I walk aimlessly , cluelessly..trying to pull my own weight. Every step feels like ascending the moon with one single large step ripping my two legs apart. I have my headphones plugged into my ears yet I can't hear a sound.

I walllkkkkk..I walkkkkk, aimlessly, One STEP followed by ANOTHER..

Then I hear a very loud honking noise breaking into the buzz of my ears. A car almost hit me..some slurs..I stand still. I freeze..

I continue standing..I feel heavy..I think I cant reach my home..I walk again,aimlessly, trying to drag my weight ..and walk home. I check the street number, Ughhhh I am wayyyy passed home and curfew.

I should walk back, I should turn 360° around "you should turn aroundddd" I tell myself. But..but my body feels like a huge castle today, like a wheel stuck and sunk in a deep mud.

"Should I call a Taxi to take me home"..I turn my neck around to look for my bag..I don't see my bag or HAND..OHHH MYYYY GOOOD where is my RIGHT HAND..my right hand is MISSING. Someone stole my right hand with the BAG..How will I ever eat again..or..drink or..write.

I freeze again. My head turns and turns. I feel paralyzed and heavy and lost and without my right hand or a bag or a phone or some money....

"How will I ever find home???!". I wonder.

 Suddenly the waves in my mind calm. I hear myself. I hear my self clearly saying

"I will learn how to use my left hand, I will learn how to eat and drink and SURVIVE"

And if I successfully turned my neck around  I can also turn my body.

So I turned around.

And walked ..aiming my home.

My body still felt heavy, very heavy actually but its my body and I need to carry it anyway, I need to learn how to carry it and feel light.

I found home.

Guess what else I found..?

I found my RIGHT HAND grabbing and clutching onto my hand bag.

And ,so, I felt light and jumped towards my bag to grab my phone and check what I had missed.

I am sorry but at this moment I don’t care about the -SomaliaWeNeverSee.

At this moment there are soldiers /tribe men/militants, I don’t even know what to call them on standby in Galkacyo waiting for the first bullet to be fired. In fact two days ago there were fired bullets from one side that killed my uncle (my father’s first cousin) and another man who had hearing disabilities.

 His name was Ina Istur, I was very acquainted with him when I was working in our hotel back home. He was the security guard of the Galdogob Mayor. Although Somalia is tough on people with disabilities he had a free spirit and was full of jokes and laughter, he radiated with positivity and managed to always shine the place he was in. I was horrified when I was told he was dead and was killed by a flying bullet, he left three girls behind. My uncle too was killed; a bullet entered his left kidney and came out from the other (may Allah have mercy on his soul).

I know I am being graphic but I don’t know why the state of Galkacyo is so pathetic like that, I don’t know if its sheer tribalism or power struggle or lack of accountability and Deen.

Somalis pride themselves in being Muslims and very conservative yet they take the spilling of blood very lightly as if they’re not going into dark graves and won’t be held accountable before a just Lord where “I was taking revenge for my cousin/tribe or my perceived honour” won’t benefit them in anyway.

 من أجل ذلك كتبنا على بني إسرائيل أنه من قتل نفسا بغير نفس أو فساد في الأرض فكأنما قتل الناس جميعا ومن أحياها فكأنما أحيا الناس جميعا ولقد جاءتهم رسلنا بالبينات ثم إن كثيرا منهم بعد ذلك في الأرض لمسرفون

“Because of that, We decreed upon the Children of Israel that whoever kills a soul unless for a soul or for corruption [done] in the land – it is as if he had slain mankind entirely. And whoever saves one – it is as if he had saved mankind entirely. And our messengers had certainly come to them with clear proofs. Then indeed many of them, [even] after that, throughout the land, were transgressors.”

Unless we respect the blood and respect the doctrines of our Deen, our situation in Somalia won’t change. Unless we learn compassion and act like Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) we will never thrive.

Sometimes, I pride myself in being a descendant form the great city of Galkacyo, where people are resilient and tough, where people are humorous despite their circumstances, where people are hospitable and optimistic, where people are cultured and nice.

But sometimes -like today- I feel ashamed of being from a city that fights often, a city that kills with cold blood, a city that doesn’t read into beyond their immediate selfish interest or the consequences of their action, a city where families live in fear and horror, a city where if your child leaves to school you might never see him/her again.

When I hear the news coming from Galkacyo and other unstable cities in Somalia and simultaneously see the –SomaliaYouNeverSee – posts I become furious. "Why are you people being insensitive?" I think. Right now I care less about the SomaliaINeverSee, because honestly it isn’t there to be seen.

Maybe it’s an escape mechanism. Maybe it’s denial method. Maybe it’s having the strength of positivity amongst all the negativity. Maybe it’s a sign of hope. Or maybe it’s just wishful thinking.

