This is a weekly post by Nidhal Guessoum (see his earlier posts here). Nidhal is an astrophysicist and Professor of Physics at American University of Sharjah and is the author of Islam's Quantum Question: Reconciling Muslim Tradition and Modern Science.

I don’t think I have ever commented in writing on political matters. But the events unfolding in my/our world for the past few weeks are unprecedented in their scope and their impact; they bring new things every day – including scientists blogging about the socio-political order around them.

Salman has taken the lead and commented several times recently on socio-political developments in the Muslim world, including events in Pakistan, Tunisia, and Egypt (for example see the earlier post, How important is the internet in Tunisia uprising?). And judging from the comments that have been posted in response to his writings, it appears that readers of this blog are highly interested in such discussions, even though in principle we are supposed to be mainly focused on science and religion topics. But then where exactly does one draw the line between religion, politics, and social order? Furthermore, Mohammad Yahia, the editor of the Nature Middle East portal and a blogger of his own, has commented on the impact of the current events on Arab scientists and academics.

But do I want to comment because people are interested in this topic or because I feel I have something thoughtful to contribute? Neither, actually. I have decided to comment because writing is a cathartic exercise (it helps heal one’s wounds), and because this gives me a chance to crystallize the ideas that have been running through my head and the feelings rushing in my heart for the past several weeks. Watching the coverage of these uprisings, mainly glued to Al-Jazeera, I have gone through various emotions and sought to understand the historic events around me.

First, let me highlight the main developments (from Tunisia and Egypt) of the past few weeks:

·    Tunisians, living under the most oppressive police state, peacefully overthrew the regime and insisted on establishing full democracy and human rights for all, including and especially freedom of speech and assembly. No more will campuses be under surveillance, and students and professors be arrested, interrogated, and forbidden from travel simply because they’ve expressed non-acceptable views or mingled with people who were already on the regime’s black lists.

·    Aftershocks followed from the Tunisian earthquake, starting from next-door Algeria and Libya and reaching Egypt, Jordan, and Yemen. (Lebanon is another issue.)

·    The “day of rage” in Egypt (January 25) surprised everyone by getting hundreds of thousands of people into the streets calling for regime change. At that point, everyone knew that the follow-up event (demonstrations three days later after the Friday prayers) was going to be historic – and it was.

·    For the first time in history, transnational mass communication media (satellite TV and internet) played a crucial role in the revolution(s), largely in the Tunisian case and to some extent in the Egyptian case. Scholars will for years be dissecting and debating the role played by Facebook, Twitter, and Aljazeera (the latter much more essential than has been recognized so far). And the Egyptian government’s unprecedented and unsuccessful attempt to paralyze and silence the protests by blocking almost all internet, SMS, mobile phone, and at some stage even land phone communication, will also soon be analyzed in depth.

Events are still unfolding day by day, and for this and other reasons I don’t want to comment too much on the events themselves and try to predict what will happen in the short term and beyond, both in Egypt and elsewhere. Instead I would like to focus on what I perceive as the real problem in this region and what people want and expect.

First and foremost, people want an end to corruption. Democracy is important and needed, but this is not what got people into the streets. After all, there are other countries in the region where there is as little (or even less) democracy (citizens’ participation in the system) but where no one has demonstrated for or against anything. And the case of Tunisia is very telling in this regard: while the regime was autocratic almost from the start (for over 20 years), people revolted against it only when it went very corrupt in the last few years, with the president’s family-in-law seizing large portions of the country’s wealth (or whatever wealth was available). I think we can see that correlation (between uprising and corruption as opposed to uprising due to autocracy) in almost all the countries where troubles have taken place.

A second cause for these revolutions appears to my mind: nepotism, as opposed to meritocracy. As I’ve just said regarding the situation in Tunisia (under Ben Ali, the deposed dictator), and as people know about the Mubarak regime and others like it, people become angry when they see their country being hijacked by a family and/or a clique and turned into its personal possession.

Indeed, in those countries (and quite a few in the region), “succeeding” depends much more on whom you know than on what you know or what you can do (with your education and skills). People then are torn between two inclinations: an idealistic, almost quixotic fight for meritocracy, and a pragmatic “if you can’t beat them, join them” attitude of “I need to secure my family’s future”, so let me play nice and build useful relations. And this is, unfortunately, so true in academia, as much if not even more than in other areas of our society.

So, while I have no crystal ball to gaze into the future and hence cannot predict what will happen now, I can make a few hopeful comments. I always tell my friends that I am (in general) an optimist with respect to the long(er)-term future but a pessimist regarding the short term. I don’t necessarily believe that things are going to be worse in Tunisia and Egypt (and elsewhere) under those who will replace Ben Ali, Mubarak, and their ilk. Many people have expressed worries about more Arab countries turning chaotic like Iraq and thus wonder whether keeping a despot like Saddam would not have been better. Well, first, the change that occurred in Tunisia (or the one that will soon take place in Egypt) in no way resembles what happened in Iraq, and secondly no one said such revolutions would turn hell into heaven in a short time. Each situation is different, and in each case history will unfold differently. But I am confident that within a few years or perhaps even a few decades (for the big ones like Iraq, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Algeria, etc.), things will straighten out. (It will take time to fix whole systems of education, management, etc.)

It will all depend on how quickly people will accept the principles of rule of law (all equally subjected to it, no matter who or what) and meritocracy. Once we have gotten rid of despotism, corruption, and nepotism, then things will work, no matter what political system or ideology one implements (and ideologies will rotate, since parties will complete and thus win or lose people’s confidence).

I am now more certain that the Arab world is undergoing an important transformation, perhaps a la Eastern Europe. Perhaps that is too hopeful, but since things can’t get worse, any change is for the better. But hopefully, this won’t be just “any change”; it may be “the change”… Inshallah!

