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On the cover are two Muslim children. The boy wears an England football shirt and the girl (in headscarf) is draped in an England flag. The message is clear: we are Muslim and English - we can be Muslim and support England. Similarly Omaar's heritage is a game of two halves.
He has lived in this country since he was five. He is a liberal, moderate Muslim who hasn't prayed at a mosque in a year and is angry that that the likes of Abu Hamza get more coverage than people like him: "As a British Muslim in London after 7th July, I did not recognise my life and the lives of my relatives in the representations I read in newspapers and saw on television."
The issues he raises are valid. Yes, the Muslim community is much-maligned post 9/11 and 7/7: members of his extended family are victims of race hate. Yes, some deaths are reported more vociferously than others. So in a way, Omaar does achieve his goal - to reveal a world which is seldom talked about.
He describes the Somali community and the political and social structure, or lack of it, in |
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the place he calls home.
There are also snippets of warmth when describing his childhood, settling into life on Edgware Road. But there are also many underwhelming anecdotes. He tells his aunt about an incident on a bus involving Somali girls speaking a mixture of English and their mother tongue. She is unmoved and I felt the same - though her reticence is for a more serious reason. The poor woman had earlier been on another bus, going to the mosque, when a man sat next to her. Afraid he would accidentally touch and thus invalidate her wash for prayers, she moved away, prompting him to react with fury. ("Your type blows up buses. You are the intolerant ones!") His aunt was sorry she couldn't explain that it had nothing to do with him being white or non-Muslim – and the example shows what chasms can exist between our cultures. Having said that, some other parts of the book just didn't ring true.
Yes, Omaar is right to ask questions - be angry even - but ultimately I feel that Only Half of Me is only half the story. 
FIRST POSTED JUNE 29, 2006
Anila Baig is television critic of The Sun
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