You know how sometimes you read and you read, and you’ve got all of this information that's just sat there, and then you read one thing, and it sort of puts it all together? Well, that's how I found my faith. For me, that was about seven or eight years ago. Before that there were times when I thought that there was a God out there and there were other times that I thought no, there's no God! This is all rubbish. There were times when I’d do my prayers and times when I didn’t. I couldn't just really believe because it had to be there intellectually.

It was important that I was able to make a connection between what I had in my head and in my heart. I didn't want to simply do things because people told me to do them or because I wanted to please others. I think it's far too easy to go down that road. People like things to be ordered and anyone that questions or reflects critically and questions norms can become an outcast but that isn't being true to yourself. Before that, I wanted to believe and at times it made sense to me, and at other times it didn’t. I started wearing the hijab post 9/11 but I had been thinking about it before. I think people may have perceived that 9/11 played a part in that but in all honesty, it didn’t! After I started wearing hijab, my mum went to Pakistan and one of my cousins asked how I was and my mum said, “Oh yes, she's started wearing the hijab!” and the reaction she got was “But she's quite nice looking! Why is she wearing the hijab?” I thought that was really funny – “Ok! Only ugly girls wear it then!”

When the whole faith thing clicked for me, I thought the hijab was a requirement.