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Her work with honey started by chance. Some bees had built a hive on the roof of the house she bought at the Mantiqueira Mountains and, after getting tired of paying beekeepers to go there, Let\u00edcia decided to study apiculture. Now, she owns 27 boxes for honey production spread over her estate and some leased places. She knows all about honey processing, sells the product and plans to create a brand in the area. While taking care of the bees and selling the embroideries she frames and sells as art, she wears the hijab.<\/p>\n
The biologist Soha Mohamad Chabrawi (pictured on the top)<\/em> also works wearing a veil as well as long clothes. An assistant at the area of Halal Quality Control at the Federation of Muslim Associations (FAMBRAS) in S\u00e3o Paulo, she has studied for a long time since started her career, which included finishing high school abroad and researching neuroscience on her doctoral studies. Daughter, Soha was inspired by her mother in her professional choices. \u201cMy grandmother only allowed my mother to get married only after she had a profession,\u201d she tells.<\/p>\n The biologist has three sisters and they all had the opportunity to study abroad in their teenage years. Soha went to the United States. She chose Biology because she wanted to work with research. And that\u2019s what she did. During her master\u2019s degree, she studied the neurological action of the psychoactive drug in the animal brain. In her doctoral studies, the theme was the connections in the region responsible for the mammal movement. \u201cI\u2019ve always liked neuroscience, studying the brain,\u201d she says. At FRAMBRAS Halal, Soha arrived without knowing much about the area and studied a lot to be part of the team that oversees ISO 17.065.<\/p>\n In Gua\u00edra, S\u00e3o Paulo, Fatima Adel Khatib teaches math in a school, while planning to open an engineering company and doing a post-graduation course in the area. From a Lebanese Muslim family, Fatima first graduated in Math and two years ago concluded Civil Engineering. She studied her last course wearing a veil over their hair. \u201cI never had any problems with that,\u201d she tells. Her plan to start an engineering company is being developed with a partner. The idea is to balance the company and the classes and not giving up the hijab, even if the work is in construction sites.<\/p>\n Silvia Ferreira is also one of Brazilian hijab-wearers Muslim women that stand out in their careers. She doesn\u2019t work directly in the area she studied but leads a major online store of Arab fashion in Brazil, Silvia Arabic Fashion. Converted to Islam nine years ago, Silvia studied Law and is a graduate in International Law. Two years ago, a year after getting married to an Egyptian and moving to an Arab country, she started the online store. Ninety-five per cent of the pieces she sells are from Egypt and 5% from Turkey. She is got a stock in Brazil and travels to the country at least six times a year. When a customs clearance is needed, Silvia is the one that solves it. The store supplies clothes to Brazilian TV shows.<\/p>\n Silvia says that, although she doesn\u2019t work with Law, studying the subject helped her create a very professional business. \u201cI have marketing strategies, strategic planning, a growth plan,\u201d she reports. The store has 80,000 followers on Facebook and the social media points it as Latin America\u2019s largest Arab clothes store. \u201cI like fashion, have always consumed fashion and beauty products,\u201d she says about her business. Silvia intends to open a physical store in Brazil in the future, but also want to keep studying. She is trying to enter the master\u2019s program in Human Rights from an Islamic perspective in Egypt. \u201cI think it is important to have a backup plan in life. I have no problem continuing my studies,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n As professors<\/strong><\/p>\n At the the University of S\u00e3o Paulo in Ribeir\u00e3o Preto, another Brazilian with a long resum\u00e9 teaches with her hair covered. Her name is Francirosy Campos Barbosa, an icon for the Muslim women around her. Francirosy is converted, has started using the headscarf recently and represents some of what this new veiled women generation aims with their careers and voices. She is a full professor at the Psychology Department at USP in Ribeir\u00e3o Preto. The focus of her research is the Islam.<\/p>\n Graduate at social sciences with a master and a doctorate in Anthropology and a post-doctorate in Islamic Theology from the University of Oxford, Francirosy coordinates the group Gracias of Islamic and Arab studies, leads a group of intellectual Muslim women called Maryam, and has organized the book \u201cOlhares femininos sobre o Isl\u00e3: etnografias, metodologia e imagens\u201d (Female perspectives on Islam: Ethnographies, methodology and images\u201d) and other activities associated to the academy and the Muslim religion.