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everywhere. Across the world it is the same. It is human nature. But when race is involved it takes on an altogether more sinister hue.
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Shahid completed his recitation. It had been good, he knew, very good. He could see the smile on his mother’s face and the adoring love in her eyes. Even his father looked pleased, almost triumphant. There were only two more candidates after him, not long to wait for the results. It was the likely last night of fasting. The night before the Eid Al Fitr feast. The official Moon Sighting committee was expected to declare this night that the moon had been sighted. One of the eternal delights of Islam, Shahid mused, was the surprise generated every year over the precise timing of this very predictable event; one upon which so much in the Islamic world depended. Some 200 boys aged between 7 and 13 had preceded Shahid through the period of Ramadan, each one attempting to recite the Koran from memory. All devout Muslims wished for their children to achieve this feat. It was the pinnacle of devotional attainment; a milestone on the way to heaven. On a par with doing the Haj pilgrimage to Mecca. But not sufficient to ensure martyrdom, as a suicide bombing would. Shahid was now in a trance-like state, carried away by the emotion of the event and the knowledge that he had, at last, pleased his father, Razak, a stiff and unbending man, quite a lot older than Shahid’s mother, who was his fifth wife. Shahid had never been close to him, but he yearned for his father’s approval. After what seemed an eternity following the final two readings, the judges assembled on the school stage. The hall was packed with local dignitaries, Muslim community leaders, and teachers and parents. The boys who had read sat to left and right of the stage. The chairman rose. He was a well-respected elder Imam at the East London mosque. Shahid heard his name called. He had won. He was a true Muslim. His father would love him now. Barely aware of events, he somehow made it to the stage. That had been ten years ago and his father had loved him. But not unconditionally – only so long as he followed the true path of Islam as his father perceived it to be. His father was an arch conservative. He had forced his three daughters, Shahid’s beloved sisters, to go to Pakistan to be married 37