Auron ka hai Payaam aur, mera Payaam aur hai, / Ishq key dardmand ka tarz-e-kalaam aur hai! (Iqbal)
Only a few days ago I was in India. There I met a lot of wonderful people and I had a lot of wonderful things happen to me. I was also tested sorely on a number of fronts. Conclusion: this is Allah’s world. He runs it how he wants and pleases.
My response to the way Allah runs his world is simple: Alhamdulillah! Praise him, for, it is his world and he is the boss. I have nothing else to say.
Among the men I was fortunate to meet in this amazing land called India was this Muslim. Or maybe I should call him a Mu’min. For, that is what he was – to the extent we mortals could tell. I don’t know his name. I never asked.
But he knew my father. And that was good enough for me. Practically everyone knew my father, Allah bless him. He was that kind of a man.
At first, this gentleman greeted me with a certain reserve. There were all sorts of things happening to me and around me. So, I don’t blame him for being cautious, if that is what it was on his part: caution.
We would meet in the mosque Fajr time (pre-dawn morning prayers) and then walk out together to a local coffee shop where we would consume that indescribably lush Tamil Brahmin coffee served by a rustic, down-to-earth Muslim, who had brought up multiple daughters and put them all through medical school.
Paradise assured, would you say?
So, this Muslim gentleman from the mosque – his children are doing well overseas and he lives rather comfortably in India – said often how blessed he felt I was. How so, I asked. Just look how briskly you walk, he said. Men half your age can’t even bend their knees or stand up straight or do Sajdah properly.
I saw his point. And I was grateful. To God Almighty for making it so and to this gentleman for saying it.
Every now and then he would ask how I was doing. He knew I was dealing with all sorts of things that were being thrown at me from different directions. The town was abuzz with what was going on.
I will say: Alhamdulillah. Allah runs his world the way he wants, and I have no objection to the way he does it, I would say. His face will light up. That is right, he would say, this is his world and everything he does is just right and it is great.
We would go through this exercise over and over again – day after day. I knew I was in the presence of a believer: a Mu’min. Here was man whose heart had been lit up with Iman. May Allah bless him.
Also on more than one occasion, he was part of a live audience for Pasha Hour International – Live from America! that was beamed out from the land of temples and Durgahs that Chidambaram was to the Caribbean and streamed throughout the world on the Internet.
EDUCATING MUSLIM FEMALES
My heart fills with joy when I think of how education seems to be advancing among Muslims in the land of Tamil in South India. Girls in particular seem to be doing quite well, often better than boys, which made me put on my thinking cap and raise my usual alarm bells.
All my life I had been an inveterate advocate of education – Muslim and non-Muslim, male and female. Now that my wishes were coming true, I was doing what I have become pretty good at doing: look a gift-horse in the mouth.
What will happen to these girls in the next 5-10 years, I asked myself. And I asked the parents. And I asked the bystanders. No one had an answer.
What kind of husbands will they get, I asked. For, the boys were not keeping up with the girls. Everyone knew what I was saying but none had an answer.
We need to get ready, I declared. We need to start planning from now and get organized, I said. Everyone agreed. But will anyone do anything about it? I don’t know. I doubt it.
Muslims rarely do anything in time. They wait forever for others to solve their problems. And then they hold meetings. Just like all the rest of human beings everywhere. The better educated among them form committees where issues simmer forever.
ALL ABOUT AMERICA
Then I met this businessman. Everyone told me, as he watched and listened with palpable joy and pride, how this true son of the south spent his wealth on Muslim causes and how he distributed Laddoos – Indian sweets – the size of coconuts in the mosque at Lailatul Qadr during Ramadan.
We would meet up at the coffee shop where he would show up on his scooter in his resplendent white South Indian clothes. We would talk. There were others and we would all talk the usual Muslim chatter.
But he was different: he asked questions. One, two, three, any number of questions.
And those questions all centered on America. What was America like? What was the weather like? How was the politics? How were the people? Did the American people hate or like Islam and Muslims?
What about racism? How were the black people treated in America? Were there poor people in America? And, interestingly, was there any bribery in American life?
And then the inevitable what was Obama like?
I answered these questions as best as I could. But there were others who never set foot on the American soil and who most likely never read a book on the subject, nor seriously followed the topic in the media, who were only too willing and eager to jump into the conversation and answer these questions before I could say anything.
That is how village life often is, even though Chidambaram, with a population close to 100,000 is hardly a village. Those who know least are also at times those who are the quickest with answers. The fact that they seem to barely know what they are talking about doesn’t seem to bother or stop them.
But I was impressed. Here was this highly successful businessman, with vast wealth and a generous heart, who was so full of curiosity about things in general and about America in particular. His graciousness made a deep impression on me.
I extended to him a personal invitation to come to America as my guest. Come visit me in America, I said. Just take care of one thing, I said. Get yourself the best health insurance you possibly can, all the rest is on me, I said.
Allah bless him and all the wonderful people who hung out with him.
[Write to the author at Drsyedpasha@aol.com. Also visit www.IslamicSolutions.Com and Listen to Pasha Hour International.]