Assalamualaikum!
Hi guys, my name is Kai. and I am a muslim, as you might notice from one piece of clothing called veil on top my head which I'm very proud of.
Coming from Indonesia, the third world largest growing population nation with massively 80% of Muslim population, living there as muslim is very easy. We have halal food, halal cosmetics, we have mosque everywhere, we can pray everywhere. But, moving across Europe where I am minority, is a bit challenging.
But, wait. Is it hard? I tell you absolutely not. Challenging but not hard.
I have been travelling across country where Muslim is minority since 2014, and with my travel skills and a bit of courage, I will break down in this Novara halal guide *insert cheesy music*.
By this blog post, I want to credit my knowledge and courage to my dad, because when I first started traveling abroad, my dad was always with me giving me clue what to do. And he build knowledge, endurance, confidence in me. Thank you abi! And I want to thank Profetik Study Club, which I learn a lot about halal in the college and also the halal certification process and training back then in my office job which makes me know a lot about the halal stuff.
First thing first, before started, I want to remind you something my brother and sister fillah.
Allah knew the best for us, and believe me the practice itself is not gonna make you suffer, dont worry.
Novara for Muslim
In general, Novara is a welcoming city with 100,000 population and 8,000 immigrants. It has quite a lot of muslim populations, you can see a lot of people wearing hijab basically anywhere so if you think you will be alien, you won't don't worry. Another thing about Italy.. Italy is one of the biggest Catholics country with 79% of its populations, when I am going around Europe, the country that is more religious (not mentioning any religion they are ties to) they are more tolerant when we practice our beliefs. But if you are in the huge populations of atheist like Prague or Budapest, some of people might shows different tolerant. But you just need to get a grip of it, and let it go.
A Complete Halal Guide
#1 Food
I have been travel quite a bit before going to Europe where muslim is minority. You need to remember that people did not really know what does halal means. And halal means nothing to do with them at all. So if you are asking for halal logo on your food, your meat, your cosmetics, you will fine none.
So how do we ask people is it really halal or not? Should we set up the whole interview?
For me, the easiest way to find one is asking is it vegetarian / vegan or not (actually vegan is the safest) and contain alcohol or not. By asking those 2 questions, you can assure that particular food is halal.
Why? Because vegan means there is no any animal derivatives in the product at all, but in vegan world its still possible to contain alcohol, so we ask the 2nd question.
Actually when I was in bachelor degree I was in a club where I studied the halal-ness of product and I also involved in halal certification in my last company. So I have a bit of knowledge about this stuff. There is something called halal criticality on the product we consumed, its actually more complicated than you think in this modern society. A lot of levitating agents derived from pig, etc. So when you learn a bit more about the criticality, you can actually asked more specific question and inspect more specific things, but in case you feel like its not a cup of your tea, then its okay as well (for no brainer, vegan/vegetarian side + non-alcohol will always works).
I can give an example, in biscuits they will use emulsifier and levitating agents, these 2 agents can use pig derivates, so when you buy biscuits you can inspect what kind emulsifier and levitating agent they use, etc. In pre-made Tiramisu they usually use alcohol in the product, you can ask if they use alcohol or not. By understanding the criticality of each product it will be very easy to live in foreign country, and of course you will not feel isolated because you feel like there is nothing you can't eat. Remember being muslim is easy, you just need a couple of weapon called knowledge.
a) Halal Meat in Novara
Halal meat (chicken, cow meat, turkey, halal sausage) can be bought in Halal Macelleria around the school or Pakistani Store near the school, sometimes they are also avaiable in Carrefour or Penny Express (with halal logo on it), but my favorite is Macelleria Hasan near university: https://g.page/islamic-mini-market-alementari-n?share. They sell very good and fresh meat and they sell halal german sausage and home made bread as well if you are interested.
