You Know Your Muslim When…

1. You have an endless supply of dates, prayer beads, and prayer rugs.
2. You arrive one or two hours late to an event and think it’s normal.
3. You talk for an hour at the front door when leaving someone’s house.
4. When your parents meet strangers and talk for a few minutes, you discover you’re talking to a distant cousin.
5. Your mother has a minor disagreement with her (or your dad’s) sister and doesn’t talk to her for ten years.
6. Your parents want every detail from you about where you’re going before you leave the house.
7. You have a curfew no matter how old you are.
8. You minimize your MSN conversation when a family member walks past.
9. Your mother does everything for you if you are male.
10. You can spot a Muslim a mile away, and they spot you too—you can tell from the way the keep turning around and staring.
11. Your relatives alone could populate a small city.
12. Everyone is a family friend.
13. Your middle name is your father’s first name.
14. You have a difficult Arabic name so you come up with a cheesy Westernized version of it like “Sam,” “Mike,” or “Fred.”
15. You have fifteen cousins named Mohammed.
16. You still came back home to live with your parents after graduating.
17. You know no one who has studied music.
18. If you are a female in college, you are studying to be a teacher or doctor. If you are a male, you are studying engineering or business. If you deviate from either these careers, your family prays that you “come back to the right track.”
19. You know someone who got married at the age of 16.
20. Your parents are panicking if you aren’t married when you turn 25.
21. You propose marriage for someone, and you are asked:
    * do you have a green card?
    * how much money do you earn?
    * what village in your home country do you come from?
22. You either really like Muslims of the opposite sex or you can’t stand them.
23. The highlight of the social scene is either a wedding or a funeral.
24. Your parents push the concept of an arranged marriage on you and try and demonstrate how well it works whenever they’re not fighting.
25. You order food at your ethnic restaurant in your own language to impress the American people you’re with, but the waiters don’t understand you.
26. You know someone who looks like ObL.
27. You get really excited and call the whole family into the living room when there is a special on Muslims on TV.
28. You always get randomly frisked at the airport.
29. You get up from your seat on the airplane to use the restroom, and the guys seated next to you get that really worried look on their faces.
30. You walk out of customs with your trolley at the airport and you see all twenty-five members of your family who have come to pick you up.
31. You go back to your parents’ country and people treat you like a member of…the royal family.
32. You have cousins you have never met, whose names you don’t know, but who insist they’re related to you, even though they bear no resemblance to anyone YOU know.
33. There’s one person in you family whom you are not allowed to talk about, because they did something “wrong.”
34. You call everyone older than you uncle or aunt, even if you have never met him or her before.
35. You read the Qur’an before taking on any major task, like exams, or asking the boss for a raise.
36. You notice that whenever you go to another Muslim’s house, your parents always talk about religion and politics.
37. Every few months, your parents say they’re moving back to the home country.
38. You hug people you hate after the Eid prayer.
39. You visit a Muslim land and everybody thinks you are rich.
40. Your mother cannot have company over without cooking a banquet.
41. You talk on your cell-phone more than you talk face-to-face.
42. You hug and kiss people you have never seen before in your life.
43. You order a Fillet ‘O Fish at McDonald’s.
44. You’re proud to be Muslim - and you pass these jokes on to all your Muslim friends!

The chief of police of Aksehir was a corrupt man who had made a fortune by receiving bribes. One day Timur asked him to bring his books in for examination. Nasreddin Hodja was present at this interview as well. When Timur saw the improbable amount of possessions listed in the chief’s accounts, he got very upset. He ripped each page of the accounts and made the chief of police eat them. Nasreddin Hodja watched in horror. 

Next, Timur asked the Hodja to collect the taxes of Aksehir and present them to him accompanied by a good list of how much is collected from whom. Nasreddin Hodja took this task very seriously, collected the taxes and kept accurate accounts. Then he asked his wife to bake a large pita bread. When the pita was ready, the Hodja wrote his numbers on it and presented it to Timur along with the collected money. 