We write here a lot about the status of science in the Muslim world. Yes, we are also often critical about scientific misconceptions and how newspapers sometimes promote pseudoscientific claims (see, for example, this nonsense about Mars from the Business Recorder, or this about bizarre anti-evolution story from Al Jazeera). But what is astounding is to find a Congressman of the most scientifically advanced country in the world (it is by far the scientific leader in the world) not only deny climate change, but also evolution. See the clip of Bill Maher show below. Not just that, but here he demonstrate a stunning level of intellectual ignorance by saying that "well, I did not come from a monkey". I mean c'mon. Rep. Jack Kingston from Georgia sits on the House Appropriations Committee which decides how the federal government will spend its money. I know, know. There have even been US Presidential hopefuls (at least in the Republican primaries) who have also shown a similar level of intellectual ignorance. I just find it amazing that with all the science and scientists at hand, they choose not to seek out even some basic information. Heck, when next time he is in D.C., he can go and visit the hall of human origins at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. Or if he wants to stay in Georgia, then he can check out Yerkes National Primate Research Center. But please, ask someone about the basic concepts of evolution! Absolutely shameful. (note that I'm not saying any thing about D.L. Hughley's rejection of evolution. He is a comedian. It is not a big deal if he doesn't know much about it. But as a Congressman, you are supposed to be able to make reasonable - in the loosest sense of the word - assessments. For that, you even have staffers at hand to help you reach those decisions. If after all that, this is the best one can do - then it is indeed shameful).

Here is the clip:

Hello from Long Lane Honey Bee Farms, we’re David & Sheri Burns, certified EAS master beekeeper here to help you succeed at beekeeping. Our contact phone number is: 217-427-2678 and our website is: www.honeybeesonline.com
In today’s lesson you MUST read carefully so that your hive that survived the winter will survive the early part of spring. Today' we’ll look at how to evaluate your queen following a cold winter.


Lesson 94: Inspect The Queen After Winter
On the first nice, warm day, it is important to open up the hive and make an inspection to determine the welfare of the queen. In the worst case scenario the queen died in late fall or winter and now there is no new brood and no new bees. The hive will become smaller and smaller and eventually perish. Or perhaps the queen is failing, unable to lay fertile eggs and has become a drone layer. Now your hive will become over populated with drones, and will soon perish.
Let me walk you through an inspection. First, choose a warm sunny day when the temperature is no less than 67 (F). Smoke the hive and beginning inspecting frames. Depending on when you do your inspection, you'll want to see a fair amount of sealed worker brood and uncapped brood such as eggs and larvae. It is not essential that you find the queen as long as you see eggs. Seeing eggs mean that you have a queen. In fact, if you spot your queen but fail to look for eggs, you have not gained useful information about the state of your queen. You must evaluate her ability to lay.
Several factors might influence what you see. First, if you have a Carniolan queen, she is less likely to lay early in the spring. She will, however, start laying when the nectar flow starts. All queens will lay more once the nectar flow increases. But you should expect to see some brood. How early you inspect your hive may change the results as well. The queen begins to lay more as there is more daylight and the days become longer.
Usually here in Illinois there is a day or two in February warm enough to allow me to inspect my hives. If I spot my queen, but she is not laying yet, I do not become concerned just yet. I will make a note in my log to check on her in two weeks. Or I may feed the hive 1:1 sugar water to see if this will stimulate her to start laying. It's not a bad idea to start feeding 1:1 sugar water to an overwintered colony to stimulate early laying.
What do you do if you discover you are queenless or in need of a new queen. It is more difficult to resolve this problem early in the spring. Queen producers often cannot provide queens this early or they already have long waiting lists. Every spring we receive calls from desperate beekeepers who have discovered that their hive survived winter but their queen did not. There is little we can do except to have them feed their hive and keep it going until we can ship out a queen. However, if you discover in May that your queen is not laying an impressive brood pattern, then you should have no trouble buying
a new queen. Replace her as soon as possible.
If you can make a February inspection and find your queen is gone, one option is to purchase a new package. Even though your package will not arrive until April, your new bees and queen will be a huge boost to the failing overwintered queenless hive. But, remember that most package providers are sold out in March, so you'll have to hope for a warm day in February to order a replacement package.

See you next time and remember to bee-have yourself!

David & Sheri Burns

This a great, quick and easy recipe and talk about cheap. I bought a box of cake mix for 89 cents. It makes 24 cookies. These are my kids favorite cookies right now.

Ingredients:

1 box chocolate devils food, strawberry or yellow cake mix
2 eggs
1/2 cup of oil

Preparation:

Mix the ingredients until cake mix is moistened. Roll into balls and then roll balls in granulated sugar or powdered sugar and place on cookie sheet 2 inches apart. Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 12 minutes

*You can also drop them by spoonfuls if you don't want to use the sugar. They come out great this way too.

Offered without comment. Enjoy.

Warning: NSFW



(I did not create this video and I have no idea who did. Whoever you are, get in touch and I will heap copious praise upon you.)

Syukur dan puji hanya untuk Allah SWT atas segala kurniaan-Nya kepada kita hamba-hamba-Nya yang tidak memiliki apa-apa melainkan apa yang telah diberikan-Nya kepada kita.

Selawat dan kesejahteraan ke atas rasul junjungan kita yang mulia, Muhammad bin Abdullah, yang dengan usaha kerasnya, kita diizinkan oleh Allah SWT untuk mengecapi nikmat Islam dan melalui sirahnya kita belajar untuk terus beriman dan berjuang menapaki jejak langkahnya menyebarkan serta berkongsi keindahan keimanan yang kita kecapi bersama hamba-hamba yang lain.