And it is wishful thinking unless we change it from a hastag
to reality. How do we do that?

You know how when we need answers to questions that we don’t know we go and open Google?. Our Google is our Qura’an. How about we open it for change and see what is says about changing ourselves before Allah changes our circumstances. How about we read the part where Allah (SWT) says 

“And not equal are the good deed and the bad. Repel [evil] by that [deed] which is better; and thereupon the one whom between you and him is enmity [will become] as though he was a devoted friend.”

By: Asia Aboosy 

Morning Thoughts and Marbels..

Morning thoughts..

I pick up my soul like marble balls scattered on the ground. It’s everywhere you turn into, almost encompassing and frightening all the same. I need to re-build my pieces, find my pieces and keep collected to feel peace. 

Peace? Is a foreign tongue to me, to us.

Peace is nowhere to be found in the land of turmoil, the land of the strong; where lions always win and rule.

Peace is nowhere in the near future when positions of power are seen as form of control instead of responsibility, instead of “All of you are guardians and are responsible for your wards. The ruler is a guardian and responsible for his subjects ...etc”

Peace is nowhere to be found when religion becomes a tool, a culture instead of character. Peace is nowhere to be found when boys are forced to be men and girls have no choice but to chase womanhood. Because being a girl isn’t cool enough, because make-up is cool, because your own skin should be painted sometimes sealed with tons of powder.

Peace is nowhere to be found when we are busy pinpointing other's flaws and neglecting our own. When we judge each other on how fleek our eyebrows are, really?! When we descend to that level of superficialness, you know the marble balls aren’t close to be found.

I am afraid that I will be searching much longer,maybe many more decades I am afraid that, by then I will no longer recognise my marble balls. Let alone find them and collect them.

Asia Aboosy 

A Letter to my Younger Self..

A Letter to My Younger Self

Asia, tomorrow marks your first day of college. Your 18 years old now. You will go to your first class in Computer Engineering and be surprised at how many male students are there. At first, you won’t see any Hijabi at the campus and you will feel extremely uncomfortable and foreigner, although, your still within the borders of the land where you spend your past eleven years. College will be full with Syrian and Iraqi students and you will be the only outstanding black, the only fully covered girl.


Don’t panic! Don’t blame yourself for being different. Don’t wish you looked like the rest. Just don’t. Years later you will come to know about your culture and country and realize that Somalia is more than a displaced nation, starved children and massive explosions. That black isn’t less beautiful then blue eyes and fair skin. 

Years later- six years to be exact- you will visit Somalia and you will finally fit. You will finally appease your longing for a place where you truly call home. Where you blend in. You will live with your first Somali- aside from your sisters-roommates. You will be exposed to Somali songs and you will learn how to dance to them, you won’t necessary learn dhanto but nonetheless, you will gain something way more crucial; how to chant your own rhythm.



That one year you will spend in Somalia will change YOU forever-and I mean FOREVER- of course to the better. That year will answer many of your pressing questions and wonders that kept knocking on your head for answers no matter how much you assimilated to the Syrian culture or knew about their history and politics and breathed their air. 

You always had that longing inside you to your blood home where grandma lived, where Ma and Pa met, where the mahmahs originated from. You had that thirst in you even when it wasn’t that evident, it manifested in the form of never-ending series of questions when your parents talked about home nostalgically.


Somalia will be very challenging and adventurous. You will have your first ever paying job there and you will learn how to alter your dreams, how to adjust your purpose. You will realize, among many things, how lucky you were all along. Your students will make you feel very important and informative, at times though; they might get fed up with your many examples and scenarios. Enjoy that experience.


One day, as your teaching general Psychology in one of your classes, one student will raise his hand and ask you “how can I study Psychology in Somalia?” you will be baffled and answer to your best judgement. Meanwhile, that will debunk your expectation about the state of Psychology and mental health in Somalia; what every Somali elder told you before about Psychology being a myth and having no future in Somalia. That incident will break that mantra in your head forever.


Another day, while you’re explaining a concept in Somali, you will notice your students staring at you blankly, then you will realize that they didn’t understand some of your words because your Somali slang is different from theirs. You will still find your way to them. You won’t feel like a foreigner. The whole scene will be so cute, them realizing that a street for you is “lamii” and to them is “zani”.


Sometimes, Somalia will be harsh, Somalis will act ignorant. Don’t be harsh. Don’t blame them. Don’t complain. Don’t be part of the problem. Don’t act like your better because you’re not. And most importantly, don’t judge. Don’t judge.

Interact with people. Learn about your culture. Ask questions, many question-a thread of questions if you want they will be please to answer. Listen to the elders. Be patient with them and even when you disagree with them, keep quite, don’t try to explain your own views, you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.