There are actually some places as well, you can just type in google maps "Halal Macelleria" and some of them will pop up. Macelleria in English means "Butcher's shop".
b) Vegetarian / Vegan Stuff
Actually I barely buy meat, I more into vegetarian/vegan stuff. If you are like me, you are most likely love the supermarket named "ALDI" the most. They have the most amazing vegan/vegetarian stuff started from meat ball, fake meat, etc. They also have very affordable mushroom which is my favorite thing ever.
ALDI location: https://goo.gl/maps/XNvYmHCvCh7zV5XE7
ALDI is our favorite place to buy groceries, they are affordable, well located, good quality and have a lot of vegetarian/vegan substitution to complete your meal.
.HEIC)
.HEIC)
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| this one is very good, they are affordable as well. |
c) Eating in Mensa (Canteen)
"Mensa" means Canteen! If you received your mensa card or matricola number, congratulations now you can eat in the mensa (canteen) with reduction price. It only cost 1,8 Euro for the full meal in the canteen.
But, can we eat in the mensa? Yes, sure. Mensa will always have non-meat options. So, don't worry! Actually Northern Italy food is not heavily meat-ed. Actually there are 2 mensa (canteen) in Novara:
--> The big mensa (lunch and dinner), which is located here: https://goo.gl/maps/pjhcET1jMfnYNJfQA
--> The small mensa (lunch only) which is located here: https://g.page/novarasviluppo?share
Everyday they serve different foods, but there are some different between small and big mensa.
In the big mensa, you have more options:
1) Regular meal (which is consist of Tris: first plate (primi), second plate, vegetables, dessert) --> in this regular meal you can see the ingredient from the list and you can check.
If Im not sure I will ask them,
the simplest - elementary school way is by doing this --> Pointing out to the meal and ask, "Questo (this one), con carne o senza carne? (with meat or without meat) its usually always works and they will explain Con means with, senza means without. If it contains meat, just drop it of by saying no when they ask you if you want it.
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| Regular meal in the big mensa (Tris or three menu). They have vegan burger which is my favorite. The canteen lady can not speak English. If you are very not sure, just ask "Vegetariano?" or "Vegano?" |
2) Pizza. Remember in some of the pizzas they have prosciutto in the pizza (and prosciutto is from pig, so its haram ^^). But you can always take : 1) Margherita Pizza (with cheese and tomato) 2) Pizza con Verdure (Pizza with vegetables on top and cheese) 3) Pizza con Tonno (with tuna which is my favorite). The canteen lady will ask what kind of Pizza you would like to have, so you have that 3 options.
By the way the pizza in the mensa is so good, you have to try!
3) They have Pokebowl and Salad with Tuna, just in case you don't feel like having regular meal and pizza.
d) Gelato and Sweets
Gelato most of them is halal, except the one with alcohol. But sweets! Be careful since a lot of the pre-made one like tiramisu or panna cota (the cheap one from supermarket) they are not halal (they have alcohol inside), always inspect them before trying.
Alcohol in Italian is Alcool, if you find the ingredients with alcool inside you can drop it.
But most of tiramisu from the restaurant, they are actually without alcohol. You can always ask, so don't worry.
Tiramisu without Alcohol - Fra Diavolo (https://goo.gl/maps/11UZrRqCTXTWECex9)
e) Halal Aperitivo
When you go to Italy, you will see they have sweet cultures called aperitivo. Usually people going out and having like drink (usually wine) and small side dish, it is happening aroung 17:00 to 20:00, that one is called aperitivo and its usually pretty affordable like 5 Euro.
How to enjoy aperitivo since we did not drink alcohol? Dont worry they usually also have non-alcoholic drink and also vegetarian side dish, the non-alcoholic drink usually mixed of different fruit juice. Or if you like you can ask for cola, but try the non-alcoholic aperitivo, its super nice.
The place where you can find "Non-Alcoholic + Vegetarian Aperitivo"
'Halal Aperitivo' Non-alcoholic drink + Vegetarian food - Il Broletto (https://goo.gl/maps/WPzUPgCVmCJxELJt8)
f) Halal Restaurant in Novara
Italy actually very muslim friendly country in terms of food. When you go to any pizzeria you will always have options. They will always have food without meat, and most of the time they write down the ingredients.
