It's November and too warm to feel like winter. Christmas lights blink and flash along the middle-class Tempe neighborhood. Plastic reindeer prance on brownish-gray rock lawns.
At the end of the almost deserted street, intense green lights outline a one-story home. This house seems out of place - like the family that lives inside.
There are no plastic Santas in the lawn. No Christmas lights. Instead, a makeshift Happy Ramadan! banner hangs from the front of the house. Below it an old man and his 8-year-old-granddaughter write more Ramadan greetings on the large front windows with white chalk. At the door, the Egyptian Eye of Ra stares fiercely from a metal plaque with Arabic calligraphy. Below the plaque is a small Mexican flag.
Inside the home, a group of dark-eyed and thick-lashed women sit together at a beige dining table waiting for 5:28 p.m. - the time when their fast may be broken.
It's Ramadan, a month in which Muslims abstain from food, drink and sex until nightfall.
The eight friends each wear a hijab, a headscarf traditionally worn by Muslim women. Only their lightly tanned faces and hands show. In lyrical Spanish, they give thanks to Allah for breaking the fast, but every once in a while, thick Arabic words punctuate the warm Latin rhythms.
The women are Hispanic Muslims, part of a hidden American population estimated to number about 60,000. They are a growing minority camouflaged in two headline-making cultures.
Though Hispanics account for only 6 percent of converts to Islam annually, handfuls of Hispanic-Muslim organizations are appearing throughout the United States and Latin America in response to this slowly rising movement. There are about a dozen nationally and 25 internationally, with the largest organization in Argentina. Many Hispanic Muslims concede that their numbers aren't high yet, but with over 38 million Hispanics and up to 7 million Muslims in the United States, they know their numbers will increase.
Arizona is following national data. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2002 there were 1.5 million Hispanics in the state. There are about 50,000 Muslims in Arizona, a Muslim organization reports, but no Hispanic Muslim organization exists in the state.
Imam Ahmad Shqeirat, the prayer leader at the Islamic Cultural Center in Tempe, says he knows Hispanic converts will continue to be attracted to Islam. The mosque has ordered more Spanish Qurans, literature and information packets on Islam. A number of Spanish speaking members work with the small, but thriving Hispanic Muslim community.
This is a story about three Hispanic Muslims living in the Valley. They have recently converted to Islam. Their reasons for converting vary from their dissatisfaction with their Catholic beliefs to a need for peace in their lives. But peace does not come easily. Their lives are a balancing act in which they must try to juggle their sometimes overpowering newfound faith and their strong cultural identity. They face disapproval from their deeply rooted Catholic families and the pressure to fit into the mostly Middle Eastern and South Asian Islamic community, without denying their rich Latin culture.
The secret Muslims
There are no traces of Islam in José and Yareli Reyes' West Phoenix apartment - at least not when Yareli's mother is home.
Islamic books are stashed out of sight, prayers are performed behind locked doors, and Yareli's five hijabs are stuffed in the locked glove compartment of her white Chevy Cavalier.
"It's like a big secret," Yareli says, "but everyone knows. We just don't talk about it."
The newlyweds converted to Islam in early 2003, yet their new Muslim identity is closeted at home. Yareli's mother, who moved in with them in May, refuses to acknowledge their new faith. She also refused to be interviewed for this story and was not present during the interviews.
José and Yareli are originally from Mexico. Yareli is from Nayarit; José from Chihuahua. José, a Chicano Studies and Spanish major at Arizona State University came to the United States at age 5 and 14, respectively.
José had been a Catholic altar boy in Buckeye. By the time he was a senior at Buckeye Union High, José says, he was fed up with the "confusing traditions and beliefs" of the church that couldn't be clearly explained. But José had been taught "to be Mexican is to be Catholic."
To José, changing religions meant changing his identity.
For many Hispanics, that may be true, David Damrel, assistant professor of religious studies at ASU says. Many feel their culture is so infused with religion, that it becomes difficult to separate the two, he says in a phone interview.
"Islam has a certain kind of appeal. It seems really straight forward, if you want to compare the mysteries and complicated layers of Catholicism," he says. "Islam on the surface seems very, very transparent. You know exactly what you're supposed to do. You don't have a hierarchy of authorities like priests and bishops and cardinals . . . the emphasis is on the individual leadership and behavior."
