Page 4 - Issue 23

The Islamic Bulletin Volume X No. 23 Page 4
ISLAMIC WORLD NEWS
ISLAM IN BOLIVIA
BY S AN F RANCISCO GROUP
I was fortunate, by the grace of Allah, to travel with a group of
6 Muslim brothers to the country of Bolivia. Our mission there
was to visit the Muslims in Bolivia so that they can establish the
effort of the Prophet Mohammed (SAW), and spread the word
of Allah –to give Dawah. The word Dawah means to invite. In
this particular case, we were inviting the Bolivians to the word
of Allah, to the deen of Islam. I was very excited to be
leaving. For the next 40 days, I would be leaving my family, my
job, and all the comforts of home. Although I had anticipated
some hardships, I knew my presence and the fact that I was
the only Spanish-speaking brother in the group would be very
helpful to the group. So, we departed San Francisco
International Airport on our way to Bolivia.
We landed in Bolivia and the first thing we did was to rent a
van. After finding accommodations for the night, we flipped
through the local phone book and searched for “Muslim-
sounding” names. Thanks to Allah, the next day we found a
Muslim man, who was originally from Pakistan, and now living
in La Paz, Bolivia, to show us around the city. He was also very
generous to permit us to use a one-bedroom apartment.
Alhamdullilah we started a musallah (prayer place) in his house,
and invited the local people. Their “downtown musallah”
consisted of an extremely run down, one-room space in the
market-place, that was open only for Jumha salat. There was no
bathroom, nor was there any water to make wudu.
The altitude was so high in some cities in Bolivia that we could
hardly breathe. In fact, each night our chests would tighten so
much that we couldn’t sleep. I then remembered the ayah in
the Holy Quran where Allah (SWT) says:
“Whomever GOD wills to guide, He renders his chest wide
open to Submission. And whomever He wills to send astray,
He renders his chest intolerant and tight, like one who
climbs towards the sky. (Quran, 6:125)”
I said, “SubhanAllah. There was no way that at the time this
ayah was revealed in the Arabian Peninsula, more than 1400
years ago, that people would have known about this altitude
pain. We were always out of breath, and amazed at how the
local men and women would play soccer and run like it was
nothing. The locals offered us an herbal drink, “mate”, which
was a tea-like drink and kept telling us that the more we
stayed, the more our hearts would open up and the less the
altitude would bother us. Our hearts opened up to feel concern
for the Bolivian people. In total, Alhamdullilah, 25 Bolivian
people accepted Islam. In fact, the name “La Paz” means
peace in Spanish and it did bring a lot of peace. Only Allah
(SWT) knows just how many others were affected by our
peaceful religion.
We stayed in the city of La Paz for one week. Each day, we
went out visiting the Muslim brothers and encouraging them
about their prayers, dhikr, and the importance of remembe, and
establishing the effort of the Prophet Mohammed (SAW)ring
Allah. Everywhere we traveled in the city of La Paz, we would
stop at prayer times to make Salat. The local people would
gather around us and watch in amazement for they had never
seen anything like it before. Many would ask us what we were
doing and inquire about Islam.
Our next stop was the city of Santa Cruz. The roads to Santa
Cruz were so tight and narrow that two buses couldn’t pass at
the same time. We were so scared that our van would fall over
El Camino de la Muerte (Road of Death), Bolivia
the side of the mountain. In fact, Bolivia is known for “El Camino
de la muerte” which translates to the “Road to Death” and is
known as the most dangerous road in the world.
Whenever we arrived to a new city, the police always met us at
the border. They were very weary of us and suspicious. They
would ask us the same questions—where we were going? Who
we were going to visit? Where would we be staying? And each
and every time we would answer politely and honestly. We had
nothing to hide. We explained Islam to them in hopes that they,
too, might be touched by the beauty of Islam.
Alhamdullilah, after arriving in Santa Cruz and met a brother
named Isa. Isa is a Bolivian of Palestinian heritage. Isa, along with
his father, offer free Arabic classes to the local people. Due to
the media coverage of current events in Islam, this has had a
great impact on the Bolivian people attending these classes
wanting to learn more about the Muslim people. This father and
son duo has brought many people to Islam. While we were in
Santa Cruz, I had the opportunity to visit their Islamic library. We
noticed that many of the Islamic books had been translated from
the Arabic language to Spanish. Brother Isa, who had studied in
Madinah, Saudi Arabia and was fluent in both the Arabic and
Spanish languages, had translated many books into Spanish. He
then asked me my opinion about which would be a good book
to translate from English into Spanish and started showing me his
collection of English books. When my eyes saw a familiar book
entitled “What Everyone Should Know about Islam and Muslims”
by Suzanne Hanif. I told him that this is a great book to translate
into Spanish. To my amazement, when I opened the book, it had
my name and address in it. I said “SubhanAllah” How did this
book come to Bolivia? He then told me that while he was
attending school in Madinah he met this brother from Argentina
who had given him the book. I then remembered the story of
this book. I had actually purchased this book when I visited
Pakistan and brought it home with me to San Francisco. At the
time I received a call from this Argentinean man that I had never
met. He was very interested in Islam so I mailed him the book.
Alhamdullilah the man accepted Islam and went back to
Argentina. I did not even know that he had gone to Madinah to
study. This whole incident brought tears to my eyes.
While we were riding back, our van broke down in the
mountains and had to be towed to the next town. Our group
then had to buy bus tickets to get to the airport to fly back to San
Francisco. While traveling on the bus, the other bus passengers
were surprised to be riding with a group of Muslim foreigners. At
the time of prayer, the brothers asked me to ask the bus driver if
he would stop the bus to enable us to pray. The bus’ music was
so loud and distracting that it would have been impossible to
have prayed in this environment. At first, the bus driver refused,
as this was a direct bus and made no stops. But when we