Driven to drive ... taxis

By Ifrah Jimale, Ask a Somali

Why is it that most Somali males drive taxis, and what do their female counterparts do?

A lot of them do drive taxis, but taxi driving is not exclusive to Somalis. It might look like all taxi drivers are Somali because they are almost all concentrated in the airport areas. The number seems high and I think it is because there are a lot of us here, but compared to other races — like white taxi drivers — there's really not as many as you might think. Part of this, I think, is because it's such a visible position, and there are a lot of people whose primary interaction with Somalis is from the back seat of a taxi. There's also a trick our brains like to play where once we get an idea about something, we tend to focus on the things that prove that idea and ignore the things that disprove it.

But to answer your question, a lot of Somali men end up driving taxis for three reasons.

First, Muslim men are required to perform their prayer in the Masjid, especially midday prayer on Friday. A Muslim woman can perform prayer at her home or wherever she is at the time. If she wants she can go and pray at the Masjid, but it is not a requirement. So having an hourly job makes fulfilling this religious duty difficult. In Somalia, men came home at midday to eat lunch, go to the Masjid and pray, and then go back to work. In some cases work ended midday, especially on Fridays.

Second, coming from a society where the male was basically the king of everything, it is hard to suddenly answer to a female supervisor, or to a male supervisor, for that matter. In Somalia, at least outside the big cities, the vast majority of men are self-employed, and there is still a strong cultural preference for that. So they become taxi drivers to be their own bosses. Adjusting to new language and new world is hard enough already, so I think it is another way of reducing stress and making as little change as possible. The taxi business provides a lot of autonomy compared to other jobs, so it makes it an attractive option.

Third, driving a taxi requires skills that a newly arrived immigrant is likely to already have, which aren't exclusive to a particular country or culture. A medical or engineering degree from another country is likely to not be recognized here, but anyone can easily demonstrate the ability to drive and read a map. This makes taxi driving an attractive first step for immigrants from many countries. Add in the fact that the more people from one country take up a particular profession, the more likely a new arrival from that country is to have a connection and an “in,” and it's easy to see why so many people choose it.

As for women, I think we do a little better adjusting to America than the males do. This is just coming from one female’s opinion, but I think the Somali female population works in more diverse fields. Like the men's preference for self employment, the concentration of women is around the medical field, especially nursing. Women are seen as the nurturers and care-givers in our culture, so the ones that work often prefer those jobs.

But again, we have journalists, doctors, lawyers, business women and men, as well as factory workers.

Ifrah Jimale (askasomali@gmail.com) writes the Ask A Somali column for the TC Daily Planet.

Source: The Twin Cities Daily Planet

ANTM’s Fatima Siad on Breaking the Top Model Curse

Siad walking Hermès.
Photo: Imaxtree

Despite what Tyra says, winning America's Next Top Model basically guarantees that a girl's high-fashion modeling career is doomed. With that precedent in mind, losing the competition might have been a stroke of luck for Cycle 10 reject Fatima Siad. Leaving the show as the third runner-up, 24-year-old Siad was then scooped up by New York Models, who currently represent Niki Taylor and Sui He. After three years of quietly working in the commercial market, shooting for department stores and catalogues, the Somali model landed on the spring 2012 runways for Dries Van Noten and Hermès — a Top Model first! Siad also confirms that she recently shot with Swedish photographer Camilla Akrans for Hervé Léger's spring 2012 campaign. We met with the refreshingly frank Siad this week to talk things Top Model and her transition into high fashion.

Why did you choose the reality TV route instead of seeking agency representation right away?
Basically, I didn't know anything about fashion. I was very nerdy; I went to Bryn Mawr and never even noticed models when I was 21. After going to Bryn Mawr for three years, I transferred to NYU, and as soon as I moved to New York, people were like "You should model! You should model!" That was the first time I heard it in my life.

Really, the first time?
Well, once in a while, people would tell me, "You look like Iman." But they didn't really know fashion either. Anyway, when my friend was auditioning for Top Model she asked me to go with her, and I just went with the flow all the way until I became a cast member. Next thing you know, I'm in this house with all these crazy people and I'm thinking, "What the fuck did I do?!" And you don't realize it because they kind of brainwash you. Until you get out and you realize, "Oh my gosh, I really could have just gone to an agency, because these people obviously had no interest in my career."

