I got married, became a father overnight, and moved to a completely alien (to me) country. And then I stopped writing. I think we can all agree that that was really dumb.

So with the next few posts I hope to catch everyone (including myself) up to speed.

Living in Penang was not what I was expecting. As an American Muslim of South Asian descent, I had no cultural or linguistic framework for what I came across in Penang. I expected (naively) Arab-style hospitality– you know, where they see a foreign person on the street and then invite them for tea or dinner. That happened to me all the time in the Arab world (especially Egypt). Instead, about a month into my stay in Penang I noticed that nobody was smiling at me on the street, post office, grocery store, anywhere. In fact most looked away, and seemed to go out of their way to be unhelpful… especially the Malay Muslims.

I’m not that ugly, am I?

So I started asking MrsHijabMan and all of her friends what the deal was. The consensus was that because I looked Arab, and international Arab students [especially Gulf-Arabs] at Universiti Sains Malaysia had bad reputations, I was lumped in with them.

This was confirmed by Nur-al-din, an Algerian shopkeeper I met one day. He moved to Penang in the early 1980′s. “Back then,” he explained, “so many people smiled at me that I would lower my head and avoid people because my cheeks hurt every night from smiling so much.” He also blamed the not-so-savory characters from the Gulf.  Now nobody smiles at him either.  His cheek muscles atrophied.

Bummer. I’m the kind of person who lives off of small, happy interactions throughout the day.

At one point, I was feeling so down that in an act of desperation, I started posting flyers in my building asking for friends.  It had that illustration above of our family and everything.

No one responded.

To survive, we would escape to other parts of Malaysia where we had friends, like Kuala Lumpur and Kuching, or travel to nearby countries, like Thailand and Indonesia.  To illustrate just how deprived of human affection I was, let me tell you about the time MrsHM took WarriorPrincess (WP) and me along on one of her business trips after a relatively long time away from Kuala Lumpur.

On our first morning there, I took WP to Kinokuniya, a Japanese-owned bookstore in KLCC, the mall below the Petronas Towers.  Unbeknownst to me, everyday when the bookshop opens, the employees line the entrance, smile and bow to the first few people in who come in.  That was me.

I was so overwhelmed with joy and happiness after spending smile-less months in Penang, that I actually raised my arms and my voice, squealing, “THANK YOU FOR THE WONDERFUL INTRODUCTION.”

Of course, the Universe was just preparing me for what was about to happen next: discovering WarriorPrincess had lice, and spending the next few hours with a nit-comb, some toxic shampoo, and a screaming 5 year old.  The result?

Shaving our heads was much easier.

In any case, BinGregory was really surprised to hear about my struggles in Penang. He’s a blogger and dear friend of mine living on the other side of Malaysia, on the island of Borneo, with his large, and always-entertaining family. He also happens to look Arab, and he has had the opposite experience from me. It seems that since there aren’t as many Arabs living in Borneo (hence, even fewer unsavory characters) they don’t have the bad reputation that they have in Penang. Every time I’ve visited, I’ve been greeted and smiled at all over town.  It’s great!

Like in Borneo, our trips to other parts of Southeast Asia like Thailand and Indonesia were full of smiles and hospitality. I don’t know enough to write more about this. I can’t say why people in Penang are so not smiley.  All I know is that it made living in Penang really gloomy despite my otherwise beautiful life in Malaysia. It is also a pretty large part of why I wouldn’t ever consider living in Penang again.

For the past couple years, that’s the state of mind I’ve been in; putting that core principle into practice.   What better way to nourish my soul than by becoming the best househusband I can be?   Of course, I’ve made several mistakes along the way and those struggles pretty much threw my blogging out the window.  I’ll write about all of that in the coming months, but for now, I’ve broken up my househusbandly duties into five areas.. and I’m excited to shift the content of hijabman.com to reflect these aspects of my life:

1.  Raising our children.  WarriorPrincess is almost 7 years old now and as feisty as ever.  WarriorPrincess#2 is due in April.  And we have begun the process of adopting a WarriorPrince in the future.

2.  Nourishing our bodies through diet and exercise. We’ve done away with most processed foods (and the additives, ‘natural flavorings’ and crap that comes with it) and cook good, wholesome food throughout the week.   MrsHM attends zumba classes regularly, and I’ve been going to a fitness bootcamp 3x a week for the past year.  Next week, I start training for my first sprint triathlon.  My biggest fear?  Being a hairy pakistani dude.  WarriorPrincess wants to compete in a kids triathlon this summer.