Unlike when you are in South Korea or Japan while they always mixed their ingredients with some pig derivatives XD LOL sorry, but that was my experience.. here in Italy they are very muslim friendly. Sometimes they dont even use butter to cook. Only salt, olive oil, pasta and tomato, very halal.. isn't it?
Everything is fresh, basic, good quality raw materials, artisan, home made so you can ask for the ingredients (well most of the time its already written down). The thing that might be a bit tricky is alcohol, but you can always ask. If you say, is there restaurant that have halal options in Novara? Yes, most of them have one.
But, lets talk about places that might sell meat that you are craving for: chicken or kebab.
If you are craving for some fried chicken there is a place that I always goes to called "Tasty Food" they sell halal fried chicken and other stuff (https://goo.gl/maps/VYF7bXecLqLSnANU8).
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| Fried Chicken in "Tasty Food" you can buy only chicken (Solo Chicken) or Tutto Menu (whole menu with Soda and fries). |
The Kebab Places that I recommended, the best one is actually near university "Marakech" (https://goo.gl/maps/kxq9zW3imfgYEkmFA). You have to try the roasted chicken in this place, which is very-very good.
the Okay place that I keep coming back is the one near the station called "4 Brothers" (https://goo.gl/maps/HpVjwA2nuoymCyLP9).
My friend said Istanbul have the best kebab but I never tried "Istanbul" (https://goo.gl/maps/m35X78u8frahKdL67).
The price range from 7 Euro - 8 Euro for full menu (dont be shock as Novara is not as cheap as you might think xD).
g) Asian African Store
If you are a big fan of halal certificate logo, you can always find product in the Asian store. There are quite few Asian store in Novara, and you can find products from Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia or South Korea from Asian Store.
As you know that Asian food use a lot of vegetables and also use more spices, make sense because we grew spices. you can actually find spices, tasty vegetarian stuff which is halal like affordable tofu, rice noodles, nori and halal stuff in the shops.
There are few stores near the station :
Asian African store #1 Haiyi (https://goo.gl/maps/1EVVLM2xJcAwwAv36)
This is the most frequently visited store because they are very complete, they have everything, and as usual chinese place is always the cheapest. It is located across the train station. The downside is sometimes there were bunch of guys standing infront of the store door and look a bit shady, you might be hesitant to look inside, but you just need a bit of courage and enter the store.
.HEIC) |
| Shin Ramyun (Produced in South Korea) with halal logo. I think this is the one they exported to Indonesia and Malaysia. |
Asian African store #2 Tuttotuo Minimarket (https://goo.gl/maps/7yjxcT2Jfqb2KNz9A)
They have slightly more expensive prices but they look way cleaner, in line, the owner is very nice and they also sell meat in the market. It is located next to Haiyi.
Asian African store #3 Atlas (https://goo.gl/maps/t654bV8SWCfcyjm86)
This one located near university, they have some stuff that the #1 and #2 market did not have.
h) Partying
As you might be like me with no "Partying cultures" at all, you might find it difficult to in corporates to the partying cultures. Well, yup, you can always come and bring your own food and drink (the non-alcoholic one), I usually bring peach tea and lemon tea from carrefour which is nice and white potato chips. Remember, no one will force you to drink alcohol, not a single drop, so relax and enjoy the party.
#2 Praying
Where to pray? Actually we pray anywhere. There is actually a mosque behind university, during autumn its possible to pray there because the schedule is possible, but during the winter it is a bit hard because the day is getting shorter.
a) Mosque Behind University called "Centro Islamico di Novara"
Located here : https://goo.gl/maps/WdVGDQ56EHuCAKmDA
But this mosque will be open only during the prayer time. Remember to bring your own prayer set, and ask the mosque member to open the "Woman prayer place" since it is located in the left side of the building (it is located separated from the man prayer place and not always open all the time). You can have wudhu here, they also have heater and AC, its actually very-very nice place to pray.