What do you remember most about your time on the show?
It was really intense and dramatic. There was unnecessary stress; they made fashion seem like it was the hardest thing in the world. Now that I work as a professional model, I advise people to stay away from any television shows. It's a waste of your time; it's just entertainment. It's not the fashion that we now know.

I'm sure you still get recognized when you're out, no?
Yes! All the gay guys! When I go Harlem or Brooklyn, I can't go to stores. It's crazy. It's nice, but when you deal with that for three years every single day, it makes you a little bit mean. I'm running somewhere and someone will be like, "How's Tyra?" I want people to recognize me for the work I do now as a model, and not something I did three years ago.

Well, now that you've done high-fashion work, how legit was all that ANTM training?
I have a love and hate relationship with Top Model. I think, obviously, if I didn't do the show, I wouldn't be where I am now and I never would have been exposed to fashion. I learned to love fashion. I went from not knowing anything to becoming really curious and wanting to know and respecting people in the industry, realizing how hard they work. I will always be thankful for Top Model for that.

Do you keep in touch with anyone from your cycle?
Actually, Whitney lives right next to me. I went to her birthday party and we hung out; she's cool. It's really hard to be friends with people on a TV show, especially when there's cameras shoved in your face 24 hours a day. After the show, I see the girls as human beings. In the show, it just brings out the worst of you. They put you in uncomfortable situations so you're not yourself.

What do you mean?
Like not being fed on time. If I'm not eating at my times, then you don't want to be around me. [Laughs.] They just want to make you the most uncomfortable, so that you're on edge. As an example, when we were shooting on the boat and Marvita [Washington] was getting seasick and basically, what happened was that they had Advil, but they didn't want to give it to her to see how she would react. Or if you wanted water or needed to go pee, sometimes they would just hold us in the car. Psychologically, it's smart because then the girls are uncomfortable and then clashes will happen.

When you first started modeling, how did clients respond to you?
I didn't really work well my first year. My agency wanted to strip the whole Top Model off me and basically sell me as a model, and not a reality TV model. I did jobs here and there, but I think what was going on was that my agency wanted to build me from scratch. I was learning through it all.

This season, you were selected by top casting director, Russell Marsh, to walk the Dries Van Noten show. What was that process like?
First of all, I work in fashion, but I still don't know much about it. I don't know names, but I'm working on it. I remember I walked in and he's just looking at me and I thought, "Who's this guy just staring at me?" I had no idea who he was, but maybe it was good that I didn't, because I would have been nervous. It was a really great experience, especially because I didn't expect it at all.

What was it like working with Christophe Lemaire at Hermès?
He has to be one of the nicest people I met. He's genuinely interested in the world and other people. He's very global. I heard he lived in Africa when he was young. At the show, people were giving us massages; they really take care of their girls. Normal fashion shows are chaotic, but he has a very interesting energy; he's very subtle and very calm, which carried over to backstage. I could not believe how nice they all are, which was a completely different experience for me.

Overall, do you think being on Top Model helped or hindered your career?
Honestly, I don’t know. I hear a lot of Top Model girls say they are dismissed by clients because they recognize them, but it never happened to me. I think it might have helped in some ways because some people know of me. If you use your time on the show in a smart way, you can take your career to the next level.

Lastly, have you heard anything from Tyra after your successful show season?
No, I just got back three days ago. But I have to say, I think she's a smart business woman. Months ago, I ran into her in the Lower East Side and she hopped out of her car yelling, "Fatima, girl! I'm so proud of you!" She shows me love. I feel like she's always tried to coach me, but I was never there yet to understand. I always thought she was really tough on me, but now I see, I think she saw potential.

Source: http://nymag.com/

UN Security Council Unanimously Urges Pursuit of Somali Piracy Kingpins

U.S. Department of State

Press Statement
Victoria Nuland
Department Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson
Washington, DC
October 26, 2011

The United States welcomes the UN Security Council’s unanimous call to all nations in the world to continue their cooperation in the investigation and prosecution of all persons responsible for acts of piracy, armed robbery at sea, and Kidnap for Ransom off the coast of Somalia. This includes key figures of criminal networks involved in piracy who illicitly plan, organize, facilitate, or finance and profit from such attacks. We also welcome the further practical steps taken by the Council in support of national, regional and international efforts to prosecute pirates, and to enhance related prison capacity.

This development is the latest indication of growing international consensus that these transnational criminals pose a serious shared security challenge for the safety and well-being of seafarers, global commerce and humanitarian aid.