Selepas ini semuanya terakhir? Mungkin ramai yang telah memahami maksudnya. Namun ingin saya abadikan di sini, agar hakikatnya semakin jelas dan usaha yang benar dapat diletakkan sebaiknya.

(gambar hiasan)

Semuanya Terakhir

Bermula jam 11 pagi semalam, segalanya akan menjadi yang terakhir buat saya.

Hari Sabtu, Ahad, Isnin, Selasa, Rabu, Khamis dan Jumaat yang terkahir.

Jam 10:30 am tadi saya baru habis Dauroh Al-Intima' (jangan teruja dengan namanya, saja buat-buat gempak) yang menggabungkan ikhwah-ikhwah junior yang comel-comel dari UTP dan ikhwah-ikhwah yang sudah semakin matang dari Kolej Matrikulasi Perak. Dan dauroh ini mungkin dauroh terakhir yang saya uruskan.

Minggu ini, saya akan menghadiri halaqoh bersama murobbi saya juga buat kali yang terakhir. Saya juga akan menghalaqohkan anak-anak halaqoh saya untuk kali terakhir.

Mungkin minggu ini juga jika Allah SWT izinkan, saya akan mengkhatamkan Al-Quran buat kali terakhir. Dan saya bercadang untuk menulis sebuah cerpen terakhir. Kerana selepas itu saya tidak akan menulis lagi.

Apa Yang Terakhir Sebenarnya?

Shoutul Ikhwah akan ditutup? Tidak mungkin, dakwah pena ini akan terus berjalan, insya-Allah.

Saya akan berhenti berdakwah, jadi orang umum? Lebih tidak mungkin lagi, dan selama saya masih mampu menguasai diri, tidak akan saya benarkan ia berlaku.

Jadi?

Semuanya adalah kali terakhir yang saya akan lakukan sebagai seorang yang bujang.

Saya dijangkakan akan mengakhiri zaman bujang saya pada 5 Februari 2011, pada jam 11AM.

Jadi, inilah minggu terakhir saya sebagai seorang bujang.
Tulisan-tulisan terakhir saya sebagai seorang bujang.
Selepas ini saya tidak akan menulis lagi, sebagai seorang yang masih bujang.
Saat-saat terakhir saya. Solat-solat terakhir saya. Sebelum menginjak ke maratib amal seterusnya, Bait Ad-Duat.

(dah lama edit pic ni, baru sekarang nak melaluinya)

Pentutup : Mengharapkan Yang Terbaik

Saya sangat mengingin, mengharap dan mengimpikan yang saya dan bakal zaujah saya dapat mencapai tahap keimanan dan ketaqwaan yang setinggi-tingginya sebelum melangkah ke alam baru ini. Semoga iringan doa daripada semua sahabat-sahabat serta ikhwah akhwat seluruhnya akan menguatkan langkahan kaki kami dalam mencapainya.

Niat akan terus dimurnikan.

Langkahan akan terus diayunkan.

Dakwah akan terus digencarkan.

Hidup akan terus dikaryakan.

p/s : Selamat Pengantin Baru kepada Akhi Rusdi & Ukhti Fatimah yang bakal melangsungkan pernikahan mereka pada 3 Februari 2011. Antum lagi 4 hari, ana pula 6 hari lagi. Bersedia ya akh!

Kad Akhi Rusdi & Ukhti Fatimah

~End Of Post~

This is a new version of a family brunch favorite.  We usually make these with spinach and white flour but I decided to try them with broccoli and whole wheat flour and they came out just as good.  I'll make and post the original version soon.


Ingredients:

3 eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
4 cups - (16 oz) shredded cheddar/Monterrey jack cheese
1-16 oz package of frozen broccoli florets thawed and cut into small pieces

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Whisk eggs, milk, flour, baking powder, salt together. Add cheese and broccoli and stir until combined completely. Pour into greased 13x9 baking dish. Bake for 40-45 minutes.

It looks like that way. It seems that almost internet communication and most of the mobile phones have been blocked in Egypt. Here is a plot that shows how Egyptian addresses are now unreachable. Here is another plot (see right) about Egypt's departure from the net. It seems that landlines are the only way to communicate. How long can Egypt stay off the grid? We'll see.

In the mean time, protests are continuing. Despite all the censorship, news is still coming leaking out of Egypt. Follow Al-Jazeera's live blog on Egypt protests here and live Twitter feed here. Also, updates from BBC here.

Update: Also added Guardian Live blog (tip from Rainer Bromer)
Update 2: Also check out live pictures from Al Jazeera. This is incredible!
Also, for an idea, here is a raw video from Cairo:

This is a recipe I found on my new favorite cooking website http://www.gourmetkoshercooking.com/. The original recipe called for ground beef but I almost always substitute ground turkey or chicken to make it healthier. I also served it with crispy kale and sweet potato fries. I will post those recipes soon as well. Everyone thought it was a hit!

Ingredients :

2 T canola oil

2 lbs. ground turkey

1 onion chopped

2 carrots peeled and chopped

2 stalks celery chopped

1/2 bell pepper chopped

1 T minced garlic

1 C brown sugar

1 T Worcestershire sauce

1/2 tsp black pepper

1/8 tsp ground cloves

Preparation:

Saute turkey, vegetables and garlic in canola oil over medium heat until browned, drain off any fat. Add remaining ingredients and mix well . Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat. Simmer for about 30 minutes and serve over whole wheat hamburger rolls.

Things are happening at lightening pace. In some sense, these are exciting times in the Middle East. In preparation for tomorrow's (Friday) protests, some of the social media sites have already been blocked in Egypt. There are also protests in Yemen also - but those don't appear to be driven by the same demographics (educated, middle-class) as in Tunisia and Egypt.

