Picture this- you’re at the beach, soaking up the sun, doggy paddling through the water (or as you call it, “swimming”), and throwing the football around when your buddy comes running over yelling “it’s prayer time!”. As you get out of the water, you see in the distance that salah has already started. You run over to your bag, quickly shuffle things around to grab your t-shirt and proceed to join the congregation.
Right as you’re about to raise your hands to your ears, you glance down and notice that your shorts aren’t long enough. Oh man, now what!? You start tugging downwards at them, but they don’t budge!. You look around and grab the first towel that you see and wrap it around yourself like a skirt in hopes that it’ll cover you (and it doesn’t fall off!) while you pray. It does the trick, but let’s be real, it shouldn’t be this complicated.
It’s a common problem, but one with a non-practical solution. You shouldn’t need to carry around extra clothing in order to fulfil such a basic religious obligation. The biggest issue? There just aren’t any options in the swimwear market that cover from the navel to the knees (awrah). It’s only when you’re planning a trip or a day at the beach that it hits you-you need halal swim shorts!
You check out numerous stores looking for swimming gear in panic as you hold up the 10th pair of short-shorts thinking about ways to manipulate the fit. It’s not like you can just walk into your nearest department store and ask the sales associate to show you a pair of boardshorts that are “halal”. And if you did, they might just give you a confused look because they think you’re asking for halloumi (it’s a cheese!). So rather, you request an oversized pair that covers your knees with the assumption that when you’re at the beach and it’s time to pray, you’ll improvise by putting on a t-shirt or a thobe. And most of the time, it isn’t an issue at all since shorts are mainly paired with a t-shirt. It’s only when going swimming that we realize we need to make it a point to cover from the navel to the knees.
At Kap Swim, we believe that Deen shouldn’t have to be sacrificed to enjoy a trip or a day at the beach. So why not bring the best of both worlds together? The Foundation Short does just that. It ensures that your awrah is always covered. Allowing you to have fun in the sun while also completing your religious obligations, or as we like to call it #shoretosujud. And we’d like to think that it doesn’t get any easier than that!
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