‘Hodja, what is this?’ asked Timur, ‘Why are your numbers on a pita bread?’ 

‘Great Timur, I did so just in case you would make me eat my accounts too.’

A young Persian man excitedly tells his mother he’s fallen in love and that he is going to get married. He says, “Just for fun, Mom, I’m Going to bring over 3 women and you try and guess which one I’m going to marry.” The mother agrees.

The next day, he brings three beautiful women into the house and sits them down on the couch and they chat for a while.

He then says, “Okay, Mom, guess which one I’m going to marry.” 

She immediately replies, “The one on the right.” 

“That’s amazing, Mom. You’re right. How did you know?”

The Persian mother replies “Because I don’t like her.”

Nasruddin was determined to be decisive and efficient. One day he told his wife he would plow his largest field on the far side of the river and be back for a big dinner. She urged him to say, “If Allah is willing.”

He told her whether Allah was willing or not, that was his plan. The frightened wife looked up to Allah and asked forgiveness.

Nasruddin loaded his wooden plow, hitched up the oxen to the wagon, climbed on his donkey, and set off.

But within the short span of a day the river flooded from a cloudburst and washed his donkey downstream, and one of the oxen broke a leg in the mud, leaving Nasruddin to hitch himself in its place to plow the field.

Having finished only half the field, at the sunset he set out for home exhausted and soaking wet. The river was still high so he had to wait until long past dark to cross over.

After midnight a very wet but much wiser Nasruddin knocked at his door. Who is there Asked his wife.

I think it is me, Nasruddin, he replied, if Allah is willing!

One hot day, Mulla Nasruddin was taking it easy in the shade of a walnut tree. After a time, he started eyeing speculatively, the huge pumpkins growing on vines and the small walnuts growing on a majestic tree.

Sometimes I just can’t understand the ways of God! He mused. Just fancy letting tiny walnuts grow on so majestic a tree and huge pumpkins on the delicate vines!

Just then a walnut snapped off and fell smack on Mulla Nasruddin’s bald head. He got up at once and lifting up his hands and face to heavens in supplication, said:

Oh, my God! Forgive my questioning your ways! You are all-wise. Where would I have been now, if pumpkins grew on trees!

Once, the people of the city invited Mulla Nasruddin to deliver a speech. When he got on the pulpit (Minbar), he found the audience was not very enthusiastic, so he asked: “Do you know what I am going to say?” The audience replied “NO”, so he announced: “I have no desire to speak to people who don’t even know what I will be talking about” and he left.

The people felt embarrassed and called him back again the next day. This time when he asked the same question, the people replied “YES”, So Mulla Nasruddin said, “Well, since you already know what I am going to say, I won’t waste any more of your time” and he left.

Now the people were really perplexed. They decided to try one more time and once again invited the Mulla to speak the following week. Once again he asked the same question - “Do you know what I am going to say?” Now the people were prepared and so half of them answered “YES” while the other half replied “NO”. So Mulla Nasruddin said: “The half who know what I am going to say, tell it to the other half” and he left!

Two men were on a plane on a business trip when a Muslim couple boarded the plane and were seated right in front of them. The two men, eager to have some fun, started talking loudly. “My boss is sending me to Saudi Arabia”, the one said, “But I don’t want to go…too many Muslims there!” The Muslim couple noticeably heard and grew uncomfortable. The other guy laughed, “Oh, yeah, my boss wanted to send me to Pakistan but I refused…WAY too many Muslims!” Smiling, the first man said, “One time I was in Iran but I HATED the fact that there were so many Muslims!” The couple fidgeted. The other guy responded, “Oh, yeah…you can’t go ANYWHERE to get away from them…the last time I was in FRANCE I ran into a bunch of them too!” The first guy was laughing hysterically as he added, “That is why you’ll never see me in Indonesia…WAY too many Muslims!” At this, the Muslim man turned around and responded politely, “Why don’t you go to Hell?”, he asked, “I hear there’s not very many Muslims THERE!”