Travels in the Riel World

There is a fascinating article in the NY Times about the culture of Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates. This city has become a contemporary melting pot of the Islamic world, where expatriates form a new identity and try to merge the choices of modernity with the traditions of their Islamic religion.

In his old life in Cairo, Rami Galal knew his place and his fate: to become a maintenance man in a hotel, just like his father. But here, in glittering, manic Dubai, he is confronting the unsettling freedom to make his own choices.

Here Mr. Galal, 24, drinks beer almost every night and considers a young Russian prostitute his girlfriend. But he also makes it to work every morning, not something he could say when he lived back in Egypt. Everything is up to him, everything: what meals he eats, whether he goes to the mosque or a bar, who his friends are.

“I was more religious in Egypt,” Mr. Galal said, taking a drag from yet another of his ever-burning Marlboros. “It is moving too fast here. In Egypt there is more time, they have more control over you. It’s hard here. I hope to stop drinking beer; I know it’s wrong. In Egypt, people keep you in check. Here, no one keeps you in check.”

In Egypt, and across much of the Arab world, there is an Islamic revival being driven by young people, where faith and ritual are increasingly the cornerstone of identity. But that is not true amid the ethnic mix that is Dubai, where 80 percent of the people are expatriates, with 200 nationalities.

This economically vital, socially freewheeling yet unmistakably Muslim state has had a transforming effect on young men. Religion has become more of a personal choice and Islam less of a common bond than national identity.

Dubai is, in some ways, a vision of what the rest of the Arab world could become — if it offered comparable economic opportunity, insistence on following the law and tolerance for cultural diversity. In this environment, religion is not something young men turn to because it fills a void or because they are bowing to a collective demand. That, in turn, creates an atmosphere that is open not only to those inclined to a less observant way of life, but also to those who are more religious. In Egypt, Jordan, Syria and Algeria, a man with a long beard is often treated as an Islamist — and sometimes denied work. Not here in Dubai.

“Here, I can practice my religion in a natural and free way because it is a Muslim country and I can also achieve my ambition at work,” said Ahmed Kassab, 30, an electrical engineer from Zagazig Egypt, who wears a long dark beard and has a prayer mark on his forehead. “People here judge the person based on productivity more than what he looks like. It’s different in Egypt, of course.” …

In this way, Dubai offers another prescription for promoting moderation. It offers a chance to lead a modern life in an Arab Islamic country. Mr. Abu Zanad raised his beer high, almost in a toast, and said he liked being able to walk through a mall and still hear the call to prayer.

“We like that it’s free and it still has Arab heritage,” he said “It’s not religion, it’s the culture, the Middle Eastern culture.”

Yesterday, I had a post about gender relations in Saudi Arabia and the remarkable lengths that the society goes to in order to maintain separation between males and females of different families. I linked to a story in the International Herald Tribune in which young men were interviewed about their interactions with women. Today, we cover the second part of the Tribune’s series, in which a reporter writes about male-female relations from the perspective of Saudi women.

First, an overview of the situation that females deal with in Saudi Arabia:

The separation between the sexes in Saudi Arabia is so extreme that it is difficult to overstate. Saudi women may not drive, and they must wear floor-length black abayas and head coverings in public at all times. They are driven around in cars with tinted windows, attend girls-only schools and university departments and eat in “family” sections of cafés and restaurants, which are partitioned off from sections used by single male diners.

Women-only gyms, women-only boutiques and travel agencies, even a women-only shopping mall, have been established in Riyadh in recent years to serve women who did not previously have access to such places unless they were chaperoned by a male relative.

Playful as they are, girls like Othman and her friends are well aware of the limits that their society places on their behavior. And, for the most part, they say that they do not seriously question those limits. Most of the girls say that their faith - in the strict interpretation of Islam espoused by the Wahhabi religious establishment here - runs very deep.

They argue a bit among themselves about the details - whether it is acceptable to have men on your Facebook friends list, say, or whether a male first cousin should ever be able to see you without your face covered - and they peppered an American reporter with questions about what the young Saudi men she had met were thinking about and talking about.

But they seem to regard the idea of having a conversation with a man before their showfas and subsequent engagements with real horror. When they do talk about girls who chat with men online or who somehow find their own fiancés, these stories have something of the quality of urban legends about them: fuzzy in their particulars, told about friends of friends, or “someone in my sister’s class.”

