I always thought myself a tolerant and generally accepting person.

In fact, it was a point of

pride for me; my ability to mingle with different groups of people, from teenage boys with
their raucous jokes, to strangers at the bus stop and friends’ parents.

But the first time I saw the dining hall I felt like crying, flung so far out of my comfort zone,
into a boarding college 10km away from the nearest town. The food was served on
partitioned blue plastic trays, much like the ones I imagined were created for prison dinners.

Yet what upset me the most was the fact that the dining hall was very clearly divided into two
sections. To the extreme left of the room sat boys, quietly eating their lunch. To the very right,
a perfect mirror of their male counterparts, sat the Muslim girls, their white and pastel-
colored tudung forming a great religious divide between them and myself. In the middle of
the dining hall, a trickle of students sat, non-Muslims mostly, grouped together. I remember
feeling very distinctly like an outcast; it was surreal for me to be in such an environment,
having grown up in the city where Muslims had constituted the minority in my secondary
school.

Irrationally, I felt my Christian faith threatened.

During induction week, I lashed out in frustration. The no-skin contact rule was too prudish,
the dress code banning skirts above knee-length positively archaic. I was disdainful in my
criticism; why couldn't the authorities relax and treat us like mature adults, capable of making
decisions without being coerced into a narrow-minded ‘morality’? Most of all I centered my
dissatisfaction on what I believed had caused this moral policing: the strong Muslim
community in my college and its values of modesty.

Then, at the end of induction week, a girl in my group, Umu, came up to me and said, "Do
you know that you are the first non-Muslim I have ever spoken to?" I was surprised that one
could live 19 years and never venture to speak to someone of a different faith. I realized then,
that I too had never truly spoken to a Muslim either, because I had always only seen them,
misguidedly, as Muslims: dismissive labels in a post-9/11 world that have led to too many
fears and misconceptions.

I am not proud of how I acted those first few weeks. Since then I have learned, am learning
still: to see beyond surface differences and the great divide of the dining hall.

Many of my most striking memories here have to do with interfaith understanding. Like the
time I tried on a headscarf at the MUSCOM-organized Girl’s Night Out and saw it as a
reminder to cultivate inward beauty rather than a symbol of female oppression. Or the night I
had a conversation about the afterlife with some Malay friends. A classmate told me she was
afraid of what came next; another articulated her doubts about the existence of heaven. We
spoke of divine punishment and the end times, struggled with issues that I was by no means
unfamiliar with in my own walk with God.

I’ve learned much from my stay in college. In this diverse community, what was once a fear
of the unknown has developed into acceptance, and then respect, as I spent more time with
my Muslim friends. The head knowledge alone has been priceless; learning about a different
culture and way of life complements and adds color to my own (especially during Hari Raya
Celebrations when festive cookies are in abundance!). The heart knowledge instructed me to
look beyond those things, to truly put into action the unilateral call of religion to love our
neighbors as ourselves.

And over those very dining hall tables I hated so much initially, I’ve realized that a single
conversation can be a doorway to the most illuminating encounter with a different world.
True, it took some getting used to, the informal gender segregation at this place. Yet, having
spent so many years wrapped up in my own world, I now treasure every opportunity to
immerse myself into new ones, and hope to continue doing so even in university.

By Amelia Foong