Me and Ziba......

Life sometime treats you really well; it gives you what you always looked for.

When I was in Malaysia Truly Asia, I was spending my happiest days ever, beautiful country, freedom from mum's tyrannical love which kills me, the best training ever, peace of mind and soul, although the body was severely in danger, the best company ever and the most important thing I met a dream, Ziba Mir Hosseini.

Ziba is a Muslim feminist, she is Iranian anthropologist, she studied Fiqh, she is a film maker and an awesome creature, down to earth and so kind, I met her in Penang in Malaysia, I used to read her articles in my research of my MA dissertation about " Islamic Feminism: Reading the Legacy: Egyptian Case Study", I reefed to her studies about construction of gender rights in Islam, I will refer later on in many posts to that important issue.

Ziba was a name that inspired me, I remember when I saw her first time, I did not recognize her, that I did not see her photos often with her scholarly articles, we were doing an ice breaking exercise, she said I am Ziba from Iran, in a proud and modest way, the words captured my attention me, I asked my Iranian friend Leila, Is she Ziba Mir Hosseni??? She said yes she is and I was happy as much as my heart can bear happiness.

I did not dare to talk with her for almost two days, I had that stars fever, and I approached Farida Shaheed, the Pakistani feminist and the organizer of the training and told her I will never dare to talk with Ziba, Farida offered me the best favor ever and interduced us, I said to Ziba I am your biggest fan, Ziba is so wise and calm, she laughed for the analogy of her with the rock stars, that I did.

Since then, the nice gestures, caring, tons of information and before everything and after everything the support was what Ziba gave me.

I am writing this post to celebrate Ziba existence in my life, I am celebrating a brave Muslim woman, who believed in God and in his justice, she is liberated - may God help her – from the shackles of outdated and unfair explanations of Islam,
I am writing this post to celebrate Ziba in Cairo, thanks to all the academic institutions that closed its doors in our faces to host Ziba's talk in Cairo, Ziba should be celebrated in Egypt as she celebrated everywhere, for the love of God see how Indonesia treat this woman

Ziba your place is in your students hearts, you are safe there, teacher.


UPDATE: in Ziba's visit to Cairoin 2007, we tried to hold a talk for Ziba in a prestigious academic Egyptian institution, however the very tight schedule of the visit, misunderstanding and the very short notice prevented us, so a door was open, but we did not manage to hold a talk.


Fatma