atlast: Muslims of the West (Europe) (part 3)

After a long break, today I try to write about those Muslims who migrated to the West, a very difficult topic really. As, I have already mentioned my writings are based upon my personal observations, talks, exposures, reflections, views and experiences and everyone is naturally free to agree or to disagree to me. In addition to that I would express myself in context of Germany as example since I have been living here. Please do correct me if there would be something incorrect.

I think there are four major categories for the immigrants in West. 1: Workers 2: Asylum seekers 3: Employees 4: Students. First two groups are in majority and are living for a longer period of time while the last two groups are mainly temporary immigrants with exceptions.

Although Workers and Asylum seekers are quite close to each other but still there are quite a few distinctions among them. How do I differentiate between Workers and Employees? Well, I think major differences among them are education and skills although both could be termed as employees, however, I would take both of them as different to figure out their characteristics and lives. Here are few of my observations of four groups of Muslim immigrants, please do bear in mind that it is almost impossible to draw clear boundaries between different types of Muslim immigrants and they do posses many characteristics in common too. Some things are common among all immigrants also.

1: Workers:

• They are among the oldest immigrants of the West (Europe), there is big majority in Germany for example. Male immigrants do dominate in number.

• Majority of them is not that skilled and educated especially if weighted in Western standards. They posses just the simple education and simple rules of how to work and earn money. Here I must make it clear that being not that educated is not a bad thing if one could not get education due to any reasons. Well, frankly speaking I have seen many bad examples among so called educated people also; so I feel a sincere, uneducated and poor human being is much better than a corrupt, educated, and rich one. However, I feel an educated person, in any field of education, feels much more comfortable, confident and open in handling matters of life.

• Quite unfortunately as I mentioned in another post also; a big majority of Muslims is not properly educated about their own religion i.e. Islam. I personally take it as root cause for big majority of internal and external problems of Muslims. In the same way, those working fellows did not posses that standard/type of Islamic education which could help a person in dealing matters at different land and culture. As most of them arrived in West at their young ages and at that time of life many people don’t take religions very seriously. Again, here I am not degrading anyone rather it is what I experienced and observed. Yes, it is true that there have been exceptions and quite well educated individuals also do exist.

• These fellows faced a tough working routines and different social, political and economic environment; different rules and regulation waited for them as compared to their own lands. Social order was influenced by the philosophies which were different than those at their own lands. In addition to that they faced a hard problem in context of communication since at start they did not know local languages, very nice:-). They were mainly expected to work and fulfil their duties and not much else; it makes sense however and I think that they did it to a good extent. Fears of unknown outcomes and unexpected decisions about their fate kept them in a state of uncertainty for much time.

• They faced hard situation of being away from their families e.g. wives, parents, children, sisters, brothers, friends etc. It never has been an easy situation for anyone. I personally feel that there is no alternative to the natural love of our close ones no matter how many other sources of care we might have!

• These fellows could not integrate well due to following main reasons

1. language barriers
2. lack of education
3. tough working responsibilities
4. uncertainty about future
5. shyness and cultural hesitations
6. social differences
7. not much awareness about system; rules and regulations
8. …
   

So they have been kind of separate group and this situation seems to be quite hard. It becomes even harder when one is not able to express and to follow what he/she feels from inside; I personally can’t stop from expressing myself. I, however, feel that situation at that time was naturally hard due to factors and parameters of that time.

• These fellows have been scared of hard questions about religion and religious beliefs by local fellows. The main reasons for this kind of fear had been lesser religious awareness, language un-competency, lack of religious guiders, strong philosophical and logical capabilities of locals, religious differences, few unhappy experiences about religion by the locals and secular trends etc. This was never easy job; so these fellows had to take one out of two choices; either they fight for the survival of their faiths at different fronts like philosophical, logical etc or just become part of the normal flow of life at new place. Most of them took the second choice as they did not have many capabilities to fight and also they were living in a challenging system. As it is never easy to sacrifice personal faith but sometimes few compromises one needs to make, which is part of life. Few make more compromises while others make lesser:-).
• Different effects which this situation has left on this class of immigrants are e.g. they have become more materialistic in priorities which is an obvious thing; their brains revolve mainly around their survival and ways to gain more materialistic benefits. They have learnt to good extent how to face local people, cultural differences, strong systematic rules and regulations, religious differences, home sickness etc. They are healthier now, are able to speak local language, their families back at home are economically better which is source of attraction for others also and they want to go abroad at any cost, have gained some sense of local logical and philosophical trends and standards etc. One thing however has been damaged and that is spiritual and religious aspect since it was time and again crushed. Many of them have lost many religious values, practice and do contradict to religious values although they do have great respect/love for their religion, faith and homelands. These fellows also have to make it sure that they are loyal to the system they live in and the people they live with, this is a natural responsibility. They have to fight for a comfortable place as a personal identity between native nationality and new nationality, native culture and new culture, native religious values and the ones at new place. Such a situation might leave many internal conflicts/contradictions inside a person but also might help in thinking more and getting stronger/patient. As immigrants are able to compare two systems so they are able to think with more parameters and choices, how do they use this facility?, it depends. Well, I am personally in total respect to everyone what he/she takes as way of life since humans are free and they have different challenges.