In the mean time, I wanted to highlight two articles on trying to make sense of the current situation. The first one is by Roger Cohen on Facebook and Arab Dignity, and the other is by Asef Bayat on A new Arab street in post-Islamist times.

Cohen is currently in Tunisia and traces the events that started the Tunisian uprising. He does a fantastic job of tracing the story of the street vendor who set himself on fire (it turns out, he doesn't even have a high-school diploma). But Cohen finds this uprising to be the first leader-less revolution - or he ascribes the leadership to Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook. Here are his key observations:

First, the old nostrum goes that it’s either dictators or Islamic fundamentalists in the Arab world because they’re the only organized forces. No, online communities can organize and bite.

Second, those communities have no formal ideology but their struggle is to transform humiliation into self-esteem.

Third, cyber-uprisings can go either way: Iran hovered on a razor’s edge in 2009, Tunisia’s regime fell in 2011. In both societies the gulf between the authorities and young wired societies was huge. The difference is probably the degree of sustained brutality a dictatorship can muster.

Fourth, Internet freedom is no panacea. Authoritarian regimes can use it to identify dissidents; they can try to suppress Facebook. But it’s empowering to the repressed, humiliated and distant — and so a threat to the decayed Arab status quo.

Read the full article here.

And Asef Bayat looks at some of the sociological reasons behind the protests. He starts with the new information technology - it is hard to deny its role in all this - and then gets to other reasons:

More recently, the ‘Cedar Revolution,' a grassroots movement of some 1.5million Lebanese from all walks of life demanding a meaningful sovereignty,democracy, and an end to foreign meddling, resulted in the withdrawal of Syrianforces from Lebanon in 2005. The Iranian Green wave, a pervasive democracymovement that emerged following the 2009 fraudulent Presidential elections, hasserved as a prelude to what are now the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, and thecurrent uprising in the streets of Egypt. These are all breaks from traditionalArab politics in that they project a new post-Islamist and post-ideologicalstruggle which combine the concerns for national dignity with social justiceand democracy. These movements are pluralistic in constituencies, pursue newways of mobilizing (such as boycott campaigns, cyber-activities and protestart) and are weary of the traditional party politics.

Why this change? Certainly there is the long-building youth bulge and thespread of new information technology (Internet, e-mail, Facebook, YouTube,Twitter, and especially satellite TV like Al Jazeera). Frustratedyouth are now rapidly moving to exploit these new resources to assertthemselves and to mobilize. For instance, Egyptian youth used Facebook tomobilize some 70,000 mostly educated youth who made calls for freespeech, economic welfare, and the elimination of corruption.Activists succeeded in organizing street protests, rallies and morespectacularly initiating a general strike on April 6, 2008 to support the strikingtextile workers. The January 25 mass demonstration in Egypt was primarilyorganized through Facebook and Twitter. These modes and technologies ofmobilization seem to play a crucial role in the Tunisian uprising.

But there are deeper reasons as well:

Thesocial structure throughout the region is changing rapidly. There is anexplosion of mass educational institutions which produce higher levelsof literacy and education, thus enhancing the class of educated populace.At the same time, these societies are rapidly becoming urban. By far morepeople live in the cities than in rural areas (just below Central and EasternEurope). A creeping urbanity is permeating into the traditional rural societies-- there are modern divisions of labor, modern schools, expanding serviceworks, electrification, and especially a modern communications system(phone lines, cars, roads, and minibuses) which generate time-space compressionbetween the ‘urban' and ‘urban' worlds. The boundary between ‘urban' and‘rural' is becoming increasingly blurred and ‘rural' populations are no longerrural in the traditional sense.

But a key change is the emergence of a ‘middle class poor' (with significantpolitical implications) at the expense of the decline of the more traditionalclasses and their movements -- notably, peasant organizations, cooperativemovements and trade unions. As peasants have moved to the city from thecountryside, or lost their land to become rural day laborers, the social basisof peasant and cooperative movements has eroded. The weakening of economicpopulism, closely linked to structural adjustment, has led to the decline ofpublic sector employment, which constituted the core of trade unionism. Throughreform, downsizing, privatization and relocation, structural adjustment hasundermined the unionized public sector, while new private enterprises linked tointernational capital remain largely union-free. Although the state bureaucracyremains weighty, its underpaid employees are unorganized, and a largeproportion of them survive by taking second or third jobs in the informalsector. Currently, much of the Arab work force is self-employed. Manywage-earners work in small enterprises where paternalistic relations prevail.On average, between one third and one half of the urban work force are involvedin the unregulated, unorganized informal sector. Lacking institutional channelsto make their claims, streets become the arena for the expression of discontent.

And add education and unemployment to the mix:

And all these are happening against the background of expanding educationalinstitutions, especially the universities which produce hundreds of thousandsof graduates each year. They graduate with new status, information, andexpectations. Many of them are the children of comfortable parents or thetraditional rural or urban poor. But this new generation is different fromtheir parents in outlook, exposure, social standing, and expectations. Unlikethe post-colonial socialist and statist modernization era that elevated thecollege graduates as the builders of the new nation, the current neoliberalturn has failed to offer most of them an economic status that could match theirheightened claims and global dreams. They constitute the paradoxical class of‘middle class poor' with high education, self-constructed status, wider worldviews, and global dreams who nonetheless are compelled -- by unemploymentand poverty -- to subsist on the margins of neoliberal economy as casual,low paid, low status and low-skilled workers (as street vendors, sales persons,boss boys or taxi drivers), and to reside in the overcrowded slums and squattersettlements of the Arab cities. Economically poor, they still fantasize aboutan economic status that their expectations demand -- working in IT companies,secure jobs, middle class consumption patterns, and perhaps migration to theWest.

