~bartender? falooda milk, please.
(i wish i was like. 8x more repressed, so i'd get really into my religion and the community at my mosque just to form a slightly homoerotic menteeship with an older man... not homoerotic in the way you might immediately think, but instead because it's so heteronormative that what the west considers to be astoundingly intimate is entirely platonic. is that more counterintuitive compared to being happily openly gay? only allah knows, haha)
i've been going to the small little corner mosque (tucked between squat shawarma places and immigration firms) pentadaily, lately. i, being small and relentless, have given nicknames (completely in my head, i don't actually know any of their names) to my favourite visitors.
halif: big beard, like ivy falling off a plateau, and glasses just above it so the only skin i see of him is his nose. knows my father, which freaked me out, and smiled at me once, which freaked me out even more.
roseface: saw him only once, with a pastel pink hoodie and fashionable pants. close cropped hair and beard. but what i named him for was his face, pinker than what he was wearing, blossoming over the deerlike composition of his face. of his languishing. i stared at him without realizing, and he stared back, and, surprisingly i did not look away. i stayed there until i couldnt.
moshkat, meshquet, masqat: first thing i noticed was his eyes, which looked perpetually stunned, or that wherever he looked he was staring into the dark. doesn't sit like most muslims; his feet are placed politely over the other, which makes him seem taller whenever we all sit down though i think he's as short as i am. wispy hair beneath a good hat.
amoud: thobe and a cloth over his head. made me think he was very serious but i heard him stifle a laugh mid-prayer when the imam's phone went off and, as he was trying to fiddle it silent, accidentally took a picture. he's in my good graces now.
This was lovely to read. Thank you for sharing :)