<\/p>\n Very close to the Muslim female universe, Francirosy says that now, among Muslim women born in Brazil or reverted, housewives are the exception, most work outside their home. But she says that, just like other women, there are some Muslim women that are happy to stay home and take care of the house and children, some that prefer working outside the house, and some who are unhappy in this or that situation. However, there is some discrimination against veiled Muslims at the labor market, according to her. \u201cThere is a prejudice against the veil,\u201d she says. Out of the 32 Muslims women that are part of the Maryam group, 19 use hijabs.<\/p>\n Some of the women ANBA interviewed for this story reported perceiving prejudice while searching for jobs, but none has stopped using the scarf because of that. Soha believes the hijab was the reason she was not hired in an institution after being approved through the whole recruitment process. \u201cThey asked me if I would take it off,\u201d she says about that final interview. Despite being from a Muslim family, Soha only started using the veil when she felt ready, ten years ago. Even tough she notices some effect in job interviews, she doesn\u2019t regret her choice.<\/p>\n A hijab over her hair<\/strong><\/p>\n Converted six years ago, Francirosy started using the hijab last March, after the attack against the New Zealand mosque. She felt not using the veil was too comfortable. People not always knew she was a Muslim. First, she used a scarf with her hair visible, but then she chose a more severe model. \u201cA piece of my religion was missing, I didn\u2019t feel like a total Muslim,\u201d she says about her time before the hijab.<\/p>\n Fatima: used the scarf for a while, paused, and then started using it again. She says she uses because of her faith, because it is written in the Quran, and she knows that while using it she does not represent only herself but her whole religion. \u201cIt is my identity, just like people are free to use a short skirt, I\u2019m free to use my veil. It shows who I am,\u201d she says. She also believes the veil makes people know each other for their ideas and opinions, and not for their bodies.<\/p>\n Let\u00edcia uses a hijab since she converted and says she became more tolerant after she started using the Islamic piece because of the challenge it poses. \u201cWhen I started using it, it was hard because I\u2019m very sensitive to heat, when I was a child I didn\u2019t even like using a ribbon on my hair,\u201d she says. The outfit also serves to keep herself from entering places she does not view as positive or responding to offenses on the street with bad words. \u201cUsing the veil, I\u2019m not just Let\u00edcia,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n For Silvia, adopting hijab was a slow process. She reverted around nine years ago. First, she used pants and a long dress, then she started using long sleeves. Four years ago, after finishing a course on Islam at the University of Al-Azhar in Egypt, she started using the whole outfit, completed with the veil over her hair. She felt ready. \u201cIt is a whole stereotype you carry,\u201d she says, telling she started being seen as a foreigner in Brazil. In Egypt, they\u2019d already identified her as a foreigner, she reports.<\/p>\n Study comes first<\/strong><\/p>\n The converts to Islam interviewed by ANBA chose their religion after learning more about the religion. This was truth for Let\u00edcia. Noticing it was not studied at schools, she decided studying the Islam. \u201cI thought it was very clever how the Muslims spread Islam around the world, taking knowledge and progress wherever they went,\u201d she says. This drove her to look forthe Quran, which captivated her for good. Silvia Ferreira was going through a rough time in her life when she received an internet link to listen to passages from the Quran. \u201cI started listening, researching, studying, reading,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n They keep searching for knowledge in the religion. Besides the content offered at the mosques, they seek information and Islamic education offered face-to-face and online in Brazil and abroad. \u201cWe only skim the surface with what we learn in Brazil,\u201d says Francirosy. The anthropologist seems very enthusiastic with the new generation of young Muslim women, which seek more knowledge about the world in general and their religion, and she believes they will occupy better positions in the society. \u201cYou have to keep your head down to God, not to men, and this is not feminism, it is Islam,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Translated by Guilherme Miranda<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/anba.com.br\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/francirosycampos-300x208.jpg\")
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