Young Minn. Somali collects stories of famine victims

By Abdi Fatah Farrah



The famine gripping Somalia is more than distant bad news for a young Somali man from Eden Prairie. Abdi Fatah Farrah, a 24-year-old spoken word artist, recently paid a visit to Dadaab, the refugee camp across the border in Kenya where about 400,000 Somali famine victims have sought refuge.

"Abdi Phenomenal," as he's known, went to make a video called "Voices of Dadaab" to wake up the world to the tragedy unfolding in his homeland. MPR News sent a recording kit with him so he could document what he found.

Dadaab, Kenya — I left Somalia when I was 3 years old because the war broke out, and we went to Dadaab refugee camp which was in Kenya. I stayed there until I was 5 years old and that's when I fled to America.

One of the main reasons why I went back over there was to put a human face on the famine. I've been seeing a lot of statistics on the news and not enough stories about people. I felt like these people's stories need to be heard.

There are a lot of women in the camps — a lot of women and a lot of children. As I was talking to most of the women, I've seen a couple of guys standing there and I was thinking to get their voices. I started conversing with one of them.

"The conditions that brought us here have everything to do with the state Somalia's in: the war, the famine, the drought," said Rashid Ibrahim Ali. "The wind has turned our babies deaf and it destroyed our tents, plastic huts. And we have no bathrooms. We have no food, we have no water to drink. We are in dire need of help. Your race and your religion shouldn't matter when you're missing the core necessities of life."

You'd see thousands and thousands of people just traveling, just to go get food, just because they heard from miles and miles away that there's food. And they're starving on the way there. Their kids die on the way there. Mothers grab children that are not theirs, that are holding on to them on the way to the camp.

And by the time they get to the camp, they find out that they have to wait in line to get registered first, for days and days because there's so many people. Then after they get registered, they find out that they have to wait in line for food. Their name has to be put on the list. After that, that's when they get food.

The reason why these people are starving is not only does it take a long process to get to the camps, it takes a long process to get food. By the time you get food, you realize that it's not food. It's not even a snack for us in America. You get a bottle of water. You get one biscuit. You get one date. Things like that. You can't survive off that.

The camps were made for about 70,000 people and there are more than 400,000 people living in them right now. Dadaab opened in 1991. I met people who have grown up in the camps.

One of them said to me, "You went all the way to America, and you came back?" I was lucky. They could have been the lucky ones that left. Instead God chose me and I came to America to get a better life, to educate myself, to help out my people back in Somalia.

I met these two artists inside the camps where the sun was setting at the time and they were staying in this little hut with a plastic cover on it. The last song they sang for us is really, really powerful.

In one of the lines, the female says, "the scars that have cut in deep will be healed."

And the guy says, "although you're going through all these hard times, although you're suffering, although you've been hurt although you've been mentally and emotionally tortured. Don't give up. Wish upon a star in Somalia basically. There still is hope for Somalia. There is still hope for the people in the camps."

He was playing the song with a water bottle as a drum. I was blown away. I was blown away by the music that they make.

Everybody in the Somali community and everybody in the world has a role in this specific situation. My role is to create awareness, through film, through poetry and also just in everyday life.

--

To see the Voices of Dadaab video, visit thepoetnation.com. The video was produced with Matt Erickson of Poet Nation. This story was produced with help from MPR reporter Sasha Aslanian.

Source: MPR

Somali govt's call to halt advance dismays allies

American and European officials are joining residents in Somalia in expressing dismay over comments from Somalia's president that called on foreign military allies to stop twin advances against Islamic insurgents.

President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed on Monday told Kenya to halt its military advance in southern Somalia. Diplomats say he also privately asked African Union troops not to move beyond the Deynile neighborhood of Mogadishu, where they are fighting al-Shabab militants for control.

A U.S. official in Nairobi said there was concern and dismay over the comments. The official is not authorized to be quoted by name.

Hakima Abdi, a Mogadishu resident, questioned whether Ahmed wants al-Shabab to maintain control in Somalia.

Allies dismayed by Somali president’s call to stop advance against insurgents

American and European officials on Tuesday joined some Somali residents in expressing dismay over comments from Somalia’s president that called on foreign military allies to stop twin advances against Islamic insurgents.

The remarks called into question President Sheik Sharif Sheik Ahmed’s commitment to fighting his former allies — Islamist militants.

