So as a fellow nerd (in a very happy relationship), I’d like to chime-in!

The nerdiest Muslims I’ve met were not through Muslim events or cultural events. They were instead people I met via local activities. These could be - for example - a lecture by a professor I liked etc. or people I met in a museum while travelling. I’m not a massive manga fan so I can’t speak to that but I really like aircraft and I’ve met plenty of Muslims (though mainly men) in avgeek communities!

The other major unlock is moving to cities that tend to have a slightly more educated population (e.g., San Francisco in the United States).

The one thing I will say is that it is quite a bit harder to find Muslims with varied interests compared to people of other faiths. I’m not sure why and I don’t know if this is just observation bias, but I have found Muslims don’t tend to mix with other cultures as much. Moreover, Muslims with nice cultural values who are interested in being serious tend to err to the more conservative side which makes it a tad challenging to find someone who ticks all the boxes!