I first met Ali and his family on the campus of a university in the northeast USA. I’d left my hometown for the first time, with a toddler and a newborn, for my husband’s return to graduate school.
We all lived in the ‘family student housing’ – rows of army barracks from the Second World War, long ago converted into draughty apartments.
Most of the families in our community were foreign, many of them Muslim. I spent summer evenings at a little park on a steep hill looking west, pushing swings and chatting with other parents. Some were women wearing cloaks and hijabs. A group of men, finishing their volleyball game nearby, fell on their knees facing uphill to sing out their prayers. It seemed only natural, not out of place, to give praise at sunset.
Broadly built, with thick glasses and a beautiful smile, Ali impressed as older and wiser. He and I worked together in an organisation that served to help students with families. Ali steadied our idealistic little group with his patience and pragmatism.
One day while delivering newsletters, I found myself face to face with Ali’s wife, Fatima, at their apartment. A well-educated working mother, I’d met her briefly many times. She stood at the threshold with her head uncovered, black ringlets falling to her shoulders. Just like her daughter, I realised.
Fatima wore a long-sleeved dress that skimmed a pretty figure. I scored no points for emancipated western fashion in my husband’s parka thrown over a tracksuit. She’d seen me walking up and asked me in for tea. It was my first visit to a Muslim home. My inexperience was to blame for the bashfulness I felt, certainly not Fatima’s attire or her gracious hospitality.
Our organisation arranged classes, such as English conversation and First Aid. We also got a good price one spring for parent and child swimming lessons, which filled up quickly. Many of us not swimming tagged along to watch our children’s first swim. I found a seat on a bench with my baby next to my neighbours as the instructor began. Just then, Ali appeared in the doorway of the men’s changing room, holding a child’s hand in each of his own, and wearing nothing but his underwear.
“Is that how they swim?”
I whispered in surprise.
“I don’t know!” gasped a European woman, blushing and laughing.
The swimming instructor motioned Ali to the poolside. Ali lowered his children into the water and walked with swift dignity back to the changing room. He re-emerged moments later in a nondescript swimsuit and joined the lesson. A memorable example of real respectability.
A FEW YEARS later, after relocating with my family, I returned to visit Ali and Fatima in their home. While our children played, Fatima shared with me that children teased her son at school for wearing his shirt tucked in. Instead of overlooking an untucked shirt, she’d asked her son: “What are you going to do when they offer you drugs and alcohol?” They understood it as the same kind of bullying and peer pressure.
Ali went on to explain his choices: “I don’t pray five times a day because the Koran tells me so. I do it because I think it’s a good idea – five times a day – to make that connection.”
The practice of Islam supports Ali and his family through life’s adversities, large and small. Their clothing helps them ‘make that connection’. It serves as a reminder to consider their behaviour, especially when situations are uncertain. And those who let it inform their character can prove that clothes don’t make the man.
Ali and Fatima are not their real names.
