The daily digest of Twin Cities culture | Secrets of the City

Over the last few months, I have met with Fozia Mussa several times to hear about her journey from sheltered teenager in a tiny Somali village to life as a working Minneapolis mother of five children (ranging from nine months to twelve years).

Out of respect for Somali custom, I could not interview Mussa alone, and certainly not in private. Instead, she and I would convene along with several of her Somali friends at restaurants close to their college in Bloomington.

While Sudan and Qatar might be tougher bets, most Americans could spin a globe and pinpoint Saudi Arabia’s deserts with relative ease. Even if your geography fails you, you’ve no doubt at least heard of Saudi and perhaps recall Peter O’Toole shouting across the desert sands in Lawrence of Arabia.

My neighborhood is solidly Democrat. As I walked through it one autumn day two years ago, I made a point of counting lawn signs. On one half-hour walk, I saw eighteen Kerry signs and only one for Bush. I made virtually the same walk the other day, for the same purpose, but with a different result. There are a lot of signs around for Democratic candidates Hatch and Klobuchar. I didn’t see a single one for Pawlenty, and I saw only one for Alan Fine — the same number I saw for Keith Ellison.

A Saturday night in late summer and downtown Rochester was completely dark except for an exceedingly lively block of First Avenue Northwest. At one end, a tall Somali man leaned into the window of a black Chevy Cavalier and spoke with a woman wearing a red silk hijab, or headscarf. Behind the Cavalier, three Somali teenagers, one in a UNC basketball jersey, clustered around a Jeep Cherokee, inadvertently blocking cars trying to emerge from a parking lot. Meanwhile, men in their twenties chattered loudly in the lot while older men conversed on the corner of Broadway.