My Islam

Hatiya, Noakhali. The village that made my Bangladesh.

It used to be that of a village Eid morning in Hatiya I’d get ready along with my Bengali brothers. After bathing in the pond we’d dress and walk the short distance to the mosque. What I wore varied. In later years I had fashionable Dhanmondi-style panjabis to choose from. Earlier I used to wear the greenish kabliwala set that my friend and brother Situ gave me. It was the only design readily understood by the local tailors.

The mosque is small and not old, and those who attend are family, friends and neighbours. There’d be a few personal prayers for Abba, who I never met but whose grave is there. We’d wash our hands and feet and I confess I often got a bit of stabilisation assistance from the others while dipping toes into the mosque pond so as not to fall over... Then we’d go inside.

Kids playing in the monsoon wonderland. Eid arrives in the monsoon months this year.

I like that mosque. The weekday Imam is youthful and friendly, and there’s no denying the distinctive qualities of his adhan call to prayer. It may not be of the sort that’s striking for its mystical, high beauty – such as an adhan I once heard while passing through Seremban, Malaysia, which seemed so intrinsic and harmonious that it may as well have been welded into the dawn.

No, our Imam’s adhan has a, shall-we-say, personal quality. When his voice wavers and the notes take on a more creative fluctuation – he’s doing his best, he’s really doing his best... When there’s the added flare of a high-pitched squeal from the PA system – being as it is... With the general muffled ambience familiar to current village-mosque technology... we love it all the more.

He is our Imam. It is his adhan – the one which by tradition at the Fajr dawn hour comes as finale to all the adhans in the area. It’s well-understood that not everybody can be a morning person. Although on Fridays and at Eid he bows to experience our Imam is always there.

My Eid mosque-going tradition arose naturally. Nobody told or encouraged me. Hatiyalas are too polite. It simply seemed strange that on a special day like Eid I would not share in the customs of the neighbourhood – in the same way we sometimes attend kirtan with our Hindu friends. It was my heart that took me to the mosque.

Hatiya's monsoon sky.

Inside, I used to find a place at the back so as not to get in anybody’s way. While we were sitting my legs would descend into pins and needles, eventually falling asleep such that at the end of the service I’d have trouble standing. While they were actually performing the namaz prayer I’d – rightly or wrongly, I could never decide which – add a little silent Christian-style prayer of my own. It was what I knew how to do – a way of showing respect for their beliefs and for them.

Afterwards there’d be the usual congregating on the road with those heart-to-heart salaams reserved for special days, a tradition in which I was entirely included. I was more than included because while I would have wished to say, “Thank you so much for not minding my attendance,” it was rather them who said, “We are so honoured that you shared our Eid.”

It’s a far cry from common perceptions of Islam in Australia, unfortunately.

The main road in Hatiya that became so overflowing with respectful greetings...

But I suppose the first meaningful contact I had with Islam was in Rajasthan, before Bangladesh. What I recall from those initial curious visits to various desert and semi-desert mosques was the strong sense of peace to be imbibed within, while sitting on the floor inside. It was easy to find a spiritual quality in that space. Incidentally I’ve known Iranian Muslims to admit as much about Sydney’s cathedrals.

Then there was the hospitality tradition. I came to expect it whenever visiting any Muslim majority country, and while culture also plays a role I have never been disappointed. Probably more than any other religion, Islam respects the stranger, the traveller, the guest...

A third early impression arose when it came to be that moving along the road in Hatiya meant encountering numerous salaams from villagers. It was quite a while before I genuinely appreciated it was not simply a ‘hello, hi’ but respect they were giving – the islanders are sincere in it. When it was explained, when it sunk in that it was more than a ‘hello’, I was really touched. Later – I was a little slow in adapting – I became better at salaam-giving also.

Meanwhile in Sydney where I used to speak of such experiences freely I don’t think I ever came to grips with the overwhelming but thankfully not entirely universal response to my chat: the sense of fear. It was so easy to underestimate and overlook the prejudices that characterise that society’s view of Islam, since the true complexity and diversity of Muslim communities was so blatantly clear to me. My Islam had become as our Imam’s adhan – original and personalised.