I was deep inside my heart a bit crying because they do adzan and I never heard it for 3 months, it felt nice to be 'home'.
As you might know because of the schedule and winter time the day is shorter, so its harder to go to the mosque on time during the prayer times because of the lecture and everything. So, we pray where?
b) EMOTION Common Room
EMOTION Common room is actually a safe place for you to pray. Bring your prayer matt with you have wudhu so anytime it comes to prayer time, you can always pray there.
c) Empty Classroom.
In many occasion we pray in the empty classroom, since EMOTION class room is the dedicated classroom no one will abruptly coming to this class except the class member. Thanks for the best classmate ever they dont mind for us to pray in the classroom.
d) In the park (yes we do).
If we study in the mensa we have no place to pray, except the park, yes. This is what I always do when traveling back then in Japan, and I always encourage my friend "Its okay to pray in the park", "Come on, people can get naked why we can't pray for one minute," Yes I do say stupid but make sense thing so I do not care to pray in the park, in fact nobody care about you. People might stare at you but actually Italian is very acceptance, never single episode in my life they kick me out or say anything. Bring your prayer matt, nothing will happen, it will always works.
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| me and Israa taking turn to pray in the corner of the school (its an open space). |
e) In the Vehicle (Bus, train, etc)
If you go to a place that feels like its not clean enough or you hesitant about the cleanliness, my advice is just pray in the vehicle.. do not pray in the open space (this is what I experienced back then in China, Paris and some cities in Italy), if you dont have time to go back to place where you stay, or constantly moving, you dont have much other choices.. Because sometimes people didnt really care about their dog poo and its just everywhere, you can smell that the road stink with pee. I didnt trust places like this. Hop on the tram/bus/train and pray there where you are on it its way better than missing it out.
One most important rule is, you are a traveler in non-muslim country. So always have yourself ready for praying because the opportunity sometimes did not come twice (have your wudhu, bring your prayer matt). When I went to Lugano, there is an empty spaces near the lake my instinct says this is the perfect time and place to pray, so I asked the girls would it be okay for me to pray there and they say okay...
f) Finding Qibla
To find Qibla, I usually use this app called "Qibla finder" https://qiblafinder.withgoogle.com/intl/en/desktop
g) Praying Mat
I recommend you to bring one the water resistant praying mat with you as Italy is 4 season country and as you might pray in the park, the praying matt will be your savior.
#3 Fasting and Celebrating "Ied" in Novara.
Italy has its own ulama organization centered in Rome, so timing / started of the fasting time will be announced by the Grand Mosque of Rome (Centro Islamico Culturale d'Italia - Grande Moschea di Roma), where you can find the information? Using facebook group. Unfortunately most of these mosque information you can only find in facebook. So joined one!
Any announcement regarding --> Fasting --> Ied --> anything else will be announced in this facebook group (The facebookgroup: https://www.facebook.com/centroislamicoculturale).
They recently also open the instagram pages : https://www.instagram.com/grande_moschea_roma/?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
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| Example of the facebook announcement in the Grand Mosque Rome |
But, you need to remember in case of the prayer time, Rome and Novara will have different timing because they are more to the mid-south of Italy, we are on the North. To have better information on that you need to joined the Milano Moschea (https://www.facebook.com/moscheamilanosesto) and Torino Moschea facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/CentroTaiba).
If you want to know how much is the different, I will give you the comparison:
1) This one is in Turin
2) This one is in Rome
As you might notice that in Turin maghrib is 20:57 in the first of August, but in Rome 20:30, so its like 27 minutes different, so make sure you pick the right timing XD. When you are fasting if you put "Rome" time you will have shorther day, welp, dont do that XD.
Celebrating ied is possible in Novara! Yess! Where?
