Searching for Answers

When the first wave of Pakistanis arrived in the UK, they came as
expatriate workers -manual labourers who worked long gruelling shifts
in the factories. Those factories can still be found scattered across
the industrial towns of the UK. The tall red brick factory chimneys
that used to belch out smoke in times gone by are a prominent feature
of the landscape of many British towns with sizeable Pakistani
communities. The Pakistani workers used to live together, each paying
his share of the rent. The houses they lived in are pretty much the
same to this day. Known as terraced houses, they were built in blocks
of ten or so with two small rooms downstairs and two bedrooms
upstairs. They were built to house the working class people who supplied
the factory labour force. They're much nicer on the inside now with
central gas heating for the chilly winters. And all of these houses
have indoor bathrooms now. That wasn't always the case though. In the
early days, the toilets were in a seperate out shed at the end of the
garden.

The Pakistanis would be given the odd shifts that were unpopular with
their English colleagues. The factory machinery ran twenty four hours
a day, week by week churning out the goods. The night shifts were
often full of Pakistani workers. They liked it that way because few
could speak English well enough to hold a conversation. Day time work
alongside English workers could be a lonely experience. The night
shifts meant you were in the company of your brethren, you could chat
in Punjabi and discuss local affairs of your beloved Pakistan. It was
never long before someone would return from visiting their family back
home. They'd bring back stories and gossip of events in the local
villages that everyone missed so much. Everyone knew that they were in
UK only to make some money and one day they'd return to their villages
with their small fortunes. Then they could have a new house built in the
village for their family, buy a tractor and live a good and
comfortable life in Pakistan.

However, the right opportunity to return to Pakistan never arrived.
The stories from Pakistan made it clear that things were certainly not
improving. Life was getting harder back in the villages, those with
farms suffered from soil erosion that made each year's harvest poorer.
If it wasn't the climate and the soil causing problems, then it was
the deteriorating social conditions. An increasing number of
Pakistanis started to bring their wives and children to live with them
in the UK. Life was better here. If you fell ill, you could see a
doctor -he'd prescribe medicine and it didn't cost a penny. When your
wife had her baby in the hospital the doctors and nurses would look
after her and make sure she received the medical attention she
needed. Again it didn't cost you a penny. Your children could go to
school and receive an education that rivalled, if not exceeded, the
quality of education provided by any snobby private institution in
Pakistan.

For these Pakistani immigrants there was no conflict of culture, no
inner turmoil. By and large most Pakistanis kept to themselves. The
Goray (English) had their culture with their pubs and their sausages
which the Pakistanis had nothing to do with. The early settlers, the
parents of the first generation could remain isolated from the native
English culture that surrounded them. They mixed with other fellow
Pakistanis, spoke in Punjabi, shopped at the local Pakistani grocery
stores for halal meat and spices and attended the Jumah prayer at the
local Pakistani run mosques. Indeed, there were many who once having
arrived in the UK never bothered to learn any English or make any
English friends. They lived and worked within their sheltered
communities. Having made a physical transition from Pakistan to the UK
they resisted any form of a cultural transition.

On the other hand, Pakistanis born in the UK, the "first generation"
as they are often called have had an interesting childhood at the
cross-roads between two very different cultures. At home they were
part of a patriarchal family structure where Punjabi was the
predominant language. At school, they were part of a British culture,
with English being the predominant language. It was chapattis and
Keema at home and fish and chips in the school canteen.

The parents had chosen to live in the UK with their families for the
advantages that the UK had to offer. But they resented the values of
the British society -the mixing of boys and girls at school, the
kissing on television, couples holding hands in public. Pakistani
parents found many aspects of British society frightening. What
effect was this going to have on the children? Would their daughter
run away from home and live with her boyfriend? Would she get pregnant
before marriage? Would their son find an English girl? Faced with
these 'threats' the parents exercised an iron fisted grip on their
daughters, sending them to single sex schools and making sure they
stayed at home when they got back from school. The Madrasah system was
setup where young Pakistani children were taught how to read the
Quran. There was a hope that being able to read the Quran and to
memorize a few Kalmas would help the children stay 'Pakistani' and
remain steadfast Muslims.

It was a tousle between two different cultures with very different
value systems. One was fighting for its survival and the other was
slowly but surely overshadowing the other. Parents tried everything in
desperation. They paid regular visits to Pakistan, hoping that
immersing their children in Pakistani culture regularly would help
them fight against the disease of British culture. Some even sent
their daughters back to Pakistan until they were old enough to be
married off. The threat to their daughters was seen as the greatest
danger.

Despite the efforts of the Pakistani parents, the first generation of
Pakistani children who were born and raised in the UK, have gradually
moved away from the values of their parents. British education has
taught them to think for themselves, to try and find a reason to
justify aspects of their culture. They find themselves torn between
two very different cultures and their response to this 'dilemma' has
been varied.

It's this dilemma of being stuck between two cultures that I face.
It's the dilemma of trying to justify aspects of my faith and culture
and finding that there are many things that I have no answers for.

Let me give the reader an example of some of these issues that I have
to deal with, and I am sure that I am not alone in this. I'm still
searching for answers and there is no shortage of questions. Islam is
under constant attack, be it the issue of apostasy, women or the
Prophet's marriage to a girl. Why is the response from Muslims so
feeble? Why do we only get ill-thought and poorly written responses
which pale next to the razor sharp criticisms of Islam.

Our Quran says that a man's testimony is worth that of two women. The
Hadith tells us that women are weak of mind, fit only for producing
babies, staying at home and keeping the house clean. Those of us
living in the West can't avoid the reality that slaps us in the face.
Here in the West women have proven that they are as capable as men. I
still remember the Islamic study circles I used to attend at the local
mosque when I was in my teens. In these study circles we would be told
women are weaker, they're more emotional, the monthly periods can
affect their moods so they should never be in a position of authority
or responsibility. However, outside my study circle in the world of
reality I see a very different picture. My A-level math's teachers,
who were all women, were without doubt more intelligent and capable
than any member of the mosque committee.