Well-brought-up, unmarried young women are so isolated from boys and men that when they talk about them, it sometimes sounds as if they are discussing a different species.

A view of pre-wedding interactions (or lack thereof) between engaged couples:

…it is becoming more and more socially acceptable for young engaged women to speak to their fiancés on the phone, though more conservative families still forbid all contact between engaged couples.

But it is considered embarrassing to admit to much strong feeling for a fiancé before the wedding, and before their engagements, any kind of contact with a man is out of the question.

And even a glimpse into some of the clandestine back-and-forth that takes place between young Saudi men and women:

A woman cannot switch her phone’s Bluetooth feature on in a public place for fear of receiving a barrage of love poems and photos of flowers and small children that many Saudi men keep stored on their phones for the purposes of flirtation. And last year, Al Arabiya television reported that some young Saudis had started buying “electronic belts,” which use Bluetooth technology to beam the wearer’s cellphone number and e-mail address at passing members of the opposite sex.

Tukhaifi and Shaden know of girls in their college who have passionate friendships, possibly even love affairs, with other girls, but they say that this … is just a “game” borne of frustration, something that will inevitably end when the girls in question become engaged. And they and their friends say that they … don’t know any girl who has actually spoken to a boy who contacted her via Bluetooth…

“One test is that if you’re ashamed to tell your family something, then you know for sure it’s wrong,” she continued. “For a while I had Facebook friends who were boys - I didn’t e-mail with them or anything, but they asked me to ‘friend’ them and so I did. But then I thought about my family and I took them off the list.”

Like yesterday, the actual Tribune story is much longer and filled with a wealth of other anecdotes and details.

After reading through both articles, two things struck me. One, of course, is that young men and women in Saudi Arabia have the same longing for romance and playfulness as do young people everywhere in the world. But the other revelation was the almost complete sense of acceptance (at least among those interviewed for the articles) regarding the importance of the culture’s moral values and the need for the social restrictions that keep males and females apart from each other. Just more proof that, as I’ve said before, we are all silently and permanently molded by the assumptions of the culture in which we are raised.

It’s easy in the West for us to express shock or dismay at the state of gender relations in some Arab countries (the veiling of women, the separation of the sexes, etc.), and particularly in a very conservative culture such as Saudi Arabia’s. However, it’s also easy for us to forget that many people in those cultures not only accept their state of affairs but also believe it to be in their best interests.

I’m not advocating any particular position here, and I do feel considerable sympathy for individuals who are constricted by the conservative dictates of their culture. But it’s nevertheless an interesting exercise to try to view a culture from the perspective of someone who was born and raised in it. That’s what the International Herald Tribune did recently, in a fascinating two-part series that looked at gender relations in Saudi Arabia from the perspective of men and women in that society. Today, I’m providing a few excerpts from the article in which young men discussed their relations and romances.

An overview of the state of gender relations: 

In the West, youth is typically a time to challenge authority. But what stood out in dozens of interviews with young men and women here was how completely they have accepted the religious and cultural demands of the Muslim world’s most conservative society.

They may chafe against the rules, even try to evade them at times, but they can be merciless in their condemnation of those who flout them too brazenly. And they are committed to perpetuating the rules with their own children.

That suggests that Saudi Arabia’s strict interpretation of Islam, largely uncontested at home by the next generation and spread abroad by Saudi money in a time of religious revival, will increasingly shape how Muslims around the world will live their faith.

Young men like Nader and Enad are taught that they are the guardians of the family’s reputation, expected to shield their female relatives from shame and avoid dishonoring their families by their own behavior. It is a classic example of how the Saudis have melded their faith with their desert tribal traditions.

“One of the most important Arab traditions is honor,” Enad said. “If my sister goes in the street and someone assaults her, she won’t be able to protect herself. The nature of men is that men are more rational. Women are not rational. With one or two or three words, a man can get what he wants from a woman. If I call someone and a girl answers, I have to apologize. It’s a huge deal. It is a violation of the house.”

A glimpse into how men and women end up agreeing to marry despite not knowing each other:

Enad’s father agreed to let Nader marry one of his four daughters. Nader picked Sarah, though she is not the oldest, in part, he said, because he actually saw her face when she was a child and recalled that she was pretty.

They quickly signed a wedding contract, making them legally married, but by tradition they do not consider themselves so until the wedding party, set for this spring. During the intervening months, they are not allowed to see each other or spend any time together.

