Society

Pakistan American journalist, attorney, and DAWN staff columnist Rafia Zakaria often has the answers for me when I’m unsettled by the questions floating around in my head. At 24, I’m watching the women in my peer group make incredible decisions in their lives and careers – choices of graduate school, artistic fellowships abroad, philanthropy projects,…

For two years I have been a nanny for a couple of tech executives in one of the wealthiest areas of San Jose. I won’t tell you which tech company they work for, I’ll just tell you it rhymes with “Snapple.” The couple have three young girls, all under age 10, who can sometimes be…

The Pan-Arab Semifinals of Microsoft’s Imagine Cup this year was bustling with youth that represented the brightest tech minds in the region. Amid all the excitement, one beautiful factor stood out at the competition’s backdrop of the American University of Cairo: a large portion of those youth were women. Two young women from Oman sacrificed…

“You’re an athlete. Expect to get hurt. But hopefully not by your friends.” Michelle, a dance teacher at the Mesa Arts Center, gently patted one of our students’ arms, which was hurt because a boy had pulled it. I looked pointedly in his direction, scrunching my eyebrows sternly at him for deliberately hurting his classmate….

I was 17, and he was my best friend’s brother. It doesn’t always happen the way we think it will. It’s not a dark alley, and it’s not a stranger or spiked drink. Sometimes it’s the men that share our spaces, our social circles and our Muslim Student Associations (MSAs). We met in university. I…

Last year, a healthy baby Kenza was born to her parents in Dallas, TX. After a series of concerning symptoms as an infant–a watering eye and swelling around her lymph nodes–her parents received the most devastating news they could have ever imagined. After receiving inconsistent information from various doctors, a CT scan and blood work…

It is not unlikely to meet a person who is a second-generation immigrant who speaks very little of his parent’s native language. I have met several people whose families immigrated to the U.S. years ago, but unfortunately the children grew up speaking only English at home, and the parents did not spend time or make…

Bourj El-Barajneh is a municipality located in the southern tip of Beirut, Lebanon. It houses a majority of Palestinian refugees, some Kurds and Iraqis, and most recently, incoming Syrian refugees. There are some Lebanese who live there due to their lower income base, as well. As a refugee camp, the conditions are horrendous. The schools…

No, alcohol does not equal no fun when it comes to a Muslim Girl wedding.  Most Muslim girls already know how to have a good time without it, but if you’re stressing about the reactions of some of the guests, have no fear. After all, in the non-Muslim world, isn’t booze usually one of the highlights–a rite of…

Almost two decades ago, I got married. We met at work. While courting, he mentioned diabetes runs in his family and his mother had died from diabetes complications. They lived in Iraq under the United Nations sanctions and insulin was considered “dual purpose”–meaning theoretically, insulin could be used to make a weapon of some kind….

I adopted the hijab on August 15, 2001, less than thirty days before 9/11. I was only twelve and in the seventh grade, and before I adopted the hijab no one knew I was Arab or Muslim. In adopting the hijab so close to 9/11, I was basically putting on a bull’s-eye every morning. Kids…

“A Woman’s Place is in the Kitchen” – Misogynist proverb While this may be the rallying cry of terrible men everywhere, a corrected version of the adage would be “A Woman’s place is in the kitchen (so long as she isn’t getting paid for it).” Life as a female professional chef can be ROUGH. Kitchen culture is…