A year later, people will think your very fluent in your mother tongue “Somali”. People will refer to you as “reermudug”, a sign that you display the characteristic of that region. Occasionally, you will refer to yourself as “Reer Mudug” too with a smirk in your face secretly happy that you finally have a HOME that you finally identify with.

At the end, you will know more about your dhaqan (culture). You will learn about the concept of “Calaf”. And all those changes that you went through will lead you to meet your “calaf” in a land that’s far from home, yet you will recognize home in him.


I am in Canada now. I am a Family Worker. I work with my people. And I still have plans to do my graduate school. And Somalia? Till we meet again Inshallah. :)

Asia Aboosy from the future XoXo

Some days…
I want to feel powerful.
 Like thunder storms.
 like tisunami waves.
So confident, I can kill you with a smile.
My energy so hype You’d think i swallowed the candy store.
Somedays, I just want to feel lazy
curl on my sofa like a mellow cat
Like a sleeping baby.
turn off my tv, log out of facebook
worry free.
I want to be
Insignificant. sealed. From outside world.
Somedays,
Just Somedays
I believe I’m a hero.
I embrace others pain
I’m an empath
 Somedays it gets a little too much
just too much hate
Too much anger.
Too much killing.
Too much blood.
Too much segregation.
Too much cries.
Too much misery.
And I just wonder when it will all end
When will it stop
Somedays,
I plug my ears with my fears of tomorrow
How are we supposed to bring kids to this world ?
And raise them on the principals<br>
 of peace
Love
Tolerance
And Compassion
When there is ..
No peace
 love
 tolerance
Or compassion
I will be a hypocrite mother
A liar
An irrelavant teacher
If I dont lay the truth before their eyes
like it is
Naked
Bare truth with
no colors
Or filters
Or photoshop..
Somedays, i dream of a world
Where children arent the extension of adults egos
Or fears.
somedays..I dream, what if we had a separate planet for people who dont choose to hate. .

By: Asia Aboosy 

Keep That Purple Hijab

Location: Stadium Transit Centre

Time: 2:10pm

Bus number: # 125

I come out from Stadium LRT Station headed to one of my work meetings. I follow the arrow signs directing to the bus stops area. I start looking for #125 bus stop. From afar I see a habaryar (an aunt) seated, hiding in the shelter of the bus stop from the sun heat. I come closer. She sees me. I smile

“Asalamu Alikum habaryar” I greeted her.

She is wearing a purple long hijab. Round face. when she smiled the wrinkles around her eyes deepened as if they’re about to fall off, except they didn’t. They were kind wrinkles that added a beautiful mystery into her face almost like a soft glow but more of a distinct Noor. Subhanallah!

“Walikum salam” she replied.

I stood next to her. Anxious. I check the time on my phone. “Oh its 2:20pm, the bus isn’t here yet. Bus ride will be almost 16 minutes-Thanks to ETS trip planner- I’ll be at the hospital by hmmmm, lemme go to my calculator-nowadays my math  skills are on life support- okay. So  I’ll be there by 2:36 pm plus 2 minutes walking to my location. I’ll make it before 2:45” I assert to myself.

Bus #125 arrives. We queue. Habaryar signals to me to go before her. She says she wanna ask the driver a question. I get in. I hesitate, “what if she needs my assistant to talk to the driver? What if she doesn’t need it and I end up embarrassing myself?” I walk slowly to my seat, alerted to scoop in if she needs me.

I choose a seat. She came sat next me, we started sheeko sheeko like Somali people do.

She told me that she originally came out of her home at around 12:30pm but she missed the first bus, so she waited for the next one. Then it became 1:00pm, while waiting. There were only 40minutes left till Salat-Al Dhuhur time so she went back in to wait and pray.

She said she was going to check a place downtown she was told were hiring. That her actual work shift was starting at 4:30 pm.

I asked her “ Habaryar, are you sure you have enough time to go check that work and still be back on time for your shift riding all those buses that are time consuming?”

“I need to go there and check the job opportunity, it’s okay” she said “if I’m late for like 30 minutes. They wouldn’t mind I was never late before. I couldn’t delay my Salaat while running here and there and end up praying us at 5pm”

I heard the woman operator announcing my street. I buzzed the bell. I greeted habryar and I got down.

My thoughts during the 2 minutes’ walk from the bus stop to my location:

1-If I was running late and had 40 minutes left to Salaat would I wait for Salaat? Or just jump into the bus and postpone my Salaat until its convenient to pray?