Nader said he expected to see his new wife for the first time after their wedding ceremony - which would also be segregated by sex - when they are photographed as husband and wife.

And a look at the small romantic rebellions that take place even in Suadi Arabia:

…Saudi traditions do not allow for romance between young, unmarried couples. There are many stories of young men and women secretly dating, falling in love but being unable to tell their parents because they could never explain how they knew each other in the first place. One young couple said that after two years of secret dating they hired a matchmaker to arrange a phony introduction so their parents would think that was how they had met.

These are small excerpts from a much larger story that is well worth reading if the topic interests you. Tomorrow, the female perspective.

Thanks to a momentous project by the Gallup organization, we now have for the first time a representative measure of the opinions of Muslims around the globe. The Christian Science Monitor just published a special report that is based on the Gallup Poll of the Muslim World and the results are fascinating.

Since the momentous events of Sept. 11, 2001, countless news stories, TV commentaries, and books have speculated on the causes of terrorism, the attitudes of Muslims, and a purported clash of civilizations between Islamic societies and the West.

What has not been available is any reliable measure of the viewpoints of ordinary Muslims, who constitute 20 percent of the global population.

That is no longer the case. Through an ambitious six-year project that involved hour-long, face-to-face interviews with residents in nearly 40 nations, Gallup has plumbed the perspectives of Muslim men and women – urban and rural, educated and illiterate, young and old.

A few of the interesting findings uncovered by the poll:

•   When asked what they most admire about the West, Muslims pointed to (1) technology, (2) a value system of hard work, self-responsibility, rule of law, and cooperation, and (3) fair political systems, with respect for human rights, democracy, and gender equality.

•   What they dislike the most about the West includes: denigration of Islam and Muslims, promiscuity, and ethical and moral corruption.

•   What they admire least about their own Muslim societies includes: lack of unity, economic and political corruption, and extremism.

•  Large majorities cite the equal importance of democracy and Islam to the quality of life and progress of the Muslim world. They see no contradiction between democratic values and religious principles.

•  Most want neither theocracy nor secular democracy but a third model in which religious principles and democratic values coexist. They want their own democratic model that draws on Islamic law as a source.

There is much more in the full report. You can see additional insights here.

The three great monotheistic religions that were born in the Middle East - Judaism, Christianity and Islam - have numerous overlapping strands which are often lost amidst centuries of conflict. But there are those who continue to work at promoting interfaith dialogue in the hopes that some of these faiths’ shared spirituality can be rediscovered. Some of these individuals can be found at the Dier Mar Musa monastery in Syria and they were the subject of a profile this week by NPR.

Every 33 years, the major Christian and Muslim holidays of Christmas and Eid al Adha fall close together. This is one of those years. While Christmas focuses on the birth of Jesus Christ, Eid al Adha centers on Abraham, a shared prophet from the Koran and the Bible’s Old Testament. In the Middle East, these dual holidays are reminders of the many shared traditions of Muslims and Christians.

In the predominantly Muslim country of Syria, Christmas trees twinkle in shopping malls. Muslim neighborhoods are decorated with festive lights, a new custom borrowed from Christians… Across the Middle East, however, true understanding between Muslims and Christians is harder to find.

One religious community in a mountaintop monastery is trying to lead the way to understanding. Dier Mar Musa … was built more than 1,500 years ago, when Christians were a majority in the region.

“Christians in the Middle East, the numbers are going down quickly,” says Rev. Paolo Dall’Oglio, who leads this community of Christians and Muslims. “Some of us are willing to create hope together, to build a complementary world vision in a way that we can work on our future world, hand-by-hand as minorities that have something to offer to majorities.” …

To promote this dialogue, a place has been set aside within the church for Muslims to pray facing the holy city of Mecca. And on the wall, Arabic calligraphy in the shape of a dove spells out first phrase of the Muslim call to prayer.

The annual Islamic pilgrimage to the Saudi cities of Mecca and Medina is a huge and often chaotic event. Several million Muslims from around the world make the annual pilgrimage, and the crush of people has resulted in numerous tragedies and thousands of deaths. So this year the government of Saudi Arabia hired a team of German engineers to redesign the public walkways and the daily schedule in an effort to head off future disasters. Newsweek magazine reports:

German engineer Dirk Serwill had one reaction when presented with his most recent assignment: “Oh, my God.” God would actually play quite a prominent role in the project. Serwill was part of a team of German engineers hired last year by Saudi Arabia to help revamp the hajj, the annual Islamic pilgrimage, taking place this month, that draws millions to the holy cities of Mecca and Medina.

