My Name Is Mohammed And I Am Not A Terrorist!

After the 9/11 incident, every Muslim in America was scrutinized. Just being a Muslim made you a proper terrorist suspect. Life for a Muslim after that incident was one of extreme turmoil.

I remember an incident in 2002 when my family and I came to visit US and how our immigration took much longer than everyone else. It went to a point where the immigration officer after learning my father's first name was Mohammed took us to Homeland Security. This went on for hours before the officer declared us okay to leave.

My relatives who lived in the states also suffered from a lot of scrutiny at every aspect of their daily lives. It came to a point that one of my cousins simply gave up and changed his first name Mohammed.

This was what life had become. If your skin was brown, you were questioned about religious views. If you were Muslim, you viewed as high-risk individual.

The truth is that the 9/11 incident was extremely tragic where aside from others many Muslims also lost their lives. However, it was mainly the Muslims that were blamed for its happening. The Muslims were made to suffer because our freedom of speech in this nation had expired. It was not right and we still never received a proper apology for it. It's time we got one for what we had suffered through. It's about time!

Life as we know it

It’s hard to believe how much my life has changed in a matter of months.  Today, I live by myself alone in a foreign country and do everything on my own.  The life I had previously is long gone and is only alive in memories.

In my culture, children in households are not even expected to separate from their parents. Even after marriage, it is the most natural thing for boys to live with your parents and girls to live with them until their married off.

Hence, when I decided on studying abroad- my parents were more than a little reluctant. To a point that initially they would not even hear of it. They would say, “Young girls don’t leave home to live in foreign countries. It is simply not right”. Their belief was that where you don’t have a guardian you cannot be expected to survive.

 

To a certain extent, before I doubted very much whether I will be able to survive on my own. This is because growing up I was highly dependent on my parents. But it was a dream that I really wanted to accomplish. I was willing to undergo all the hardship in the world to make that dream come true.

So, today when I think of the life I previously had where my parents helped me in every single struggle but are no longer here I feel proud. I feel pride I am alone overcoming all my obstacles. It’s true that there are still many times when I feel helpless when faced with a challenge and I still do struggle quite a bit to adjust. However, it’s no longer struggling to survive but struggling to acquire my goals.