GRIOTS REPUBLIC - An Urban Black Travel Mag - Jan 2016

ammar asfour
©Ammar Asfour
home, was a challenge. We arrived at the bus station where
we were supposed to meet him after a lengthy bus ride.
After waiting for approximately an hour at the bus station
during which we visited a nearby grocery store to buy some
delicious Brazilian persimmon fruit, Kaab finally met us with
big hugs and genuine warmth that immediately eased any
worries we had.
We just wanted to talk to Kaab, and we were ready to head
back to Sao Paulo a couple of hours later. But Kaab had
other plans.
He first took us to the musalla. He was wearing a black shirt
with a Malcom X picture on it and a journalist vest that had
patches of Middle Eastern countries’ flags. The musalla was
a single room at the ground floor of the building Kaab lives
in. It was a humble place, yet it is taken care of meticulously.
A red carpet covers the ground with many individual prayer
rugs around the place. The front wall had a large electronic
clock that keeps track of prayer times and the back wall had
a large flag of Saudi Arabia. “Have you been to Mecca?”
he asked pointing at the Saudi flag. “Yes, I have been!” I
said.
“I have been to hajj. Allhamdulillah,” he told me. We
prayed the second daily prayer of the day together, and
then he walked us upstairs to his home.
Kaab was humorous, animated, and energetic. He told us
how his curiosity about Islam was triggered when he
heard the athan, the Muslim call to prayer. In 2008, he
became Muslim after learning more about Islam through
talking online to someone from Egypt. He continued to
rap. He even tried to infuse Islam into his music.
However, he found it conflicting to mix hip-hop and his
newly found faith. He now only performs poetry with no
instrumentals under the name Fragmentos de um
Muçulmano (Fragments of a Muslim).
We sat at the patio of his house overlooking the favela.
Kaab was engaging and captivating. When he was not
sharing deep thoughts about his faith and passion for the