Hookah, also known as shisha, argileh or hubbly bubbly, is said to have originated in India or Persia. Nowadays it is mainly found in the Middle East, but more and more lounges have also appeared in cities such as Paris, Tokyo and New York. It’s no surprise, then, that cafes have proliferated throughout Dearborn, where “it really feels like you’re in an extension of the Arab world,” said Farah Al Qasimi, who photographed this story.
Hookah smoking remains a cultural touchstone for many Arab Americans, despite the well-documented health risks of tobacco use. “The widespread popular belief is that smoking a hookah is a safer alternative,” said Mary Rezk-Hanna, an assistant professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, School of Nursing who studies the vascular effects of tobacco products. In reality, Rezk-Hanna said, the chemicals in hookah smoke are similar to those in cigarette smoke.
Rezk-Hanna also noted that many lounges in the United States are located within three miles of a college campus, which may contribute to their popularity among young people. And research has shown that flavored tobacco products like hookah facilitate initiation, especially among younger users.
Like many young people in Dearborn, to marry started smoking hookah in high school. Despite the public health messages she was bombarded with during her childhood, she said she wasn’t terribly concerned about the health risks of tobacco.
But she struggled with guilt, shame and fear because her mother used to say that it was “haram” and “aib” – forbidden and shameful – for women to smoke. Had warned her mother about health risks, to marryPictured below for an ad in a dollar store in Dearborn, said “we probably would have listened.”
Still, to marry also felt a strong sense of liberation and community. She remembers being 13 and secretly making bongs out of water bottles with her cousin. “That’s the age when you want to keep secrets. You want to rebel a little.”
There was a certain lounge and a certain booth, “where the most important life events took place.” All of her teenage memories, she said, are wrapped up in that space.
While today’s teens may not have the same legal access to hookah as they do, to marry thinks they will still find a way to smoke. “Children break the rules — that’s how it is in the world,” she said. “We were all kids and we were trying it for the first time,” she added. “You might as well do it in the safety of a lounge.”
