Browsing: Barriers

“With the impending divorce of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, I began to think a lot about Scientology. Sources say that Scientology has played a part in their unhappily ever after.

It is reported that Katie wants primary residential custody and primary legal custody of Suri (the couple’s six year old daughter) due to differing parenting styles. Katie is a Catholic girl and would like Suri to be raised Catholic; and Tom is a devout Scientologist and wants Suri to become a Scientologist like his other two children.

I have studied Hinduism, Sikhism, Christianity, Kabbalah and Scientology. I think religion and culture gives us something to depend on and think about. It gives us our belief system and lets us believe that we operate as part of a system.” Guest Blog – The Single Desi. Photo – Harpreet Thinking

Like all New Yorkers, playwright Rehana Lew Mirza has turbulent memories of 9/11 when the world seemed to come crashing down. That night, aware of the rising backlash against Muslims, she and her sister remained barricaded in their one bedroom apartment, watching the horrific images on TV.

A week after that, just as they were struggling to get back to work, Mirza found a flier pinned to her door: it had the image of a missing South Asian woman – and someone had burnt holes into the paper, into the eye-sockets and mouth with a cigarette.

It was at that chilling moment that she knew that for New York Muslims the tragedy was a double whammy – not only were they too the victims but were also being demonized as the perpetrators.
Her response was the play ‘Barriers’. Now on the tenth anniversary of 9/11, ‘Barriers’ is back.