3.  Keeping an organized house.  I come from a disorganized family– I know the ‘junk drawer’ all too well.  Training myself to create a system that I can work with has been a huge struggle for me, but I’m well on my way to banishing all the ‘junk drawers’ in my house.

4.  Money management.  With one kid edging toward tween-dom, one kid about to be born, and a couple big purchases coming up (more on that later), it’s become more important to track all of our finances and make sure we’re maximizing our savings.

5.  Time management.  While my official title is househusband, I do have a part-time work from home gig which makes my balancing act a bit more challenging.

That all being said, welcome back to the web site!  For all you loyal fans of the site, I’ve decided to start a giveaway each month.  This month, I’ll be giving away the book Love InshaAllah: The Secret Love Lives of American Muslim Women… (MrsHM is one of the contributor’s, remember?)  All you need to do is 1. share this post on Facebook (Twitter, if you don’t have a FB account) using the FB button below and then 2. comment here, telling me what you’d like to see on hijabman.com.  On Tuesday Morning… UPDATE: On Wednesday afternoon, I’ll pick someone randomly!  Oh, feel free to like the FB page as well.

Have a great weekend!

Image1: BinGregory‘s son at the beach in Sarawak, Borneo.
Image2:  WarriorPrincess and I on Eid.

In the era of factory farms and hormone-fed animals, the label of “halal” has been watered down and exists only as an empty brand name.  If you are a heartless person who doesn’t care about the treatment of animals, consider this of your beloved label:

“75 percent of Halal meat in America produced in the year 2000 came from pork fed cows, according to Dr. Stephen Emanuel, from Agway Feed Company.” - SoundVision

Thankfully, I’m not the only one who feels that ‘halal’ doesn’t mean much.  Check out the new stream of ‘organic and halal’ meat suppliers like GreenZabiha, founded by Yasir Syeed. (Full disclosure: I photographed his brother’s wedding)

“Muslims are directed in the Quran to eat food that is Halal and Tayyib. Halal is defined as food that is permissible according to Islamic law. Tayyib means wholesome, pure, nutritious and safe. Traditionally, Muslims in North America have emphasized the Halal over the Tayyib when it comes to meat consumption, Hussaini says.” – SoundVision

(More disclosure: That quote was from 10 years ago, but the emphasis on the method of slaughtering of the animal over the health and treatment of the animal hasn’t changed much.)

Some Muslims like to use the excuse that when someone sells you ‘halal’ food you should take it at face value, as they are the one making the claim. I don’t buy that. I believe we (who have the means) have a responsibility to ourselves, our families, and our communities to support businesses that produce high quality food by treating animals with respect. In that way, we do justice to the bodies that God has given us on loan, we do justice to our families, and to our communities.

I’m not going to provide a detailed discussion on the benefits of eating mostly locally grown, organic vegetarian food, as it has already been discussed in books, articles, and documentaries. (Hi Michael Pollan!)

Instead I’m going to ask myself (and yourself) to consider what “The Most Just” God would be pleased with.  Let’s take a look at revelation, let’s take a look at what people like to overlook.

The Qur’an strongly enjoins Muslims to treat animals with compassion and not to abuse them. The Qur’an states that all creation praises God, even if this praise is not expressed in human language.  In verse 6:38, the Qur’an applies the term ummah, generally used to mean “a human religious community”, for genera of animals. The Encyclopaedia of the Qur’an states that this verse has been “far reaching in its moral and ecological implications.”

There is not an animal (that lives) on the earth, nor a being that flies on its wings, but (forms part of) communities like you. Nothing have we omitted from the Book, and they (all) shall be gathered to their Lord in the end.

—Quran 6:38      – Wikipedia

Would you dare treat any animal with disrespect if you fully understood that they are muslims…i.e., literally “those who submit to God?  That you will be called to account as to how you treated them?

For me, the method of slaughter is not as important (as long as the animal isn’t killed in the name of some other “god” other than The [One] God)*** as the way it was treated.  Based on my reading of the Qur’an and my approach to Qur’anic principles (namely that they are a precedent for progress, pushing us towards realizing universal principles of justice and equality), this is what I think God would be pleased with:

- Staying away from processed food with additives, flavorings, etc.
- Not eating too much
- Eating locally grown organic food (Remember kids, pesticides on vegetables hurt and kill a lot of animals (including humans!)  
- If eating beef, making sure it is well-treated, grass-Fed, hormone-free and from a local farm.
- If eating any other meat, making sure it is well-treated and from a local farm.
- Working towards vegetarianism

So, what’s your take?  What’s important to you?