Ahmed on Monday publicly told Kenya to halt its military advance in southern Somalia. Diplomats say he also privately asked African Union troops not to move beyond the Deynile neighborhood of Mogadishu, where they are fighting al-Shabab militants for control.

The dual offensives have forced the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab to defend itself on two fronts and helped put the weak U.N.-backed Somali government in its strongest position in years. The government, backed by 9,000 African Union soldiers, now holds almost all the capital.

A U.S. official said there was concern and dismay over Ahmed’s comments. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the press.

Officially, both African Union and Kenyan officials are tightlipped in their response to Ahmed.

“We are not responding to him in the media,” said Kenyan government spokesman Alfred Mutua. He said the speech would not change Kenya’s military plans in southern Somalia, which aim to capture the port city of Kismayo, the main source of revenues for the insurgency.

Kenyan troops drove across the barren scrubland of the Kenya-Somalia border earlier this month after a string of kidnappings by Somali gunmen on Kenyan territory. Kenya’s government has been calling for more than two years for a buffer state to be established along the border to help improve security.

On Tuesday, gunmen kidnapped a 32-year-old American woman, a 60-year-old Danish man and their Somali colleague working for the Danish Demining Group in the northern Somali town of Galkayo.

A spokesman for the African Union force, Lt. Col. Paddy Ankunda, declined to comment on the reports that Ahmed had asked the AU troops to stop their advance.

American and European officials in Nairobi said they were dismayed by the president’s remarks, although they declined to be named because the matter was diplomatically sensitive. The U.S. and the EU are the two biggest financial contributors to the AU mission. Neither is directly financially supporting the Kenyan operation although Kenya receives military aid from both powers.

Not all Somalis welcomed his comments, either.

“If he does not want Kenya’s help does he want al-Shabab to stay on?” asked Hakima Abdi, a teacher from Kismayo who fled when militants banned her from teaching at her school. “That kind of comment is moving us toward further fighting and lack of genuine government. My view is that we need all help from the world to eliminate the ruthless al-Shabab.”

Ahmed’s words seemed to contradict an agreement between the Kenyan and the Somali government last week to coordinate their security operations, a British official said.

They also appeared to catch his Cabinet by surprise. A senior Somali official said Somalia’s American-educated prime minister was not consulted before Ahmed spoke, but the official speculated that the president might be trying to take a popular public stand amid concerns that Kenyan bombing raids are causing civilian casualties and damaging Kismayo’s port.

Ahmed is a quietly spoken former teacher who rose to become an insurgent leader by fighting Ethiopian troops who invaded Somalia in 2006. He joined the government two years ago as part of a peace deal and many officials speculate he is under pressure to demonstrate to his political base — conservative politicians backed by Middle Eastern nations — that he can control the Kenya advance.

Burundian soldiers have been fighting hard to take Deynile, and lost between 30 and 50 soldiers in a single day last week, a Somali official said. The AU has only publicly acknowledged 10 deaths, but the fighting is continuing.

At least 95 Burundian troops have been wounded, a security official told The Associated Press from Mogadishu.

On Monday, al-Shabab published a statement claiming to have killed 150 Burundians and calling on them to leave the country. The group routinely exaggerates the number of soldiers it has killed.

After taking Deynile, AU soldiers would most likely press on toward the heavily populated Afgoye corridor, home to one of the world’s largest camps of displaced people and an al-Shabab command headquarters. As long as al-Shabab controls that territory, it can still launch suicide attacks on the capital.

The reason for the president’s request to halt the AU advance was unclear. He is believed to be in talks with some al-Shabab leaders, one Nairobi-based official said. The government has long invited insurgent leaders to hold peace talks, but more are said to be coming forward now as the military pressure increases.

Dispute resolved with Somali workers at Tyson plant in Noel

By Josh Letner
Globe Staff Writer
The Joplin Globe

Approximately 130 Muslim workers, many of whom are Somali refugees, who walked off the job at the Tyson Foods processing plant in Noel on Friday, have returned to their shifts after reaching a tentative agreement with management allowing for prayer time.

Tyson officials and workers met Monday afternoon, and agreed to negotiate a long-term solution.

Muslims are required to pray five times daily at specific times, including 5 p.m., which was the time most in dispute between employees and a new management team at the plant.

Tyson officials and a Union representative have said the Noel plant is the most culturally diverse in the company.

Source: The Joblin Globe