Hello, beautiful soul. I'm Sarah Michaels and welcome to the Elated You podcast, where we dive deep into the world of self discovery, growth, and healing to find out who you truly are.
On today's podcast, I've actually brought Zane on because we really have, especially with what's going on at the moment in Gaza, really feel very strongly about showing up and talking more about. Islam and I guess our journey with Islam because It's something that I've always been ashamed about, but I was always ashamed to say that I was an Arab, let alone Muslim.
And we'll talk about a few things. So we're going to talk about how we both brought up, because it was very, very different. The struggles that I've had in terms of being Muslim and being an Arab and the racism that I've endured, and I know that you're going to also talk about why we changed our surname.
Like what, you know, what was happening in, you said something about 2001, but then also when Donald Trump took over and he was saying he wasn't going to allow Muslims in, how that affected us and how we were going to bring up our children. So there's a lot of exciting stuff. There's going to be a lot of vulnerable stuff that we're going to talk about, but I really want to start personally for me growing up.
My parents didn't teach me about religion. Like I went to a Catholic school, which is very not common for Muslims, but we lived in East St Kilda, predominantly a Jewish area and not, I don't, I don't think I knew any Arabs that lived in that area. Whereas you grew up.
So I grew up in Northern suburbs, uh, predominantly with Arabs around me and, you know, living the Arabic culture and Muslim culture and.
I remember having one Jewish friend, like I'd never actually met a Jewish person until I actually lived in this
area, Bentley East. I had Jewish friends and even, um, a woman, an older woman that we called her grandma, we would sleep at her house and she was Jewish. So we would do Sabbath. And so I just want actually to say that this is not about.
With what's going on, it seems that way to a lot of people that if you're Muslim, that you don't like Jewish people, which is not true. So that's something I wanted to get out, but back to me growing up. So yeah, so my parents didn't teach us Islam and they definitely weren't religious. So we never fasted like as in fasting.
No one, no one fasted in my family. We didn't eat like roast pork, like on a Sunday or anything like that. But like we ate bacon. Like my, my mom would eat prosciutto, my dad ate salami. So I wasn't really told not to eat that stuff. My parents drank alcohol, you know, and all of their friends were non
Arabs.
On the other hand, my family were very conservative. Like we practice Ramadan. We, my dad would have a beer here and there, but, uh, nothing too, too excessive. Uh, didn't eat ham or pork or anything like that. So. We grew up, we grew up to be quite
conservative. Can I just say something funny? When, when Zayn met me, he started eating bacon and one day he went to his mom and I was like, don't ever tell your mom cause then she'll say, you know, she'll blame me.
And he was like, Oh mom, you know that I eat pork? And she was like, if you eat pork, you're going to go to hell, blah, blah, blah. She was like going off. You will go to hell if you eat pork. You want to be a pig? And then he. I turned around and I said, Oh no, um, which means my mother in law, he's just joking.
And she turns around and goes, yeah, no, I'm joking. I know he's joking. Of course he's joking. And that was like the end of ever, you know, bringing that up with them. So obviously they're not going to listen to this podcast, but yeah, it's, you know, that's how embedded it is. But look at the end of the day, when you think about it.
There's a lot of people that don't eat pork, not just Muslims. But look, I'm not here to convert anyone. Cause we both still eat pork and drink alcohol. Yeah. Mainly we
want to talk about our experience and our perspective. Like for example, back in, back in 2001, when a 9 11 happened, I remember just going, just.
Just seeing it on, on the screen just before I went to bed, I saw a building get knocked down. Thought yeah, just on the news. Turned it off, went to bed, woke up. I was in year 12. I remember going to the TV in, um, I was in the library and I was watching it and I'm like It's not 11, yeah. I've seen the planes hit the, hit the buildings
and what have you and He was in school when I was on holidays cause I'm older and it's funny, sorry.