The recent explosion in the number of pilgrims—from 1.5 million in 1996 to almost 4 million in 2006—has resulted in thousands of deaths in recent years. One engineer described it as “the biggest pedestrian problem in the world”—trying to fit millions of people speaking dozens of languages from 100 different countries into three square kilometers.

The crux of the problem is three ancient pillars in the Mina Valley, which pilgrims are required to stone as a symbol of the Devil. Serwill watches on his video monitor as thousands of pilgrims surround the site, a scene he compares to the spin cycle of a washing machine, “pushing and fighting their way to the pillars,” he says. Generally, three to four people can fit into one square meter; in Mecca, 10 fit in that space.

“You don’t find these levels of density among humans anywhere else—only among rats,” says Habib Zein Al-Abideen, the Saudi deputy minister of Municipal and Rural Affairs and head of the kingdom’s hajj-related construction. Under such conditions, pilgrims are exposed to pressure equivalent to more than a ton—similar to the weight of a small car.

Working mainly off videos and aerial photographs, the engineers employed cutting-edge computer software to digitally map pilgrim flows so that they could pinpoint the exact moments when disasters have broken out in the past. They used the latest theories in “panic studies” to understand how people react when forced into “escape mode”—much of it applied from rock concerts and football games.

Based on these studies, the engineers redesigned the entire hajj process by creating a network of one-way streets, circumscribed plazas, overflow areas and emergency escape routes—applying a strict structure to what has historically been haphazard and chaotic. They also organized what might be the most complex schedule ever attempted, coordinating time slots for 30,000 different groups of 100 pilgrims each.

There is an interesting story in the Washington Post about a new and younger group of Muslim televangelists who have not only been taking advantage of advances in technology to spread their message, but who have also been promoting a more contemporary and tolerant form of Islam. an excerpt:

Muna el-Leboudy, a 22-year-old medical student, had a terrible secret: She wanted to be a filmmaker. The way she understood her Muslim faith, it was haram — forbidden — to dabble in movies, music or any art that might pique sexual desires.

Then one day in September, she flipped on her satellite TV and saw Moez Masoud.

A Muslim televangelist not much older than herself, in a stylish goatee and Western clothes, Masoud, 29, was preaching about Islam in youthful Arabic slang.

He said imams who outlawed art and music were misinterpreting their faith. He talked about love and relationships, the need to be compassionate toward homosexuals and tolerant of non-Muslims. Leboudy had never heard a Muslim preacher speak that way.

“Moez helps us understand everything about our religion — not from 1,400 years ago, but the way we live now,” said Leboudy, wearing a scarlet hijab over her hair.

She said she still plans a career in medicine, but she’s also starting classes in film directing. “After I heard Moez,” she said, “I decided to be the one who tries to change things.”

Masoud is one of a growing number of young Muslim preachers who are using satellite television to promote an upbeat and tolerant brand of Islam.

Television preaching in the Middle East was once largely limited to elderly scholars in white robes reading holy texts from behind a desk, emphasizing the afterlife over this life, and sometimes inciting violence against nonbelievers. But as TV has evolved from one or two heavily controlled state channels to hundreds of diverse, private satellite offerings, Masoud and perhaps a dozen other young men — plus a few women — have emerged as increasingly popular alternatives.

Masoud and others promote “a sweet orthodoxy, which stresses the humane and compassionate” as an alternative to “unthinking rage,” said Abdallah Schleifer, a specialist in Islam and electronic media at the American University in Cairo.

As a “contemporary figure,” Masoud is fast becoming an influential star among youth from “a middle-class full of yearning” who will eventually become decision-makers across the Middle East, Schleifer said. And as a product of American-founded schools in the region, Masoud is able to speak with authority about Western values in a way many others can’t. His most recent show, a 20-part series that aired this fall on Iqra, one of the region’s leading religious channels, attracted millions of viewers from Syria to Morocco. Clips of the show appeared immediately on YouTube, and fans downloaded more than 1.5 million episodes onto their computers.

