‘off’, but that she was very panicky, emotional and scared. She assured me she was not homeless, but something had happened to leave her stranded that night in London and she needed money to get home, the something had lost her her money as well. I was not listening, I was overwhelmed by her distress. She did not smell (homeless people tend to) but she did bear the marks of poverty, cheap clothes, blackened fingertips, and bad teeth (missing molars by the looks of things). But there were tears in her eyes, and she looked me straight in the eye when she made her request for the bus fare.

It crossed my mind that she may be a drug addict in need of a fix (hence panicky shaky demeanor), but she was lucid and coherent and not pally as is my experience in the past when drug addicts pestered me for money, also she had a specific amount in mind £12.90, the bus fare and asked for my name and address so she could pay me back (I didnt, I am not completely insane!). Her distress I felt was due to her earlier rebuffs, and getting worried. Allah A3lam, I decided to help her, I acted on instinct… but I always obsessively analyse my instinctive decisions later.

So, I wonder, how do we know that our instincts are correct, and when we are being played by those who know how to manipulate people?

The Inheritence Rules in Islam and the Independant Woman

*I am cleaning up my drafts section, and came across this old post, not sure why I never posted it… so here goes… keep in mind I am not a scholar of Islam, I just believe in its rationality.

On the face of it, it isn’t fair. The sister gets a fraction of whatever inheritance her brother gets. If a couple have no children, or only have girls, then the inheritance from the death of the man is not split equally among the Mum and daughters. In this case the Mans siblings are entitled to a cut. The reasoning is well known, Men are deemed financially responsible for the women in their family (daughters, wives, mothers, sisters and nieces).

Being the curious (read: argumentative) youngster that I was, I challenged the Islamic teachers, and any random Muslim I came across on why this was so. The answer, to say the least was unsatisfactory, to say the most made me not want to be a Muslim. Their answer was “well a woman would just waste her money on makeup and stuff while a man would put it to good use to serve his family”….. I shall leave the shock and rants to you. Lets just say I felt that the worth of the woman was not exactly ‘appreciated’ by these people.

Fast forward a couple of decades, and I’m still a Muslim. All grown up now, I have experienced life in many forms, and even though not a wife or a mother myself, I have witnessed my friends make this transformation, and have seen the (major) changes they make for the sake of their children (they change and sacrifice for their husbands too– rather unequally I may add– lets leave that for another post). I don’t think they would have been able to do this, with so little regret or stress, had they had to carry the financial responsibility of the family, or any part of it.

So lets revisit that old question, why are men entitled to more inheritance than women under the rules of Islam? Let us attempt to rationalize it shall we:

• In Islam women are not expected to carry the financial burden for anyone, not even themselves. The idea being that should she wish to have biological or foster children then she should feel free to dedicate as much of her time as she wishes to them. Without the added worry of money, or feelings of guilt about not contributing financially to the family. (Note to women who feel like this after having given birth: Honey its not your problem, enjoy motherhood).
• Had women been assigned an equal percentage of the inheritance, I expect that the men would have resented having to be financially responsible for the women as well.
• Again, had the women been assigned an equal percentage of the inheritance, women would not feel it to be their due to be financially looked after, and therefore would be less inclined to demand this right from their un-conscientious male relatives and protectors. Thus negating the aim outlined in the 1st bullet point.

Now we come to the case of the independent women, of which we are seeing many of these days, what if a woman decides that she does not want to rely on anyone but herself? Since she has absconded her right to financial support from her male relatives, doesn’t she then deserve equal inheritance?

Why a woman would choose to do this are many fold. She could simply crave the freedom, she may not feel a respected part of the community and sets out to prove herself, she may want to cut off ties with said male relatives, or keep them as far from her as possible. It may be that said male relatives set conditions on their financial support (note: this is wrong, and she could challenge it but we don’t always want the headache). However, at the end of the day it is her decision. I would imagine that in the case of the male relatives shirking their duties, a court may order them to hand over a lump sum to her, or whatever. But if she refused it on grounds of her wanting to be independent, and does not need anyones help, then no, I don’t think she should get the full inheritance. Simply put, because this would (ok MAY) make other women feel inadequate for not seeking total Independence themselves, and it MAY lead to the phenomena I first read about in the book Affluenza, where new mums were feeling pressurised by the expectations of society to return to work, when they secretly really wanted to enjoy motherhood for a while.

I think that this system offers women the choice of work and financial Independence, with the added boost of the safety net should they change their minds, or change their circumstances, or lose their job or whatever. Why would you say no to that?

Here in the UK, the concept of society looking after mothers, and offering women special treatment when it comes to housing and welfare exists. As a working Mum, you get a years’ maternity leave on half pay, as a single unworking mother you would be given priority for council houses, and as a homeless woman, you would be offered priority at shelters. I argue that the concept of looking after women is simply more institutionalised in the UK than it is with the Islamic way (which leaves it up to the family in the first instance and extended society in the second). 

Terror Makes the World Go Round

The Devil and Miss Prym

A Novel by Paulo Coelho

Excerpts:

…and [they the people] confused fear with generosity

…the man did not go to court …[because] he wanted at all costs to be liked

It is always far easier to have faith in your goodness than to confront others and fight for your rights.