Yeah,
so just watching these, um, planes hit the buildings and just wondering what the hell's going on, like, you know, Who are these people actually targeting New York and America and killing all these people and turns out to be, uh, Islamic jihadists or whatever they call them. Um, and That's when everything changed, like, you know, my, my name is, uh, at the moment, Zayn Michaels, but it was actually Zayn Mohammed.
So for years after that, like, as soon as I introduced myself and, you know, if I was to say my name is Zayn Mohammed, it was sort of joked about that I was a terrorist. And like that sort of, yeah. Um, that sort of reaction. Didn't really sit right with me, um, just because my name was Muhammad and being told I was a terrorist and even in a, in a joking way, but it wasn't a joke.
Like, I don't know anybody that is, like, in my family or extensions of my family or friends had any sort of extremist views. Like, before 2001, I had not known that there were fundamentalist Muslims out there that actually Radical Muslims. Radical Muslims that, you know, explode themselves and, and killed other people.
I mean That's
not part of the religion. It's not Not at all. People will say to you, Oh, that's what's written for you guys. That's what you believe in. But that's not actually true.
Look, that's actually something that is against our religion and, and documented quite extensively that if you kill yourself, regardless of whether you're doing it to kill other, other people, that's a massive sin.
And it's even documented in the Quran that there's rules for engagement when you, when you actually go, go into war, like for example, uh, you're not allowed to kill cattle or sheep. You're not allowed to actually destroy. Buildings of worship or hospitals or women and children, like these things are against the Islamic religion.
So even after 9 11, the effects of that actually remained for quite a long time. I mean, even finding work, you know, saying that your name Zayn Muhammad is frowned upon, like looked at as if, you're judged straight away.
And something else, while you're talking into that, is that what I always experienced is Because my name was Sarah Hage, but my original was Al Haj Hassan, but my parents changed it.
Like the minute they put foot on this land to Sarah Hage, people would assume that I was Christian and never even question. And they would assume that my parents were as well. So what would happen to me is that people would be like, Oh, you know, you're Christian. Like Muslims are like this and that and talk about the Muslims.
And, you know, growing up, I would never, ever. Stop someone and go, excuse me, don't speak like that because I actually am Muslim. So I would sit there and listen to people talk such rubbish about Muslims, but be too afraid to one, embarrass them to tell them that I'm actually Christian, that I'm actually Muslim, not Christian.
Um, and two, I didn't want to humiliate them and two, I would then feel ashamed about being Muslim. So I held on to all this shame being Muslim and that was one of the reasons is that because It was always frowned upon. I wasn't, I was living in a country where Muslims were, were looked at as like Zayn said, you said terrorists, but it's dirty, unattractive, because people would, when I would say, as I grew up, that I was Muslim, if people asked the actual direct question, people would say to me, What?
You don't look Muslim as if Muslim looks a certain way. I'm like, what? Cause I'm not covered. And they're like, no, no, you just don't look Muslim. But what does a Muslim look like? You can't say that Muslims are covered cause they're not all covered. Right? So you can't say that's the reason. What do you think when you think of a Muslim, you need to actually ask yourself that question.
Like if each individual should ask themselves, what do I think a Muslim looks like? What they can't dress a certain way. Why are you assuming someone's religion? Because I can tell you now, if you look at Orthodox and, you know, Maronite, like Christians in general, right? If we're going to look at Christianity and go back, Mary was covered.
Because when you go into church, you should cover your head. You shouldn't wear a skirt or you shouldn't wear pants. So we're looking at that. And then there's Lent and stuff like that. Not everybody goes to church every Sunday. Does that mean that you don't? I've never said to someone, you don't look like a Christian.
You don't look like a Christian. So I know that's. generalizing, but what does a Muslim look like? How should a Muslim be? So for me, I had, I just felt it was easier to reject my religion. And I'm really sad about having to do that all my life. And even the surname, you know, like, even if you wanted to finish,
like the reason.
The reason why we actually changed our surname is 'cause we didn't want our kids to actually be judged. Like, how sad is that? Like I didn't wanna get my kids to be pigeonholed into, into Muslims where people can judge them and have less opportunity, have less opportunities out there in the world.