Monsoon road. Hatiya, Noakhali.

But I suppose not accepting that differences must divide us runs in my Australian family. My father’s clan were Presbyterian while mother was raised as a Catholic. One Catholic grandmother married a Lutheran grandfather and in those days due to denominational differences he was not allowed to walk in the front door of the Catholic Church – when they eloped he came in via the unceremonious side door. Sometimes in response to the protestant-catholic question I used to say I was Cathlotestant... and it’s surprising that some otherwise educated Australians had difficulty in accepting even that answer. Sometimes people are like buildings. They take their structure from walls. But I don’t believe God cares for petty categories.

And on 11 September 2001 after I knew that my Australian brother in New York was okay, my main concern was for the inevitable anti-Muslim backlash. I made a personal vow: whatever happens, nothing will come between me and the Hatiyalas. That tiny but rather wonderful history we made together was more important than ever.

And yet it is sadly true that Australians can have no confidence in mature, moderate governance, especially in the country’s security sector. It is sadly true that hysteria reigned and division still does. Somehow I kept my Hatiyan Islam anyway...

Monsoon landscape. Hatiya, Noakhali.

The church in Aizawl, Mizoram.

On the other side of the coin, a few years ago came the first convenient opportunity for Situ to experience a church service – just to see how it is. We were in Aizawl, Mizoram and the Presbyterian evening service was in Mizo. We sat up the back so as not to get in anybody’s way. While one lady down the front became so moved when the music played that she started an animated dance and sang a loud lively solo, we did our best to simply follow the song book, singing in unknown Mizo language which is written with familiar European script, without knowing the tune. It must’ve made our Imam’s adhan seem as traditionally beautiful as that Malaysian adhan I once heard.

With the difficulties of transport to Hatiya I will share Eid in Dhaka this time. For the past eighteen years Islam has been a part of the mix of religious influences that make me. It’s something for which I am grateful. I’ve always felt it was life-enriching. But perhaps it’s simply Bengali: differences shall not divide us! So from a non-Muslim to Muslims and non-Muslims all, I wish you a happy and joyous Eid!

After the rain comes the sun.

Me in modern Dhaka panjabi.

This article published in Star Magazine, here: My Islam.

Temple & Mosque

Md. Aminul Islam and Ratan Chakraborty can't recall any discord between Muslims and Hindus in Rajapur.

“Dhan, nodi, khal – e tine Barisal.”

In the calm alleyway mix beyond the centre of Rajapur in Jhalokati; where the shady homestead yard may be ditch-and-mound ribbed – the mounds for trees in rows to gather contemplating while in each ditch water reclines for longer days; in that wooded zone yet to shed its rural heritage in its newer semi-suburban age; on an afternoon when rickshaws politely and without bell squeeze to pass on that forgotten arch of a bridge over whichever canal – the paddy might be some way off but it’s easy to sit back and think, easy to recall the old rhyme of that Division. “Paddy, river, canal: these three are Barisal.”

Yet in that area beside the not-so-busy bitumen road, beyond the yawn of the motorcycle repair shop to the right, beyond the shack of a tea shop too, where locals seem to loiter even when the kettle is off-the-boil and the tea is seemingly on its way from Sylhet, prior to the uninteresting junction where the road to the back of the college leads off between the trees, there’s something that’s a little more Jhalokati perhaps and less broader Barisal – and it starts with the mosque.

At the Baitul Aman Jamia mosque in Rajapur.

To say there’s any remarkable feature to the Baitul Aman Jamia mosque building would be a lie. It’s clean and functional, tiled in white with Arabic inscriptions across the doorway. The adhan call is in every sense usual. It’s the image of a mosque of the ordinary type to be found across the country.

Diagonally opposite, over the road and entered through a colourfully signposted green gate off a side lane, the Sri Sri Hari temple likewise cannot claim extraordinariness in either grandeur or historical merit. It’s peaceful and has a banyan tree in the midst of a largish yard that no doubt devotees take enjoyment from – but even that hardly makes it outstanding.

