Tucked inside a cushy high-rise in Tysons Corner with floors of co-working spaces \u2014 the kind with fruit-infused water and slick modern furniture \u2014 a group of five people sit in a conference room, facing a projector screen.<\/p>\n
You can call it the Situation Room for BeyondChai \u2014 a D.C.-area based paid matchmaking service that caters mainly to young Muslims. It\u2019s within these glass walls that BeyondChai\u2019s matchmaking staff meets to discuss their clients.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a client in mind, he\u2019s 38 years old, an entrepreneurial dentist and he\u2019s very successful,\u201d says matchmaker Sadia Khan.<\/p>\n
Across the table, her colleague Abeer Ayaz thinks she might have found a match for Khan\u2019s dentist.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s an entrepreneur herself, she has her own fashion line,\u201d Ayaz says.<\/p>\n
The two quickly trade notes, until a detail derails the potential match.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe wears hijab,\u201d Ayaz says.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh sorry, he\u2019s not interested in hijab. I think he\u2019s not used to it, because no one in his family wears it,\u201d Khan says.<\/p>\n
The match fizzled before it even began, but luckily for the dentist and the designer there\u2019s a healthy pool of clients in the matchmaking database. The group says membership has grown by 45 percent in the last 6 months, with roughly 10,000 active members nation-wide.<\/p>\n
BeyondChai attributes the bump in clientele to President Trump\u2019s comments about Muslims and terrorism. Co-founder Asad Ansari says all of that instilled fear in the Muslim community.<\/p>\n
Members of the BeyondChai team discuss matches between their clients.Tyrone Turner \/ WAMU<\/p>\n
\u201cMuslims are looking to unite, and are looking for ways to comfort each other,\u201d Ansari says.<\/p>\n
Another matchmaker, Saman Quraeshi, says she had a client who used to be married to a non-Muslim. But in the wake of the election, her client\u2019s views on faith and love changed dramatically.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe came specifically to me and said, \u2018This time I would like to marry someone who is of the same religious background,\u201d Quraeshi says. \u201cBecause that\u2019s what was bringing her comfort in this time when she felt personally attacked by the government.\u201d
\nA Modern Search for Love<\/p>\n
Hasan Khalid joined BeyondChai about 2 months ago. Khalid says his timing had nothing to do with politics, and everything to do with living a sheltered life when it came to looking for love.<\/p>\n
\u201cI grew up under a rock,\u201d Khalid says with a chuckle, \u201cAnd I felt like I had the definition figured out which is to have a nice, educated person who is from a good family and is a practicing Muslim.\u201d<\/p>\n
In many ways, the 29-year-old Pakistani-American is looking for someone who is a lot like himself: a practicing Muslim professional who prays daily, and fasts from dawn until sundown during the holy month of Ramadan.<\/p>\n
But Khalid says he\u2019s too busy to meet someone the modern way, and too modern to be set up by his mom.<\/p>\n
\u201cI tease my mother this way, and tell her that \u2018I am not importing a person\u2019,\u201d Khalid says.<\/p>\n
So, he signed up for BeyondChai.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat BeyondChai provided me is, that value of time,\u201d Khalid says. \u201cWhere I speak to someone who is serious, they\u2019re invested in this process and you really have good, insightful conversations.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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