Ayman Ismail

I won't get another chance to help them learn Arabic for the sake of them being connected to this massive heritage that they're inheriting.

So in that context, it has to happen now.

And if you're going to ask me how important is it that they get that connection, I'm going to tell you it's everything.

Wow, what an intro.

You almost do this for a living or something.

I don't want to get mad, Muslim.

When I was growing up, the question of whether or not I would go to Islamic school when it came up with my parents had nothing to do with money.

In fact, it made zero money sense.

The Islamic school they chose to send us to was the local one.

It was in Jersey City.

So it was one town over.

We were living in Newark, New Jersey, where I live today.

And the tuition, I think, was around $6,000 per student.

And they had four kids, so they're talking about four students.

Okay.

So this is like a K through 12 school.

So it's all the way up to the end of high school to college.

Academically, it's pretty good.

But at the same time, we really got to learn Arabic.

And we also really got to understand not really the spiritual side of the religion, but the mechanics.