Lindsay Lohan claims that she was racially profiled while at Heathrow Airport in London. The Mean Girls alum opened up about the incident during an appearance on Good Morning Britain on Tuesday, February 21.
“When I was flying to New York recently, I was wearing a headscarf, and I got stopped at the airport and was racially profiled for the first time in my life,” Lohan, 30, told cohosts Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid. “[The agent] opened my passport and saw Lindsay Lohan and started apologizing but said, ‘Take off your headscarf.'”
Lohan complied with the request but admitted that the exchange did freak her out. “I mean, it’s OK. But what scared me was that moment, how would another woman who doesn’t feel comfortable taking off her headscarf feel? That was really interesting to me. I was kind of in shock,” she said. “It was strange. … I’m from New York, born and raised. I was a little intimidated.”
Lohan was returning from Turkey at the time, where she had met with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. She said that she wore the headscarf out of “personal respect” for the country. She posted a photo with Erdogan via Instagram on January 27. “What a dream it is for Mr. President Erdogan and The First Lady to invite me to their home,” she captioned the pic. “Their efforts in helping Syrian Refugees is truly inspiring.”
The former child star, who moved to London four years ago, also responded to rumors that she has converted to Islam. “I think that me studying the Quran is something I found solace in. You can’t just convert to a religion overnight. I just study it. Nothing is confirmed yet,” she said on Tuesday. “Religion is a personal belief. My sister’s [Ali] a Buddhist. I don’t want to speak on something I haven’t finished yet. I find a solace in studying not just the Quran but meditation. The Islamic culture, I feel it’s a family to me. They’ve been really good people to me. I want to learn the language so I can discuss situations with them [Syrian issues]. It calms me. It’s something I’m interested in.”
In November, Lohan revealed to the Daily Mail that she was learning to speak Turkish, as well as Italian and Arabic. During the interview, she introduced a bizarre, much-discussed new accent.
“It’s a mixture of most of the languages I can understand or am trying to learn. I’ve been learning different languages since I was a child,” she explained at the time. “I’m fluent in English and French, can understand Russian.”
She later jokingly tweeted: “@DailyMailUK what should I call my new accent? I’m thinking #LILOHAN.”
