“If there’s an imam on Earth who resembles this one, I will convert to Islam, don the veil and catch the next plane to Mecca.”

— Margaret Wente, writing a somewhat gushing review in the Toronto daily The Globe and Mail of the new Canadian sitcom “Little Mosque on the Prairie.”

The show revolves around a small community of Muslims in a town in rural Saskatchewan, and the series premiere – which drew, by Canadian standards, a staggering 2.09 million viewers – tracked the group trying to set up a mosque in the town parish.

Zarqa Nawaz, creator of “Little Mosque on the Prairie,” explains the concept: “I want the broader society to look at us as normal, with the same issues and concerns as anyone else…We’re just as much a part of the Canadian fabric as anyone else.”

Mimi Hanaoka