In our efforts to reconcile Islam with the reality of the Western
world, some of us have taken to 'redefining Islam'. We have decided
to do away with an interpretation of the 'troublesome' verse that has
stood for fourteen centuries or have decided that the verse is not
really a part of the word of Allah.

A clear definition of what exactly constitutes Islam is needed here.
If we accept some verses of the Quran and reject others, then what
criteria should we use to determine what is acceptable and what is to
be rejected? Who is going to define the criteria in the first place?
If we redefine existing interpretations, what process do we use and
how do we know we are still following the commandments of Allah? I can
see us following the Christian model. We gradually bow to the pressure
from society and change our tenets until they no longer conform to the
prevalent views of the contemporary Muslim societies. In that case,
homosexuality becomes acceptable, sex before marriage is left to one's
own conscience and we take a more understanding view of adultery. We
would be like the helpless Synod of the Anglican church who run to
conform themselves to the popular social values rather than defining
intrinsic values for themselves and the society to follow.

The differences between Muslim sects continues to widen accompanied by
an increasing friction that often erupts into violence. Sectarian
violence is not simply endemic to Pakistan, clashes between rival
sects in the UK are not unheard of. Today we have Muslims who believe
that all Hadith literature should be rejected as a source of guidance
while others believe there is no Islam without the Sunnah. We have
proclaimed messengers of Islam such as Mirza Ghulam Ahmed while others
declare that any belief in a messenger after Muhammad is a Kufr. We
have those who believe that Muhammed is divine and made from light
(Nur) and that he had fantastic powers while others believe he was a
human just like the rest of us. Each group blames the other of Kufr.
In the absence of any reconciliation, these divisions will continue to
grow as time goes on.

We need answers to old problems such as defining the role and worth of
women, that concurs with reality and is at ease with our
conscience. We also need to address contemporary issues. In the UK,
scientists are cloning genes. In the US, NASA has discovered water on
the moon and is planning a future colony on the moon. We on the other
hand are still busy trying to decide if women should be allowed to
vote and whether Ibn Taymiayh was an alim or a traitor.

We fumble and stumble through life, stunned by the power of the West.
We try to reconcile what we were taught by our parents with the frank
and merciless reality of the world around us. Even that age-old
defense of 'Er.. we've got proper family structures and the Goray
(English) don't have em' is now a joke as many Pakistani families in
the UK are falling apart. Pakistani men in the UK suffer from higher
rates of stress related illnesses such as blood pressure, angina,
heart attacks and diabetes than any other segment of society. This is
not surprising given the amount of stress involved in dealing with
Pakistani family problems. I would go so far as to say that Pakistanis
here in the UK suffer from many psychological problems caused by
cultural pressures. Why do our parents screw with our brains? They use
psychological blackmail to achieve their twisted ends. "Papa's gonna
get a heart attack! Look what you're doing to your mama?" Hey excuse
me, I'm doing what I do exactly because I don't want to end up being
another Pakistani casualty like papa with a dicky heart and a dodgy
kidney. As my mama used to say when I complained about the way papa
did things "Asee goray neey ban sakdey" (we can't become English).
She felt we had to stay Pakistani with our peculiar ways there was no
escaping from our behavior.

So what is the reaction of the first generation Pakistanis to the
failings of our community? One is denial. To pretend we don't have a
problem. It's all a Jewish conspiracy. Project our insecurity and
problems onto something else. That way we don't have to deal with the
problem. This is the "it's the Kufar who are deliberately doing this
to us to undermine the Ummah" attitude. You find many such young
Pakistanis in the Universities and colleges of the UK. To them every
failing boils down to a conspiracy. A posting in the mosque recently
managed to link Clinton's sex scandal, the Jews and the Iraqi conflict
into a giant conspiracy theory. As one Pakistani once said to me at
an Islamic study circle recently "the price of a chocolate bar goes up
and it's a Jewish conspiracy".

The second reaction is to declare that we have problems because we are
not 'real' Muslims. If we followed the 'real' Islam we would achieve
utopia. What on earth is this real Islam? Fourteen hundred years of
civilization suddenly made irrelevant because we've just discovered
the fact that it isn't the 'real' Islam that we've been following!
Many try to return to their roots. They join the Tableeghi Jammaat,
grow long beards, wear shalwar kameez and generally look ridiculous.
I once attended a weekend Tarbiyahh (training) programme run by an
Islamic organization in the UK. The women were at the back of the
room as usual and a sheet of cloth was draped across the width of the
room to create a wall to separate the men from the women. This was
supposed to be a movement that had discovered the 'real' Islam! I
looked in amazement as a Muslim (doctor by profession) conducted a
conversation with a sister. He stared at a spot on the floor while
speaking to the sister who stood behind the cloth wall. I've long
since given up trying to understand the behavior of Pakistanis. I now
put it down to the effect on our brains of generations of successive
in-breeding.

Another typical response to any challenge our culture and religion
faces is aggression. This is common amongst immigrants who were
brought up in Pakistan -threaten whoever 'rocks the boat'. This is
actually caused by fear. A fear that one's world is about to collapse
around him because he can't justify himself. Try going into a mosque
and asking whether Aishah was a little too young to marry at the age
of six (and make sure you can run pretty fast).

It would be nice to have answers to some of the issues I have raised,
but as I said earlier I have no answers but plenty of questions. Here
are few more: I look beyond my own life at the upcoming second
generation. What will their culture be like? What will Islam mean to
them? Perhaps I'll save my thoughts on that for another time.