My Journey to Islam admiring Allah’s Creation

By Caroline Corda 

Growing up in Dubai and being around Muslims all the time never made me feel different towards them, they seemed to blend in, and yes sometimes I would see hijabis and niqaabis in malls but gave little or sometimes no attention to it at all. I had Muslim friends that I could divide in 2 groups, one who either were practicing but never showed it much and the others who didn’t practice, I don’t think I had the third group who were open about their beliefs and came about doing dawah work.

I’m very fond of nature and animals, discovery channel and animal planet till today fascinate me. I was so content within to see things around me take its own course without worry, unlike people who were always caught up by some or the other stress.

Sitting alone on the patio looking up at the moon and stars, enjoying the sounds of the waves rushing towards the shore or sometimes being so calm that I would doubt I was at the same place. I would feel the sand in my feet and touch the rocks that I would sit on little did I realize that this content that I felt within would bring about a question in my life. That would take me to a whole different level that still takes my breath away.

I would bring home injured birds because I could not keep a dog or cat, ‘my house was too small and it would not be fair for the animals to be in such a confined space’ my mom would say, so I somehow forced her to buy me a rabbit, I got so attached to having pets around that learning their habits and watching shows on animal planet got me even more caught up with all of this. I would read about their habits and how they would take care of their young ones, and what mainly amazed me was that how I never heard on these shows of how animals would go in search of food and always come back without something, so who was taking care of them and their needs? I did believe in God so this just pierced my heart so deep and I started looking at all this in a much deeper way, I would look out of the window of my car not to see the buildings but to see the sky, the clouds, the trees, the flowers bloom, and when I would come to a point where I would be so filled with it inside me I would research more about this.

I was a girl who would attend Mass (Church Service) and Bible Study and I was even given a Quran but I guess I wasn’t so bothered about both, for me they were books from different religions and people are different they believe in different things and all that was fine for me. I never pushed it I never asked even though I then started to have Muslims who were getting too personal with their questions something I didn’t like and as such I would tell them to stay away with their beliefs. At the same time when I was given the Quran I showed it a friend who is a Hindu and she said don’t read it I have heard that people who do they become Muslim (she thought there was some spell in it) and I laughed and said well I don’t believe that a book would bewitch me and now that I have the Quran I will read and see what’s in it that was a challenge I took on but I didn’t care as much to read it from cover to cover I read in between and was ok with what I read.

But mainly all I did was ponder over what fascinated me, and all that fascinated me was creation, questions like how is it that my rabbit can understand me and my sparrow, but I can’t understand a single noise they make unless it’s a very disturbing noise then too I am I guessing what it is? So my sparrow likes to take an afternoon nap and would screech so loud if the TV was disturbing her. Yea that was funny but it also made me think about her intellect, it made me think about mans intellect how much he changed his life from the age of having no gadgets to the most sophisticated ones today, I enjoyed discovery channel because of this it gave me insight on how man progressed in various fields such as medicine, law, etc.

I was a rebel according to some or most people, I had a mind of my own did my own thing, I guess I never wanted to ever regret saying that if only I made that decision on my own I would not be upset of having taken that persons decision and as such I never asked for advice but asked for opinions. And in our families this is not respected unless you take a decision that would favor them.

As time went by then I started to look into religions and I made my decisions that Islam was the right one. Simple and made sense – tawheed never made sense in any other better than it did here. Cause I had to connect this to the most important thing that I admired so much…. I couldn’t believe that there had to be more that one who created this and manages it all so smoothly subhan Allah I still am amazed today.

So what really got me come to Islam was Allahs creation the beauty in it, Allahs wisdom in creating so much that I can feel to some extent but not fully understand. Why it is till date new species are still being found, strange species and how they survive in the places even man can’t go subhan Allah.

So please guys give some reverts a break and ask them the reason and not ask them with a question like I get all the time.

So Caroline how did you come to Islam is it because you didn’t believe Jesus was God, is it because you lived in a Muslim country and saw how the Muslims were?

Well my question to that I didn’t care at that time if it made sense of Jesus being God, and I grew up in a Muslim country where every second person was a Muslim, that too didn’t affect me either.

Allah chose to guide me differently and when I read the ayahs mentioning about the verses of how He created the moon, the earth, the animals and man that’s when I tear up cause that was my path to this beautiful religion. And it still works till today I admire nature but when my emaan is low I give few minutes to myself and just look at a tree or the sky (how difficult it is to find that thank Allah for that some don’t even have that) and subhan Allah that reminds me how Great our Creator is, so perfect in every way.

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Something to laugh about…

Spanish dog

My neighbors dog chases my cat and I stand in between both so he doesn’t attack my cat and tell him “No! No!” he doesn’t understand and his owner yells from the other side saying “He understands only Spanish”

Gift for you

One of my cats will bring a bug from the garden home, and I would joke with my mom and say “ see Ronnie has brought you a gift”, no one was there to see a bug he brought home one day so he went to the basement where my mom was walked in front of her she had to tell him to go upstairs and throw it he listened and walked up with it (no idea what he did with it then) so what I said to my mom about the gift was true he always brought it to show it to her.

Bodyguard and my little miracle

Zizou my other cat who is very attached to my mother never leaves her side unless she is sleeping alone in the room then he may leave the room depending on his mood. He sleeps on the bed touching his back towards her, don’t even bother to touch my mom or even move towards her side or he will snap at you, but if she is sleeping alone on the bed he might not even be there. He even chases the other cats from them… its more like “shes all mine”

One thing that is really good about him is that he like an alarm clock, at 10:45 – 11pm he comes to the bedroom cause that’s my moms time to head to bed so no matter where he is in the house at that time he comes to my moms bedroom and wakes her sharp at 7am.

Why is he my miracle boy!?…notice he never comes to wake anyone else up except my mom and he wakes her walking around her till she pets him.

For me it was different I had trouble with fajr I was not used to getting up and praying and my alarm was not really helping me get out of bed, those days he would come and wake me for fajr and would keep tapping my face slowly I never felt his paws, I would always cover my face completely under the covers, he would continue doing that till I showed him my face and got up that’s when he would go. He never walked around me to be petted there was no reason for him to come to my bed (with my mom he wants to be petted, Ronnie my other cat goes to my mom in the morning for her to put food, Bentley the 3^rd cat wait for my mom to get out of bed to let him out in the backyard)

But why did Zizou wake me, there was no reason I noticed that stopped as soon as my emaan got stronger and I was able to get up without much trouble Alhumdullah. He doesn’t do it any more