Monday, December 14, 2009

Khanum Hajj Khalili

Today's blog is dedicated to this special woman. Khanum Hajj Khalili is the head of the dormitories (khaabghah in Farsi) of the university where I go to school.

She's an amazing woman. She manages to look after her husband, 2 kids, house, manage the dormitories (800 girls when its at full capacity), do her MA and stay sane! She was in my English class last year and always did her homework, even with her full workload - something the other students couldn't manage. Ok, so I was a bit apprehensive about having her in the class at first, with her being a manager and all (and me not exactly being the model Qum Girl) but actually she was kinda cool. And she always knew the latest developments at the school!

Khanum Hajj Khalili always baked cakes for our class 'parties' i.e. the lessons where we used to eat junk food and play games to practise speaking English. (Yes, I got paid to play 20 questions and miming games last year!)

I will always remember the day when she pulled out the Eid card I had sent to her in 2004 - the year we spent 2 months in the dorms learning Farsi. She kept this card for 5 years! She made my day when she pulled out the card from her handbag - it was such a small gesture on my part, but meant so much to her that I had remembered her once my trip to Iran was over.

My other Khanum Hajj Khalili memory is the day when she asked me if I get tired studying in the mornings and then coming back to teach in the afternoons. I replied that I look to her for inspiration on that! She has accomplished more in her life that most people only dream of.

I dedicate my blog to this amazing woman. This amazing woman needs our prayers right now. She's in a semi-coma in ICU with advanced cancer. We pray that all those who've had the pleasure of knowing her to continue this relationship and those who have yet to embark on the journey of knowledge in Qum have the pleasure and honour of forging a relationship with this wonderful woman. God Willing.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Adhan

You can hear the call to prayer (Adhan) nearly everywhere in Qum. We're lucky. We have 2 mosques in our neighbourhood which both play the adhan from their loud speakers. It starts of with a recitation of a few verses from the Qur'an, followed by the 'synchronised singers' and then the call to prayer starts.

There's not really synchronised singers! I just like to call them that. They kinda go like this - "SubhaaaaanAllah, SubhaaaaaaaaaanAllllllllaaaaaah, SubhanAllaaaaaaaaaaah". There's a few of them singing it together and it lasts about 30 secs. Its really cute. And I'm really going to miss it when we leave! Maybe I should record it on my phone.

Thursday, December 3, 2009

Eid e Ghadeer

Eid e Ghadeer is the anniversary of the appointment of the successor to the Holy Prophet. It happened on the way back from the Holy Prophet's last pilgrimage to Makkah before he died.

As is the tradition at school, we had a 'jashn' (celebration gathering) to mark this. Now I don't really want to get into the usual sunni-shia arguments that usually happen around this time of year, so any comments posted on the blog along these lines will be deleted. During the celebration, I noticed that all the girls just went crazy shouting out Imam Ali's name and cheering and it made me reflect a little about how things are 'back home' in the West.

Don't get me wrong, I loved living in London. But when we have celebrations and commemorations of Islamic significance, it makes me appreciate living here in Qum a little more. And this is something I'm really going to miss when we move back to London (or Toronto depending on whether The Husband or I get their way!). Every happy or sad occaison is marked with coloured or black flags in the streets. And happy occaisons find the streets of Qum decorated with lights.

The thing which really made me ponder was hearing my fellow students cheer for Imam Ali with such enthusiasm. Muslim children back home rarely have such enthusiasm for our Islamic Heros. They would most likely be found cheering for football teams, X-factor or the latest Big Brother wannabe. Maybe we've forgotten who the real stars are... the ones that will help us achieve eternal success. The role models we should be following... not the ones who encourage us to be the next talentless reality show moron.

It made me wonder where we've gone wrong? Have we moved to the West to make better lives for ourselves and children and in the process forgotton our basic values and principles? I was ashamed to see the state of our community on my last visit back home. Many of the kids/teenagers had no sense of what was haram and halal.

Anyway, thats today's rant over with... now lets get back to celebrating Eid! The tradition is that Sayyids - decendants of the Holy Prophet and Imams - give presents to non-sayyids. So email me at qum_girl @ hotmail . com and I'll send you my address to post my pressie to!