Nyu alumni as well as the faculty and General Community as well. It is a pleasure to be hosting tonight. Welcome back to nyu it is a pleasure to have you here. We will have time later for questions and answers and a book signing. I want to start the evening i giving a brief introduction. Very active since graduating so i dont need to cover everything that i will leave it up to him to fill in the gaps. Currently a senio senior fellowd director of the Development Center for global studies, policy, excuse me. He is a commentator and broadcaster who wishes he could be a writer, and i think you are, so i very much enjoy your writing. Among other things, hes the Muslim Leadership Initiative at the institute and has appeared on Major Networks and the essays and reviews have been published at the washington post, the times, cnn, the guardian, foreignpolicy. Author of a novel published by penguin in 2006 and tonight event is the launch of his new book out to b how to be a musd american story. Published by beacon press in boston and we thank them for helping us make this event happen. A bit more about haroon he was previously a fellow at the Law School Center and a fellow at the National Security studies program at the new america foundation. He served as director of Public Relations at the Islamic Center here at nyu from 2007 to 2009. Haroon moghul holds an m. A. At the south Asian Studies from Columbia University where he is currently a phd candidate. You can tell us more about that. His field of study includes muslim nationalism, colonial and postcolonial politics and the indian ocean economy. I think that this sort of different than your previous work. This is a very personal book, so im going to leave it at that. If i may, it is a pleasure to welcome Haroon Moghul and we will talk a bit later and have time for questions and answers. Thanks so much. [applause] iem pretty loud so i dont know if i need the microphone but you might since you are recording. Cameras follow me everywhere. Its called being a muslim. You cannot laugh. I want to read a section of the book that covers the president because i saw it coming so i thought it would be a nice gesture. I asked the publisher if we could change the subtitle in case i flew to canada but they were not amenable. The section im going to read one that is terrifying to me because when you write something obviously there are things that have a constant search for that happy middle ground. This book is very personal and it took a lot out of me to write. I come from a very conservative family religiously speaking and i talk about a lot of things that i dont think my family would have been particularly excited about the talking about so i had a weeklong panic attack whether i should invite my family to the readings because it would be rude not to but then if i read the book out loud if only be parts of the family so it was a very exciting balance. It was before i started nyu. I was not a muslim kid they thought. When i got to the kitchen i found my parents waiting in ambush. My father fired first. Why did you have a girl in your car yesterday. My eyes went wide. My face compensated with confusion and disbelief as if i didnt know what one was. To define the female as a species near embarrassment would have surrendered them from the interrogation. As it turns out someone had snatched on the switch there ofe were only two in my entire town one of which belonged to my family and the other to the president whose family was the only muslim family in town, the two cruisers were the same color with brown paneling. Since the president s wif presiy mother were both heads carved you can imagine the confusion they look the same to me so to their cars. I decided to own it partway. I said she needed a ride home and seems offering a girl a ride home is a trespass may be bad and that alone was the reason for the panic in my eyes. I folded a waffle and having shoved it in my mouth washing it down with a glass of chocolate milk. It was nothing i said, but i have been sloppy and i would have to pursue with even greater deception. Mcdonalds never called back so i found another job that would be easier to hide a softening the blow. It might have been unethical and possibly illegal. I help students write their thesis papers from scratch. Technically i didnt graduate High School One but several times. I profited in order to pay for a life to try to escape from it. I walked past her every morning. My friends teased me for not making out with her and i wondered why i held back even as i knew i was scared that there was an absence of opportunity. Her friend presented one by announcing a pool party at the end of may which i knew i had to attend i would make my move then and there but of course her house had to be decided president s which meant he might see my car that was also his car. A risk to take two weeks before prom not enough however to drive over it. I asked my friend to be derived. She was a bright kid that in the course of senior year difficult a habit of falling asleep during a briefing. Bright enough to post on his waits for for a while but the warning signs were there. He deemed most of his life to unimportant to be present for and he wore oversized sweater is looking like his mother got him lost. Also in case you forgot he was asleep but not when driving to get his mom took a liking to me. She wasnt particularly religious but always asked me to find him a nice jewish girl as if stranded in connecticut i had a special access to jewish women that she lacked. On the way to the party naturally his nose started bleeding so badly that we drove right past sams house almost to massachusetts and the closer we got to canada for further we were from harm. No luck. He practically ran it into a lawn and did a face plant as he sprinted to the biggest tree on the lawn. It took me a while to realize he was repurposing napkin that pind then we met a homeowner that shared after we explained why the plurality of the semites were watching their face while laughing and falling over. I ended up the nigh tonight is y where i wanted to be, on her pool deck with carla, her beautiful legs, blind children know how to wal block it is an instinct inside of them. The right time and place comes to the surface. Some reached entirely around my