Interesting essay in the recent issue of Time Magazine. Carla Power examines a key difference between Western and Muslim societies, notably that Westerners are uncomfortable with public prayer while Muslims are uncomfortable seeing bare skin in public. She writes:

Reams have been written on the differences between Islamic and Western societies, but for sheer pithiness, it’s hard to beat a quip by my former colleague, a Pakistani scholar of Islamic studies. I’d strolled into his office one day to find him on the floor, at prayer. I left, shutting his door, mortified. Later he cheerfully batted my apologies away. “That’s the big difference between us,” he said with a shrug. “You Westerners make love in public and pray in private. We Muslims do exactly the reverse.”

At the nub of debates over Muslim integration in the West lies the question, What’s decent to do in public–display your sexuality or your faith? The French have no problem with bare breasts on billboards and TV but big problems with hijab-covered heads in public schools and government offices. Many Muslims feel just the opposite.

As my friend suggested, Westerners believe that prayer is something best done in private, a matter for individual souls rather than state institutions. In the Islamic world, religion is out of the closet: on the streets, chanted five times daily from minarets, enshrined in constitutions, party platforms and penal codes. Sexual matters are kept discreet…

So here is a sweeping generalization, but perhaps a useful one: Western societies are cultures of personal revelation and exposure, while Muslim cultures are traditionally structured around protecting honor and propriety. On our shrunken planet, the two codes bump up against each other, throwing the other into relief.

There is an interesting educational effort underway in Saudi Arabia, where King Abdullah is putting his monarchy’s money and influence behind a new university that could change the way students learn in that famously conservative society. The International Herald Tribune reports:

On a marshy peninsula 50 miles from this Red Sea port, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is staking $12.5 billion on a gargantuan bid to catch up with the West in science and technology.

Between an oil refinery and the sea, the monarch is building from scratch a graduate research institution that will have one of the 10 largest endowments in the world, worth more than $10 billion.

The prospect of this new university has provoked much discussion in Saudi Arabia, with strong feelings apparent among both supporters and detractors of the project.

Its planners say men and women will study side by side in an enclave walled off from the rest of Saudi society, the country’s notorious religious police will be barred and all religious and ethnic groups will be welcome in a push for academic freedom and international collaboration sure to test the kingdom’s cultural and religious limits.

This undertaking is directly at odds with the kingdom’s religious establishment, which severely limits women’s rights and rejects coeducation and robust liberal inquiry as unthinkable…

The king has broken taboos, declaring that the Arabs have fallen critically behind much of the modern world in intellectual achievement and that his country depends too much on oil and not enough on creating wealth through innovation.

“There is a deep knowledge gap separating the Arab and Islamic nations from the process and progress of contemporary global civilization,” said Abdallah Jumah, the chief executive of Saudi Aramco. “We are no longer keeping pace with the advances of our era.”

Slowly but surely, women in the ultra-conservative nation of Saudi Arabia are beginning to gain some of the rights and freedoms that females in most other countries have long taken for granted, including the right to divorce, travel abroad without a male, and own a business. The ability to legally drive a car still eludes Saudi women but the topic is being broached more often these days, even on a popular television show, as this story reports.

In a recent episode of Saudi Arabia’s most popular television show, broadcast during Ramadan this month, a Saudi man of the future is seen sitting in his house as his daughter pulls into the driveway, her children piled into the back of the car.

”Where have you been?” the father asks.

”The kids were bored, so I took them to the movies,” she replies, matter-of-factly, as she gets out of the driver’s seat.

The scene may appear mundane, but in Saudi Arabia, where women are forbidden to drive — and, by the way, where there are no movie theaters, either — the skit portends something of a revolution. From a taboo about which there could be no open discussion, a woman’s right to drive is becoming a topic of growing and lively debate in Saudi Arabia…

”We are telling everyone this is coming, whether today or tomorrow,” said Abdallah al-Sadhan, producer, writer and host of ”Tash Ma Tash” (”No Big Deal”), a variety comedy show that is broadcast during Ramadan and tackles controversial social issues in Saudi Arabia. Other episodes have also shown women driving in what Mr. Sadhan says is a deliberate message. ”There will be a time we will accept it, so now is the time to get prepared for that.”

The debate over women drivers is centered, not surprisingly for Saudi Arabia, on religious and moral issues.

Some Saudi officials and religious men agree with the women that Islam does not forbid women to drive. In the past, Saudi women were able to move freely on camel and horseback, and Bedouin women in the desert openly drive pickup trucks far from the public eye.

