Fluffy post alert!
Ok, continuing to browse through their gulf abaya section. This one looks like it's faux coat, and it's got shiney stuff too!
According to the Silk Route stocklist, it looks like they've got a distributer in the US. Oooo, now if only he would hurry up and start selling online! You can view their stuff at the new islamicdesignhouse website, where it looks like they're also going to be selling shirts with Aerosol Arabic and VisualDhikr designs on them. Weee!
...and everything in Australia seems to be a wee bit on the expensive side, but dang, this site has some great hijab ideas!We cater to the active woman, the one who runs the marathons, hits the gym, goes to school, holds her job, all while still looking modest and stylish. The focus is on function. We want each hijab to move with you without having to re-adjust and restyle.
Dear Amy: I live in a retirement community where all residents are provided one served meal each day. This meal is served by high school students in a dining area accommodating about 200 residents. These servers are both male and female, and wear white shirts/blouses and black pants/skirts. It is a uniform of sorts. Two of the female servers wear black scarves over their heads and around their necks, consistent with, I presume, their Muslim tradition. It offends my sense of propriety and decorum to have these two servers display their religious symbols in a private dining area, such that they cannot be ignored. I would like to complain to management, but I don't want to stir up a hornet's nest. Am I wrong?-- Kilroy
Dear Kilroy: I'm not sure what you find offensive. Are you offended by evidence of any religion in the dining room? Or do you mind the fact that these girls are Muslim and it is impossible for you to ignore that fact? The ideal function of the hijab is to project an air of modesty to avoid attention -- not draw it to themselves. And it seems that a black head scarf fits in with the black-and-white uniform for servers.
I wonder if you would be similarly offended if these girls wore Amish caps or if some of the young male waiters wore yarmulkes? Perhaps you would be. If so, and if any evidence of religion in your dining room offends you, then complain to management. But you will be stirring up a hornet's nest if you do.Unless these scarves somehow impair these young people's ability to serve you dinner, I don't think you have a leg to stand on. We live in a pluralistic society, and while it might be changing a bit fast for your taste, the freedom to practice and express one's religion is a pretty important aspect of what it means to be an American, right?
Yet that's not how the journalist at the local newspaper in Oxford, the Oxford Mail, decided to approach the issue. Her article was titled "Row over fully dressed woman in sauna". The main interview in the article was with Ian Caldwell, the man who verbally attacked me in the lobby. There was no attempt to find out the full story. A so-called "Muslim community leader" called Taj Hargey called it "political correctness gone crazy".
At no point had the journalist contacted me. She seemed to have decided to take a similar approach to the man in the swimming pool - talking about me, not to me. As did David Lloyd's, which had backed up his story without consulting me. At no point did they bother to inform me, a paying member, that such an article was being written. I contacted the Oxford Mail, offering them my side of the story. I never heard back.
Of course, that would have destroyed the theme of the article. Nobody in Oxford would be interested in new swimming suits with hi-tech material, but a crazy Muslim woman jumping into a pool fully clothed and potentially suffocating in the sauna was much more interesting. Since when have facts been important to journalists covering stories involving Muslims?
Alhamdulilah, I haven't had any international sensation news stories written about me when I go swimming at the local Y. Maybe someone will write one when I finish a marathon (currently training for a half, planning on a full in 2009), but I would hope they would have the decency to interview me. Heck, I hope they interview me.
I think I"m going to use the sauna this weekend at the gym...
Anything from Silk Route.
With a great deal of discomfort and a tad bit of pissed-off-ness, I regret to (re)inform the KABOB-o-sphere that Palestine has officially become a trend…That's right folks, for a mere $20.00 (or 75.0127 Saudi Riyal) you too can jump on the socially stupid hipster-doofus bandwagon by rocking your very own "Anti-War Woven Scarf!" (available only at Urban Outfitters… or..err..uh… the Middle East)
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Besides – what the hell is so "anti-war" about a kaffiya anyway? Are people wearing it in solidarity with the Iraqis? If so, which Iraqis? And what do they propose the US' role should be in the country after the war is over? I wonder how many of these "anti-war" Iraqi solidarity fashion moguls voted to reinstate G.W. Bush for second term in 2004 - or didn't show their solidarity with the millions of Iraqi children who suffered and/or died during 10 brutal years of American endorsed UN sanctions... oi vey!
I don't know about you – but I, for one, don't appreciate being tokenized! What next - a FUBU yarmulka? Puh-leez! If you're sincere in your display of solidarity, buy your kaffiyas from here.