cowardly impediment of resolve and shoved it to the floor. Ive never felt so overcome but heres the thing, but some radar i didnt kno know why had i coud sense that she wanted at the same. The energy hung in the air and we were opposite ends of a magnet. I just reach over, put my arms around her and watched her moms Station Wagon pull up. He jumped away from each other. I walked her to the car with a mere consolation as she made her way to the back she offered me her hand in apology. There was so much in the grasp i fear i spent my entire life trying only to return to the squeeze. Somewhere i could be held with someone instead of just myself. I let my parents to believe that on a friday night the first week of june, convenient, i would sleep over at a friends house, his friends mom conspired with me as did everyone else to leave school early on the data from one had to have provincial permission, both parents gave theirs. My income and you dont need to ask. So a little more than the conclusion of the day i crossed over to my friend friends home, showered and shaved and returned in time for the evenings events. Jacobs neighbors were on vacation so i parked my land cruiser not merely in the backyard under the deck so i wouldnt speak the same mistake twice. At jacobs house i finally relaxed. I was going to get away with this. We went to the backyard and posed for the camera. You actually got to live in a moment and said that watching yourself live in it a few seconds later. Every student went out of his way to congratulate me amazed that i needed more encouraged i wanted to attend in the first place. Everyones belief system appreciated the consolidation and i wanted affairs so that one day i wouldnt need it. I got rejection letters between Boston University and nyu i picked the latter. All good things must come to an end. Ive never seen many of my classmates again or we again. It was like it never happened. We slow danced to Sarah Mclachlan which i cant listen to now without breaking out in goosebumps. I still ask myself why she needs to know we havent done anything wrong and why i was receiving this from all places. Leading to the kingdom that never dies it tastes better than. But it has no average ill send. Tempted by the desire to live forever, yes, he failed and falls but only in fall when does he become for you is meant to be. Maybe we missed the point of the story all along. You can do the wrong thing for the right reasons. They ate from the tree but they repented and stuck together. I was a 17yearold who wanted more than anything to be long to believe there was a world he could just be a part of that he didnt need to analyze from without or to be excommunicated from to let the stars circle me, the occasional bracelets, the wallet tucked on the chained to a belt loop these were the tribal markers of a snowboarder. It was announcing it was sticking out to fit in. We could want what others want because they want it and still want it for ourselves. Sometimes we are not able to point to where our desired ends. After prom we might have stopped at friendlys but i cant remember. Carla wanted nothing to do with me. The last thing she said as he cant drink youve got to drive. The next afternoon carla chose instant messenger to shock the we should break up, i typed and agreed and died. I did not expect this would end even as i made plans to go away for college. You can hold up the hopes in your head woul but still be devastated when one of them gives way. Its wanting to have your cake and eat it too. I drove with my parents tonight after prom to see my family. I sat broken in the backseat. My mom would pass away less than a decade away. My father is still with us another decade after that i couldnt admit to them that money and run around of them failed. We never moved beyond our first case. While i trembled to meet her lips she told me in detail what intimacies she would and wouldnt be okay with and i nodded as if this was a subject that i have mastered. For me on the ideas of marriage once and forever i believed that it was noted different. Once we were together we would remain together. Terminology with technicality so i was ruined like i couldnt believe. Its one thing not to go to prom and another to be dumped the day that you pull off the greatest deception. If every person has a great test mine was and may still be parting. I learned i could deal with death but i couldnt accept that god would let wives become entangled to be ripped apart. How could you live forever and be a part forever. A real end without resurrection and a place where islam cant go doesnt help stop working. Had carla not broken up with me that i had broken up with her. They say the more you can contain from which i learned this lesson the further you let a person into your soul the longer it takes for them to leave. I couldnt guess how long it would take but i had stupidly given away all of my heart presuming the future existed while the present was still coming together. I stopped by her house to pick up a good friend although he was on the other side of town. Jeremy who was also on the other side of town that behind me. None of this made sense but probably because all i was focused on and all i could see is carla at the top of the stairs putting dishes away. She might have waved. We ended up across from each other at a diner in connecticut. Jeremy laughed as we walked back to my car. He said that is the longest conversation youve ever had with her. Maybe i should ask her out. I never spoke with her or saw her again. Some overlap and some are a pa part. I do not know what they need to mean in this universe. My religion is a man shouldnt be alone with a woman but a man shouldnt be so alone that he needs to be with a woman to be like her life is worth living. All of them she provided to the universe i otherwise felt misplaced by. From the first time she offered her as a skating rink to the last when we left the dance floor it may be you hated things it is good for you beyond my desire for her was in loneliness feeling only briefly interrupt interrupted. It was no life at all. This made the world stark and beautiful but it haunted and the person would be. Something always comes from nothing and with every difficulty there is relief. It could be this is me or all of us and we