If you are a Riz Ahmed fan, I am sure you know what this Needull is about.
The British actor and rapper has been recently in news for his essay, published in the Guardian. The piece is an extract from The Good Immigrant – a book about race and immigration in the UK, penned by British minority ethnic writers. In the essay, Ahmed details his experiences of being cast as a radical Muslim at airports in the era post-9/11. The topic is an old wine and have been touched by many but what I find interesting was that Ahmed’s experience is at odds with the sort of characters he strives to portray – an individual “whose story is not intrinsically linked to his race” and completely in sync with the character he actually portrays, like Changez in The Reluctant Fundamentalist or Shafiq in The Road to Guantanamo.
On the way out past my lookalikes, I gave a loud, “As-salaam aliekum.” No one leapt to return the greeting. Perhaps they lacked the safety net of a convincing “gosh!”
Needull in a haystack 