The ‘middle class poor' are the new proletariat of the Middle East, who arevery different from their earlier counterpart -- in their college education,knowledge of the world, expectations that others have of them, and witha strong awareness of their own deprivation. Muhammad Bouazizi, the streetvendor who ignited himself and a revolution in Tunisia represented this ‘middleclass poor.' The politics that this class pursued in the 1980s and 1990s wasexpressed in Islamism as the most formidable opposition to the secularundemocratic regimes in the region. But Islamism itself has faced a crisis inrecent years, not least because it is seriously short of democracy. With theadvent of post-Islamist conditions in the Muslim Middle East, the ‘middle classpoor' seems to pursue a different, post-Islamist, trajectory.

Though, he is less hopeful of a deeper change in places other than Tunsia:

Yet in the longer term their efforts may not be enough. The structuralchanges (educational development, public role of women, urban expansion, newmedia and information venues, next to deep inequalities and corruption) arelikely to make these developmentalist authoritarian regimes -- whether Libya,Saudi Arabia, Iran or Egypt -- more vulnerable. If dissent is controlled byrent-subsidized welfare handouts, any economic downturn and weakening ofprovisions is likely to spark popular outrage.

At stake is not just jobs and descent material welfare; at stake is alsopeople's dignity and pursuit of human and democratic rights. As we have seen sopowerfully in Tunisia, the translation of collective dissent into collectiveaction and sustained campaign for change has its own intriguing and oftenunpredictable dynamics. This explains why we keep getting surprised inthis part of the world -- revolutions happen where we do not expect, andthey do not happen where we do. After all, who sensed the scent of Jasmine inthe backstreets of Tunisia just a few weeks ago?

Read the full article here.

Anda ada menyertai lebih daripada satu gerakan dakwah? Boleh ke?

Ramai yang sudah membahaskan perkara ini.

Tetapi saya suka untuk membahaskannya dengan cara saya, bercerita.

Terimalah:

Pilih, Jangan Tak Pilih

Bunyi ketukan pintu dan salam menghentikan bicara mereka. Perlahan-lahan pintu dibuka.

"Wa'alaikumussalam WBT. Abang Meor! Jemputlah masuk, kebetulan kami tengah berbual-bual ni. Dari mana bang?"

"Dari masjid, lambat sikit solat Asar tadi, jumpa pensyarah, uruskan jadual waktu."

Keempat-empat mereka bersalaman dengan pemuda yang digelar Abang Meor tersebut.

"Cantik bilik korang ye, macam-macam ada," ayat yang terselit makna tersirat di sebalik yang tersurat.

Ghaffar, tuan bilik tersengih-sengih sambil mengalihkan fail-fail yang berteraburan di atas lantai.

"Memang cantik bilik ni bang. Kalau abang tak datang, saya rasa lagi cantik." Jamil yang berbadan besar menambah perisa.

Seketika mereka tertawa bersama-sama. Mereka berbual bagai adik-beradik walau jarak usia Meor dan 4 orang juniornya itu agak jauh. Namun ukhuwah islamiyah yang cuba dipupuk tidak mengenal sempadan mahupun usia.

"Korang ni memang susah nak balas sms ye? Ana hantar dari pagi tadi sampai sekarang tak balas-balas lagi."

"Bukan tak nak balas bang, tapi susah nak balas." Karim pula bersuara.

"Lah, apa yang susahnya? Soalannya, boleh tak datang dauroh hujung minggu ni?"

"Nak jawab tu boleh, tapi soalan lepas tu yang berat nak jawab tu."

"Kenapa? Tak boleh datang ke?" Meor sudah dapat menangkap maksud Karim.

"Lebih kurang macam itulah bang. Hujung minggu ni dah ada 3 program saya kena pergi. Tak tahu nak pergi yang mana."

"Kau 3, ok lagi. Aku ada 4!" Akbar menyampuk.

"Mak ai, banyaknya? Kenapa tak tambah je lagi?" Meor bergurau.

Mereka cuma tersengih-sengih tidak bersuara.

"Jangan risau. Kes-kes macam korang semua ni memang biasa terjadi. Junior-junior yang baru berjinak-jinak dengan pergerakan Islam biasanya akan ikut banyak jemaah serta organisasi Islam. Tapi akhirnya kita tetap perlu berkomitmen dengan satu sahaja."

"Kenapa kita kena ikut satu je bang? Tak boleh ke nak join semua? Kan semuanya buat kerja dakwah? Semuanya baik? Abang pun cakap macam tu dulu?" Ghaffar menyuarakan pendapatnya.

"Mari kita fikir sama-sama. Bagaimanakah kita hendak membantu dakwah Islam? Adakah dengan mengikuti sebanyak-banyaknya jemaah dan persatuan yang ada? Untuk diri kita sendiri mungkin kita akan menerima input-input yang pelbagai daripada banyaknya pergerakan yang kita ikuti. Tetapi berdakwah bukan dengan hanya menerima, kita perlu juga memberi."

"Memberi?"

"Ya, memberi dengan mengajak seramai-ramainya orang untuk memperbaiki diri bersama-sama dengan kita. Barulah perbaikan dapat dilakukan. Tetapi misi ini tidak akan dapat kita lakukan jika kita sibuk dengan banyaknya pergerakan yang kita ikuti. Cara yang terbaik adalah kita pilih satu pergerakan yang kita yakini paling baik untuk kita memperbaiki diri dan berusaha bersungguh-sungguh untuk mengajak orang lain bersama-sama memperbaiki diri dengan apa yang kita yakini."