• Immigrants in general face different types of people in new country and it is natural that one feels a bit shy and afraid of new personalities and things get even more complicated when immigrants see that locals do posses different values, priorities and philosophies of life etc. These things naturally increase shyness and some fears. What results out of it? Immigrants try to restrict themselves to their own people; they miss their homeland and family even moreJ and their thoughts go back time and again to their homelands:-). In addition to that for a person who has spent a good part of life in a different (native) country, it is never easy to be comfortable if he/she gets a very different environment suddenly. It is natural for human beings that past events/things do remain in our brain so this factor also effects. To get trust of locals is never easy and bad acts of some immigrants make it even harder.
• Many of these fellows don’t have good exposure to the international happenings and developments. They feel happy at some work , money and watching TV for example. They are interested normally in work, money, native country, family back at home etc. I think pain they take at start of their journey makes them so.

• Many of them do have wives from the home lands who joined them later while few have local wives too which is an interesting aspect attached to the immigrants in general. Local girls and immigrants have created many interesting stories:-). I have come across quite a few people who got married to local girls mainly for survival at new place and to get nationality etc but frankly speaking this has created mess in many of such cases, why? Some of the reasons which I could figure out are as follows:

1. I strongly believe that a relationship based only upon greed and materialistic benefits and not based upon humanity, love, care, respect and mutual understanding is a weak and narrow relation!
2. lack of religious education/values, lack of practice of religion, contradiction to own values and resulting internal/external conflicts etc create many strange situations. I feel that a person who is his/her self not on a strong and clear faith will most probably create many problems!
3. differences of backgrounds, cultures, religions, life priorities etc which are normal part of life and which should be source of learning in life, in many cases result in chaos due to lack of understanding, some egoism and exaggerated national prides!!!
4. …

Wives of the Immigrants: Well, those who brought wives from the homelands, they lead a different life than those who have locals and this factor plays role in lives of the children also. Non-local wives are mostly house wives:-), they are mostly not as highly educated as local ones and also don’t get that much exposure to the local society. Their main tasks are to run the matters of house and children; they also let their husbands decide about matters not related to home. This is due to both religious and cultural values although sometimes this situation results in abuse of women which is never a fair thing. However, perception of force or oppression of women by the Muslims is not always true either! Many problems to women occur due to lack of religious understanding, wrong cultural norms and human corruption.

On the other hand local wives (Westerner) do lead a different role. They like to have much more independence and like to have their own careers and decisions which is not bad either. I have already mentioned above few reasons for problems in such relations. However, there are few very good examples of this type of relationships, it depends upon individuals. I am personally in favour of all due independence and rights of women no matter where they belong to. Force is not good for any kind of relationship but in case of wife it is even more detrimental. My imagination says that if females are forced to do something against their wish then they teach such a lesson at which one simply starts crying:-), they know many ways to do that:-) .

Children: Children born or those who were brought to new land at their early age might have following characteristics.

