Meet a Muslim

At a cafe in north Seattle, Moina Shaiq met with more than 20 people who showed up for an understanding of Islam.
Moina Shaiq in the USA has created “Meet a Muslim,” a series of gatherings in which people meet her for coffee and talk about the religion, with an aim to show that followers of Islam aren’t all alike. In 2015, Moina Shaiq took an ad out of her community newspaper inviting people to meet her for coffee. “Meet a Muslim,” she called it. It was shortly after a Muslim couple opened fire at a San Bernardino office party, killing 14 and wounding 22, and Shaiq wanted to prevent prejudice before it took hold and show that followers of Islam weren’t all alike. She went to the coffee shop with her laptop, expecting no takers; just to get some work done. But there were 20 people waiting for her. In all, 100 people would respond to her invitation, and Shaiq didn’t leave until every question was answered. “It showed me how much people were extending their arms, reaching out,” she recalled. 
It was the same another night at a cafe in north Seattle, where Shaiq met with more than 20 people who showed up hungry not only for dinner, but for an understanding of the religion that many Westerners know little about and often see through a suspicious lens. Since then she has arranged more interactions for the same purpose of promoting bridges of understanding with people of other faiths.