Keempat-empat mereka mengerutkan dahi, cuba menghadam penerangan Abang Meor mereka.

"Hai, muka seorang-seorang macam ada masalah besar. Faham ke apa yang ana terang tadi?"

"Faham bang, tapi saya nak tanya satu soalan. Macam mana kalau kita ikut satu jemaah ni, tapi untuk pengisian dan usrah kita ikut jemaah lain pula?" Jamil pula bertanya.

"Itu bergantung kepada jemaah yang yang antum ikutlah. Tapi kalau dengan ana, sampai suatu ketika, ana akan meminta anak-anak halaqoh ana membuat pilihan. Sebab kita berdakwah bukan saja-saja mengisi masa lapang. Kita ada tugas besar untuk menyelamatkan ummat. Masyarakat yang sedang rosak secara berbondong-bondong ini perlu segera dikeluarkan daripada kepompong kejahiliyahan mereka. Untuk itu, dakwah memerlukan Da'i-Da'i yang mampu membimbing mereka, bukan mereka-mereka yang hanya suka mendengar tazkirah sahaja. Dan untuk itu, kita perlu melalui proses tarbiyah secara penuh, bukan sekerat-sekerat. Barulah kita dapat mempersiapkan diri kita untuk menjadi 'doktor' yang mampu mengubati ummat."

Semuanya diam mendengarkan penjelasan Abang Meor.

"Jadi, setelah sampai ketikanya, ana akan meminta anak halaqoh ana untuk memilih jemaah mana yang dia rasakan terbaik buat dirinya, imannya serta dakwahnya. Jika dia tak memilih untuk bersama dengan ana, ana sentiasa berlapang dada. Dia senang dan ana pun senang. Dia akan berusaha bersungguh-sungguh untuk berdakwah dengan cara yang diyakininya, dan ana boleh fokus untuk mentarbiyah mad'u-mad'u baru."

"Tapi bang, tak rasa bersalah ke pada jemaah yang kita dah lama ikut sebelum ni kalau kita ikut jemaah yang lain pula?"

"Tiada apa yang perlu dipersalahkan kalau kita ingin memilih sesuatu yang kita yakini. Semua orang perlu menghormati pendapat dan keyakinan orang lain. Dan jika kita berpendapat dan menyakini bahawa jalan inilah yang terbaik, maka orang lain tidak punya hak untuk melarang kita mngikutinya. Biarlah berapa lamapun kita telah bersama dengan gerakan yang lain."

"Kalau anak halaqoh abang yang ingin meninggalkan abang?"

"Kalau ana sebagai murobbi atau naqib, tiba-tiba anak halaqoh yang ana dah lama tarbiyah tiba-tiba memilih untuk ikut jemaah lain, ana tetap akan berlapang dada, insya-Allah. Kerana ana yakin bahawa tugas ana adalah membimbing mereka untuk beriman, bertaqwa dan berdakwah di jalan Allah dengan cara yang terbaik menurut ana. Apabila mereka memilih untuk keluar, maka ana menganggap itu adalah masa untuk ana bermuhasabah dan meningkatkan kualiti diri dan jalan dakwah yang ana ikuti. Barulah 'fastabiqul khairat', berlumba-lumba dalam kebaikan."

"Bang, saya dah buat keputusan, saya akan datang dauroh hujung minggu ini, insya-Allah. Terus bimbing saya ya bang." Ghaffar berkata dengan tulus.

"Insya-Allah. Yang lain-lain?"

"Kami fikir dulu, insya-Allah." Jamil menjawab.

"Haah, ingat nak iktikharah dulu." Akbar menyambung.

"Tidak mengapa. Take your time. Apapun keputusan kamu semua, kita tetap akan berukhuwah, insya-Allah."

~End Of Post~

This is a Susie Fishbein recipe from one of her Kosher cookbooks (Kosher Palette, Kosher by Design....I can't remember which one)  It's a great parve recipe that comes out excellent everytime you make it.  Karen just made this recently for her ladies brunch that she hosted at her house for her friends.

Ingredients:

10oz bittersweet or semi-sweet choc, chopped
1 cup butter or marg, cut into pieces
5 large eggs
1 1/4 cups sugar
5 TB flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
powdered sugar

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  Grease and flour a 10-inch springform pan. Heat chocolate and butter in a double boiler until mixture is melted and smooth. Beat eggs and sugar in medium bowl until sloghtly thickened.  Combine flour and baking powder and stir into egg mixture. Fold chocolate mixture into flour mixture.  Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 20 min then cover with foil.  Bake 30 min or until toothpick inserted in center comes out with moist crumbs. Cool on wire rack; release sides.

I really only like egg salad that is homemade so I can control the amount of mayo. I like to experiment with different ingredients to add in. This one I made recently for a family brunch and it came out yummy.

Ingredients:

8-10 hard boiled eggs

1/4-1/2 cup of low fat mayonnaise

3-4 celery stalks chopped

1/2 small onion chopped

1 T fresh dill chopped

paprika, garlic powder, salt, pepper to taste

Preparation:

Combine all the ingredients in a bowl together and chill.

The Huffington Post recently huffed about Betelgeuse - a red supergiant - going supernova in 2012 (of course!). And perhaps, we will be seeing two Suns for a period of time in 2012 - just like Tatooine from the Star Wars universe. Awww. Only if this was close to reality.

So I was called in at 93.9 - The River for a brief chat about this and about the recent news that astrology may be out of whack because of Earth's precession. Basically, all your horoscope months are off by about a  month (noooo!!). Here is the link to the chat- with ample dose of original Star Trek music by our morning host, Monte.