It is always easier to hear an insult and not retaliate than have the courage to fight back against someone than yourself.

Scary isn’t it… in fact terrifying. Throughout the first half of the book, Coelho puts forward a rather convincing argument in favour of the innate evil of mankind. That the reason we are law abiding is we fear punishment, the reason we are generous is that we fear the scorn of others, the reason we choose certain professions and not others is we fear gossip. The example of the man who did not seek his rights for fear of not being liked will strike a chord with many of us I will imagine.

But how does it explain guilt? If no one knows, no one will dislike you. If you are hard core aetheist/agnostic then the issues of heaven and hell wont make you feel bad. Is it that we are so used to cause and effect that we develop an internal judiciary system. If not hell, then karma?

But there is sensibility in being liked, if we are liked people will have a desire to be liked by us and hence treat us with kindness and generosity. They will not take us to court if we wrong them, and they will not fight back if we insult them. Not ringing so true now is it? Fact is people do fight back, people can be unkind and mean, they will take us to court if we wrong them, and many will destroy us for the smallest perceived slight. 

Yet the excerpts I chose resonate with me. I will on occasion let things pass, because I dont know how to fight, and sometimes the wrong that has been done to me is vague, it has been done cleverly, in a way that is known as counter-aggressive. Unlike passive-aggressiveness, counter-aggressiveness relies on manipulation extract favours without actually incurring a favour, but I guess that is for another post. The fact is, when that happens, I know what is happening and I know it is wrong, but I find explaining the wrongness of it very difficult, and hence do not react or defend myself. My lack of action is not always to do with being liked, in fact letting things pass in order to be liked is a newish thing for me. I have noticed that I become less assertive following an emotional dip.

In his attempt to construct an argument for the innate evilness of mankind, Coelho forgets that often we do good deeds for total strangers and transients. People we are sure we will never meet again. We do it because we feel for their situation. I have had people in strange cities walk me to bus stations and wait till they were sure the bus was coming, with true concern on their faces for my welfare, even though I was a visitor to their city. I have had people notice a sudden look of lostness in my face and immediatley offer assistance. I have had hostel owners go out of their way to pick me up, when I could have taken a taxi, and looked out for me when I went on a long hike in adverse weather conditions. It is not only the acts that have re-affirmed my faith in human decency, but their attitude and look of true concern on their faces when they have helped. These are good deeds done with nothing required in return. 

نفسي أفهم هبل البنات

This post was brought to you by Yamli, the arabish to arabic convertor. Excuse the slang, its been a while since I wrote anything in Arabic, so I decided to start with a simple subject, simplistically constructed, and written in shamee dialect.

نفسي أفهم هبل البنات

ولا بالأحرى، الجيل الجديد.

خلوني أعطيكو مثال… هي وحد زميلتي اتعرفت على شاب مع نية الزواج. البنت من النوع إلي بتحب تتبع الدين، فبنقدر انقول انها متدينه شوي. فطبعن انصدمت لما اكتشفت إنو الشاب إلي عم تتعرف علي زاني. أيوا، أريتو صح، زاني. هلأ أن ألت لحالي، بلكن هي سألته و من الإيمان إلي في البو ما ادر يكذب عليها فعترف. فاستفسرت منها كيف بالظبط اكتشفت هلئكتشاف… طلع إنو هو إلي فتح الموضوع! يعني زاني و مش مستحي على دمو. حاولت أشرحلها إنو الواحد لما اكون مش مستحي من عمايلو، و ما بحاول يستر على حالو، معناها إنو بالفعل ما تاب، لأنها التوبة فيها إعتراف إنو الشخص غلط، و يفترض إنو احس بشويت خجل، و الإراده على اخفاء فضيحته. زعلت مني، وكان امبين من وجها انها شايفاني كوحده رجعيية، وبلا قلب، لأنها ضلت إتعيد إنو هي العمايل تاعتو كانت بالماضي وهو هلأ تاب وصار متدين. هبلة البنت بس شو بدنا انسوي؟ الحمدلله الله حماها و اتفركش الموضوع، هي البنت بتستاهل أحسن من هيك بصراحة.

بس أنا ما ادرت استوعب هلتفكير، انها البنت بتحافظ على حالها، و تتبع دينها و تتجنب الكبائر بس مستعدة اضحي بمستقبلها و مستقبل اولادها كرمال فهمها المشوش عن التسامح و التفاهم. إذا الواحد غلط وتاب، و ستر على حلو، و بعدين بالصدفه، بعد ما إتزوجو اكتشفت شو كاين إمسوي، ماشي، تتفاهم و تنسى ، و بتكون فعلاً وحده محترمه. المهم كنت عمبضفض لوحده تانيه، و فكرت ان حيكون رأيها من رأيي، إنو الوحده لازم إتعز و تحترم حالها، و تختار الرجل إلي بناسبها دينياً ومادياً و ثقافياً. بس طللع رأيها العكس، آل بتفضل “الصراحة”….

ابصر، يمكن أنا الغلطانه، بس ما بتوقع، معقول انهم البنانت هلقد ميسرين الأمور للشباب؟