14th of August at the Local Mosque!
Asslamo Allaikum,
One day I went for Maghrib after my university in my local Mosque in America & there were hundreds of cars in the parking lot, so I thought that maybe somebody is getting married or someone has died.
Went upstairs and people were doing Qur’aan Khawani (Pakistanees getting together & reading Qur’aan) so I figured someone had died.
As soon as I walked in, someone gave me a Qur’aan so I read a bit & then asked the neighbour who died?
The guy looked at me puzzled and said, “Don’t you know today is 14th of August”...I put the Qur’aan down & went straight to my teacher (Arab Syrian) and asked , “Shaykh! Did you give permission to celebrate the independence day of Pakistan in the Mosque?” He said, “What? No? What are you talking about? The Pakistanee community wanted to read some Qur’aan so I said, “Go Ahead”
The important point to note is that MOST OF THESE PAKISTANEES came AFTER ASAR & left BEFORE Maghrib Salah.
After a while there was a huge rift between Pakistanees & Arabs and huge problems at election; so one day a whole bunch of Arabs showed up at my house late at night and said, “Brother! You know the problems that the community is having, so we would like YOU to stand for elections because you are the ONLY person that the Arabs & Pakistanees will both agree on & we know that you are NOT in the Bid’aa & stuff & you are sort of the Assistant Imam anyway” The Arabs will vote for you and Paksitanees will vote for you because you are a Pakistanee & the Americans will vote for you”...
I was like what? Me? You talking to me? That was scary!
Tell you a joke about elections that year....This Pakistanee Doctor stood in elections and one day he came to the Mosque and introduced himself (he had a name tag) and my friend said. “May I suggest something Doctor Saheb?” He said, “Sure kid, Go Ahead”
My friend said, “Why don’t you put a picture next to your Name because I have NEVER seen you in Salah and next time we see you we will recognise you”
UNCLE WASN’T HAPPY AND DIDN'T APPRECIATE THE JOKE!
Being a Pakistani is my identity but We are Muslims, Islam is our Deen, Muslims are our family and the whole of Islamic world is our homeland!