The number of Muslims in Japan has almost quadrupled in the last two decades. Migrants are coming in ever greater numbers to work there from countries like Indonesia. And yet, Islam is still seen as this... foreign, elusive thing.

This week on the show, reporter Tanita Rahmani follows two Muslim women who try to change things. And begin the long journey towards normalizing their faith and the slow making of a more Muslim Japan.

All through a unique—and universal—lens: food.

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Credits:

Reported and produced by Tanita Rahmani, with help from Nadeen Shaker.

Story editing and original music by Salman Ahad Khan.

Additional music by Alexander Overington.

Sound design and engineering by Joe Plourde.

Fact-checking by Heba Elorbany.

This season of More Muslim is powered by Al Mujadilah, a center and mosque for women in Qatar. If you liked our show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. A transcript of this episode will be available shortly on our website.

More about our show at moremuslim.org.

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Guests:

Hitomi Remon, founder of the Japan Halal Association, the first body certifying halal for domestic Japanese products

Esma Esra, founder of Tulu Tours, a halal travel guide to Japan

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Further reading:

To see some of the deep Japan spots where Esma and her groups prayed, check out @placesyoullpray on Instagram.

As millions of Muslims complete Hajj this week, we revisit a question scholars have debated for centuries: can a Muslim woman make a journey like that without a mahram?

This week on the show, host Sohaira Siddiqui recalls the first time she ran headfirst into that debate, when she decided to tell her parents she wanted to move to Jordan to study Arabic. And how that initial conversation at her parents' kitchen table led her to dive deep into centuries of scholarly debate on the topic, from the Mughal princess Gulbadan Begum's seven-year pilgrimage to Mecca, to the 2023 Saudi ruling that let women perform Hajj without a male guardian.

Years later, in post-Arab Spring Egypt, a young woman in the middle of a spiritual crisis feels the same pull to leave, and signs up for a women's retreat in Morocco, hoping a group of new Muslims might help her find her way back to a faith she's losing her grip on.

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Hosted by Sohaira Siddiqui.

Reported by Nadeen Shaker, with help from Tanita Rahmani.

Produced by Tanita Rahmani.

Editing by Salman Ahad Khan.

Fact-checking by Heba Elorbany.

Special thanks to Sadia Ramzan from The Muslim Women Travel Group, Parvez Siddiqui, and Suzanne Gaber.

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Suggested Reading:

• Begum, Gulbadan. The History of Humāyūn (Humāyūn-Nāma). Translated by Annette S. Beveridge. London: Royal Asiatic Society, 1902.
• Lal, Ruby. Vagabond Princess: The Great Adventures of Gulbadan. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2024.

When reporter Yassmin Abdel-Magied's friend tells her she's been using ChatGPT as a therapist, Yassmin doesn't know what to think. The chatbot calls her friend "habibti." Gives her Islamic relationship advice. It's helping her reconnect with her faith in ways no human in her life has been able to. But it's also a product built by a tech company with no foundations in Islamic psychology.

This week on the show, Reporter Yassmin Abdel-Magied goes down a rabbit hole to try and understand Islam's relationship to mental health and whether AI can ever truly heal us. And she finds a Stanford professor asking herself the same questions.

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EPISODE CREDITS:

Reported by Yassmin Abdel-Magied.

Produced by Taqwa Sadiq.

Edited by Sarah Qari and Salman Ahad Khan.

Music by Alexander Overington and Salman Ahad Khan.

Sound Design and Engineering by Alexander Overington.

Fact-checking by Heba Elorbany.

Illustration by Lina Jaradat.

Special thanks to Muhammad Faruque, Sidrah Hassan, Merve Nursoy-Demir, Jacki Shoyeb, Ndaa Hassan, Tasneem, and Talia Augustidis.

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This season of More Muslim is powered by Al Mujadilah, a center and mosque for women in Qatar. If you liked our show, please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. A transcript of this episode will be available on our website.

More about our show at moremuslim.org. Follow us on Instagram at 'moremuslimshow.'

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Further reading:

Awaad, Rania, and Merve Nursoy-Demir. Maristāns and Islāmic Psychology: A Historical Model for Modern Implementation.

Abdel-Magied, Yassmin. “Are You Using ChatGPT for Therapy?” Substack, 2025.