When Stones Begin to Speak: Finding Our Place in Prophecy - By: Fouzia Usman

[Part 5 (final) of Journeys with Purpose: Turkey Dairy - Originally experienced in July 2023, reflecting back in January 2024]

When Service Transforms Sightseeing

After days of distributing aid to earthquake survivors and spending time with the Uyghur community, we returned to exploring Istanbul—but everything had changed. The city's historic sites were no longer just beautiful backdrops for family photos. They had become chapters in a story we now felt part of.

This wasn't my family's first visit to Turkey. The previous year, we had toured the country extensively—from Trabzon to Cappadocia, Konya to Antalya, Fethiye to Pamukkale, Izmir to Istanbul, and finally Bursa. We hired professional guides who recited facts and dates at each landmark. We collected beautiful photos and enjoyed quality family time.

It was what most would consider a perfect vacation.

But there was an emptiness to that first experience that I couldn't quite name at the time. We prayed in magnificent masjids and ate halal food, but Istanbul's rich Islamic history remained just another beautiful city to my children. The dates and facts our guides shared evaporated from their minds almost instantly.

The monuments were impressive, but they were just monuments—stones without stories.

The Delusion of Heritage Tourism

There's a delusion we have as parents that taking our children to historical places and showing them monuments will somehow connect them to their heritage. It won't—not when those places remain just picturesque backdrops for family photos.

As immigrant parents, we make regular trips back to our home countries so our children can connect with their roots. With our three children, we traveled to India every 2-3 years to build bonds with our extended family. These experiences helped them stay connected to our language and culture.

But what about the roots of Islam beyond our national identities?

We take them to Umrah and visit historical sites in Makkah and Madinah, but we still leave out over a thousand years of Islamic history. We've reduced our children's understanding of Islamic heritage to a few cities in Arabia, completely overlooking the vast expanse of Islamic civilization that transformed the world from Spain to China.

We're giving them fragments when they deserve the full story.

Prophecy Comes Alive

"Verily, you shall conquer Constantinople. What a wonderful leader will her leader be, and what a wonderful army will that army be." - Prophet Muhammad ﷺ (Musnad Ahmad 23461)

Everything changed in our second visit to Istanbul. After our experiences with earthquake survivors and the Uyghur community, we approached historical sites with different eyes. Rather than focusing on dates and monuments, we traced the narrative of this profound prophecy and its miraculous fulfillment.

We walked the same streets where Abu Ayyub Al-Ansari (RA), an elderly Companion of the Prophet ﷺ, traveled from beautiful Madinah in his old age. This wasn't just a historical footnote—it was the story of a man who left comfort behind to plant the seeds for a prophecy's manifestation, even though he knew he might not live to see its fulfillment.

Standing at his tomb, my children asked questions they never would have considered before: "How old was he when he came here?" "Why would he leave Madinah at that age?" "Did he know that it would take centuries for the prophecy to be fulfilled?"

After spending time with earthquake survivors who had lost everything yet maintained their faith, my children could better appreciate the sacrifice and conviction of this companion who journeyed so far from home.

Youth and Purpose

We followed the footsteps of the 21-year-old Sultan Mehmet II, who finally conquered what generations before him thought unconquerable. My son, approaching his teen years, was particularly struck by this young leader's determination and vision.

"He was only 21?" he kept repeating in disbelief. "And he accomplished what everyone else failed to do for hundreds of years?"

After our teen daughter had formed friendships with young Uyghur girls maintaining their cultural identity against all odds, she could better appreciate the courage it took for a young sultan to pursue what seemed impossible.

The narrative of potential, purpose, and perseverance now had concrete meaning—not through lectures, but through connections made between past achievements and present resilience.

Finding Inspiration at Any Age

We stood in masjids built by Mimar Sinan, one of the greatest architects in Islamic history—a man who discovered his extraordinary gift after the age of 50 and went on to design over 300 magnificent structures throughout the Ottoman Empire.

This fact particularly resonated with me as I approached middle age myself. Through his journey, my children learned how vital it is for Muslims to fulfill their potential regardless of age—that living with ihsan means excellence at any stage of life.

Just as we had witnessed the Uyghur elders preserving their culture for future generations, now my children could see how Sinan's late-blooming talent had created beauty that still inspires hundreds of years later.

When Monuments Find Meaning

Suddenly, the same landmarks we had photographed the previous year transformed before my children's eyes. Each pillar, each wall, each dome now had a story to tell—stories of sacrifice, determination, and unwavering faith.

For my children, this wasn't just "Islamic history" anymore. This was our history. Their inheritance. Their identity.

The same landmarks we had captured from every angle on our first trip—we returned to them again, but with hearts full of respect for the stories behind each structure.

Standing in the courtyard of Hagia Sophia, my daughter whispered, "Mom, I can almost hear the adhan that was called here for the first time after the conquest." After spending days with earthquake survivors who prayed despite having lost everything, the spiritual significance of these historic spaces became tangible to her.

Why Our Children Struggle to Connect

That's when I realized why our children struggle to connect with their Islamic heritage.

It's not because they don't care. It's because we've reduced 1400 years of triumphant history to boring textbooks and occasional TV shows. We educate them about the golden age, yet we rarely allow them to explore the places where history unfolded and prophecy came to pass—and when we do, we focus on facts rather than narratives.

More importantly, we separate historical greatness from present struggles. But in our journey, it was precisely our connection with today's resilient Muslims—earthquake survivors rebuilding their lives and Uyghur families preserving their identity—that made historical achievements meaningful.

The elderly companion who traveled far from home to fulfill a prophecy became real after we met families who had lost everything yet maintained their faith.

The young sultan who conquered the unconquerable became inspiring after we witnessed Uyghur youth keeping their culture alive against all odds.

The architect who found his purpose at 50 became relevant after we saw displaced communities creating beauty amid struggle.

From Tourists to Inheritors

As our trip came to a close, I observed a profound shift in how my children related to Islamic heritage. They no longer viewed themselves as tourists visiting important sites. They had become inheritors of a legacy—participants in an ongoing story that stretches back 1400 years and continues through struggles and triumphs today.

When news about Turkey or the Uyghur situation appears now, my children pay attention differently. These aren't distant events happening to strangers but developments affecting places and people they feel connected to.

The humanitarian experiences we had—distributing aid, shopping for orphaned sisters, spending time with the Uyghur community—created the emotional foundation that made history come alive. By connecting with today's Muslims in their moments of struggle and resilience, we could better appreciate the sacrifice and vision of those who came before us.

This, I believe, is how we truly connect our children to their Islamic heritage: not through passive tourism, but through purposeful engagement with both past and present.

As we boarded our flight home, my daughter summed it up perfectly: "Mom, next time we travel, can we always do it this way? I feel like we didn't just see Turkey—we found our place in it."

It is my dream and heartfelt dua that one day I can create such transformative experiences for other Muslim families. Our children deserve more than fragments of their history—they deserve to find themselves within it, to discover not just where they come from, but who they are meant to become.

This series of posts recounts our family's journey in Turkey during July 2023, where what began as a simple aid project transformed into a profound exploration of service, connection, and heritage. From my daughter's casual comment about "just $40" to our walks through historically significant sites, every step taught us that meaningful travel isn't about the places we see, but about how deeply we engage with the stories—both historical and contemporary—that make those places sacred.