***Regarding the method of slaughter: God, in the Qur’an says:

FORBIDDEN to you is carrion, and blood, and the flesh of swine, and that over which any name other than God’s has been invoked, and the animal that has been strangled, or beaten to death, or killed by a fall, or gored to death, or savaged by a beast of prey, save that which you [yourselves] may have slaughtered while it was still alive; and [forbidden to you is] all that has been slaughtered on idolatrous altars….”  -Qur’an 5:3    The verse continues,   ”As for him, however, who is driven [to what is forbidden] by dire necessity  and not by an inclination to sinning -behold, God is much-forgiving, a dispenser of grace….” – Qur’an 5:3   Two verses later, “…And the food of those who have been vouchsafed revelation aforetime is lawful to you, and your food is lawful to them…”  (Muhammad Asad translation)

HijabMan’s note:  Just so I don’t scare off our friends: we do buy halal meat when we have guests who keep halal. 

Image:  Butterflied and broiled a chicken from the farmer’s market over a bed of vegetables.

Instead, we bought a $135,000 townhouse after looking at all sorts of properties. We saw old homes, new homes, townhomes and single-family homes. One day, our real estate agent commented, “I don’t think you guys know what you want.”

Wrong. We just wanted to see what was out there. We knew exactly what we wanted:

- To live WAY below our means
- Something we could easily rent out
- At least 3 bedrooms
- A spacious kitchen
- Outdoor space for gardening
- Little or no grass to mow (What’s the point? I’d rather plant vegetable and fruit gardens!)
- Laminate or hardwood floors
- 2 bathrooms would be best (We ended up with 1 full bath and two half baths)

When I told my dad about considering a 30 year mortgage (4.0%), then a 15 (3.375%) and finally settling on a 10 year, he suggested that we stick with the longer term so we’d have the flexibility of paying it off later just in case ‘something happens.’ He also mentioned that interest rates are so low that it would be even better to invest money in mutual funds that pay a 10% return over the long run. He had some great points, and in fact, investing in something that will give us a 10% return may give us more money. But since we have a sizable emergency fund, for me what’s most important is to own the house as soon as possible. I know I am debt-averse to a fault. I don’t ever want to be in debt–for anything. Praise God, we are debt-free and in a comfortable position to save for our children and to help others.

Before we got married, MrsHM and I agreed that we would do our best to live below our means. Thankfully, both of us aren’t big spenders. We don’t have Starbucks addictions either. Sure, there is the occasional splurge, but generally speaking we only buy what we know we will use, and try to purchase used goods if possible. MrsHM came back a couple days ago with about 10 pieces of clothing from the local thrift shop. There is only one thing I don’t compromise on: buying mostly local/organic food. MrsHM is ambivalent on the issue and since I’ve made the case for our health, she is happy to comply (except she buys non-organic tomatoes, for some reason. I can’t wait to grow our own!). Outside of our needs (retirement, WarriorPrincess’ education, etc.), I would say our top priorities are charity and travel.

Sure, we could’ve bought that completely new, beautiful $260,000 house we walked into the other day, but why? To fill it with junk? Since we live in a college town it makes a whole lot more sense (for us) to buy two $130,000 houses and rent one out (and eventually rent the other one out too). We’ll be working towards building another down-payment and buying another rentable townhouse soon. The goal is to invest in assets that will pay for our luxuries– a lesson learned from Rich Dad, Poor Dad.

I’ve also become a bit obsessed with cutting down our utility bills and other costs of living. Here are a few examples:

1. Since MrsHM’s iPhone plan is covered by work, I decided to give up my cell phone and stick with a free land line provided by this gadget. I own a pay-as-you-go phone that stays deactivated unless I am traveling alone. Since we live in a small college town with super-friendly people (NEVER AGAIN, BIG CITY!), and it takes a maximum of 7 minutes to get anywhere, I’ve decided there is no excuse for spending $70-$80/month on a smartphone.

2. Comcast, our internet service provider, sucks. When they decided to mess with me, I fought back and won 4 months of free internet service, and $19.99/month service for the next year after that. I’ll explain how in a new post. With our free cell phone and free landline, our telecommunications bill comes to $20/month.

3. As soon as we move into our new place, I’ll definitely be putting in the new energy efficient light bulbs. Maybe we’ll even splurge and get these (if the price goes down!).