But on a more serious and awesome note, astronomers announced the discovery of the farthest galaxy known so far. Of course it goes by the sexy name of UDFj-39546284 and it was found in the ultra-deep field image in infra-red taken by the Hubble Space Telescope (that is what UDF stands for in the name). 

How far is the galaxy? About 13.2 billion light years from us! Yup. We are looking at a galaxy when the universe was only 480 million years old. Remember, the farther we look into space, the farther back we look back in time. This is because of the finite speed of light. So we are seeing this galaxy as it was 13.2 billion years ago - since light has taken 13.2 billion years to get to us. Many of the stars that we are seeing in this galaxy are dead by now. This is like a delayed transmission. Since the Big Bang happened about 13.7 billion years, this is indeed a very short time!

There is an excellent description of the galaxy and the way it was discovered at Bad Astronomy.

My whole family loves guacamole so I wanted to make a salad with the same flavors. I served it along side my Healthy Taco Lasagna (see below) the other night and it was a big hit. It is a great, simple and refreshing side dish.

Ingredients:

3 plum tomatoes
2 ripe avocados
1 small red onion
lemon juice
salt and pepper

Preparation:

Cut the avocado, tomato, and red onion into bite sized chunks. Toss with fresh lemon juice and season with salt and pepper.

I am a big fan of the one dish dinner. I hate having a hundred pots and pans to clean. I like fast dinners during the week because I don't have a lot of time to cook since I work late three nights a week. I am constantly on the search a good casserole recipe. Unfortunately, they are always so fattening. I decided to make up a healthier version of a rich recipe and it came out awesome.

Ingredients:

6 whole wheat flour tortillas
1 lb lean ground turkey
1/2 packet of taco seasoning mix
1/4 cup water
1 can of enchilada sauce
2 plum tomatoes chopped
1 cup of frozen corn
1 8oz package of shredded low fat cheese cheese (cheddar or Mexican blend)

Preparation:

Brown turkey meat (drain fat if needed) add 1/2 of the taco seasoning packet and 1/4 cup of water. Add corn and chopped tomatoes. Cook through. In a 9x13 casserole dish pour a thin layer of enchilada sauce on the bottom. Cover sauce layer with two tortillas. Add 1/2 the meat mixture, 1/3 of the cheese and another thin layer of sauce. Top with two more tortillas and repeat. After placing the last two tortillas on top, pour sauce to cover (you might not need the entire rest of the can). Place in 400 degree oven for 20 minutes. Then top with the remaining cheese and bake for an additional 10 minutes.

When I was in Egypt just over a month ago, I was surprised at the lack of political vibrancy there. In fact, several of my conversations focused on that. Even the widespread (and largely undisputed) claims of election rigging did not generated much protests (apart from the sporadic clashes between members of the Muslim Brotherhood and the government). But now things have changed. Tens of thousands of people today came out to protest Mubarak's rule. Even if the current protests are unsuccessful in removing a 30 year dictatorship and the three decades of emergency rule, they would still succeed in transforming the political culture.

Couple of quick points: While Tunisia is the inspiration, the local political and scene of Egypt is quite different than Tunisia (see an earlier post: How important is the internet in Tunisia uprising?). For starters, the chief opposition to Mubarak in the form of Muslim Brotherhood is stronger (still in a relative sense) than some of the Islamist groups in Tunisia. Up until recently, Mubarak has been quite successful in playing the fears of an Islamist takeover in the case of fair democratic elections. So it was interesting today that Muslim Brotherhood officially declined to join-in the Egypt protests - and it is unclear how many of the individual members were there. Indeed, the protesters appear to represent a broad spectrum of the Egyptian society:

 The reality that emerged from interviews with protesters — many of whom said they were independents — was more complicated and reflected one of the government’s deepest fears: that the opposition to Mr. Mubarak’s rule now spreads across ideological lines and includes ordinary people angered by corruption and economic hardship as well as secular and Islamist opponents. That broad base of support could make it harder for the government to co-opt or crush those demanding change.

This may be a smart move on part of the Brotherhood. But then again, with all this turmoil, it is unclear what will happen in the coming days. One thing is clear: Arab political scene is currently changing at a lightening pace. And it is vibrant!

And New Media is again appear to be playing its role. Today's protest was instigated with the help of Facebook.

 In the days leading up to the protests, more than 90,000 people signed up on a Facebook page for the “Day of Revolution,” organized by opposition and pro-democracy groups to be held on Police Day, a national holiday. The organizers framed the protest as a stand against torture, poverty, corruption and unemployment. The Muslim Brotherhood said it would not officially participate, though some of members were among the protesters in Cairo.

But many people said they did not belong to any particular group and were attending their first demonstration. They included Ramy Rafat, 25, who said he lived in El-Marg, an impoverished neighborhood in north Cairo. Mr. Rafat, who has a master’s degree in petroleum geology and is unemployed, said he learned about the protest on a Facebook site for Khaled Said, 28, whose family says was fatally beaten by police officers last year.

“There are a lot of things wrong with this country,” Mr. Rafat said. “The president has been here for 30 years. Why?”

It is still too early to really assess the larger impact of social media. But it is becoming quite clear that Facebook and Twitter are certainly playing an important, if not central, role in the organization and mobilization of these protests. And it appears that Twitter, at least for some time, was blocked in Egypt:

But there were signs of other containment tactics: Several times Tuesday afternoon, cellphone networks appeared to be blocked or otherwise unavailable for people calling from Tahrir — or Liberation — Square. Many people had trouble getting access to Twitter, the social networking tool that helped spread news of the protests. Twitter confirmed that its site had been blocked in Egypt, Reuters reported. For much of the day, state television made no mention of the demonstrations.

