London

Put a Western girl, with headphones in her ears and a Marilyn Monroe notebook in her hands, for 48 hours inside a Muslim community in London.

‘How Did I End Up Here?’

With my eyes, I scan the faces of those present. Some were more relaxed, some less, some dozed off, tired after the turbulent plane journey, some discussing his opinion on current topics, some lighting up by recounting places and personal experiences. And yet, he reads it in her eyes. The echo of the attack on Westminster that hit the city ten days ago is still strong and resonates in the hearts of everyone present. An echo that smells of anger, nervousness, and intolerance.

The indignation of those who know but who assist, in some ways helplessly, at the staging of the black and white show of the ‘good guys’ vs. the bad.’ Because the bad guys are always the others from us, on the other hand, giving a ‘different’ light to Islam through the generous faces of the people who will host us is the ultimate goal of this trip.

Islam From a ‘Different’ Light

I am in the minibus together with the Italian delegation, and we are reaching our hotel to prepare for the press conference quickly.

I speak a little, listen a lot, and think quickly because I’m afraid I’ll have little time to do it, especially to gather my thoughts and line them up into sensations and emotions that make sense. In fact, we are about to be catapulted into two days full of events and demonstrations, which will culminate with the long-awaited meeting with the Caliph Hazrat Mirza Masroor, the spiritual head of the Community. I am tiptoeing into unknown territory with the traveler’s curiosity and the beginner’s luck. I really don’t know what to expect.

The Departure

I know Sumera through a site for which I work as a copywriter, or rather, ‘on’ a place since we have never met in person. Her name is imposing, and I try to imagine a face that can at least partially honor that world that every time I write to you, she opens up in my head. Taken from routine and creative work, in recent months, I have always closed that world, thinking of Sumera as a person that sooner or later I would have met.

A month ago she wrote to me: ‘Melania, are you by chance a journalist? You will be a guest with an Italian delegation of journalists and cultural exponents close to the religious and Islamic world.’
She asked me if I was interested… half an hour and we’d already booked my plane ticket for March 25th. Destination: The Peace Symposium of the Ahmadiyya Community in London! I pack my suitcase, prepare my pen and notebook, and train my eyes with a little preliminary study, ready best to describe my journey into the heart of Islam!

The Ahmadiyya Community 

When we arrive at the place of the press conference, after a total of 10 minutes of ‘rest’ in the hotel, I am entirely disconcerted: damn London speed bumps! It is a tragedy for a stomach like mine, which suffers from the pain of everything and has already faced 16 hours of cars, buses, planes, minibusses, and the sporty driving of Pakistani drivers. “Yes, I know, here they drive like in Naples and like in Islamabad, which for me are the same city.” I catch myself smiling without looking up, too busy pouring the OKI into a plastic cup while awkwardly trying to hold Marilyn’s notebook, my black backpack, and the bottle of water with the same hand.

Finally, I raise my eyes: a large man is offering me her help. He has good eyes, the typical Muslim hat on his head, and an unexpected Roman accent that makes me immediately feel at home. He is from the Ahmadiyya community of Rome and asks me to call him Sandro, a good-natured request to those who constantly get his real name wrong. I laugh and accept ‘Sandro’s’ help. I hope the medicine takes effect immediately: the press conference is about to begin, and I can’t afford any weaknesses.

Meeting Sumera’s Eyes

I recognize Sumera’s eyes, which meet mine in the distance. We’ve never met in person, but I already feel like I’ve known her forever. He smiles as she approaches, certain she, too, has recognized me without the need for introductions. Her black, brilliant eyes stand out thanks to her silk veil that falls delicately around her face, illuminating it and framing it in a princely allure. She hugs me warmly.
We come from opposite worlds: she is the wife of Imam Ataul Wasih Tariq, mother of 2 children and expecting the third, who dreams of being able to return to Pakistan as a free woman (the Ahmadiyya community is harshly persecuted in Pakistan); I am a solo traveler, who dreams of being able to find my ‘home’ in the world. Yet, we are the same age, two girls curious about each other, each other’s passions, and each other’s world.

Imam Ataul Wasih Tariq tells me about his life, Sumera, within the framework of the Ahmadiyya community. A world made up of blacks and whites. And I’m not talking about the color of the skin, but the color of the walls. Those who stand up when culture, prejudice, and distance get in the way.
The white of a glass of milk offered for breakfast to guests, the white of the walls of the hospitals built by the Community to help the weak and needy, the white of the radio station, which broadcasts the Caliph’s words every Friday from its Fazl Mosque in London (white, too).
And black. The black of persecution, the black of isolation, of when in Pakistan they don’t even sell you a loaf of bread if they know you as Ahmadiyya, the black of the hats of men who are not free to profess their beliefs freely.

Love and Terror

They are made of 2 worlds inside, opposing and unapproachable to each other. That of love and that of terror. That of faith and that of extremism. That of the roots and that of radicalization. These two worlds, within the Ahmadiyya community, make no sense whatsoever.
Islam, in fact, is a single religion of peace, of respect, of love. And Sumera forcefully reminds me of this, looking me straight in her eyes without ever leaving me. Almost as if she wanted to force me to understand, to enter inside her. Especially when she talks to me about women. Respected women, untouchable women, free women.

I feel tiny when speaking of respect; Sumera tells me how a woman is such a sacred being, especially when she is tied to a man, that touching her with her hand is a sin. She is holy as her daughter because she opens the doors of happiness to her father. She is sacred as a wife because she completes the man and gives him meaning. She is holy as a mother because she contains within herself the very essence of Paradise.
Respect for love and for the bond, here among these white walls illuminated by an unexpected green, you really breathe like something to lower your head towards. Something that arouses in me reverence and even a little envy, thinking of the chaos of liquid relationships that govern the world from which I come.

Meeting the Caliph Hazrat Mirza Masroor

On Sunday morning, together with the members of the Ahmadiyya Community in Italy, I met His Holiness Caliph Hazrat Mirza Masroor inside his private residence.

He is a magnetic person, the Caliph, with an imperturbable royalty who comes from a place of the ancestral soul: a place of peace capable, at the same time, of firmly condemning any form of abuse, injustice, dishonesty.

His concentrated and steady eyes, which during the Symposium on Saturday enchanted all those present together with their words, became lively and curious during the private audience on Sunday morning: they are the eyes of those who love their Community, of those who are keen to spread the true jewel contained in the treasure chest of the Koran, of those who ask the press for a pure soul to see reality and to tell it honestly to readers. Of those who want to spread ‘the true teachings of Islam’ to the world, the actual teachings of Islam very often collapse under the blows of bombs and weapons of destruction.
It reminds us to focus on ourselves, seeking and discovering our most authentic selves, and to work on our heart, a powerful and sophisticated machine that often gets stuck and starts up again, but always with some pieces left over or with some seals. Defective.

Sensing the whirlwind of doubts and emotions that have not let go of me for two days now, it is the Caliph who explains how to repair a broken heart: ‘being honest.’ Honesty and unconditional love for human beings: this is ‘right thinking,’ the thought that leads straight towards a place of peace, beauty, and gratitude for all living beings.

Returning Home With a Full Heart

The sun is high in the London sky. I’m on the minibus and headed to the airport. I’m about to go home. My suitcase is overflowing, and every time, I wonder how I manage to fill it like this, especially in 48 hours. Yet, what I am taking home has little to do with the material.

I can’t wait to show my mother the photo they hurriedly took of me and Sumera: surprised by the flash, smiling, and with their eyes shining under the white and green of the Mosque.

Even though London’s bumps upset my stomach, my heart’s seals are all working flawlessly today.