It’s like American Idol except in this Malaysian reality TV show, the goal is to find a religious role model. Young men compete in challenges such as washing corpses and ferreting out unmarried couples. The winner gets a MacBook and the chance to lead prayers in public. Nuri Ali Arbain had never dreamed of becoming an imam. But he also wasn’t one to miss an opportunity, which explains why he was standing on a stage with the number 1801 pinned to his shirt, staring into the serious faces of the jurors and blinking into the lens of a television camera. He was wearing his Islamic cap and a freshly pressed shirt. He was only a farmer with a side business in used computer parts, just a boy from the village. He liked riding his motorcycle. As a child, he used to go hunting for fish with a bow and arrow. He didn’t really belong here on this stage in front of a TV camera, and he knew it. Nevertheless, when two of his friends had told him that they were driving to the capital and asked if he wanted to come along, he agreed right away. There was a casting call for a TV show, they had said. Astro Oasis, a Malaysian TV network, was looking for a young imam who could help put an end to moral decline in the country and get young people more interested in Islam. The winner would become an imam at one of the big mosques in the capital, travel to Mecca and study at the University of Medina in Saudi Arabia. Most of all, however, he would receive a cash prize of 20000 ringgit (about €5000 …
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The models say goodbye for the last time. Watch more at malaysiandreamgirl.tv