Dispatches
from a Young American in the Muslim World
By Hailey Woldt
Jakarta, Indonesia
The
authoress, Hailey Woldt, is seen sitting
extreme right as Professor Akbar Ahmed addresses
students at Deoband |
In Doha, Qatar, the legendary
anthropologist and my favorite professor read
to me the poem “Ulysses” by Tennyson
to communicate the nature of an epic journey in
search of truth. I had just started my life-changing
experience, the “arch wheretho’ gleams
the un-traveled world whose margin fades forever
and ever when I move,” and I foolishly thought
I was mentally and emotionally prepared for every
margin.
The trip really began in Washington, DC, as a
student in the famous Professor Akbar Ahmed’s
“Clash or Dialogue of Civilizations”
class at American University. He had inspired
me at the time to reach out and understand the
Muslim world as a necessary step towards peace
and understanding in the future. I began researching
for his project with the Brookings Institution,
American University, and the Pew Forum early in
the process and then he offered me the chance
of a lifetime: a spot on his fieldwork team traveling
through the Muslim world for his research project.
I jumped at the chance before I had funds, time,
or consent from my parents, but I knew this was
the chance to expand my horizons and challenge
my inner strength.
My parents objected on the basis of safety, of
course — a young American girl in the Muslim
world? Then they objected on the basis of my college
career, but I was firm and I promised to pay for
the trip myself.
Now here I am in Indonesia, the last stage of
our exhausting but exhilarating journey, with
two parents proud of me at home and a world of
inconceivable adventures under my belt. I have
many stories to tell that I cannot myself believe
that I experienced, but I will save them for another
time.
Perhaps my greatest test but most important lesson
came during our stay in India on our trip to Deoband.
Deoband is the center for conservative Islamic
thinking, dating back to the nineteenth century
when it led the jihad against the British. Today
their message and university are flourishing in
the context of the “war on terror”
and globalization. Professor Ahmed assured us
that there was no danger in traveling there for
research, but our Deobandi tour guide who was
a leading ideologue began our four-hour journey
by describing his latest, best-selling book, Jihad
and Terrorism. I asked him about the nature of
the book and he then looked away to describe his
thesis, as it is custom in his orthodox tradition
not to talk directly to a woman. He said that
it was a justification of the usually un-Islamic
tactics such as those used by Osama bin Laden
and other terrorists in response to what he called
“American barbarism.” He argued that
because the Americans’ tactics like those
seen in Abu Ghraib were so horrific against his
people, the “freedom fighters” could
step out of their boundaries as well.
I settled in for a long journey to Deoband, passing
through villages many miles from Delhi and finally
bumping along a broken down road to our destination.
We were received by the head cleric himself upon
our arrival and were immediately escorted to the
front of the mosque for Professor Ahmed’s
speech. I sat in the front, in the place of honor
rarely given to a woman, much less a foreign,
non-Muslim woman, with my head respectfully covered
in a white veil and avoiding eye contact with
the hundred or so boys facing us from the audience,
although it was not difficult. They all sat enraptured
throughout the speeches. The cleric began a severe-sounding
introduction in Urdu, periodically pointing a
discouraging finger towards Frankie Martin, the
other student, and me. The students stood up as
they asked questions of Professor Ahmed, mostly
about Iraq, Afghanistan, President Bush, and “Amerika,”
the only identifiable words. However, they were
not hostile or out of order; they sat as calmly
and respectfully as ever throughout the answers.
The speeches were over and we had made it through
unscathed. In the flurry of Urdu we were apparently
invited to the cleric’s home for lunch.
We were brought into the courtyard of his home
and I was escorted to the ladies’ section.
I met his three young granddaughters, 15, 13,
and 7 years old. I asked all three in English
what they wanted to be when they grew up and they
answered ambitiously: doctor, journalist, and
civil servant. We had a nice chat and then I came
into the men’s quarters for a fantastic
lunch, homemade Indian food served with warm smiles
from the family. As we left their home we took
some pictures as a group and the girls asked when
I was going to come back to Deoband. The youngest
motioned for me to lean down and surprised me
by giving me a kiss on the cheek and we finally
left trailed by waves and smiles.
Our team took a tour of the university at Deoband.
The facilities were well-established and advanced,
with a computer science department, thousands
of books, and hundreds of students. I was surprised
by the organization and pervasive sense of discipline
there, not really the amateurish madrasa that
I had envisioned. We passed by a classroom filled
with five hundred students in white robes and
white caps with their heads down reading the Qur’an
and then entered the English class where we were
to distribute our questionnaires for our study.
They quietly filled them out without any cries
for blood as I had been expecting that morning
on the rode there, and as we left the class, they
asked us for words of wisdom to be written on
the board. I took the opportunity to write something
to help bring the United States and the Muslim
world together in peace:
“Learning and education are the most important
things for world peace. Let us all continue to
work for peace with all. Salaam alaykum.”
Salaam alaykum is the Arabic phrase for “peace
be with you,” their standard greeting, which
unexpectedly gave rise to shouts of delight and
friendship. We left as friends from the classroom,
two Americans, a Muslim professor, and students
of the most conservative madrassa in India.
I had survived what I thought was to be a frightful
day in Deoband by capitalizing on human connections
and mutual respect, rather than hiding behind
security guards or armies. By the end of the day
we had left as friends from Deoband, two American
kids. I bumped along the road home as a traveler
who had not just seen the margin but continued
beyond it, learning that most importantly it was
“to strive, to seek, to find, and not to
yield” when it comes to peace and understanding.
The truth of that day carried on when a week later,
the same author who had accompanied us there introduced
Professor Ahmed in a mosque and madrasa in Delhi
as the model not only for Muslims, but for all
religions because of his dedication to dialogue
and peace. That same man who had written Jihad
and Terrorism decided to translate Professor Ahmed’s
most recent book on dialogue himself. That same
man who had called for the death of Americans
and spread that message desired understanding
between civilizations and extending that knowledge
as well. It was like changing the rotation of
the earth in terms of ideas, but through compassion
and dialogue our team managed the impossible.
This truly was a margin I could not have seen
in Washington or Doha at the start of my journey—
“knowledge like a sinking star beyond the
utmost bound of human thought.”
(Hailey Woldt traveled on the 10-week, eight-country,
field research trip as a research assistant to
Akbar S. Ahmed for his upcoming book and research
project, Islam in the Age of Globalization. She
is from Texas and is currently a student at the
School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University
in Washington).
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