Covered Under the Same Hijab

by Salua Kamerow (United States of America)

A leap into the unknown Israel

From the bubbly attitude born in my Colombian lineage, I looked at my husband and suggested he wear long pants for the day as we were planning to visit the Muslim Quarter in Jerusalem and, hopefully, go into the Dome of the Rock. But, he thought the restrictive dress code was only for women. With my appearance in mind, I geared up with a long blouse with long sleeves and a black hijab. I darkened my eyelids with kohl and painted depressing bags under my eyes. I did not wear any lipstick. I wanted to have the mystery of the Arabic eyes, but still be sober and demure. I’ve learned throughout the years, as well as from growing up with my Arabic father, that Arabs tend to care for a woman with a submissive, sorrowful face. Once we started walking towards the Wailing Wall, I was prevented from visiting the third sacred place for Muslims. I had mixed feelings when the officers said only “pure” Muslims could enter the mosque, so they occasionally question tourists at the entrance. My face is the daughter of a catholic Latina, and a Muslim, Lebanese man. Furthermore, I am now happily married into Judaism. On arriving to the wall, Harry asked for directions to the Dome of the Rock. A Jewish old lady questioned him in an ill tone on what a Jew would want inside of “that place.” Certainly, I was not scared of walking alone in the Jewish Quarter. Yet, I was swamped with unknown expectations once we crossed into the control of priggish Jordanians. As the gate came into view, the security guard beckoned us over as if we were speeding on a highway. He pulled my hijab from my shoulders and wrapped up Harry’s legs. My intuition had struck again, and it became clear that our journey was becoming an odyssey. I walked towards the door of the Dome of the Rock and a man with a heavy accent held his hand before me, impeding my entrance. He said Christians were not allowed in the mosque, which prompted me to regard my overtly Jewish husband with confusion. I responded in a soft voice in Arabic that I was Muslim. He retorted that I was not a Muslim since I was married to a Christian. I argued back and forth with him but failed to override his bark. My husband was frightened already—because he knew his wife. I have always lived my life with the motto, No Retreat, No Surrender, the title of the 1987 classic film. I walked away and asked where to find the leading shaikh. It became evident early on I was speaking with a worker bee, not the queen. Harry’s face started to characteristically spasm as it does when he gets nervous. Contrarily, I was feeling discriminated against, like if I was a traitor. I walked up the stairwell to the main office, and at the security point, I asked to talk to the shaikh. I was unsurprisingly asked why and after explaining myself, I was judged for marrying a Christian once again. I look at them and queried: “are you saying before the eyes of Allah that I am not a Muslim?” I knew they would never answer that question, not even if they thought I wasn’t. When the shaikh saw me entering the door of his office, he greeted me in Arabic, which I replied in the same language. But when he saw Harry he said in an amusing way “you are a strong man,” to which Harry replied a dry “of course.” The shaikh sat us down for 5 minutes in a room next door and sent a worker with instructions to show us the Dome of the Rock. Priceless was the face of the guard who was expecting to see my disappointment with rejection, when instead, he saw me next to a chaperone touring the third most holy site of the Muslim faith. At the end, I was proud to have gotten a Jew inside of the Dome of the Rock because we have more things in common than apart and we covered ourselves under the same hijab.