The Smoky City

In a world where Chicago is known as “The Windy City”, New York as “The Big Apple”, Seattle as “The Emerald City”, Miami as “The Magic City”, Bermingham as “The City of a Thousand Trades” and Philly as “The City of Firsts” I couldn’t help but wonder: What is Damascus known as?


With the help of google.com I was able to find out that Damascus is known as “The City of Jasmin;” Jasmin as in the flower, not the Princess :). However, after being here for a little over a month I think im going to go with “The City of Smoke;” Smoke as in cigarette smoke.


Today my cousin who came down to Sham from Homus for the weekend took me and my baby brother out to a very popluar/hip café known as “In House”. As he and Ahmed ordered their chocolate milkshakes, I got an Americano with sweet ‘n low packets since no one in this country has heard of splenda yet. We managed to snag two couches facing eachother and a table in between. As Ahmed and I sat, the smell of cigerettes was overwhelming. To our luck, maybe 2 feet away, there was a group of four 20-something guys, each on a laptop cigerette in hand.


As we waited for our drinks to arrive, my 20 year old cousin himself pulled out a cylinder of death. Why?...WHY??? I could see Ahmed’s eyes getting bigger, I could no longer be silent…I had to say something. As I began asking my cousin questions such as, “umm excuse me but what the heck are you doing with that?” and “uhh you do realize that cigerettes are nasty and you can die” the four guys sitting next to us decided to join in on our conversation.


All four of them, including my cousin himself could not understand that they are being inconsiderate and disrespectful by smoking in front/near me. I explained that they made the “dumb” choice of harming themselves with a nicotine, tar, radio-active polonium, arsenic and benzene vapour filled piece of paper. By smoking in near me, they’re exposing me to these poisons. They all looked at me and laughed, as if the words that were coming out of my mouth were outragous and I was just being a big baby about it.


Literally in a matter of 20 seconds, the couch across from me was filled with the four guys and my cousin all eager to make me sound like a dummy…awkward! Hamdillah Ahmed had my back on this one and I wasn’t alone.


Just in time the guy brought our drinks and made things a little less awkward, but it was still weird. They were all staring at me waiting to hear what I had to say…One of the guys had a grin on his face, I could tell he was waiting to make fun or say something “smart”. I took a sip of my Americano and tried to explain to them a little more in depth my point of view…


It is my understanding that in Islam doing something that will make you sick is prohibited. Allah says in Surat Al-Baqara aya 195 “Do not cast yourselves, with your own hands, into destriction.” Also Surat Al-Nisaa aya 29 says “…nor kill yourselves.” Now im not saying that smoking is like suicide, but in my opinion, it’s pretty darn close.


I also believe that smoking is a source of wasting one’s wealth. Allah says in Surat Al-Israa; aya’s 26-27 “But spend not wastefully (your wealth) in the manner of a spendthrift. Verily spendthrifts are brothers of the devils.”


As soon as I got done with my little “lecture” as Ahmed likes to call it, the 4 guys across from me including my cousin himself started laughing…again. Uhh…did I say something funny?


They all said that they pretty much smoked because they’re bored and its something to do. It seemed like everything that I had just said went in one ear and out the other. So I kinda let things go but did ask them to not smoke in front of me and my baby brother.


A while later Ahmed, my cousin and I decided to head out. To my surprise walhamdulilah, the whole walk home my cousin didn’t pull out a cigarette. I guess maybe he was listening to what I said, or maybe he just didn’t want to hear me lecture again. :)