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For young Americans, hajj is an epic adventure

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published January 1, 2007

MINA, Saudi Arabia - The 20-year-old American tells his hajj pilgrimage stories a mile a minute, his hands moving in excitement - about how he arrived in Mecca days ago, lost amid the huge crowds, and saw a man drop dead while circling the Kaaba.

"Dude, I saw it, the guy had the most peaceful smile on his face," Adil Muschelewicz, performing the pilgrimage for the first time, said Sunday, his head shaved bald after a ritual a day earlier.

The young man from Easley, S.C., had arrived alone in Mecca because of a travel agent mistake that prevented his family from arriving for three days. He was with hundreds of thousands of others circling the Kaaba, a massive cube-shaped stone structure draped in black cloth that is Islam's holiest site, when he saw the elderly man fall dead. The body was quickly lifted out of the crowd.

Muschelewicz didn't know the cause of the man's death - exhaustion maybe, he said - but it became one of the many powerful religious moments that have shaken him during the trip.

"I looked at his face and I looked at the Kaaba, and it was like he was happy, he'd gotten close to God. It just went boom, like this deep bass line in my heart," he said. "It was so emotional. I was by myself, in this wild place I'd never been before."

For young American Muslims far from home, the hajj pilgrimage is an awesome adventure that they say deepens their faith and connects them with the wide range of Muslim peoples.

The annual hajj is overwhelming even for those who have done it before.

Some 3-million pilgrims from all over the world move between the holiest sites of Islam, in and around Mecca, over the course of five days, tracing the steps of the prophet Mohammed and Ibrahim - or Abraham to Christians and Jews - considered in Islam as the first Muslim.

Traffic jams are epic - it can take more than an hour for a bus to drive 200 yards.

Amid the hundreds of thousands of people moving on foot for miles, you can turn and find the friend by your side has disappeared. Pilgrims often go days on only a few hours of sleep, snatched whenever possible amid the constant movement.

It is also a sensory overload, with a sound track in languages from around the world: Arabic, English, Turkish, Malay and Bahasa, Urdu and Hindi. Intense poverty collides with wealth, with some pilgrims sleeping on the pavement and others staying in "five-star" tents with meals and other facilities provided.

More than 20,000 Americans are participating in this year's hajj, a higher number than usual because the pilgrimage, which began Thursday and ends today, coincides with Christmas and New Year's holidays.

At the hajj, Muslims seek forgiveness of their sins and meditate on their faith.

But for American Muslim parents, it is also a chance to connect their children with a religious heritage they have only heard about growing up in the United States. Some of the younger pilgrims may have visited their parents' homelands. Others, whose parents are converts to Islam - like Muschelewicz - have a less direct connection to the Middle East.

Tahar Amrouni, 21, of Houston, said, "You realize the sheer magnitude of the Muslim world, how different all the Muslim cultures are and what they share. ... I see people here with only the clothes on their back, and I thank God for what I have."

As he spoke, his father came over and handed him the knitted skullcap worn by hajjis, those who have performed the pilgrimage. Amrouni worked it down over the stubble on his shaved head.

"Does it fit okay?" he asked. "I can't tell, is it on right?"

[Last modified January 1, 2007, 00:17:37]