“I’m not a fan of the sun. I do not like sunny weather,” said the girl from Dubai.

 

One of those rare spring days in Houston, fair weather with a slight breeze and low humidity, feels like winter to Fatima, but it’s not enough. She prefers the cloudy grey skies of London, where someday, she hopes to attend medical school.

​

Fatima was born in the United Kingdom, and she’s spent her whole life hoping to go back. Houston and its sunny skies are just a pit stop.

​

“It was something I’ve thought about ever since I was a kid,” she said. “I thought, ‘I left, but I’m going to come back.’ Even now, I think (UH) is what I’m doing for pre-med, but when I get to med school, I want to go to London.”

​

Coming to Houston was Fatima’s back-up plan when she discovered medical schools don’t accept 17-year-olds. Fatima, an international student, chose this city because she already had relatives nearby, but her aunt and cousin who live in the area aren’t aware that she does not wear a hijab.

​

“I’m never been someone who’s really religious or saw the importance behind wearing one, so I never believed that I should, so I never did,” she said.

​

Fatima said she believes wearing a hijab does not define Muslim women or their religion, and embracing or rejecting the hijab is not an act of faith but of interpretation.

​

“It’s a minor part of Islam,” she said. “If you strongly connect with the message that comes with wearing a hijab, you should do that. But if you’re like me or other women who choose not to wear a hijab or don’t see the need to wear it, that’s fine. It doesn’t really define whether or not you believe in your religion or whether you follow it.”

​

Fatima, who came out at her “open-minded” high school in Dubai when she was thirteen, approached her sexuality in the same way: she can be gay and Muslim in the same breath.

​

“Personally, I didn’t have an issue with it, thinking (being gay) was wrong or a bad thing, despite what I’d been told,” she said. “I tried to read up on it and understand why it would be wrong or why I shouldn’t be this way, and I never saw an issue. I can still be me either way. I can still have my faith. I can still be whoever I am, and I can be with whomever I want to be with.”

​

However, Fatima’s parents, who still live in Dubai and whom she sees only twice a year in person, aren’t aware that she does not wear a hijab or that she has a girlfriend who she met through the LGBT sorority on campus, Gamma Rho Lambda.

​

“I know that I won’t be able to come out to my parents at all,” she said. “They’re very stuck in their own ways. I don’t want to say it’s because they’re religious. My brother is religious and I came out to him not too long ago, and he said, ‘OK, I knew it.’ The same with my sister. But with my parents and most of their generation in the Middle East, coming out is not going to be an option.”

​

Despite hiding some parts of herself from her parents since high school, Fatima says she remains true to herself and her identity.

​

“In high school, I didn’t wear a hijab when I went to school,” she said. “I did have a girlfriend throughout high school. This is me, but when I’m physically around them, I look different and that’s it. I don’t pretend to be someone that I’m not. I just put on a piece of cloth and that’s it.”