Period Dramas and Hijab.

It's raining and it's a friday. I feel I shall stay within my boundaries tonight and bake some cookies to get that delicious aroma wafting through the house...or maybe a fudge and macadamia nut cake. Also, I feel I need to bake due to copious amounts of double cream glaring at me everytime I open the fridge and a basket of nuts, flour and sugar whispering 'bake me'. 

On the note of baskets I've always desired to be an actress in period dramas - (a Pakistani would not qualify in a period drama) but let me continue to dream to hold a handmade basket, wear a beautiful jane austen-esque dress and have a summer hat with ribbon...to go over my hijaab :o/ ...walking in the lush green fields picking berries and flowers. Or baking fresh bread and then having to visit my stables to grab the horse and go galloping around, galavanting carelessly through woods and the country side. And people would stare, what's that strange tanned girl doing, where is she from? Somebodys house-helper perhaps? And what is that on her head! By God, she looks like she is a nun from a far away country!  A hijaabi in a period drama!  Think about it though, didn't Maryam [a.s]=(Isa's mother) cover her head? Why is it that at times people cannot see how hijaab isn't something new or simply surfaced by Muslim women.Why is it that those who dislike or misunderstand hijaab don't see it worn by women of other faiths, sometimes their own! Is it so different to the way Mother Teresa dressed? I think not.

I constantly remind people who question why Muslim women cover their hair, that the statues depicting Mary show her with her hair covered and a long dress- infact go to google images and type in holy mary. This is hijaab, this is modesty even if you glance away from Islam and into Christianity. Mary wore a head scarf, nuns didn't show their ankles 100 yrs ago and many still follow strict rules of modesty. This is hijaab. So maybe me, hypothetically galloping around the period-drama setting in the countryside, in hijaab wouldn't be that shocking for society back then, if it were a group of people inclined towards Bibi Maryam (a.s). Maybe. Somebody give me a role in a period drama, let's do it with hijaab and abaya instead ;o)