3rd Listening Post and Impressions

I'll be blunt: I failed again.

I returned to the mosque at the same time I went in my first LP, hoping to find the same people that I talked to that time. There were no families I could see on the premises at that time and no women, so there was no way I could stick my foot in my mouth on that level. Well, I was partially correct; there were no families, but nobody that I met during my first LP was there. Even the Imam wasn't there.

This concerned me, because this meant I had to start over with making connections. I wasn't bothered, so I tried to strike up conversation and ask a couple of questions. However, I was politely rebuffed, with litterally no cooperation with anybody there. Again, nobody was overtly rude, but it was clear that nobody was interested in talking with a Spanish kid that walked in and was curious. I couldn't get a name, much less a number out of anybody there. What really seemed to be a turn off was the fact that I was a student. They seemed mildly receptive until they knew that I wasn't a legit reporter, which is something that one of my friends who has taken this course before warned me about. Following that, I stuck around for about a half hour hoping that somebody I knew last time would show up, but alas I was SOL. Defeated, I left and went to work with my failure hanging over my head.

Now I'm supposed to talk about what I learned through this entire process. I'm sure most people in the class will have wonderful stories of enlightenment and new human connections they have formed. Unfortunately, I have none of those stories. What I learned in this class was to always, always, always get contact information with any and everybody that I can speak to. If I had the presence of mind to get either Yusef's or Sulaiman's phone number, I probably would've had the 'in' that other people had. While I did get the contact information for the Imam, he never returned my phone calls. This also taught me that it's important to get more than just the information for the man in charge, and I absolutely NEED to get other people's info.

I don't have any negative feelings toward the mosque, but I have to say that I'm surprised I got rebuffed the way I did. I thought I was dressed appropriately and was courteous. I thought that people would help out somebody who was curious, but I guess that they thought I was suspicious. That isn't surprising, considering the acts of vandalism that the mosque has been subjugated to over the last several years.

However, I did learn a bit more about Islam and the people that follow it based off my first LP, so I wouldn't call this a complete wash. I feel that if I had some more time I could crack somebody there and get the 'in' that everybody else seemingly got. I just hope that anybody else that reads this doesn't make that fatal mistake I made earlier.