Field Trip Paper. On Friday, April 18th, my friend Amanda and I went to the Salam Islamic Center in

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1 Field Trip Paper On Friday, April 18th, my friend Amanda and I went to the Salam Islamic Center in Sacramento, CA. I chose to go to the Salam Center because I wanted to learn more about the Islamic religion and culture. This was a new and unique experience that I am extremely happy to have been a part of. After conducting this field trip, I am now more educated and aware of the thoughts, values, and beliefs of the Islamic culture. When Amanda and I first met up, I had her teach me how to put on a hijab. A hijab is the scarf that Muslim women wear to cover their heads. We were both dressed so that our bodies were covered head to toe. The shirts were long in length so that when we bowed there would be no midriff. Our sleeves covered our wrists, pants covered our ankles, and the hijab covered our neck and head. I learned that Muslim women cover themselves as a sign modesty and obedience to Allah. Once we arrived at the Salam Center, I noticed that some people were extremely dressed up in traditional Islamic outfits, and others wore jeans and a t-shirt. Some women had long beaded dresses on while the men wore white shirts with small white hats called kufis. Amanda told me that I should not look men in the eyes. Eye contact is inevitable, however it is inappropriate for women and men to have prolonged eye contact. When we entered the Salam Center, women and men had separate entrances into the mosque. The entrances were on opposite sides of the center as well. When you went up the stairs on the women s side, the first thing you come into is the bathroom. Before you enter the mosque, it is custom to cleanse yourself. To do this, you wash your right hand three times, then your left hand three times, then your nostrils, followed by your ears, face, hair (stroke water through your

2 hair), legs, and feet. Each wash had to be done 3 times before you could move on. After cleansing, we took off our shoes and entered the mosque. The mosque was beautiful. The carpet was green and gold and there were Islamic phrases written on the walls with green and gold arches in the front of the room that the speaker would stand under. When we walked into the mosque, the room was divided into two separate sections. The front half of the room was for the men and the back half was for the women. Men and women did not sit next to each other. There were only a few chairs in the back of each section for the elderly or disabled to sit if they wanted to. Everyone else sat on the carpet. When we quietly entered the mosque, Amanda walked me through a prayer that must be done three times before sitting down. The prayer consisted of putting your hands on your chest, raising them up and then bowing while putting your forehead to the carpet. Once this had been done three times, we were able to sit down and relax until the teaching began. In order to announce that the service was going to start, a huge pre-recorded chant was sent through the speakers of the Salam Center. This resulted in more people trickling in. Throughout the service, I realized that people of the Islamic religion pray with their palms facing up, instead of their palms together. While praying, they bow their heads and close their eyes. I really enjoyed the lesson that was being taught throughout the service. It was about how mother nature is not our property and we should value it and take care of it. I thought it to be very harmonious and honest. At the end of the service, everyone stood up, stood close together, and then repeated the prayer that I described above, three more times. Once that was done, it was time to go home. Just as we had come in, women and and men had to leave from their separate entrances.

3 I learned more about the Muslim and Islamic culture than I thought I would have from participating in this field trip. For starters, I was not aware beforehand of how many people in the Sacramento area were Islamic. This trip opened my eyes to how diverse Sacramento truly is. This experience has increased my ability to recognize, prevent and resolve future conflict by heightening my awareness of the diversity between my own thoughts, values and beliefs and the thoughts, values and beliefs of others. According to The Giraffe and the Elephant, people who are engaged in the process of working towards diversity effectiveness know that the journey begins with themselves. They develop personal goals, objectives, and requirements and review them periodically. They also stay mindful of whether the setting they are in meets, or is capable of meeting, their significant personal requirements. Before taking this field trip, I was unaware of how to approach men and women from this culture. I always viewed the men from this culture to be very chauvinistic and the women to be very inferior. After taking this field trip and learning more about the religion, I learned that is not the case. The women s lack of eye contact and quiet demeanor is not because they are fearful or disrespected, but it is because they are modest and loyal. Men from this culture tend to avoid eye contact or any physical contact with women because doing so is a sign of disrespect of the women s modesty. Learning this has already helped me recognize and resolve conflict because I now understand the true circumstances and I am able to not misinterpret the lack of eye contact as a sign of being rude. Instead of trying to shake an Islamic man s hand and look him directly in the eyes as a sign of respect, I have learned that it is more respectful to acknowledge his cultural norms and alter my approach. According to Chapter 8: Conflict, to prevent conflict, cultural differences in approaching problems,communicating, gender roles, or time management may

4 need to be explicitly acknowledged and group norms altered in order to meet the needs of group members with different national, ethnic, religious, gender, or cultural identities (Ungerleider, p. 217). Participating in this field trip has not only helped me learn more about the Islamic religion, customs, and ways of life, but it opened my eyes to how truly diverse the world is. Everyone comes from different backgrounds and experiences. It is important to embrace the diversity and learn all that you can from one another. Integrating diverse perspectives and acknowledging different cultural norms expands one s awareness and opens their world up to a new realm of opportunities. In terms of cultural diversity, I can t wait to see what I will learn next.

5 Works Cited John Ungerleider Conflict. Chapter 8 in Effective Multicultural Teams: Theory and Practice. ASU Library Electronic Holdings. R. Roosevelt Thomas, Jr. Giraffe and Elephant.