1. Normally are more active, confident and comfortable as compared to their parents as they find the new land like homeland, familiar and natural. They are normally quite liberal and might have sometimes differences of priorities with parents. Parents, as in general, want children to be similar to parents but children want to take their own ways, it is also a typical generation gap problem. Here again the lack of worldly and religious education of parents does follow them and they are normally not able to handle children very nicely! Personally I find this situation very painful; I can understand pain and compulsion of parents due to natural love towards children but very unfortunately due to change of time and space and other factors of life, things get complicated. I personally feel that parents should understand that faith can’t be necessarily inherited so children should not be forced rather advised with care and love.
2. As these children normally find themselves quite free and independent due to open environment of the West, they make a lot of experiments themselves. They don’t feel bound to those limits which their parents had faced or still do feel. Many of these youngsters try e.g. current fashions, alcohol drinking, parties etc, which is a natural inclination and phenomenon in West. Quite a few of them are able to stay focused upon their faith and are able to handle fairly their immediate society at the same time too; this could be due to following reasons; a: they get a balanced and proper guidance through their parents; b: they themselves have strong inclination which makes them quite strong faithful; c: some worst/best experiences/people do lead them towards being strong at their faiths etc.
3. I have noticed that most of them are quite intelligent as they have different sources of information and views of the life although get confused sometime. They try to understand advice with great attention if done so with care and love. They don’t like to be forced especially in case of religion which is a good thing. I personally think that two things are total personal choice of a person and no one can force them for it; first is choice of a faith and religion and the second is choice of selection of a life partner for marriage.
4. They, in general, do have love, respect and inclination towards religion and country of their parents which I take as natural phenomenon. However, winds of the time and space and lack of proper guidance strongly effect their inclination. In addition to that they also have to face all confusions arising due to sects, differences among Muslims, International happenings, propaganda, and silly acts of some Muslims etc. In some cases they find mother and father having two different religions which is an interesting situation.
5. Beside all their inclinations and love for the land of parents they love their current land (i.e. West) too. I came to know about few cases where parents took their children back to their homelands because they felt that their children are not sticking to their religion/values and drifting away. I can understand feelings of such parents and I respect their choice but I personally feel that if parents can give proper attention, love, care and guidance to the children then normally things don’t get messy. If children get more friendship, care and respect at home then they will be lesser influenced by the other attractions they find outside otherwise children will drift away and get bad no matter where they do live!!!
6. I personally feel that these young Muslims are like an asset for the Western societies since normally they are very open, neutral, confident, flexible and show great understanding so they should be encouraged and guided to play role for bridging gaps and making integration/understanding easier. Here it should be kept in view, however, that efforts to misguide or misuse or confuse them from ANY SIDE might create awkward situation!!

2: Asylum seekers: Well many things are similar for the Asylum seekers if compared to Working immigrants, however there are few differences. Some of the things which belong to this group are

• They are normally very ill informed about the realities of the West when they start their journeys. They even don’t know where are they going and what will happen to them. Their journey is normally a blind and dangerous one. There are quite a few factors which force them to move at new place which I might mention sometimes later. Many of them even lose lives while crossing borders or due to extreme weathers or due to other calamities etc.

• They don’t know where will they live and who will take care of them. They don’t have those skills which one might need to survive in new country and language skills are also almost nil initially. These fellows are not quite educated ones. They don’t have support of friends or family at new place in most of the cases.

• These people do face quite a few fears and pressures although local systems try their best to accommodate them. There might be cases of crimes committed by the people of this group as they have to survive somehow. Most of them try to get married so that they could get some kind of protection, however many such marriages result not that positive as I mentioned above. Personally I am not that much in favour of such blind, unplanned and dangerous journeys by anyone; it is a kind of suicide. These fellows do have to face extremely tough challenges in religious, philosophical and logical aspects and the difficulty gets even double folded due to insufficient local language skills. They do have great love for their religion inside but are incapacitated by their lacks and normally are unable to defend their faiths/religions. They also can’t speak all what they have in their hearts as they are at the mercy of local system which can thrash them out any time. This situation might bring quite a few strange characteristics in a person e.g. one gets good at pretending, telling lies, some cheating, huge differences between faith and practice might occur etc. There are both good and bad examples as naturally among this group.

• After few years of extreme hardships and training, they are able to understand life at new place. They are able to learn local language, might have a local partner, find few friends mostly from their homeland, find some places of work and earn money etc. Their life is not that social normally and just stay within restricted circle.

• …

3: Employees: This is the class of Muslims which consists of educated and well skilled individuals if analysed in context of Western views. Few examples are researchers at universities and other institutes, at higher posts in big companies etc. These people are not in big number normally. What are they? Of course human being:-)))), let me think.

• More educated, skilled and aware of current setup of the world; again here it does not mean that they are better than other people; good and bad people do exist at every level and in every group. These individuals are normally above 30 years so are quite experienced ones about matters of life.

• These people normally don’t have to pass through all those tiring formalities which are faced by two groups mentioned above as they come to new land with proper contracts, understanding of responsibilities and do get protection and guidance through their employers. These people normally live a managed, focused, rich but a bit limited life. Their working responsibilities make it hard for them to be quite socialized or to get to the roots of the local cultures. Too many bosses are also not good sometimes:-). In addition to that they normally have limited and predefined period of stay and then fly back.

• They, in general, are already married or engaged and have their families back at homeland which they miss extremely at start:-) as they can’t go for dating and waiting and have to stay faithful to their wives:-). However, more they see openness of Western society more they miss their wives and try to control themselves in this difficult situation! They face few hardships, sometimes, in context of family reunion as visa formalities for their families take a good period of time and it is getting even harder now because of current international situation. Anyhow…

• This group though is in general not able to get to the roots of the local culture but they contribute positively in following forms:

1. They create goodwill for the Muslims and local people observe and think that some Muslims are also skilled, educated and peaceful too and not all of them like to terrorise:-)
2. They are able to enhance their professional skills and knowledge and contribute both to their land of current stay and homeland.
3. They earn capital which helps them in fulfilling their financial needs.
4. ...

