The Woman at the Pool

The last time I was on vacation, I met a woman at the swimming pool who asked me about a vaccination scar on my thigh. She showed me a similar scar on her thigh and asked me where I got mine. It turned out she is from the Middle East, and they had the same childhood vaccinations as I had in my country of origin. So that became the conversation starter, and over the next hour, she shared her life story with me.

Mira (I’ve changed her name to protect her identity) had immigrated to the United States about 30 years ago with her husband and young children. Mira and her husband had liquidated all their assets from the old country and had brought it to the U.S. to start some sort of business. Shortly after they arrived, they met some fellow immigrants from their old country who seemed very helpful and friendly. These new friends convinced them to invest all of their money into a business that shortly divested Mira’s family of all their savings. Mira says she felt desperate and embarrassed at the same time. She couldn’t believe that she and her husband were duped by her own people and now couldn’t provide the basic needs for her two young children. One day, she needed to get diapers for her baby, but didn’t have enough money left for a whole pack. She took her two sons and went to the store anyway. On the way there, her older son (who was six at the time) found a scratch-off lotto ticket on the ground. He picked it up and told his mom that they should take it to the cashier at the convenience store and see if it was worth anything. It turned out to be worth $500. She explained to me that $500 was worth a lot of money 30 years ago, and her husband used it to start his own business which is still thriving today. This business has supported the family for the last three decades.

Now, here is where things start getting really interesting to me… After relating the above story to me in bits and pieces, over an hour (because we were still strangers who met by a swimming pool and every so often we took breaks to swim)—she ended the story praising, glorifying, and giving all the credit to God. As this was the first time she had mentioned anything relating to God, I was curious to know her faith background. I assumed she was a Muslim since she is from the Middle East—but I was reluctant to ask her such a personal question. I waited a bit longer and then just came out and asked her: “So, are you a Muslim?” She answered: “No, but I know a lot of Muslims.” At first, I thought that was a weird response…and then I realized that she thought I was a Muslim. It turned out that she was Christian too. Here we were, two brown-skinned women assuming common stereotypes about each other. We were both reluctant to talk about our faith, at the risk of offending the other. Yet, she couldn’t help but express how God had brought her thus far by grace.

This woman by the pool had taught me some great lessons: Don’t stereotype others based on your limited human perspective. Be open and transparent. Just share your life, give God the glory, and then wait for people to ask you about your faith.