Thread by @AsimCP

Another trip, another #travellingwhilemuslim encounter with UK borders agents.

They are really doing their best to make my re-entering the UK as difficult as possible.

وَمَكَرُوا۟ وَمَكَرَ ٱللَّهُ ۖ وَٱللَّهُ خَيْرُ ٱلْمَـٰكِرِينَ

Yesterday I was in Paris for the launch of an excellent @UK_CAGE report written by my colleague Rayan Freschi. The report details the ‘systemic obstruction’ placed in the way of French Muslims - and how they are being legally persecuted.

Please do download and read the report

https://twitter.com/uk_cage/status/1499095579082645505

After a really great launch and being in the company of my colleague, we had just enough time to relax a little and for me to make a pit stop in the famous Laduree to pick up some treats for my wife and children. Finally praying maghrib and isha in the Paris Grand Mosque

When you travel to France by Eurostar, the UK border agents are actually based in France, so you cross UK immigration at the train station itself. Lo and behold, as I attempt to proceed through immigration late last night, I am stopped and told I need to wait as they make checks

I’m there so long, that all the passengers have gone through and all the Eurostar employees have clocked off for the night. Of course by this stage I’m left with a bag of fresh pastries that I hoped to share with my family, and an empty bench to wait on

After the train leaves, I’m informed by the border agent that I should have expected to be stopped (I don’t know why I should expect this at all considering I’ve never committed a criminal act), and that I should come earlier the next day for the train.

I’m forced to book myself into a hotel (extra cost to my trip) and book another ticket (more cost). I enter my hotel room, only to be given an ironic reminder, that being in France, I’m ‘almost home’. Except coming home now always carries the sense of being unwelcome

I arrive at the terminal extra early this morning. After I get to the desk, the border agent looks at my file and says ‘you get stopped a lot don’t you?’ I don’t laugh. He says he’ll have to stop me again. I’m back on my bench. Still haven’t tucked into these goodies!

One of the blessings for being kept for an hour on the bench, was being able to sit with the exquisitely beautiful verse and prose of @_jamalbhai - subhanallah, really such a beautiful contemplation. I’ve attached a taste of his brilliance

I’m finally let through to my train after an hour of waiting without questions. The officer says to me I am probably used to this now and I want to scream in his face that I’m not f***ing used to it, but I’m far too dignified for that. I opt for, ‘no one should be used to this.’

Sometimes I wish the South London in me would override all of the training of my mother.

My one small victory is that as the officer somewhat smugly informs me that I’ve missed my train, and gives me instructions on rebooking. I afford myself a little smile as i inform him how I’m perfectly on time for a train that I should never have turned up this early for 😏

Home is that place where you feel sakinah in your heart when you finally see road signs that indicate you are going to be approach your area. Returning home for so many Muslims in the UK now carries a sense of anxiety that they are suspect.

We’ll continue to fight this iA

Oh, just when I thought it was over, as I arrived in St Pancras, a police officer went out of his way to find me through a throng of people to take me aside and ask me questions. He flicked through my passport and asked if I could speak English 😅 (Much better than he could)

Fortunately he let me go, but in a sea of white faces, his racist hurdles and acrobatics to confront me were highly amusing 🙄