Why Islam is my choice — Page 113
113 a town, they were usually honored by the society. These were talented people, and they earned quite a bit of money, and they weren’t in the category of jobs that were usually offered to African-Americans—as waiters, and bus boys and porters and these kinds of jobs. I can remember those days when being a taxi driver was “too high” of a job for Afro- Americans. And they come along, very talented people, they made records and all this kinds of business. And when they started accepting Isl ā m, people thought it was a big thing. At first, I thought it was just a fad. America pulled a fad. You know, the clothes are a fad, the language is a fad, the way they cut their hair is a fad, and America goes through fad after fad after fad. So when I heard about Isl ā m, I thought it was another fad. But after I started investigating, I found out that it wasn’t a fad—it had a lot of substance to it. So I started taking it seriously. At the time Muslims were also out there preaching their wares, and when I heard about them, I heard about the other Muslims at the same time. So I went to one of their places. When I went to one of their temples, the first thing they would do then is search you. And I got searched. A group photo from a west coast convention held in the early eighties.