In 1999, José started college at Arizona State University, the first person in his family to attend college. He moved in with his best friend - a non-practicing Muslim from Lebanon.
Eventually, José wanted to hear more about the religion his roommate left behind in Lebanon.
Last year, José moved into an apartment with Yareli, his new girlfriend. On campus, José frequently walked by information tables set up by the Muslim Student Association. He wanted to talk with them, but was intimidated by the many students gathered at the tables.
In October 2002, the Muslims handed José a booklet on the beliefs and practices of Muslims. His interest grew.
Soon after, he made his way to the Tempe mosque, only a block way from campus. After speaking with members and observing their prayers, José began attending an intro to Islam class. In January 2003 he converted.
For four months, José never told Yareli about his serious interest in Islam. Yareli noticed the Islamic books he brought home and all the heavy religious talk, but never suspected he was thinking of converting.
Like her husband, Yareli had questioned her Catholic faith, but couldn't imagine leaving it. It was as much a part of her as the black, thick hair she curled every morning.
Yareli, a thin woman with glasses and lightly tanned skin, accepted José's conversion, but made it clear that she wasn't ready to make the same move. José didn't push her, but asked her to join his Islamic class. She did, and a month later she converted on her wedding day.
She doesn't regret her quick decision, but she says she struggles with her new identity, and her Catholic mother's reaction to it.
"We just don't mention anything about the mosque or our Muslim friends [to her] because we just want peace at home," José says of the conflict in the apartment since Yareli's mother moved in.
Both José and Yareli's parents and siblings know of their conversion, but only Yareli's mother adamantly disagrees with their decision. They don't think she ever will accept their conversion.
Their friends and extended family don't know yet.
"When there's a party, we make up excuses and try to get out of it. And we just don't go to their houses. We just try to avoid it."
José and Yareli don't think their Mexican friends would understand. "Our culture is blunt. My Mexican friends and family aren't afraid to criticize and tease us. You open up to them, but you have to be ready to face the response," says José.
"We'll tell them," José says ly as he sat on his living room couch, his dark eyes darting to the floor. "After we move out of Phoenix. We need to get away from here."
A couple of hours later, keys jingle at the door. Yareli's mom is home. Yareli heads to the bedroom to curl her hair. José greets his mother-in-law and then follows Yareli.
"Islam doesn't have to be a culture." José says. "It's a way of life, sure, but I guess you can keep your identity. Hispanics can fit into Islam too. We can adapt. Right, Yareli?
Before answering, Yareli pauses a moment, "Yeah, José. We can," she says.
Family acceptance may never occur
Family acceptance of a religious conversion may never occur or take years to achieve, says Aneesah Nadir, an assistant professor at ASU West and president of the Islamic Social Services Association.
Nadir, who is writing a book aimed to educate families of recent converts about Islam, says through her work she has experienced a variety of responses from acceptance to disownment of the new Muslim member.
"The family is worried for the new Muslim, and they usually know nothing of Islam or only know the negative image associated with Islam," Nadir says in a phone interview. "They think it's a cult and so they're afraid for them."
To help improve the situation, new Muslims shouldn't be so rigid in dealing with stubborn family members, she says. They should keep families ties, keep attending family gatherings and try to slowly educated members, she says.
It's the hijab
Maria Swailem decided to wear a hijab last summer. Now she's rethinking the decision. It's all so much harder than she thought it would be. Once she felt confident about the hijab because "it was the right thing to do." But now she figures she probably won't wear it for the rest of her life, as many Muslims women choose to do.
"My relatives [in Mexico] have never seen anyone wear something like this, except the Virgin Mary," she says one day tugging at her beige hijab. "I don't want them to think I'm pure and innocent like the Virgen."
Maria is married to an Egyptian immigrant, Tamer Swailem. Tamer, 31, recently pleaded not guilty to federal criminal charges stemming from an alleged $11 million scheme involving "stolen or fraudulently obtained," infant formula. Tamer was recently released from jail on bond. He would not comment for this story.
The couple have three trilingual children ages 2, 4 and 8. Since the day they were born Swailem spoke Spanish to them. She doesn't want them to forget their heritage.