It’s a fifty-fifty world in Rajapur – Muslim and Hindu. Temple and mosque share fellowship as possibly their greatest reward; and that’s a phenomenon as natural to Rajapur as the shady blessing of the canopy.

“We go and sit in the temple sometimes,” says a Muslim man at the tea shop, “Nobody disturbs us there.”

Now let’s speak of two men – locally important and pious. It didn’t start with them but there they are: madrassa assistant professor Md. Aminul Islam has been the mosque’s Imam for the past three years while primary school teacher Ratan Chakraborty has filled the temple’s post of Prohith for the last five.

“Islam always wants freedom for everybody,” says our Imam, “It gives the chance to everybody to enjoy their religion. Islam does not like any violence, clashes or anarchy. Islam wants peace.”

A Durga motif at the Sri Sri Hari Temple.

“In the Gita it states that we should honour all religions,” says our Prohith, “All religions are one.”

“Communalism is a great crime for a man. A Muslim cannot do it. Those who have committed such things are not real Muslims,” are our Imam’s words.

“Communalism decreases relations between the communities. People should not be doing it,” is our Prohith’s speech.

There’s a natural beauty to Rajapur: of rain tree, chambol, mahogany, jackfruit, banyan, Hinduism and Islam. Drastic change is nowhere in the forecast.

“We have our weekly service on Tuesdays,” says our Prohith, “We celebrate many pujas – Kali, Durga, Lokenath, Shiv... Muslims are always invited to join our pujas and funeral processions – and they do. There’s never been a quarrel.”

“When they perform namaz prayer the temple stops to show honour,” he continues, “Hindus and Muslims are like brothers here.”

“We don’t disturb Hindu functions,” says our Imam, “Some Muslim youths help with their pujas. I never saw any problems between Muslims and Hindus in Rajapur.”

News? What news? There’s no news here...

One of the protimas at the temple.

At the time of Eid ul Adha there are many invitations – Hindu families will be busy visiting Muslim homes to sample shemai, noodles and fruit. At the time of Durga Puja, Muslims too dig into their pockets to help fund the festivities. The temple sends jackfruit to the mosque each year. Each Thursday after namaz and recitation of hadiths and Quranic verses at the nearby meeting hall there’s the kichuri rice dish to be savoured – and shared – to comers of either faith.

And so on and so forth it goes... the chambol stretches out another branch, new roots of the banyan find their earth, the mahongany trunk ever so slowly thickens – it’s all show for the first one hundred years. The tea meanwhile is still on its way from Sylhet – an entirely natural phenomenon – and the one community of two faiths continues to share and to respect each other beneath Rajapur’s canopy.

At the time of the Babri Mosque’s demolition in India in 1992, when also in Bangladesh communal relations reached a particularly low point, Rajapur Muslims came out onto the road to assist the police in defending the temple and Hindu homes. Some troublemakers came from further afield but sure as the trees closed in on the open sky as they approached Rajapur, they found no scope for harassment or havoc.

For about a week the temple was continuously protected. And a beautiful nothing happened.

“All Hindus and Muslims are citizens in Bangladesh,” says our Imam, “People here are educated and religious. They do not make anarchy or harm others.”

“Hindus don’t leave this area for India,” says our Prohith – and five years ago he recalls, “My kitchen accidentally caught fire. My Muslim neighbours saw it and quickly put the fire out.” Now that’s a beautiful something to consider!

“Muslims have to apologise and compensate Hindus for losing their houses,” says our Imam about the recent troubles elsewhere, “Either the Muslim community or the government should compensate them. They should try to develop their brotherhood with Hindus.”

But wait... finally there is something remarkable – something has happened in the one-canopy one-community backblocks of Rajapur... at last there’s news, quite literally, brewing: the kettle is boiled and from somewhere far in hilly Sylhet the tea seems to have arrived...

And that is, for Rajapur surely, a worthy leading story.

Our Imam and our Prohith at the temple gate.

This article is published in Star Magazine, here: Temple & Mosque