If you think Novara have small muslim populations, you are wrong XD, when we gather together, we are actually a lot. Usually the prayer held in the yard near MCDonalds near university (you hear me right, MCD), you need to come at 07:00-08:00 before the prayer started and bring your own prayer mat.
Praying location : https://goo.gl/maps/rmN4QHsoKEQaDJdy8
Walk to the field behind MCD and you will see policeman (polizia) and people preparing the prayer there. There is a line to separate man and woman. Btw, The police is always there but dont worry they dont do anything.
In case of ied adha, the community will provide you with cold water and snacks which is very nice. My advice is dont go to McDonalds afterwards because its super crowded. Everytime Ied is celebrated that MCD has 1000% of revenue XD.
If you want to have more "mosque" praying experience you can always go to Milan or Turin because they have grand mosque there but you need to come early in the morning, which possible for Milan but a bit hard for Turin since Turin is a bit far.
#4 Clothing
I want to say something about clothing, especially for summer. Welp, I dont find a good quality hijab friendly clothing that will makes you survive in very hot conditon for summer. I think since Indonesia is very hot, we have a lot of innovation in our fabrics. We can have long sleeves and stay cool. Its about the fabrics XD.
Actually I bought one clothes for summer which is not cheap like 30 Euro, but to be honest, it was bad. It was easily crumbled (I feel like using not ironed shirt), It was hot when I was using it, the size is too big for me, the cut was not suits me, its just makes me feel unhappy and I feel like to just drop this 30 euro shirt.
I wonder maybe that's why people here like less clothing because they dont have a very good fabrics that suits for summer. Actually I thought it was only me but no, there was a Vietnamese tiktoker complaining the same thing about European fabrics which is not very good for summer. I think all the SEA people can relate. But well, I have an options to buy Aerism Series in The Uniqlo its just The Uniqlo in Europe not affordable at all.
But luckily, I have one week sets of clothing for summer (no actually its my daily clothes back home) which is suitable for this weather. So if want to bring clothes from your home country, I recommend to bring summer clothing than winter clothing because we have that "summer technology" way better than here.
Another thing I will mention is hard to find hijab, you can find one in the bazaar by pakistani or Indian seller, but in the normal store you can use scarf as alternative.
As, again Indonesia is very innovative in clothing, also in hijab I owned a lot of instant hijab, that I can use it without any hardship for 2 second! Very stylish, very cool, you dont need to iron them its always ready. And ofc here you will find none. The hijab materials here is also not for summer for sure, so bring your hijab that suits for summer from your home country. and bring some instant hijab as you will always need it :
a) bring the light one to use at home, in case you are travelling or there is a guy coming your house (because everything is quite mix, you might live in a girl only house but you might have guy visitor).
b) bring the formal instant hijab for daily use is very useful.
I personally bring 6 instant hijab. 4 for formal, and 2 for daily use. I have one which I always bring during travel, because its super cool, super light, very nice.
Another I can mention as Indonesian is very windy place, very crowded we always use pin and broches to secure our hijab. Unfortunately its very rare to find people that sell both. I bought my pin in Padova's market, and I found none of the broches that I like, because they barely sell any.
So if you always see me using the same stuff, not only because I was a minimalist, but I also find none.
Okay, that's all the small stuff that I can write down to you as a halal guide
Everyone have different way of processing and doing stuff and this is what I do. I was not a saint so I might type something wrong but Allah knows for sure I have tried. I hope this is helpful because figuring out by yourself is maybe hard.
So have a pleasant journey as minority group in Novara, always be kind, be respectful, remember to be respected you have to be respectful.
Remember we are not doing any harm to practice what we believe, and so does others. You just need to put a mindset that other people did not know what you are practicing, believing, so do not feel disrespected when they ask something about Islam ^^ (feel happy about it and do not let yourself down).
I wrote this down, because I want you to hold a faith because being a muslim is in fact very easy. If anyone have anymore question just DM me on instagram.
Assalamualaikum!
