"Himself is the pot

And himself is the pot maker

And himself even is the clay of the pot."

 

Jalāl ad-Dīn Rūmī, Masnavi

 

Himself is the pot

My first encounter with the Aga Khan Award for Architecture was when I met a master juror, Arif Hasan, at three months old. He was speaking at an educator’s conference about the Award’s contribution to global communities: it was facilitating recognition and awareness of the impacts of architecture and highlighting the environmental and social benefits created by Award recipients. 

 

He dedicated his speech to me, as the youngest member of the audience. He talked about how I was a representation of the Ismaili community, as someone who made sacrifices without question to improve the lives of others. He saw it as me ‘sharing’ my mother with other educators from around the world in a place far from home. That became my first identifier; I am known to many as the PTEP (Professional Teachers and Educators Program) baby. 

 

When I was around 7 years old, visiting my grandparents, I found my grandmother cooking in a large red clay pot, which she called a haandi. I asked her what made such a pot special. I remember her explaining, “If you cook something in a red clay pot and take it off the stove, it will continue cooking slowly and will stay warm.” Later that morning, she showed me how she stored water in another clay pot in her courtyard. Surprisingly, the water remained cool inside. Looking back, articulating the thermal insulating properties of that pot to a child was probably not the easiest task, so my questions about its application led to more examples. She showed me a picture of a mosque in Mali and the red brick buildings and thatched roofs that surrounded it. This became my first understanding of purpose-built and environmentally-friendly architecture.

 

And himself is the pot maker

Since starting school from grade 3, the ‘PTEP baby’ moniker had been a continuous identifier and I began feeling this need to live up to it. I began to follow the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, with its 3-year award cycle. I would read about many different projects that were recognized in the Ismaili magazines I had access to monthly. Growing up in Dhaka, Bangladesh, I read about the Friendship Center in Gaibandha, an award recipient. It was located in a remote area of Bangladesh, and I heard about a group visiting the center. Unfortunately, I couldn’t go, so to make up for it, I read several articles on the project and was eventually directed to “read more at archnet.org.” ArchNet was fascinating to venture into because of the sheer quantity and quality of the information provided on topics that were entirely new for me. I was captivated by the Award projects’ descriptions of the story behind the architecture. One of my favorite examples to date is the Bait-Ur-Rouf Mosque, built in 2016 using bricks and other locally sourced raw materials. Marina Tabassum’s use of the brick pattern to act as a column as well as providing natural ventilation and lighting inspired by Sultanate styles was a source of wonder for me. 

 

Service is a central ethic of my faith as an Ismaili and I’ve always found fulfillment from helping others especially those who are less fortunate. As a girl scout, I helped the elderly within our community. As an elementary school student, I participated in a run to raise money for hydrotherapy tanks for the Center for the Rehabilitation of the Paralyzed and created a low-cost water filtration system using locally-sourced materials for a school in Dhaka’s slums to clean contaminated water during the monsoon. When I came to NIST, I saw that service was encouraged within the NIST community, a completely different approach from the self-driven service I had done earlier. I examined all the service groups available, and I chose to join the Rooftop Garden, finding a surprisingly hidden passion in myself for urban gardening, green spaces, and sustainability. This gave me a meaningful way to contribute by regularly spending time maintaining the garden, mentoring younger students, and providing our produce to the school cafeteria. However, I began noticing that in their five years of existence, the original beddings and structures had begun to deteriorate. When I joined the leadership team, I initiated programs to change the beddings and rebuild the structures. As I, along with the rest of the team, designed and modeled new beddings, I didn’t see the architectural underpinnings until much later. 

 

Simultaneously, I took a leadership role in PhuLiPhay, a group to help refugees and asylum seekers in detention centers in Thailand. I talked to Somali youth and South Asian women, noticing that it was easier and a more encouraging experience for me to identify with them because I didn’t have the same language or cultural barriers that would normally hinder communication. My tendency for helping others was, therefore, blooming because I could easily identify with their plight.

 

And himself even is the clay of the pot

I, in my architectural internship, was assigned a project for a mall in Egypt. We were discussing cost-friendly insulating materials because Egypt, being a desert, had very hot days and very cold nights. All of my memories of red clay came flooding in. Later, as I sat across from the senior architects and pitched them the idea, I felt as though all of my memories had brought me to this time: the speech, the Grand Mosque of Djenné, ArchNet, and beddings. I heard the same question that I had asked all those years ago coming across the conference table, and finally, I felt equipped to answer. 

 

I believe that Rumi’s message was twofold: firstly, that background, personal development, and intellectual interests shape who a person is and influence their impact on others, and secondly, it means that a person has complete control over who they will become. In essence, the amalgamation of my experiences have shaped the contents of the vessel of myself.