When Shakur regained his freedom, he had more on his mind than just visiting the mosque.

Like many formerly incarcerated people reentering society, he had many needs that needed to be met, many of which were complicated by his status as a felon: obtaining housing, reuniting with loved ones, finding a job.

He did better than most, and a few weeks after his release, he found a job at a Middle Eastern restaurant in the Bay Area called Falafel Corner. The skills he honed working on makeshift electric stoves in cells and prison kitchens were now used to build a new career, and he was soon promoted to managing the restaurant.

In 2016, the restaurant opened a second location in Sacramento, and in 2018, Shakoor bought out the former owner. The company currently has more than 30 franchise stores in Northern California, he said.

If cooking was one skill Shakur continued to develop after his release from prison, his interest in criminal justice reform work was another.

In 2014, Shakur, who earned a degree from Ohio University remotely while incarcerated, testified before the state Senate in support of SB 1391, a bill that expanded access to college education for incarcerated people in California prisons. The bill was passed and signed into law in September 2014.

In 2023, he also became a public supporter of SB 309, a bill that would create universal standards for religious appearance and head coverings in California detention facilities.

He cited his own experience of being harassed in prison for expressing his religious beliefs, recalling an incident in 2002 when he was held in solitary confinement for seven days for refusing to take off his chitralli hat, a move that he, as a Muslim of Pakistani origin, Identity is important.

But perhaps his favorite form of activity is sharing food and worship with fellow Muslims in prisons across the state, a practice he began in 2017.

He said he usually makes about five such visits a year, sometimes as many as ten. It’s no small task, requiring hours of cooking and even more grueling trials within the prison system’s grueling bureaucracy.

But Shakur believes these events provide a source of friendship and optimism for inmates who might otherwise feel oppressive and hopeless.

While at San Quentin, when he still believed he would spend the rest of his life in prison, he recalled becoming obsessed with a pair of flowers growing out of a desolate rocky cliff.

“We can’t always change our environment, just like that flower can’t,” he said. “But we can learn to rise above the things that hold us down and use our surroundings to build us up.”

Back in Solano’s room decorated with colorful murals, where Cali, 69, was enjoying a burrito, Shakur, who has known him since his incarceration at Pleasant Valley State Prison, talked about his purpose and A sense of peace. Discovered through Islam.

His first conversion came in 1992, while he was in solitary confinement, studying the Bible and the Koran in depth and conducting what he called a “moral inventory” of himself.

For many people sentenced to life imprisonment, religion provides a way to resist, if not escape completely, the downward pressure of despair that comes with a life of perpetual confinement.

The physical distance of the free world, often visible just outside the window or hexagonal fence, only adds to the tantalizing feeling of possibility of cancellation. It seems miraculous that a source of warmth, creativity, and friendship should emerge under such circumstances.

It’s a feeling Shakur understands deeply, Cali said, and he now helps others try to live with it by holding anger management classes in Solano.

He quoted his favorite verse from the Quran: “Verily, where there is difficulty, there is ease.”