4. Our car has 135,000 miles on it. We will drive it until it dies, despite the urge to buy a brand-spanking new Hyundai Elantra. (It’s so pretty!)

5.  No TV = No Cable Bill.  We watch whatever we need to on Hulu, borrow movies from the library, and spend time playing board games.

That’s how we cut our costs and live below our means, how about you?  Any tips? Tricks?  Do you track your expenses?  If so, how?  Comment!

 Photo: A humble bride remembers others on the day before her wedding.

A Polish artist by the name of Janek Simon made this:

At the age of 12, my father decided to put me in Islamic Sunday School at our local mosque. Since I was new to Sunday School, the teachers put me in the kindergarten class. Within one year, I was skipped to second grade and then to fourth grade, before I was ultimately promoted to instructor in an alternative Saturday school. Can you say, “lowered expectations?”

It is not uncommon for mosque Sunday Schools to be staffed by volunteers as young as 13 who just parrot what they’ve heard. As for the content, I learned about how birthdays are prohibited in Islam, that only prostitutes pluck their eyebrows, and how a one-eyed monster will come and get me on the Day of Judgment. In short, I left Islamic Sunday School with the perception that God was a big scary being that was going to throw me into hell.

The experience, however depressing, did inspire me to read the Quran for myself. It was only then that I realized that the vast majority of fairy tales they teach you in Sunday school are not in the Quran—which, by the way, is what Muslims believe is God’s message to humankind. In fact, the lessons taught in my Sunday School growing up didn’t come close to capturing the spirit of the holy book.

It is with that background that I struggled last weekend, wondering whether or not I should send my 5-year-old daughter to the local Sunday School. On one hand, I knew I could do a better job at teaching her the core of religion. On the other, as my friend Shabana stated, Islamic Sunday School is seriously discounted babysitting.

In the end, I decided to sit in on all of her classes to see what would be taught. It turns out that the first two classes are Arabic language and Quran recitation. While I wasn’t impressed with the teachers, the subjects they teach are fairly harmless and straightforward; you can’t really teach alternative viewpoints on language and recitation. The added bonus was that WarriorPrincess (the nickname I have given my daughter) has a friend in both of those classes, and the classroom provides some time to socialize.

The final class of the day was “Islam,” and honestly, I didn’t even want to bother with the possibility of some sort of nutty teaching. I can’t be there every day to monitor everything she hears, so I’ll teach her the basics at home. Simple: One God. Do Good.

Happy that I found a middle ground to my Sunday School dilemma, I asked the principal if WarriorPrincess could attend the first two classes and not the third. I’m still waiting to hear back.

Do you have any crazy Sunday School stories? Please share in the comments!

Update:  We’ve taken her out of the Sunday school.  MrsHM helps her with her Arabic letters and Memorizing Chapters.  I teach her stories from the Qur’an in English and the basic message of Believe, Do Good, And A Day of Judgment.

Ingredients:

• 1 lb bag of dry chick peas (soaked overnight)
• 1 whole bulb of garlic
• 1 medium size onion
• 1 jalapeño
• 1 cup cilantro
• 1 cup Italian (It’s the flat-leaf kind) parsley
• 1 table spoon coriander powder (freshly ground if possible)
• 1 ½ teaspoon cumin powder (freshly ground if possible)
•  ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
• ¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 ½ teaspoon (kosher or sea salt)
• pinch of baking soda
• oil to deep fry

1. Add all the ingredients in the food processor except baking soda. Grind everthing into a very fine consistency so you can easily form into falafel balls. (You may
have to add the chick peas in two batches depending on the size of your food processor.)  I flattened my falafel balls a bit so they would cook faster.  They were around 1.5 ounces each before cooking.
2. Add the baking soda just before frying.
3. Fry in hot oil at 325-350 F and allow to drain over papertowels/cooling rack/whatever

Serving: 

You can eat em by themselves, you can serve em on a platter with hummus/some sort of tahina-based dip, or you can throw em in a pocket-pita with cucumber, tomato, tahina-based dip (baba ghanouj, hummus, etc).

How do you like to eat your falafel?

Happy Friday!  Inner peace… in the Qur’an?

Afterthoughts: 1. Good farmers are also consistent. 2. This does not refer to just people who label themselves Muslim— it refers to everyone. God made a covenant with each community– grow your own soul by following that promise.

Related verses from the Qur’an:

91:7-10 (Qur’an) By the Soul, and the proportion and order given to it; And its enlightenment as to its wrong and its right;- Truly s/he succeeds that purifies it, And s/he fails that corrupts it!

