Sacred Life Sunday

Souren wearing the keffiyeh he got for his birthday in 2005.

If you walk around downtown Copenhagen for any length of time, you will see dozens of teens wearing the keffiyeh. White kids, most of them with shockingly blond hair, sporting the keffiyeh as an accessory to tight jeans and Chuck Taylor all stars. The boys wear them in the traditional black or red. The girls have them in everything from turquoise to hot pink. You can get them for less than $50 kroner ($10 US) at any stand on the street.

I asked our sometimes-teenager Souren, who lived most of his life with the Euro-kids in Germany, what this prevalence of the keffiyeh is all about. Did it mean that a lot of young people in the EU supprted Palestine’s quest for independence? Did it have something to do with aligning themselves with the much-maligned Muslim communities here in Denmark? Did the girls wear it as feminist statement aligning them with freedom-fighter Lelia Kahled, who was one of the first women to be noted wearing the traditionally male headscarf? Were they showing solidarity with recent Muslim immigrants who are struggling in this new country? What was the appeal of these Middle-Eastern head coverings worn in this cold clime as scarves against the winter chill?

Souren tells me that in Germany kids who like the peace loving tunes of reggae & skaa punk wear them; and that these kids often go to protests against the neo-Nazis. (Something that looms larger in his German upbringing than it ever did in my Californian youth.) But here, they seem to be merely in fashion.

I am long past being a teen, and I think that in this society, it would be ridiculous of me to wear the keffiyeh. But part of me wants to don this ethnic wear, to wrap something around me that would stand out as a sign to my Muslim neighbors – something that would say “I am with you. Don’t be afraid. You would have a warm welcome here.”

As racism and tragedy seep like poison into the veins of my new city, this becomes my prayer—that peaceful ties might reign in my neighborhood. That love might stretch across the great divide. That I might wear a badge of solidarity with all of those who seek to co-exist, as we wend our way towards Allah, towards God, toward Yahweh–stumbling as we are towards the Great Divine.

Posted in Immigrant Diaries
Tags: Immigrant Diaries, Sacred Life Sunday |