The Assembly
Queens, NY 1984 Nothing in P.S. 19 was ever heated enough. The auditorium, the cafeteria, the large windows with their pull-down plastic vinyl drapes rattled in another winter storm. Ms. Cooperman, our teacher, frowned as she saw us shiver. “Bring your coats,” she said. “We’re having an assembly.” It had snowed heavily the day before, [...]
Secret Survivor: An Interview with Amita Swadhin
On the morning of July 16, 2012, I received a letter from Amita Swadhin, an activist and educator who is at the forefront of the movement to end Child Sexual Abuse. Her father Vashisht “Victor” Vaid was put on probation twenty years ago for sexually assaulting her during her childhood. Amita had just discovered Vaid [...]
The Endless Baptism of Palestine
For the last few months, I’ve been working on a series of essays on Palestine. I’ve now written and erased my words until there is nothing left but the original title of the series. It could fit on a button: “Islamophobia is not the answer to Anti-Semitism.” —-Eventually, the title too had to be scratched. [...]
A T-shirt, a Muslim and a Handful of Eleven-year-olds
An intense anti-Arab media campaign against the Khalil Gibran International Academy ends with a high-tech lynching.
November 12, 2007
Spotlight: Chamindika
ColorLines, Sept/Oct 2006 “The work of visual artist Chamindika is populated by characters who create the unsettling sense that they are spilling out from another world.” http://colorlines.com/archives/2006/09/spotlight_chamindika.html
They Sing the City Poetic
New York Times, April 30, 2006 City Lore and the Bowery Poetry Club got a bunch of NYC poets to write an epic poem about New York City. Of course I wrote about Corona.
My Family and Earthquake Relief in Pakistan
ColorLines, Winter 2006 “…While watching my parents. . . in action, I relearned the most important lessons of activism: the strongest, most effective form of community activism is not complicated. It comes from a sense of family, love, urgency.” Earthquake (PDF)
Our Little Secrets: A Pakistani Artist Explores the Shame And Pride of Her Community’s Bathroom Practices
ColorLines, Summer 2005 “We were in the kitchen, my mother and I, when she turned to me and said, “Did you know Amreekans keep medicine in the bathroom?” I waited, not quite sure where she was going with this. She looked at me as if I was slow and then continued, “They keep it in [...]
Will Heaven look like Zeenat Aman?
SAMAR, Winter 2001 “My mother used to tape Indian movies illegally all day long…”