2-When did we lose our life compass? Are we created to worship Allah or to run after Dunya? Yes we are instructed to do Tawakkul; putting our trust in Allah while also implementing the means that have been permitted to us, on the other hand we can’t, we shouldn’t prioritize the affairs of Dunya before our Islamic duties such as Salaat.  When Allah sees us putting him before anything else, communicating with him and resisting the Sahytaan’s(devil) waswas (insinuating whispers) into our heart telling us to catch the bus, to sleep, to rush to school because we have no time for Salaat, because we can always pray it with the next one, because “the deen is ease and not hardship”, because Allah will forgive us., because Allah will understand. Then we indeed responded to the waswas of the shaytaan over the call of prayer. We end up getting used to delaying Al-Salaat. We end up weighing in favor of Dunya on the expense of our Deen and that’s when we become astray and lost.

3-There are things in life that should never be compromised and Salaat is one of them.

4-Many Somali mothers are on the go. Always, tirelessly, looking for new doors of income to single handedly support their family here, send money back home and still save some to sponsor other family members. They embody the true definition of Tawakkul , rocking their purple hijab they still manage to get hired! Whoever said -immigrants need to assimilate to get jobs- was justifying his/her weak sense of identity and his lack of believe in himself. And we as Somali girls should take the torch, sustain our identity and lead the way for our younger sisters.

5-People need to stop painting the whole Somali community with the same brush. There are always many challenges that arise in the first generation of immigrants, Somalis are no different.  ie: broken families due to the new environment, shift of typical gender roles and much more. However, we will come together as a community and strive. Inshallah.

6-I just l LOVE how spontaneously our people can bond. If someone saw us seated there, just talking and talking, they would have assumed we knew each other for so long. Let’s not lose that beautiful trait in us and let’s not wash it away with cadaan coldness. We are naturally warm and welcoming. May Allah bless us always.

Then I entered the hospital and looked for the pediatric wing.

Our Unsung Heroes 

“Did you hear about the man who was killed last night in Galkacyo” her mother asked.

“Right after the athan , as he was returning to his home from the Maqrib prayer. Streets were empty. He knocked the door of his house. His son opened the door, very young around 5 years old. Two men approach him; one extended his hand to say Hi the other one gunned him down on his dead. He died immediately. Before he broke his fast. Right in front of his 5 years old son”

“It’s starting to get unsafe in here, it’s too scary. Innocent People die every other day while the murderers feast and walk around, like nothing happened” her mother continued.

“It’s unsafe here too Ma, ” she said. Thinking of how scared she feels when she walks alone with her hijab after dusk.  

She lived in Syria her whole life. Now Syria is on fire. Fate of her friends is unknown. All that’s left is ashes and memories lived with happiness, joy, and gratitude.

She wasn’t Syrian.Syria was her temporary home. She curses the men-monsters-who started war, who spilt blood. Once blood is spilt, it keeps on spilling. War lords emerge. Chaos starts. Once blood spills rage will never end.

She wasn’t Canadian either; she just holds their birth certificate. A small rectangular paper that stated the date and place she was born, but does the place she was born in dictates her identity, her personality or who she is?

Can she possibly belong to a place she doesn’t feel safe in? Or call it home?

She is Somali, or that’s what she claimes. At least she resembles them when she isn’t talking or walking.

She is a Somali even when her country is unstable and two men shot a fasting man, who was standing before his little boy, in his head. Even when she knows that once blood is spilt it’s impossible for the spilling to stop. And these shootings, these qarxs (explosions) will go on at least in the near future. 

People inside home wanted to run away desperately from all the chaos to the seemingly “Paradise” land behind the seas, only to come here, try too hard to resemble, try too hard to fit in, only to be called “bloody immigrants” to feel “less then-” like “others” and to realize that the only place that you can remotely call home is a place that isn’t very pretty or safe but at least no one has the right to kick you out, no one will tell you to go home.  

You run back to your "home". Very enthusiastic, very hopeful, longing for positive change in your home land, aspiring for reconciliation and repeating constantly, tirelessly  “Ghandi and Mandela never gave up on their nations, we shouldn’t either, change is around the corner, we should see the hope at the end of this long tunnel”

   

Every one discourages you. Tells you how stupid you are. How naive you are to the dirty politics. “Don’t go to xamar it’s too dangerous, too risky” they tell you. 

“But should we leave xamar to the criminals? To the blood spillers ? ” you say, thinking you’re the unsung hero of Somalia. Or maybe just looking for opportunities to invest in, to create an identity, to have that feeling you longed for, of just blending and not standing out of the crowd or be point at. 

You check into the hotel, where adeero told you the meeting with some Xilbanyaloo- Parliament members-old xilibanyalo of course- will take place.You notice that the security is very tight. you are scrutinized to the teeth.Yet minutes later a big Qarax happens. Even before you climbed the stairs. 

 Your crime? Too much hope in Somalia.

Indeed, you are the unsung hero.
She is the unsung hero.
We are the unsung heroes.
Because we will conquer our fear.

By: Asia Aboosy