• These fellows normally are able to defend their faith/religion at logical, philosophical and scientific fronts as their education and skills help them greatly in this context. If one would like to analyse them in context of religious believes and practice then one would find different types among them; quite secular, medium religious and strong religious. Majority of them is, however, good at theoretical aspects of religion.

4: Students: ohh here comes the group of cows:-) including me myself… what about them?

• In general poor, solo and wandering cows:-)

• They also face great cultural shocks at start but gradually do improve because they are normally at their early youth which is period where one learns and is not that fixed in habits; also at that time one does not have many burdens on shoulders which helps in looking at life with a bit relaxed mind. Moving to a new place is normally like a second birth for them. They leave their parents so look for a similar love which they can’t find unfortunately. Now they have to live in a society which is fortunately/unfortunately quite individualistic/materialistic in nature so don’t cry mama papa dear child and be ready for the challenges yourself. Ok, Uncle Tom.

• They do get good support and guidance through their Universities/Institutes so System at new place does not scare them a lot although some fears they do have naturally. They themselves don’t have great know how of the local System; they try to know it through test and trials like children:). No baby this is wood one can’t eat it. Ok, Aunty Lena.

• Most of them are normally bachelor, miss their parents, sisters, brothers and friends they have been living with together. So try to contact them through chat and phone calls and tell them their situation and difficulties and makes them also sentimental.

• Here starts the difficult part of the story; a twist. Poor student is now in a society where dating and waiting is very open, girls and boys are so free, there are not many restrictions from society and parents, ahhhaa, is it really so? He never dreamt like that although he/she heard a lot about openness of the West. So now Student starts taking his chances and gets many smiles in response which are not normal by girls in his homeland. So he thinks that he is going to find a beautiful girl quite soon and will be successful:-). Poor student is so simple. Actually he doesn’t know that a person who is more open is also more aware and confident. If girls smile at you in West, it is due to courtesy and necessarily doesn’t mean that she is in love with you. Also girls are not easy to convince, they are normally extremely careful about having a permanent partner. In addition to that Youngsters in West normally don’t like to get into permanent relationships at the early part of youth; they say that we want to have so called enjoyment first then we will see whom to take as life partner if we felt any need of it; well nice philosophy but… Anyhow, poor student gets into a difficult situation; he finds so many options which look so close but are so far in reality.

• Very interestingly most of them don’t get a life partner at new place! Why? I could figure out few reasons which play some role

1. Shyness and fear of losing their identity/philosophy
2. Differences of cultures and religions. They normally get strong instructions from home that don’t try to go too deep into new culture and stay focused.
3. Uncertainty about careers and futures
4. Lack of mutual trust and understanding
5. They want to have some kind of serious relationship but locals don’t like it so early
6. Current engagements, though weak normally, of both parties
7. Reservations and fears of the locals towards Muslims and Islam
8. Atheistic trends
9. Sometimes they themselves don’t have strong values which sooner or later causes distrust and lack of interest
10. Distrust which is normal part of life and it is true that people do cheat
11. Well, matter of relationship I find very tricky, it is beyond my little mind to solve this equation since there are so many factors which do play role here. I have personally left this matter to God:)
    

Well, very few of them are able to have good relationships; very few sadly.

• Students are normally average at Islamic knowledge and practice with few exceptions but in general are not that bad. Normally prefer to stay with their own friends and people which is a general but natural problem. There are few reasons which hinder from getting social e.g. study burden, earning burden, shyness, laziness, cultural unawareness, social unawareness and coldness of locals sometime, materialistic and atheistic trends of the West and fast and demanding life pattern etc.

• Let me share some of their routine of life, it consists of e.g. study, part time jobs, cooking, sleeping, praying (some are regular while others not and few don’t pray at all), internet surfing, online chatting, movies watching at home, chit chat with other friends, political and religious discussions sometimes hot ones, calling back family and to watch local girls from a distance only:-) etc.

• This group could contribute to the local society since in general they are young, more flexible and open.

• As they have spent their previous lives in a different culture and society so can’t be expected to be totally like Westerners. Past experiences of an individual do play role in his/her decisions and actions consciously or unconsciously. So this bunch of cows needs to be handled carefully keeping in mind their history, culture, experiences and philosophies. I have found them in general quite peaceful and cooperative. They are also not that bad at logical and philosophical fronts.
  
  There are few businessmen and few others like female students which i could not cover here. May be sometime latter.

So it was what I could observe and think about different types of Muslim immigrants, my views and observations are open to any agreement or disagreement. What next? Let me think first.
Keep on enjoying your lives and be happy.