The steps at Lakemba mosque on Thursday night hum with a contented quietness, and the smell of sweet bread baking.
Two men sitting get up to greet me. Outside, three 14-year-old boys stopped to chat. They’ve just finished tutoring and are heading to the mosque for tarawih – evening prayer – before the Lakemba Nights markets, one says.
View image in fullscreen Crowds gather at the Ramadan night markets in Lakemba. Photograph: Blake Sharp-Wiggins/The Guardian
“He has his own shop,” the other boys add. “He’s selling juice!”
The first day of Ramadan has good vibes, the first boy says.
What vibes? “It’s safe, not terrorism,” he says.
“We are not terrorists.”
In the days before Ramadan, the Australian rightwing politician and One Nation leader Pauline Hanson added to her long history of divisive comments directed at Muslims, suggesting there are no “good Muslims” and singling out Lakemba as somewhere
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