A Missouri woman was removed from a roller coaster for wearing hijab. Was it racist?

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Hadil Alqarini of Blue Springs loves roller coasters.

Alqarini and her family immigrated to the United States from Jordan when she was 13. One of her first American memories? Riding the Mamba steel roller coaster at Kansas City’s Worlds of Fun amusement park.

That was 24 years ago, when she was a young Muslim teenager who wore a hijab, an Islamic head covering, everywhere — including on roller coasters — to honor her faith. Fast-forward to Sept. 13, Alqarini is a grown Muslim woman with a husband of 15 years who hates roller coasters and three children, still proudly wearing her hijab.

Her oldest child, a 9-year-old boy named Moe, also inherited the roller coaster bug from his mother, and that day had encouraged Alqarini to take the family and his friends to Worlds of Fun for their Halloween Haunt celebration.

It started as another enjoyable night of roller coaster rides, but ended with Alqarini spending more than three hours in a Worlds of Fun office filing a report after a worker removed her from a roller coaster because of her hijab.

Alqarini told The Kansas City Star it was what she considers her first overtly racist encounter in America.

‘He was racist’

Alqarini said the night was great, and she rode on several roller coasters before she, Moe, his friend and her niece climbed into seats to ride the Prowler, a wooden roller coaster. Just before the ride began, she said a worker named Paul told her she needed to remove her hijab to ride.

Some Muslim women don’t wear hijabs based on their beliefs, but Alqarini said she never removes it unless solely in the presence of her immediate family and female friends.

“God asked me to do so, and I believe in God,” Alqarini told the Star in an interview in her home days after the incident. “God will see me actually follow what he wants me to do.”

She told the amusement park worker the hijab was for religious purposes. The father of Moe’s friend expressed the same sentiment, and so did a teenage Worlds of Fun worker who told Paul that his family is also Muslim and they have worn hijabs on the Prowler, according to Alqarini.

Paul wouldn’t budge, she said.

“He was racist. As hell,” Alqarini said.

He told Alqarini he had contacted the supervisor, and said his reasoning for the request was due to the rules for roller coaster rides, which include no headgear or loose articles of clothing. But Alqarini said he recommended she buy a hat, which confused her.

“I think that’s your rules. I don’t think this is Worlds of Fun rules,” Alqarini told him, as the worker began shooing her off the ride.

“I can’t forget my son looked at me like, wow, they (took) my mom (off the ride),” she said. “I get up and I looked at the people, they were giving me body language and it’s like feeling sorry, but no one actually was standing up and [speaking] up. I’m here when I started saying, ‘Hey, you guys, does this sounds right?’”

“I also told him it was racist,” Moe said, as bystanders began recording the incident.

In the ensuing confusion as she was being kicked off the ride, Alqurini said her son nearly didn’t get properly buckled into his seat.

“My son would be dead if he’s not buckled up for him being racist,” she said. “If I did not notice it and run and did something about it, he would be dead.”

When the ride was over, Alqarini said the supervisor came and told the worker he was wrong, and made him apologize.

“He’s saying the sorry in a way that he has to do it. He’s not actually sorry,” she later said.

She attempted to file a report with Clay County Sheriff deputies, who directed her to instead file a report with park security. Alqarini spent more than three hours filing a report with the park, she said. A park official offered her free passes, which she refused.

‘Felt the discrimination’

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, billed as the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, reported a 69% increase in anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian complaints through the first six months of 2024.

The Kansas chapter of the CAIR released a statement accepting the amusement park’s apology sent to local television station KCTV5.

Worlds of Fun did not respond to the Star’s request for comment.

“We welcome the apology and corrective action taken by Worlds of Fun for this incident,” CAIR-Kansas Board Chair Moussa Elbayoumy said in the statement. “Religious freedom is one of the most important rights guaranteed to all Americans by our Constitution and must be respected everywhere in society.”

Alqarini and her husband, Waleed Al Qalawi, who moved to America from Jordan to be with his wife, said they’ve seen the rise of these incidents, some they believe inspired by the Israel-Palestine conflict.

They said they’ve always been honored to live in America, and the freedom to practice their religion here was the main selling point. After this incident, Alqarini’s world has been shaken, and so has her faith in Kansas City and America.

“I think I need to think and have a plan B and just maybe get out from this. This is one of the things that pops in my mind,” she said. “I don’t want to be (in) an environment that (I) don’t feel safe or feel like I’m different.”

Alqarini believes she would have been more understanding if the worker had been a teenager who didn’t know better. Instead, she estimates Paul, who is white, is in his 40s.

“He needs to learn a lesson. And companies need to educate their employees,” she said, adding her hijab is not a safety issue, as some people have alleged online. Alqarini said her tightly-wrapped hijab has never flown off her head, and showcased a safety pin which helps keep it on her head.

Al Qalawi said he sees the toll that the incident has taken on his wife, making her lose sleep and question her safety.

“We don’t need this thing to change our life,” Al Qalawi said. He was at a mosque praying during the incident.

His wife feels that’s already happened, noting it was the first time her son felt the sting of racism.

“He felt the discrimination,” she said. “We’re different, we are American, we (have) citizenship, but we are different. And I really don’t like that, but things happen. I mean, I really don’t like him to know these things this early (in his life).”

After filing a report at the park, Alqarini said she went to file a report with Blue Springs Police, mainly for failure to secure her son in his seat. They told her since there was no physical assault, there was no crime. She said she is considering hiring an attorney.

Alqarini said she will not go back to Worlds of Fun, even though her kids still want to. But for the ride-loving Muslim mother who made America her home decades ago, the experience is now ruined.

“We learned when we got our citizenship, we’re equal,” Alqarini said. “We’re not, that’s not true.”

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