Japanese photo journalist inspired by Muslim women
Shahid Husain
Karachi: Fujiyo Tsonemi, a Tokyo-based journalist, captures the life of Muslim women and writes extensively about them. A freelance journalist for the past 10 years, she has been filing stories for magazines like AFRA, Shincho, Yoniuri etc.
A Buddhist by birth, she converted to Islam last year and continues to derive inspiration from Muslim women across the globe.
In an exclusive interview with The News on Wednesday, she said, “I have visited Syria, Jordon, Yemen, Sultanate of Oman, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and many other countries and everywhere I’m enthralled by the interesting lives of women. Some lived in abject poverty while others basked in luxuries, some were outlawed liberals while others diehard conservatives.”
But not all Muslim women are same. “In the Middle East, women are strict Muslims. They offer prayers five times a day,” she said. “But in Pakistan, some women adhere to religion but not all of them.”
“Over the years I’ve observed that rich women in Pakistan and other Muslim countries are generally xenophobic. They are not friendly to outsiders,” Tsonemi revealed. She said sometimes, women who were not so well-off also preferred to stay aloof.
In Pakistan, Tsonemi visited the Manchar Lake and interviewed women of different classes in Karachi. “At the lake, women sleep on boats, eating fish, rice and roti. I visited the lake for a very few hours but what I saw fascinated me.”
When asked about the difference in the life styles in Middle Eastern countries and Pakistan, Tsonemi compared weddings in Tunisia to those in Paksitan. “In the African country, the marriage ceremony also goes on for seven days and includes a hena ceremony, dances and dinners,” she said.
When asked whether she found Pakistani women more beautiful than their Egyptian and Middle Eastern counterparts, she termed it a difficult question to answer. “There are beautiful women in Pakistan and one finds beautiful women in the Middle East. In Japan too, some women are beautiful, while others are not.”
Asked why she decided to convert from Buddhism to Islam, since Buddhists were peace-loving people, Tsonemi said, “Every religion has followers who are kind as well as those who bring bad name to their faith.”
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