stumbled onto the places that we live but do not ever belonged to her for me to be taught this mercy we do not be long here. [applause] i got dumped a day after prom, yes. If i may start the qanda part of the evening, i want to refer to an article published in the atlantic. The article is titled to be a political muslim in america some of the books how to be a muslim tries out a new genre of writing about islam. Tell us a little bit about what brought you to write a different kind of book. The book is titled how to be islam and the first review of the book was pretty positive at the end of never answered the question. Theres some confused people and then people giving their kids the book on prayer so theres going to be an exciting overlap. When i came to nyu in 1998, this bookstore wasnt here. I had a very tenuous connection and i grew up in a very small christian town which was a lovely town and i wanted to come to a big city in new york. You have to whittle it down in size. I basically debate between joining the foundation of islam or the muslim club and it was a dance party and i cannot dance. Its why i joined at nyu. They come from honest explanations of important things to. I know different people that are muslim and i thought to myself i may not be a particularly religious person that i can help to build a religious community and need a few kids. We were like is now an institution into something completely different than anyone has ever seen before because it isnt going to be about a certain type of muslims who come in. In. We were not challenging anyone we just said if you are identified as islam, you can come into the door. Im going to go after that and if i cant become a doctor i have to become a lawyer. And this is like salvation eugenics. We do not let people reproduce unless they have certain type of vehicles in their garages. No one will marry you unless you can afford a mercedes or a bmw. If you think about it here kind of likyourekind of like fascist slightly less intimidated. It is just not as scary. So, i am still answering your question, i promise to be i told myself its fine. We can do this and they will go to law school and who cares if they built the club. I was elected president for my senior year and i celebrated by asking a girl out. I wrote a poem and decided to read it to her in starbucks down broadway im sure you passed it many times. I am asking the girl out and halfway through reciting the poem. I asked a friend to do research and this friend completely failed and i think now he runs this development. My third day was 9 11. I am a 21yearold kid that is incredibly shy and awkward and did not know how to handle himself in the settings. It is constantly commenting about islam and having to defend your identity to explain where you are. It was something to do with violence if you are a tourist or you are not. It doesnt really tell the story about what they go through. That makes a very long answer to your question. Im going to open up for any questions. Hold on and i will bring you the microphone. Have you familiarize yourself with mystical writers . In the book i talk about a few people depending on how you want to define this new. Towards the end of the buck. I tried to pick up the pieces and makeup as a person that had promised on paper how did i end up like driving my car into a ditch and try to make sense of that. Dont worry it is not a painful memory i can write about it and laugh. Im doing okay. Im a happy person. My mom passed away in thi and ts one of those things we call irony. There were 16 women who let me actually go backwards on that. My grandfather and on up were religious scholars. They spoke arabic and persian. My grandfather was interesting as a conservative, but he would have been completely he would have laughed or been disgusted by the kind of things that happened because it would have made no sense to him. He wrote poetry and spoke english. He did yoga and it used to be very common. So what is interesting a is he d seven daughters but no sons. He raised them all to be educated women. It was a very fortunate and common patriarchy because in my moms family all women outshine their husbands like you dont even know they are in the room sometimes. My mom was one of only 16 in the entire country way back in the day so she became a radiation oncologist. I was the only in seattle at a Dinner Service with people one of them was amazed that my mom was educated because it makes you wonder what people think of you. My mom was a radiation oncologist and she died of cancer. She loved eddie vedder said she thought pearl jam and kind of connected those two things. A question as to talk about your vulnerabilities and failures and its not an easy thing to do and you mentioned the panic you had. Can you talk about the process that you had to get to where you want today . About a month ago, my boss, we were talking about this earlier. People are going to read this. Rachel is like a jewish mom so she read the book and just kind of wants to start crying that she cant because shes my boss but she looked at me like she wanted to give me a hug and felt bad for me. They are like the same ethnic group and there is a real convergence. Book is what kept me going because there was this idea. Working on this in the years long project because i have th this. It requires you to kind of be there for a certain way i want to start by saying i love the way you say the word pakistan. It sounds very much like it and i have this is a little unrelated to your buck. Keeping aside the. In todays times there is a fine line between balancing the religious responsibilities and not all of us seemed to live up to that idea of being a muslim and idyllic when you go out into society where people that are not muslim look at you and feel like if you are muslim why are you doing abc based on your experience how do you deal with not feeling like you are living up to that idea with a checklist would you still be okay with it and feel like you are a muslim and that is okay. No one can identity need coke to find your identity and make you whatever you want and you still have a choice. Its a good idea to keep the seat next to you open. Ive learned a few of them a look in arabic it can be anything. You open a book in arabic and its like as it hits