From the hood

A reference to people from a neighbourhood, usually dangerous, where 'black' is considered a racist usage to identify skin colour. And its reference with ownership, not one used by those living outside the 'hood'.

Today "from the hood" is being reused to define the women I came across at an exhibition where I took my tiny, petite mother. 'Came across' is mild way of describing the encounter. Pushed, shoved, stomped upon, bulldozed into, trampled...are better adjectives. By a stampede of women wearing the hood. The black hood.

My loved ones subscribe to that club. Those who believe that one of the ways to jannah (heaven) is covering themselves with ample cloth to hide their curves, their assets. As of today, there is a clear line drawn straight through the hood. Those who understand the actual implications of wearing the abaya and those who do not.

For wearing that ample black garment is not to merely tick it of the checklist for the one way trip to heaven. It, like all other tenants of a religion, ascribes a way of life that underlines haya; a word that spans concepts like dignity, self respect, modesty, and not just in terms of what you wear but how you behave in front of others and the divine power you subscribe to.

The women wearing the black hoods today at a fabric exhibition defied the purpose of wearing that garment. I don't believe in wearing it, but I respect my friends who wear it, because they wear it with a complete ideology. The women I know today were taking refuge behind its voluminous folds while shoving through a crowd as if that fabric the last fabric being sold on earth. Or that it was the anecdote for a deadly poison. Rather, that fabric to them seemed like a jihad, something that has to be achieved without any worldly regrets. Regrets like pushing an old lady, stomping on an aunty's foot, taking a tired person's place in a long line.

It was sad, initially, to watch them drag a way of life through slime and back. Then it just because disgusting. My own primordial urges took over and I felt like pushing back. Then the evolved side of me pacified the barbaric instincts.

I can hear indignant voices asking me "didn't the other women also misbehave?". Of course they did. They also did not wear attire that is meant to symbolise self control and inner grace.

So ladies, before you decide to wear a veil, or a chaddar, please internalise what that garment is meant to depict, how you are meant to act in it. No one is more stared at than the bully.

And these ladies were bullies.