Malcolm X in Mecca

Story taken from a book - One Thousand Roads to Mecca - CLICK.

Motto:
Yes, I am an extremist. The black race here in North America is in very bad shape. Show me a black man who is not an extremist and I will show you someone who needs psychiatric care.

Hadj 'in Arabic means: to direct yourself to a specific goal. In Islamic law, this means going to the Ka'ba, the holy house, and performing the pilgrimage ceremony.

At the airport in Cairo, groups of travelers became pilgrims, assumed a state of sanctification. I was nervous and prepared to observe others and act like them.

By assuming the state of ihram, we take off our clothes and cover ourselves with two white cloths. One, izar, is wrapped around the hips. The second, rida, is wrapped around the neck and left arm, leaving the right arm uncovered. For this simple sandals and a bag with money and documents.

Each of the thousands of travelers dressed the same, king or peasant, is no different.
We all cry: Labayk! Labayak! - Here I am coming to you, Lord!

A plane with pilgrims takes off every few minutes, but the crowds at the airport are not diminishing.
On the plane, white, black, brown, yellow - all brothers, who worship the same God and respect everyone everyone.

Jedda airport looked even more crowded than Cairo. Each group of pilgrims has been assigned a guide - a mutawwif - who will lead us from Jedda to Mecca.

I got mixed up in the middle of the group, I was nervous. I am at the root of the Muslim faith, and in a moment I will have an American passport for inspection, which is the complete opposite of the essence of Islam.
I was so nervous that I broke my bag key. So I broke the zipper to open the bag so they wouldn't suspect that I was carrying something forbidden. Finally, passport control. The clerk looked at me and said something in Arabic. I showed him a letter of recommendation from Dr. Shawarbi (director of the Islamic Federation in Cairo). The clerk started arguing with my random traveling companions.

They explained to me that I would be handed over to a religious court, Mahgam Sharia, who controls so that unbelievers do not end up in Mecca. My passport will stay at customs.

I did not have the courage to protest, my guide took me to a shelter right next to the airport, found me a place in a 15-person room. Most of the guests slept on rugs on the floor.
The guide took me to a corner and explained that he would show me the correct prayer positions. I tried to imitate his movements, but it didn't work. My ankles refused to give in to what Muslims do all their lives.
Asians sit on their heels, Westerners sit on chairs.

I had no dream in my head. I practiced persistently. In the end, I thought I figured out the way, but after three days my ankles were still swollen.
I thought that in our organization Nation of Islam maybe we should introduce the teaching of basic Muslim rituals. It was dawn, the people around them got excited.

I realized how big a role the carpet plays in their lives. Everyone has their own prayer rug, each family or group has a larger rug. After praying, they covered the rug with a tablecloth and ate their meal, then took off the dishes and tablecloth, and they had a living room.
Now I understood why the trader with stolen goods was paying me such a good price for Eastern carpets when I was acting as a Boston burglar.

Time passed, I did not know what awaited me. After a while, I noticed people sitting at the table with a telephone. I showed them a letter from Dr. Shawarbi and asked them to call the number provided there.

Dr. Omar Azzam came to see me in an hour, he took me to his villa. Soon my passport and documents seized at the border were brought there, I was informed that my court hearing would be held in the morning.

After asking many questions, the court decided that I was a full-fledged Muslim, entered my name on the register and gave me two books to read.
I went back to Dr. Omar's villa, got some sleep when the phone rang. The chief of protocol from Prince Faisal called - after lunch the prince's car will pick me up.
The car drove me to Mecca. We parked in front of the Grand Mosque, washed and entered, surrounded by a crowd of praying pilgrims.

Seven laps of the sacred stone.
Like here...

 I walked and prayed, and my guide made sure that pilgrims did not step on me. Then I drank water from the well of Zamzam and we ran between the two hills of Safa and Marwa where Hagar (Abraham's exiled wife) once wandered looking for water for her son Ishmael.

I visited the Grand Mosque three more times and circled the Ka'ba stone.
Last time, after dusk, we went to Mount Ararat.

This visit ended the series of pilgrim rituals. We also threw the traditional seven stones at the devil.

Some of pilgrims cut their hair and beards, I spared them for fear that my little daughter would not recognize me when I returned.

America must learn about Islam because it is a religion that wipes out racial problems from society. During these eleven days in the Muslim world, I ate from the same plate, drank from the same glass, slept on the same rug, and prayed with people of all colors of skin.
We were all brothers because faith in God wiped out the "white" from their minds, from their behavior, from their approach to others.

Full information on Malcolm X HERE.