Clerics and religious conservatives maintain that allowing women to drive would open Saudi society to untold corruption. Women alone in a car, they say, would be more open to abuse, to going wayward, and to getting into trouble if they had an accident or were stopped by the police. The net result would be an erosion of social mores, they say.

Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor of Malaysia just became the first Malaysian astronaut when a Soyuz rocket blasted off two days ago from Kazakhstan. For Sheikh Shukor, this journey is not only a significant accomplishment, but also a dilemma, for as a devout Muslim he must try to accommodate Islamic religious practices while in space. The Christian Science Monitor has an interesting story about his situation.

Imagine trying to pray five times a day in zero gravity while having to face an ever-shifting Mecca hundreds of miles below. How do you ritually wash yourself without water? And, now that it’s Ramadan, how do you fast from sunrise to sunset when you see a sunrise and a sunset every 90 minutes?

… up to now, there have been no guidelines for Muslim religious practice in space. And so the Malaysian National Space Agency (MNSA) and its Department of Islamic Development held a two-day conference in April last year. They invited 150 scholars, scientists, and astronauts to discuss “Islam and Life in Space.” The result is a recently published booklet of guidelines for the faithful Muslim astronaut.

The solutions?

Five times a day (before sunrise, at midday, in late afternoon, after sunset, and at night), earth-bound muezzins call Muslims to prayer. A spaceship traveling 17,400 miles per hour orbits the earth 16 times in a day. Does that mean praying 80 times in 24 hours?

The guidelines are much more reasonable: Daily prayer in space is not linked to sunrises and sunsets, but to a 24-hour cycle…Five meditations every 24 hours will suffice…

The next problem: Where is Mecca? Muslims on Earth face Mecca, in central Saudi Arabia, when they pray. The MNSA suggests that the astronaut pray toward Mecca as much as possible, or at the Earth in general. But if it becomes necessary, the astronaut may simply face any direction.

The guidelines also provide suggestions for dealing with prayer postures, ritual washing and diet in space. All issues that early Muslims certainly never imagined having to deal with.

Islamic countries are currently in the midst of celebrating Ramadan, the month-long religious observance that is marked by daytime fasting. Interestingly, each country tends to bring its own style and traditions to the month. The Egyptians, for example, are known for having lively Ramadan celebrations, as the Christian Science Monitor reports.

If Egyptians are known for one thing in the Middle East, it’s for living life with spirit. A strong, creative energy has created a movie and music industry that dominate the Arab world. Egyptian movie, singing, and belly dancing stars and their distinctive dialect of Arabic are the most widely known in the region.

So it’s no surprise that Egyptians celebrate the Islamic holy month of Ramadan with equal exuberance.

Muslim countries around the world bring their own style to Ramadan, which this year began in mid-September and will conclude later this week. Egypt is famous for having one of the liveliest traditions. Egyptians say it’s a product of their joie de vivre in the face of hardship and deepening religiosity…

It’s on display in the traditions surrounding sahour, the early morning meal before beginning the daily fast during Ramadan. While iftar, the meal that ends the fast at the close of the day, is a more serious matter of satiating thirst and hunger pangs, sahour is about fun and celebration.

Some Egyptians host sahour parties where friends and relatives pack into homes often decorated in brightly colored fabrics to give them the look of a traditional tent. There, they eat, drink, and celebrate from midnight until 4 a.m. Others pay top dollar to attend swanky “tents,” as these fabric-walled spaces are known, at posh restaurants or hotels.

If you didn’t see it, Newsweek did a special report last week called “Islam in America” that is worth reading. It provides a detailed look at the state of Islam in the United States and at the diverse group of individuals who practice the faith in America.

Muslim Americans represent the most affluent, integrated, politically engaged Muslim community in the Western world. According to a major survey done by the Pew Research Center and released last spring, Muslims in America earn about the same as their neighbors, and their educational levels are about the same. An overwhelming number—71 percent—agree that in America, you can “get ahead with hard work.” In stark contrast, Muslims in France, Germany and England are about 20 percent more likely to live in poverty…

There are 2.35 million Muslims in America according to Pew, though many estimates put that number much higher, and 65 percent of them are foreign-born. These Muslims began coming here in large waves after 1965, when U.S. law changed to allow increased immigration from countries beyond Western Europe.

