On the home page for Pure Matrimony, it read: “If you are SINGLE and want to meet a PURE marriage partner in a HALAL way, click here!” What followed was an advertisement featuring a man who had found his wife through this very site, and an assurance that the website used scientific methods of connecting people.
* * *
Then Abdi showed up.
“We have to tidy the boys’ room,” Sara said one day.
Their cousin from Canada was coming to stay. The boys had to move into their parents’ room.
Abdi was tall, handsome, polite, the complete package. He spoke polished English and stuttering Somali. He was passing through Norway en route to Somaliland. His parents thought it would be a good idea for him to become more familiar with his own culture, and his own family. Ismael thought he was cool. Leila thought he was exciting. Ayan fell head over heels in love with him. As they were related, she did not need to cover up. She could be freer than she had been with a young man since her early teens, prior to her self-confinement behind a wall of rules.
Abdi was to stay for a month.
It was not long before the flat felt crowded.
Toward the end of his visit, he asked Sadiq for Ayan’s hand in marriage. Sadiq called their relatives in Canada.
They were skeptical. After all, Abdi was on his way to Hargeisa to receive a religious education and learn proper Somali, which he would need in adult life. Ayan was still in secondary school. Would it not be better to see how things developed? Was all this not a little hasty? Both sets of parents seemed to be of the view that their child could do better.
It was decided that the two of them would have to finish their educations first. Abdi and Ayan begged their parents to change their minds. Get married or die fasting.
14
PARAGRAPHS
Geir Lie, the school’s religion teacher, hurried along the footpath leading from Dønski school. He wanted to catch the bus into town.
On the main road he saw a woman draped in black approaching, the clothes fluttering around her body. Her face was concealed by a black veil. He moved to the right of the footpath, looking down in respect, because he presumed that when a woman covered herself, she was indicating the discomfort she felt at the male gaze. When the figure was almost alongside, he heard a voice say, “Hi, Geir!”
He recognized the eyes. A feeling of relief washed over him. Ayan had been absent from school lately, and he had feared she had either dropped out or been sent to Somalia against her will. He had been concerned enough to call her several times, but she had not answered. He had considered ringing her parents but decided against it. She was of age, so he had no right; moreover, perhaps it was the parents who were the problem.
“I’ve been worried about you,” he said. “I’ve tried to reach you by phone…”
“Everything is fine with me,” Ayan replied.
“Great, then I’ll see you in class,” Lie said, a hint of uncertainty in his voice.
She looked straight at him.
“Oh, by the way, I’ve decided that from today I’m going to wear a niqab all the time.”
“I see,” Lie said. He did not like playing things by ear and looked at his watch. “I need to get a move on if I want to catch my bus.”
She was one of his favorite students. Engaged, liked discussion and debate, and was knowledgeable. She could be a little weird at times, like when she had refused to go on the school trip to the nearby Catholic church or to a Buddhist temple. What he had found most odd was her unwillingness to come along to the mosque close to the school. She said their teachings were heresy. Ayan was very clear in her own mind about right and wrong and often expressed her views in class.
Her religious self-confidence was something he had not witnessed in any pupil previously. She spoke candidly about her faith. For Geir Lie, the fact she always mumbled “peace be with him” every time she mentioned the Prophet’s name was a genuine religious act. To put it simply, he was impressed and more than somewhat taken by his Somali pupil, not because he liked everything she came out with—on the contrary—but because she believed in it so strongly, a lighthouse in a sea of apathy.
It was a difficult class, troublesome, with a lot of absenteeism and loud, unruly boys. Many of these were Muslims, several of whom wanted to “catch him out” and get the better of him. They raised objections and quibbled at his teaching, but on the whole their knowledge was superficial, so it was mostly nagging and clamor that gave way to demonstrative passivity. While Ayan was eager for good grades, many of her male counterparts did not seem to think they needed a diploma. Geir Lie was well-meaning and not given to excessive reprimands. Only infrequently did he take someone to task. Once he had asked a pupil to leave the classroom because of the trouble he was causing. At least then the others might learn something. When the pupil refused to budge, Lie approached his desk. The pupil shouted, “Don’t come near me, kafir!”
Geir Lie exploded. “Out! Get out!”
“Don’t touch me!” the boy shouted.
“OUT!” Lie roared.
Afterward the boy rounded up a few classmates and went to the principal to complain. They wanted to get rid of the religion teacher. When Ayan got wind of this, she marched up to the principal’s office with a couple of girlfriends in tow to protest the complaint.
What was interesting, Lie thought, was that Ayan had authority in the class; no one made a noise when she spoke. She had a commanding personality and was impervious to criticism. One time, each pupil was to give a talk on a