Because at the end of the day, my kids are just Aussie kids. You know, my son plays basketball, my daughter loves singing. Uh, they're just happy go lucky kids. And for them to be judged by people, I think that'd be sad. And, and the fact that we actually had to do that because of the circumstances at the time, I mean.
When we did change it, Trump was talking about how he didn't want any Muslims in the country anymore. And I'm like,
that's devastating. How could we go to
America? Like, how do you judge one billion people based off a handful of people that did some bad
things? Mm. And then you, you could talk to Muslims that go to the airport with a, you know, predominant Muslim surname or name in general, like Hassan, whatever.
And they imagine like Osama, for example, is a very common Arab name, right? So imagine having a name like Osama. Because of, you know, Bin Laden, you actually get stopped. Like I used to get stopped in the airport. Do you know what I mean? If I was coming back from Lebanon. So why are we treated differently?
And this is what I wanted to touch on is because of mainstream media is because of America is because of the movies, all of that, if you go back and you look at what. a terrorist looks like. And if you're watching one of those movies, the terrorist is always an Arab, an Afghani, which are always Muslims, right?
So they're always trying to portray the Muslim as the bad guy. And time after time, that conditioning starts to feel normal to you, even to me. Even to me that I didn't want to say that I was an Arab or a Muslim because I didn't want to be perceived as a terrorist, which means somewhere down deep inside me, I felt that that's what they were as well.
And it's really sad. Like even when I went to Lebanon, like we just went to Lebanon this year for the summer to take the kids. The amount of people that said to us. You know, on Instagram, when I saw my stories, where are you? They thought I was in Dubai. I said, I'm actually in Lebanon. And the amount of people that said to me, wow, I had no idea that Lebanon was so beautiful.
I thought it was this, you know, war torn third world country. And like, I'm embarrassed to say, I didn't realize it was so beautiful. And I'm like, of course not, because you tell me how many times have you been into the travel agent where they tried to sell you to go to Lebanon? Never. Never. And there's never even been, like, there's no flyers of, of Lebanon.
And Lebanon was the Paris of the Middle East. It's like, you've got summer and the snow at the same time, and you can ski and then go down to the beach. You can actually see the beach from the snow. Like it's just. A beautiful all round country. The people are so beautiful. The hospitality, but yet,
best food as well, best food you'll ever have in your life,
but yet people perceive Lebanon to be these, I don't know, you know, ask yourself, have you ever thought about Lebanon?
I
don't know. Fun fact, by the way, Lebanon is actually 70 percent Muslim and 30 percent Christian. Yeah. And we both call God, Allah. Fun fact.
All right. Beautiful. Well, you know what? That's just something that I really wanted to share because I feel now that I want to be a little bit more open and the more, since I have been like, I've, I've changed my mindset to go, you know what?
If someone asks me. I'm going to definitely give a different response. And what's happened is literally this week alone, we've met four people randomly. This woman came up to us in Brighton to talk about our beautiful family. And as she was talking, she was like, Oh, she's like, but you're not Muslim. And that, that connotation, you're not Muslim shows me that they have a perception of what a Muslim is and that I'm not it.
And I now have gone, yeah, no, I am Muslim. Same thing happened. You know, we went away on the weekend and this. You know, Australian gentleman that we were talking to said it like that. And then again, recently I was talking to a friend of a friend and as she was talking, she's like, but you're not Muslim. And I was like, Oh no, I am.
And then I spoke into this. And I think that the message that I have for everyone out there is that whatever identity you are, whoever you are. Own it. Don't hide it because you're afraid not to fit in or you're afraid of what people will think. Yeah, so
regardless of whether you're Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Hindu, whatever you are, be proud of who you are.
I mean, it's diversity that makes this country great. Yeah,
exactly. God bless Australia. God bless Australia.
See you guys.
Thanks for listening. If you found value in this content, please subscribe to my podcast and head over to Instagram at elated underscore you to see what I'm getting up to. Bye.