Coasters, Camaraderie and a Case of Nerves (Muslim Day at Great Adventure)

Stephanie Keith for The New York Times
Muslim Youth Day participants hit the rides at Six Flags Great Adventure, in Jackson, N.J., after midday prayer Friday.

JACKSON, N.J., Sept. 17 - It may have been Aqsa Khan's first visit to Six Flags Great Adventure, but she knew enough to hustle over to the park's largest roller coaster as soon as the midday prayer ended.

"I thought I was going to die," said Ms. Khan, a sophomore at New York University, upon exiting the Nitro, the mile-long roller coaster that drops 230 feet at about 85 miles per hour.

Accompanied by a half-dozen classmates, Ms. Khan was among the estimated 15,000 Muslims who came out for Muslim Youth Day on Friday, when the Great Adventure theme park was set aside for Muslims from as far away as Massachusetts and North Carolina. Many of the children were off from school, since public schools in New York City, Philadelphia and much of New Jersey were closed for Rosh Hoshanah.

"It's nice to see so many here," said Ms. Khan's friend Maheen Farooqi, a junior from Long Island. "I haven't really been around so many Muslims at one time before."

Shaista Barch, who was waiting in line at the giant swing ride with some of the 50 relatives who joined her here, concurred. "It's a good Muslim day," she said.

Yet Muslim Youth Day, intended as a day of relaxation and morale boosting, has not been a thoroughly smooth ride. The last week has been fraught with threats and racial epithets lobbed at the Islamic Circle of North America, the group that rented the park for the event, and the corporate offices of Six Flags Great Adventure.

Kristin Siebeneicher, Six Flags's spokeswoman, said she spent the week in interviews with radio performers from New Jersey, California, Colorado, Texas and Oklahoma who wanted to know why the park was turning its rides over to Muslims and shutting everyone else out for the day.

"The concerns are that they believe the event is exclusionary," Ms. Siebeneicher said. "I don't think most people understood it was a day we're closed anyway, and we were not taking something away from the public to give to a private group."

In the spring and fall, Six Flags is open only on weekends, and the park is often rented out to groups on weekdays, Ms. Siebeneicher said. She added that the National Conference of Synagogue Youth regularly rented the park for a day, as well as the Catholic Youth Rally and an organization of home-schooled children.

Earlier this week, the words "for Muslims only" were removed from the sponsor's Internet advertisement for the event. Adem Carroll, a relief coordinator and spokesman for Islamic Circle of North America, said the event was never intended to exclude others, particularly because many of its members are in mixed families, with Muslims and non-Muslims. The intent instead was to provide a protected environment for those seeking to relax.

"A lot of people don't feel safe going on another day," Mr. Carroll said. "Because of our dress standards, they might be afraid of being taunted. There's a lot of hostility out there."

Raza Farrukh, chairman of the organization's local chapter and chief coordinator of the event, said some people who bought the discounted $20 passes were concerned for their safety.

Stephanie Keith for The New York Times
Most at the park gathered on plastic tarps for midday prayer Friday, and three less formal prayer sessions were scheduled
throughout the day. Six Flag held off on its Halloween decorations, at the sponsor's request.

On Thursday, the F.B.I. brought in bomb-sniffing dogs to do a full sweep of the park, said Mr. Farrukh, who sent out a mass e-mail message to ticketholders earlier in the week informing them of added security. The park brought in not only the Jackson Township police but also a contingent of F.B.I. agents for the day.

Ms. Siebeneicher said that the most disturbing thing about the questions she fielded about the event was the implication that Six Flags was playing host to a terrorist-friendly organization.

She said one talk show host asked if the company would rent the park to Nazis. The park's guest services phone lines and the company's corporate offices in Oklahoma were flooded by callers asking Six Flags to reverse its decision and threatening to boycott or sue the park.

"It's truly sad and very unfortunate that people feel that way," she said. "This is America. Six Flags doesn't discriminate against race, religion or sexual orientation. We're not about politics."

Nevertheless, Six Flags did run an additional F.B.I. check on the sponsoring group, despite the fact that they had rented the park to the group twice before.

In fact, the last time Muslim Youth Day took place here was just three days before the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

Farhan Pervez, the secretary of Islamic Circle of North America, said his group, based in Queens, decided to skip the event the last two years because "we didn't want to be in a festive mood around that anniversary."

When talks resumed with Six Flags last winter to bring the event back, the group sought to book a day in a month other than September, but were told that Friday was the only day available, Mr. Pervez said.

Most of those who came to Friday's event - while highly sensitive to the bias against Muslims, often brought on by their style of dress - were unaware of this week's controversy.

"Of course we are looked at," said Bayan Adileh, a 14-year-old from North Bergen, N.J., wearing a black and white scarf covering her head. "People wonder why we are outside our house. You learn to ignore it."

While most of the women at the event complied with some version of the dress code, or hijab, fully covering their bodies and heads, standards were somewhat loosened for the men, many of whom were admitted in shorts and T-shirts.

With rides scheduled to open at 3 p.m., the lines to enter the park grew slow and long by early afternoon, as the security force raked through pocketbooks, backpacks and baby strollers. With the crowd growing antsy, the park added security guards at 2:30 p.m. to speed up the entry process.

After waiting two hours to get in, Yassar Abraham and his family headed straight to the picnic area, where halal dishes like samosas, biryani and buttered chicken replaced the usual burgers and fries.

Before racing off to their favorite rides, most gathered for the midday prayer. Giant blue plastic tarps were spread across the pavement in front of Fort Independence, where men knelt facing east during the hourlong sermon. Behind them, women lined more blue tarps on the ground beside Bluebeard's Lost Treasure Train. Three other less formal prayer sessions were scheduled throughout the day.