Her Mexican mother, Amalia Martinez, 51, is also a Muslim. She officially converted last month.
Maria is from Nayarit, Mexico, a medium-sized state along the West coast. She stands about 5 feet 6 inches tall. She has deep-brown eyes, framed with thick, black eyeliner.
Tamer and Maria met at the University of Arizona in 1992. She was an 18-year-old Mexican exchange student and he a 20-year-old economics student from Cairo. They dated for two years and married in 1994.
"I didn't understand his culture at first," she says in a interview at her home. "I just went along with the Ramadan and the fasting and praying."
"Tamer talked about Islam to me. I wasn't religious, and I didn't want to become religious. He told me, 'I will not force you to convert to Islam, I will not push you, but the children must be Muslim. They have to be. I wasn't religious so I accepted it."
When their oldest child was born in 1995, both Tamer and Maria took her to the mosque and religious events. Maria still claimed to be Catholic at the time and went to church occasionally.
One sleepless night in 1999, pregnant with her second daughter, Arabic words flooded her mind. A single phrase repeated itself most of the night.
"I felt something that was not normal," she says. "I don't know if I was dreaming or not, but a phrase kept coming to my head all night."
The next morning, she asked her husband what it meant - ashahadu alla ilaha illallahu waashhadu anna muhammadan abduhu warasuluh.
It was the Muslim Shahadah - a statement professing a belief in Allah and Muhammad, the last prophet Muslims believe God sent.
Maria knew it was a sign.
Maria converted to Islam that year in Tucson. Her Catholic parents didn't know how to react at first, but they eventually accepted their daughter's decision, she says.
On a Tuesday morning, Maria, her son and her mother drive a borrowed cream-colored Buick to Wal-Mart. Maria's own car is not running, and she doesn't have the money to fix it. Times are hard. Maria has a part-time job as a baby sitter, but says she doesn't know how to look for a more lucrative job because she's never worked before and doesn't know how.
Instead, she asked her parents, in-laws and friends for help during Tamer's recent incarceration. The Muslim community also responded by supporting her for a few weeks after Tamer's arrest.
"I get money from here and there," she says. "I hate asking, but I have kids to take care of."
At Wal-Mart, Maria and her mother speak in Spanish. Other shoppers, mostly Latinos, stare or do a double take. It's the hijab, Maria says.
Maria plans to visit her relatives in Nayarit next year and cringes at the thought of all the questions and gossip about her covered head. They know of her conversion - she calls and visits regularly - but no one besides her parents has seen a covered Maria.
Aneesah Nadir, the ASU professor, says a covered woman tends to put others on their guard.
"Some people are taken aback, and see [a covered woman] as flaunting her righteousness - which is not true," she says. "Other times, they see a bright woman now becoming Muslim and are scared because they see the hijab in a kind of primitive way - a symbol of women being oppressed and old-fashioned."
But the hijab has nothing to do with oppression, she says. In Islam, men and women are commanded to dress modestly out of respect for each other. According to hadiths, written accounts of Muhammad's life, women should only allow their face and hands to be exposed in public. The rest of the body should be covered with loose fitting clothing.
Besides possible misinterpretation from family and friends, Maria questions her decision because of the response her headscarves have caused in public.
A few weeks after donning the hijab in July 2003, Maria says, she and another Hispanic Muslim who wears a veil were verbally attacked at a grocery store. The person followed them throughout the store making obscene comments about their hijabs and faith.
Maria says she and her friend escaped to their cars, but the incident has made her wary of going out in public.
"Sometimes I cry and just ask myself, 'Why don't you just take it off and let it be over with?'" she says, making her way to the garden section of Wal-Mart.
Maria and Martinez ignore the occasional stares from the other shoppers.
An hour and a half later, they return home - the Buick's trunk filled with purple and red flowers. Once the garage is closed and the back doors locked, Maria takes off her hijab with a sigh. The thin scarf falls to the carpet.
It's 12:30 p.m. and time for the second prayer of the day. After a pause, Maria picks up the hijab and heads to the bedroom mirror to neatly pin it back in place. One more time.
Reach the reporter at jacqueline.shoyeb@asu.edu.
