A Happy Somali Couple

Faith, as has been said, is a funny thing. Many people say that my religion is sexist, that it oppresses women, and all that shit. Well, they're right, and they're also wrong. The religion of Islam doesn't oppress women. Insecure Muslim men use the religion of Islam to oppress misinformed women who lacks the brains and guts to speak up for themselves. My name is Ayanna Muhammad, and I'm a young Black woman of Somali descent living in the City of Calgary, province of Alberta. I recently married a fine brother named Omar Laban, and we're very happy together. I have a lot to be thankful for, truly. I recently started working as a nurse at the hospital downtown. Finding a job six months after graduating from the University of Calgary is no small feat for an immigrant woman who's also a visible minority in the cutthroat world of western Canada.

My husband Omar currently works as a manager for a security company with holdings through Canada, with regional offices in Alberta, Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes. Omar has a bachelor's degree in Criminology from the University of Alberta and aspires to work in law enforcement someday, but so far that dream hasn't materialized. Omar is frustrated, but I support his dream. It's not easy being a Somali person in Canada. We're the one group that everybody loves to hate. Even other Africans, both Christian and Muslim, hate our guts with a passion. Supposedly, we're the worst of the worst and deserve no pity. Somalis are seen as troublemakers by all other immigrant groups in Canada. We're second only to the Arabs in terms of being almost universally disliked. Kind of makes one proud, doesn't it?

Omar Laban and I met while I was hanging out in the City of Edmonton, where my sister Khadija lives with her husband, a Turkish guy named Mehmet Selim. I was walking to the bus station after a two-day visit in the Selim household, and my bus was late. I sat there, waiting for the bus while periodically checking up on my iPhone. While I was checking my updates on Facebook, something caught my eye. A tall, broad-shouldered and dark-skinned, sexy brother clad in a black leather jacket, bright red silk shirt, blue jeans and boots. He noticed me noticing him, and smiled. He walked over to me, and in accented Somali, he asked me if I had seen the bus go by. I coyly told him that I missed the last one. He looked at the seat next to mine and asked me whether he could sit down. I nodded, and he plopped down next to me. I asked him where he was from, and he told me that he grew up in the City of Minneapolis, Minnesota, but his parents came from Somaliland. And that's how I met Omar Laban, the Somali-American stud from Minnesota. We exchanged numbers, added each other on Facebook, and started a friendship filled with sexual tension.

At the time we met, Omar Laban had been in Canada a year and a half. His parents, Ahmed and Aisha Laban, moved to the State of Minnesota from their native Somaliland in the 1980s, and he was born in the City of Minneapolis in 1988. Like a lot of Somali guys, Omar led a less than productive life while in America. He flunked out of Walden University in his hometown of Minneapolis, got involved in all kinds of shady shit, and ultimately, his fed-up parents sent him to stay with his uncle Abdul and his aunt Fatima in the City of Calgary, in provincial Alberta. Kind of like in that old sitcom Fresh Prince Of Bel Air, only with Somalis instead of African-American urbanites. Omar seemed genuinely determined to turn his life around, unlike a lot of brothers I knew around metropolitan Calgary. I decided to take a chance on him, and I'm glad I did.

Omar and I started hanging out, first as friends, and then before you know it, we were a couple. Somalis pair up very quickly, it's part of our culture. I was born in Somaliland, and grew up in the Confederation of Canada. I still remember life back home, and sometimes I miss it. When I tell this to Somalis born and raised in Canada or America, they ask me what kind of weed I've been smoking, because I'd have to be on something to miss Somalia. You know what they say, there's no place like home, no matter who you are or where you're from. How could I miss my home any less than you would miss yours? Seriously, some questions, people should be ashamed of themselves to ask them.

Even though we were both Somali, Omar and I came from different worlds. The guy barely spoke the Somali language, and after growing up in the U.S. he was way too Americanized for my liking. His knowledge of Somali culture was virtually nonexistent, and he didn't seem to mind that one bit. Also, he did a lot of things that most Somalis would consider to be haram. He owned a dog, a mutt he called Spike, and he also smoked weed. Omar had an impressive porno collection boasting of a hundred or more DVDs, most of them black or interracial erotic movies. All this he told me early on in our relationship, just so I wouldn't be shocked. Well, after living in Canada for most of my life, I had seen so many things which I considered to be more than a bit shocking. My parents and I lived in a house across the street from a lesbian couple, a Jamaican butch lady named Beatrice Thorns and her short, blonde-haired and very feminine lover Allison Mendoza, a former supermodel, if you can believe that.

Canada has legalized gay marriage and abortion nationwide, and there's not much you can do about the law of the land regardless of your religion or lifestyle. Omar was cool with gay marriage and abortion, things that are considered haram or forbidden in Islamic doctrine. Omar flat out told me that although he was raised in a Muslim household, his mindset was more than a bit secular. He wasn't very religious. At the time, I found that odd. After we got married, Omar's lack of religious conviction and his westernized view of the world proved to be a blessing. He treated me fairly, many Somali sisters aren't so lucky. A lot of Somali women living in America and Canada are marrying men from other communities.

I look at my life now, and I am honestly thankful for what God and fate have seen fit to bless me with. I live in one of the world's most wonderful countries. Canada isn't perfect, there's still a lot of racism and prejudice and it cuts both ways. While many Canadians view visible minorities as oddities, especially those from places like Africa and the Middle East, many more are open-minded and friendly. Of course, there are hypocrites who fake it and you've got to watch out for those, but for the most part, life is okay up here. I love my husband, and since he's become a permanent resident of Canada, life has been a bit easier for him.

Omar got promoted to assistant regional manager of the security firm where he works. He still hopes to become a police officer one day, and I'm happy for him. That's why I'm going to share something special with him tonight. It's easier for an educated Canadian woman who's a permanent resident of America to find work in the States than for a similarly educated American man who's a permanent resident of Canada to find work in the Confederation. Canada is closed, and America is open. I want to explore life in America, and since I know I'll be able to function with my university degree and health care licence, I see nothing tying me to Canada. Tonight, I'm going to tell Omar that I want us to move to America, back to Minnesota, where he was born. He'll have an easier time becoming a police officer there since he's a U.S. citizen and all. My husband is gonna be so happy to hear this. Ah, the things us women do for love, eh?