Over the past four decades they have come from South Asia (Pakistan, India and most recently Bangladesh), the Arab world (the Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Egypt), as well as Europe and Africa. They came for education and advancement, but also to follow family, and—as in the case of the 35,000 Somalis who began arriving in the 1990s—to flee war and oppression in their home countries. The pull of the American dream remains strong.

“The U.S. is founded on the idea that we’re all connected to a set of ideas, not a set of histories,” says Keith Ellison, the Democrat from Minnesota who is Congress’s first Muslim. “For all our criticisms, the idea of America is an amazing thing—a society organized around a set of principles instead of around racial or cultural identity.”

Most of the Muslims who were born here are African-American converts and descendants of converts. But a fast-growing number are the children of immigrants, and this last group is extremely young; nearly half are between 18 and 29. In this melting pot, no one group is significantly bigger or more powerful than any of the others—it is, Muslim Americans like to say, the most diverse group of Muslims anywhere except in Mecca during the annual pilgrimage, or hajj.

Interesting article in this morning’s NY Times about a desire among many Saudis to open up their society but without giving up the traditions of Islam. These individuals are seeking a middle way between an orthodox version of Islam and the extreme openness of Western society.

Perhaps more than most societies, Saudi Arabia is a land of contradictions, a nation that demands conformity to very strict social rules even as it rides a wave of oil wealth into modernity. Heads and hands can be chopped off as punishment for crimes. But more young people than ever have been awarded scholarships by the government to attend universities in the United States.

It is the extremes that tend to define Saudi Arabia in the Western consciousness, particularly the radicals who see terrorism as a valid way to spread their ideas.

But a lot of people here also say that what they want is something in the middle, not quite Western democracy and not quite the restrictive life forced on them by the ultrareligious. The issue is less immediately about whether women can drive, or whether there should be movie theaters, as it is about the more abstract concept of allowing people to decide some things for themselves.

“Some people think that all you can find here are conservatives or liberals,” said Shemoukh al-Almaei, 23, a university student studying language and translation, as she walked through a mall in the capital city. “But there are people in the middle.”…

The Koran and the Sunna, the teaching of Prophet Muhammad, still serve as the constitution. People all over the kingdom said they lived by the word of the Koran, the literal word. But as with any other religious practice, the literal word is often a matter of interpretation.

“Nobody wants to separate Islam from the state,” said Hussein al-Shobokshy, a writer and television commentator from Riyadh. “But, I am talking for myself, I want to separate sect from the state. We don’t have any choice but to open.”

It is in the space between religion and tradition where many Saudis say they are trying to have it both ways, to enjoy the benefits of the modern world without giving up the traditions of the old.

During my own travels in parts of the Middle East, one of my strongest memories is of the rhythmic beauty of the Islamic call to prayer, which is heard five times each day from the minarets of every mosque in every city and village in the region.  So I could appreciate this recent essay in the Christian Science Monitor, written by Marcella Prokop, which recounted memories of her time in Cairo, Egypt, and in particular the timeless chant of the call to prayer.

An American student in this historic city, I am in awe of the endless sounds, the ever-present taxis, and the liquid curves and solid dots of the Arabic script. The scents of Cairo beckon to me not unlike a wispy cartoon finger of smoke. The fruit-infused haze from the tea shops, the scent of lamb and peppers roasting on a spit, and my own cucumber-melon lotion - all these memories are now and will forever be part of Cairo to me.

The Nile, the Sphinx, the pyramids are also forever locked in memory, but there is something more poignant, something sharper that resonates internally when I think of Cairo. It is the azan, the call to prayer, that anchors my thoughts when they drift to Cairo. …

The effect of the call is the same no matter the timbre or clarity: The words of ancient humanity swirl around me as I pause while shopping, dining, or even golfing - and become one with time and history, one with religion and civilization. … The call is beautiful to me. I am moved to my core by its reassurance, its grace, and its timelessness.

For additional information on the call to prayer, you can read this wikipedia entry.

When most of us think of China, we conjure images of Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong.  Or the Great Wall, the Yangtze River and the Xian warriors.  We rarely think of Muslims in China.  But as Howard French shows in a travel article he wrote for the NY Times, there is indeed a flourishing Muslim region in western China, centered on Kashgar, that can serve as an interesting travel destination.

For at least two millenniums, Kashgar was one of the most prosperous market cities on what eventually became known as the Silk Road. Caravans of camels sometimes stretching for miles made their way through its walls, carrying