In my last trip to London I had the good luck of revisiting the Science Museum. I walked in to find a great exhibition, 1001 Inventions. It was an exhibition in cooperation with the Jamil Foundation, exploring the impact of Muslim civilization on all kinds of aspects on various field and parts of our lives. In our every day life examples include the concept of having gardens, or the one thing we all have had - a three course meal, believe it or not comes from 9th century Muslim Spain.
I was caught in the moment enjoying every little detail, learning about the great contribution the Muslim civilization has done to the world -most of which is part of our daily lives without us knowing so. My position at that very instant seemed so feeble, here I was in London, in the middle of an exhibition informing me of a civilization I belong to. Why is it that our schools in Pakistan do not teach us anything relating to the positive image of Islam?
It is our duty to promote a positive image of our civilization, the most constructive way of countering the negative "terrorist" image that the Muslim identity is suffering from today, yet all we tend to do is talk. The mainstream needs to be informed of our true heritage, which is going to be a daunting task, fore we ourselves are unaware of the extent of contribution Muslim civilization has had. Our literature classes are occupied with teaching us Wandsworth's "Daffodils" while abandonning the likes of Rumi, Hafiz and Khalil Gibran.
It is time that someone point this out to our leaders, to begin promoting ourselves in a positive light, a step in the right direction to shed the coil of "terrorist" image that has become associated with the Muslim identity.
Source: Science Museum London
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