Gas Station Life on West Main,
Religious Conflictions in Everyday Life
Mohamed Cheema stands on a stool to reach the lottery tickets for a customer.
As a traditional Muslim man, Mohamed Cheema and his son Adil Cheema face conflicts every day, working at their family-run Vacero gas station on West Main. Of the prohibitions in Islam, gambling and alcohol consumption are not allowed. Within the Vacero gas station, lottery tickets are sold copiously among the poverty stricken residents of the neighborhood.
While coffee is not even explicitly allowed in Islam, both Mohamed and Adil partake in coffee consumption while working at the gas station over ten hours each day. While making concessions to sell lottery tickets, they have not started to sell alcohol. Mohammed believes that taking care of his family overweighs the prohibition of facilitating gambling.
“We really need the money from the lottery tickets,” Mohammed explains, “while we do not scratch the tickets, we do sell them, I wish we didn’t have to.”
Although he doesn’t sell alcohol, one of his hardest challenges consists of dealing with the inebriated customers that frequent the store, typically later at night. Safety becomes a pertinent issue when customers become violent, or when burglary is attempted.
“All I can do, is be friendly, be honest, be fair,” he says, sharing his personal ideology, ”a lot of customers come here and leave change, I put it aside.”
And yet, although his attitude towards humanity consists of fair treatment and the benefit of the doubt oftentimes, it has lead to further complications at the Vacero. Of his ten years owning the Vacero, he has only had one employee other than his son Adil. Wayne Johnson, an employee of four years, was fired this past year for stealing lottery tickets.
“I didn’t check his record when I hired him, that’s big trust, but it was my fault too” he recollects, “I find out when I fire him, that the four years he worked with me, he’s sneaky and manipulative and has a criminal record.”
Unfortunately, scratching lottery tickets was just the tip of the iceberg with Wayne.
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