Six Flags would usually have had its Halloween decorations up by now, but the park honored the sponsor's request to hold off hanging skeletons, witches and ghosts, which Mr. Farrukh said were viewed as idols by some Muslims.

Most of the park's shops and concessions were closed, and those that were open were not too busy. Much more active was the open-air bazaar outside the Batman and Robin roller coaster, where shoppers could buy a new gown, scarf or prayer rug.

Youssra Kamal of Matawan, N.J., was doing a brisk business in scarves, head pieces and sleeve extensions. "It's difficult to get these around here," Ms. Kamal said. "We're trying to do something that looks fashionable and elegant, but still is religious."

After three years of lying low, most of those who came to Six Flags on Friday were happy to have Muslim Youth Day back on the calendar.

"A lot of Muslims are scared to have big gatherings," Ms. Farooqi said. "They're afraid to be in the public eye. If something goes wrong again, they don't want to be there. But we need to do this kind of thing. It's time."

You seem overly sensitve on behalf of the Muslims...my point stated over and over is that the "reasonable" Muslims have never stood up and expressed outrage at the terrorists.

The reasonable ones breed like crazy in Europe so the crazy Muslims can take over in 30-50 years. All Muslims are involved in demographic warfare.

Nazis and KKK are all wrong-American Muslims are not ALL bad

Why? What's the difference? All Muslims by definition worship the Koran which is definitely a hate-book that promotes the slaughter of all Jews and Christians. Mohammed himself despised Jews at least as much as Hitler did.

"..I WILL GO UP AGAINST YOU OR ANYONE IN CONSERVATIVE IDEOLOGY AND KNOWLEDGE....YOU'RE BIGOTRY AGAINST ANYONE WHO DOES NOT AGREE WITH YOU IS APPARENT..OH MAN-I FEEL LIKE HAVING A ZEL MILLER DUEL!!!!!"

The key to a successful counter attack is not to type all in caps. It makes you look like a michael moore style loud mouth

There's a movie coming out right now that shows the gentle sweet side of Hitler --- even he was probably not completely evil --- but overall he was very evil. Hitler's Nazi Youth I'm sure had their sweet side --- they would likely have been thrilled at a day out at an American amusement park -- we could have seen them dressed with their swastikas smiling faces filled with joy on these same rides.

Perhaps I did go a bit nuclear! For that I will apologize a bit-YOU did not advocate killing-just some other commentors did or made references..

You know whats funny..I don't really know why I am defending them or sounding sensitive...because I usually take the side you are arguing....I just saw the pics and thought about some people I know and felt that I don't like lumping all of a people of a religion together...even though they sure desrve it at times...It was the snowball effect of responding to comments and I backed myself into souding like an apologist which I am not!
God Bless America and the Yankees...The yankees really need it!!!!!(as America always enjoys His blessings!)

lol well said there.

Just because the muslims have little kids who smile when they go on amusement park rides does not mean they mean america well.

On another note, kudos to the muslims for actually *gasp* having a tiny bit of fun in their otherwise boring and repressed lives.

The liberal Muslims gravitate to the nicer part of Mohamed's life

Wasn't that "nicer" part of his life when he was older and was pleasuring himself with that little girl "wife"? His favorite -- the one he married when she was 6 years old? Anyone worshipping a man like him is not good deep down.

as tough as I can be on our fellow Muslim citizens...
I will admit that the photos from the article/thread will just burn the butts of
the Taliban/Islamic terrorist thugs...

ummmm...I see what you mean! Thanks!

This is not to you....whats with all the Nazi talk...sounds a bit crazy. Yes I know- Nazis=enemy=WW2, All Muslims=enemy=WW3....I dunno....

Plus --- I wonder why these amusement park Muslims are grinning so joyfully when some of their own just wiped the smiles off several hundred Russian kids --- you'd think they would be looking a little more serious if they were questioning the direction their religion is going.

well, I do not know for sure that all of those people at muslim fun day would be capable of the same kind of brutality that was carreid out in russia.

I do know that most muslims seem to be rather apathetic about such going ons. You do not hear of many loudly protesting muslim groups (except the ones who are afraid of getting kicked out of russia by an enraged putin). It doesn't worry them half as much as it worries us.

I don't think it is so crazy. I thought the muslims were scary back in 1994 when i first learned about them. They seemed so intense and strange to me.

If another terrorist attack carried out by muslims happens in america, I predict that there will be clamorings to deport many muslim americas for safety.

If it strikes home it gets personal and people get mad. People do what they must do during a crisis...

I guess if you're consistent and think it would be nice to have a similar Nazi celebration so we can see pictures of them smiling with their own kids. Nazis had families also -- and many were just going along with the rest --- many closed their eyes to what was taking place in the name of their ideology --- they just ignored the death chambers and concentration camps -- but did go along with the overall goals.

Most Nazis didn't actually run the death camps either -- but they allowed some things to go on. Hitler and his helpers didn't just get where they got by themselves --- they had the basic support of many many others. Just like the terrorists don't just pop up out of nowhere and use only their own finances for their deeds.

Our doors have been too open for too long.

We are stupid fools.

History will look back on us in more vigilant times and wonder.

yes and who can say for sure that those muslims in six flags would not serve dinner to osama bin laden if he happened to turn up at their doorstep?

I am sure many of them would rather serve dinner to a terrorist or future suicide bomber than our president George W. Bush.

But that is just speculation.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.