2:155-156 (Qur’an) And most certainly shall We try you by means [of danger, and hunger, and loss of worldly goods, of lives and of [labour's] fruits. But give glad tidings unto those who are patient in adversity -who, when calamity befalls them, say, “Verily, unto God do we belong and, verily, unto God we shall return.”

89:27 (Qur’an) [But unto the righteous God will say,] “O thou human being that hast attained to inner peace!

89:30 (Qur’an) yea, enter thou My paradise!”

5:105 (Qur’an) O you who have attained to faith! It is [but] for your own selves that you are responsible: those who go astray can do you no harm if you [yourselves] are on the right path. Unto God you all must return: and then He will make you [truly] understand all that you were doing [in life].

2:286 (Qur’an) God does not burden any human being with more than s/he is well able to bear….

59:18 (Qur’an) O YOU who believe! Remain conscious of God; and let every human being look to what s/he sends ahead for the morrow! And [once again]: Remain conscious of God, for God is fully aware of all that you do;

Happy Beautiful Thursday y’all.  I’m allowed to say y’all now that I live in the South.  Okay, y’all?  Here you go, three beautiful things!

1.  Revelation.  The Books revealed to the prophets and messengers of God.  Sure, some people pick out verses from them that seem unjust.  But if you look at them as a whole, if you look at the message, they are beautiful.  Believe.  Do Good.  There Will Be A Day When You Will Be Judged.  Today I was gifted a Bible by Stan, a friend of mine who is also a United Methodist pastor.   We meet [almost] every Thursday for breakfast, and I’m honored to speak with him about revelation and the followers of revelation.  It’s always an inspiring conversation and it gets my brain churning– both informing me of my own faith tradition (and covenant) as well as other peoples’ covenants.

Today, we spoke a bit about the description of Judgment Day in the New Testament (what Muslims refer to as the Injeel, and also considered a revelation of God)…   it echoes a similar description in the Qur’an…

I saw the dead, both great and small, standing before God’s throne. And the books were opened, including the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to what they had done, as recorded in the books.  The sea gave up its dead, and death and the grave gave up their dead. And all were judged according to their deeds.  – New Testament, Revelations 20:12-13

And [on that Day] you will see all people kneeling down [in humility]: all people will be called upon to [face] their record: “Today you shall be requited for all that you ever did! This Our record speaks of you in all truth: for, verily, We have caused to be recorded all that you ever did! – Qur’an, The Kneeling, 34:28

2.  Home-made food.  Before I got married and gained daddy status with WarriorPrincess, I talked the talk about eating healthy but rarely walked the walk.  Having a family forced me to be consistent, and so I began to use as many local, organic, and unprocessed foods that I could. I avoid additives like the plague.  When I looked at the list of ingredients on a package of butter, I noticed that one of them was “natural flavoring,” and I wanted to puke.  How do you add flavoring to butter?  I want to taste butter! Not what some chemist thinks butter tastes like!   It feels absolutely amazing to fill my grocery bags with fresh fruits and vegetables and make things… it fulfills my creative needs, my spiritual needs, and my bodily needs.  What more could I ask for?

Tonight, I made falafel from scratch.  You’ll see the recipe on Wednesday.

3.  You.  I know, what a cop-out! I want you to write about something beautiful in the comments!

Lots of people say that about my hummus, but I’ll let you in on a little secret– I stole it from my friend Amer. This hummus is a regular staple at the Friday Prayers we hold at my house, and all I get are rave reviews. So thanks Amer, for making me a super popular guy in Blacksburg, VA.

Sure, it tastes absolutely amazing, but the best part is it’s really easy to make. See all that stuff up there ? Throw it all in a food processor. (shh! the garlic is hiding!)

1 can chick peas. Rinsed and drained.
3 cloves of garlic (mash into paste w/ salt) (I never mash it into a paste, I just throw all this stuff in)
1 tsp kosher salt
1/4 cup of yogurt (can add more or less if you like)
pinch of cumin powder 1/4 tsp or less (I go for a full 1/4 tsp)
cayenne pepper 1/4 tsp or less (depends if you like to add a kick…)
1.5 lemons of juice
4-5 tbsp tahini (I do 5)

Flip the switch or push the button… and leave your processor running for a full minute.

Now, dump it all in a round plate or glass pie pan. Make pretty circular design with a spatula by turning the plate.

Top with lots of olive oil and a bunch of sumac.

Enjoy!