Family Reunion
By Mona Eltahawy
Over the past month, I’ve been to Qatar, Germany and Egypt. As jet setting as all that sounds, I was counting the days till I was in Bellevue, Ohio for it was in this tiny town halfway between Cleveland and Toledo that my family would finally gather again for the first time in six and a half years.
And so here we are. My parents and sister flew in from our hometown Cairo, Egypt, three days ago and as I write this, my father is feeding my nephew something green and mushy. My niece is eating Arabic food that her father bought from a Lebanese store in Toledo and I’m trying to write amidst the chaos that my family is famous for. But it is chaos that we have longed for. The last time we were together, loudly and gloriously and chaotically together, was in London in February 2001.
And then September 11, 2001 happened.
But this isn’t one of those “Muslims are miserable in America” essays. For sure, it hasn’t been easy for Muslims in the U.S. since those awful attacks. But the story, as are the best ones, is complicated.
My brother, a cardiologist in Toledo, has not left the country since the terrible events almost six years ago because as a Muslim and Arab man in this country on a work/study visa, he would have to renew that visa at the U.S. Embassy of whatever country he travels to. To renew that visa, he would have to submit to a FBI background check that could take months and that could cost him his fellowship and job. Two co-workers lost their jobs because of lengthy background checks when they traveled to their home countries of Syria and Pakistan respectively.
He was one of 5,000 Muslim men visited by the FBI shortly after the attacks to be asked, among other things, if he knew anyone who celebrated the attacks, and a year later he had to submit to being fingerprinted and photographed as part of Special Registration, which was put in place by the Patriot Act but which has thankfully been suspended.
But he would be the first to tell you that despite the FBI questioning and the humiliation of Special Registration, he is happy here in the U.S. And the reason that he commutes almost an hour to and from Toledo every day is so that his wife can maintain her OB/GYN practice here in Bellevue. She is the only woman OB/GYN doctor in the town and her waiting list is almost as long as her husband’s commute to Toledo.
There are many delicious ironies and surprises that make this story even more complicated. My sister-in-law wears hijab, or a headscarf and modest clothing that some Muslims believe is required of Muslim women. But her patients could care less. Their only concern is that they have a woman doctor to tend to them. I like to think that if they ever see something on television that is Islamophobic or an ugly stereotype of Muslims, they can yell at the television and say “My doctor is a Muslim and she’s not like that”.
And finally, the house where we’ve all gathered for the first time in six and a half years is one which is rented from the church which is just a few yards from our kitchen window. Every time the church parking lot fills with its worshippers’ cars, I am reminded that despite our differences and despite the complications of our stories, many of us turn to faith and to God to sustain us during challenging times, whether they are years of separation or the longing for family or whatever else ails us.
And as I look around my family finally gathered in this house around the dinner table and as my niece says grace in English and Arabic, I am thankful for that faith and for God’s sustaining presence. And thankful for this tiny town of Bellevue which has finally brought us together.