But I think it will be hard to control this for a long period of time. In Iran, the government was able to regain control with excessive use of force. Though we may still have to see the long-term impact of that.

Tunisia. Egypt. Any others who want to add to the drama?

Here is an interview with El Baradei from CNN:

Ah, the number five. You remember learning to write it, don't you? First the hat, then the neck, then a big round belly.

Well, this jolly-old-number has brought nothing but frustration and disappointment to my four-year-old (almost five-year-old) daughter for the past year. It is THE ONE number that she just can't couldn't get right. 

Mommy! It doesn't look like a five it looks like a three! Voice quivers in fear.

Mommy! I. can't. do. it! Foot stomps in anger. 

Mommy, the belly is going the wrong way! Tears fall in frustration.

Well, it all came to a head last week. I couldn't take it anymore. Ava + I were going to get our lives back. She was going to persevere and OWN that number once and for all.

It was afternoon + little sister Anna was napping. I was straightening up after a morning's work in my office; Ava was beside me pencil + composition notebook full of blank pages in hand. Sun was streaming in bright white streaks through the window. A pretty day but cold. So cold you were okay being inside, appreciating it in warmth.

Ava's afternoon challenge was to practice our phone number. She cheerily announced that she wanted to give it out to all of her classmates so that they would have it, just in case. (I realize this could be very bad for a couple of reasons. But the most immediate being that our phone number has a five in it.)

So she began.

Usually when we get to the foot-stomping-tear-streaming-throat-yelling part of number five writing, I tell her maybe we need to take a break. But today, I decided to try a different approach.

When she was ready to give up, to throw in the towel and pick up a puzzle instead, I stopped her. Told her no, that we were going to write the number five. I told her that today was the day she was going to get it. She protested, confused. This wasn't the way it usually went. Usually, we had a little talk about how everything happens in time, how she will conquer five soon, how she wouldn't someday be seven unable to write five.

It wasn't something I had planned, this perseverance approach. But it suddenly felt like the right thing to do. I sat her down and told her we would write the number five twenty times.

Twenty times! That's too many! I can't do that.

Yes, you can. And, you will. I told her.

She sat at the table and was so flustered she couldn't even grip the pencil correctly. She stood up to leave. I sat her back down. She cried. I told her to get started. Firmly. She got up to leave again. I sat her on my lap and kept her there.

I modeled the number five one time. Had her study it and practice it five times before I turned the page over. A blank page. I told her to write the number five. She cried louder.

A hat, a neck, a big round belly.

She got it fifty-percent right. Not good enough, not for her.

She cried louder and I told her we weren't leaving until she wrote it twenty times.

She composed herself and started again, stopping herself at the big round belly--the part where she usually went the wrong way. She thought about it. She went the right way.

Success.

After her tenth twenty, she cruised to the finish.

Mommy, I'm doing it! 

The bright white streaks are no longer streaming through the window now. They are streaming through her. Ava is aglow.  

I wish I had captured her face on camera as she inhaled that page full of five's and recognized the writing as her own. It wasn't just a smile, it wasn't just a grin. It was a realization settling deep in her bones. Strengthening her. Framing her.

The truth is, it felt like the right thing at the time, but I wasn't sure it was the right thing. Until that moment. Every time before that, when I allowed her to walk away from the table, I thought I was preserving her confidence.

But here was my realization: Up until that day, I wasn't preserving her confidence. I was artificially preserving her perfection--a practice that I have personally perfected. Can't do it perfectly? Don't do it at all!

When I made her sit at the table and work through discomfort and fear (made her persevere) I was showing her how to abandon the perfect five and accept the five that was perfectly hers. In that moment, over and over and over again. 

Because ultimately, I want her to know the value of seeing it through, not just the value of it, want her to be able to apply the empathy that is gained in the struggle, want her to enjoy the satisfaction that rises out of the sacrifice, want her to accept the rewards + recognition that result from the (hard) work. 

Of course this strategy cannot be universally applied. I'm not going to trek her to the top of a snowy mountain and force her to ski down it. Nor am I going to hand her the periodic table and make her decode it. I don't want her to persevere in a relationship if it's not good for her. Some things, you have to walk away from.

But not the number five. And not lots of other difficult and uncomfortable experiences that await her.  But yes, there are some things she will just have to walk away from. And I pray to God that she has the confidence, the faith, and the experience to do that too.

I've never made stuffed pepper before EVER!  Our Mom used to make them when we were growing up but I have no idea what she put in them and I don't remember liking them all that much.  I had these gorgeous colored peppers and I didn't want to make the usual sausage and peppers so I decided to try my own version of the typical stuffed peppers using orzo instead of rice and ground chicken instead of the typical ground beef.  I also wanted to kick up the usual tomato sauce and decided on this version of a sweet and sour sauce so this is what I came up with.  They came out delicious.......this new recipe is a keeper! 

Ingredients:


4 peppers cut in half
1/2 lb  cooked orzo pasta (very aldente)
1 lb ground chicken
1/2 chopped onion
2 cloves of garlic
1 tablespoon of ground ginger
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup water
1-6 oz can of tomato paste
1/2 can (6-8 oz) jellied cranberry sauce
Salt and Pepper to taste
1/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese


Preparation:

Heat oil in a skillet and add onion, garlic, ginger saute for a minute.  Add chicken and cook chicken until cooked through and white in color.  Add tomato paste, water soy sauce and cranberry sauce and stir and cook for about 10 minutes.  Add cooked orzo and stir to combine. Season with salt and pepper to taste.  Stuff pepper halves and top with parmesan cheese.  Bake in a 375 degree oven for 35-45 minutes until parmesan cheese is browned and peppers are soft.

Linked to This Chick Cooks