The other extremists

It has been an eventful month mainly dominated by ultra-hardcore tree huggers on one side and skeptics on the other, who incidentally appear to be too stupid and arrogant to accept the crisis which has been constantly gripping the planet for a century. The 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Copenhagen was on every news channel, and as if that wasn't enough, numerous talk shows and documentaries were dedicated to the event. Countless street protests, cynical arguments, sugar coated comments by politicians and passionate debates later, the final outcome of the conference turned out to be rather bleak. No surprises there.

Here're some of the reactions from various leaders who attended the event.

"We've come a long way but we have much further to go." - Barack Obama
"We have made a start." - Gordon Brown
"The meeting has had a positive result, everyone should be happy." - Head of the Chinese delegation.

That's how politicians say "We've gone absolutely nowhere with this, what a bloody waste of time." Plus, I think we should all be worried when communist China uses the phrases "positive result" and "everyone should be happy" in the same sentence.

Anyway, our very own Anni had a lot of exposure during the whole event. I would like to think he managed to enlighten people about the plight of this country with his performance during the debate, and also the somewhat corny THREE-FIVE-ZERO speech. Some people appear to think we've elected a pot smoking hippie as our President.

But let’s leave that aside for now, shall we?

It was a little over a year ago when Danny Boy (let's see if this nickname sticks) began his helm as the President of this tiny Republic. We all had huge expectations, some downright unrealistic, but I don't think anyone will deny that he had a massive job on his hands. A debt-ridden economy that had been further crippled by corruption was just one of the things he had to take into consideration. Also, there was the tiny matter of a global recession. And he was not, in any shape or form, helped by a significant chunk of the population who had been brainwashed into believing that the sun shone out of Maumoon Abdul Qayyoom’s every orifice. No, I don't think even he expected things to be this hard. His fantasy of resolving this country’s problems within a month went down the drain. The whooping sound of yellow-clad street dorks were cut short. Voices of dissent took over. We Maldivians are so fickle.

Having said this, I think he has done a pretty decent job so far. He has managed to successfully initiate some very important projects that are bound to help the country prosper, like the transportation system, plans to develop metropolises in other atolls, cutting the cost of our overly large Civil Service to name just a few. Plus, he is also carrying out the unenviable task of undoing and editing all the mishaps of the previous government. The great thing about Danny Boy is that he's an extremely enthusiastic character. BUT that does not mean I’m going to take him as some sort of Messiah and nod along with everything he says. For an instance, I do not agree with some of his foreign policies. I don’t want us to become pals with Israel, whose hands are dripping with the blood of our Palestinian brothers and sisters. Before you begin to accuse me of anti-Semitism, which is utterly ludicrous, please consider these excellent articles:

Are 60 Years of Agony and 94 Years of Deception Not Enough?

Where is 'Preventing Radical Extremism' - in Al-Quds?

The stench of hypocrisy on Israel is simply too much for us. We also must not forget the Salha Mosque Massacre in 1948; the first Houla Massacre in 1949; the Qibya massacre in 1953; the second Houla Massacre in 1967; the Hanin Massacre in 1967; the Yareen Massacre in 1974; the Aitaroun Massacre in 1975; the Bint Jbeil Massacre in 1976; the Al-Ouzaii Massacre in 1978; the Rashaya Massacre in 1978; the Kawneen Massacre in 1978; the Adloun Massacre in 1978,; the Khiam Massacre in 1978; Al-Abbasiyeh Massacre in 1978; the Sabra and Shatila Massacres in 1982; the Sohmor Massacre in 1984; the Bier al-Abed Massacre in 1985; the Iqleem al-Toffah Massacre in 1985; the Aitaroun Massacre in 1989; the Al-Zahrani Massacre in 1994; the Mansouri Ambulance Massacre in 1996; the Nabatiyeh Massacre in 1996; the first Qana Massacre in 1996; the Jenin massacre in 2002, the second Qana massacre in 2006, and the Ghaza Massacre of 2009.

These are only the large scale murders; the atrocities committed by Zionist terrorist groups like Irgun, Lehi and Haganah while all the Western pro-Israeli forces sat around twiddling their thumbs must be taken into account. And we can write whole books about the Palestinian exodus, of the way they were forcibly ejected from their homes with no hope of returning. So yeah, let’s become pals with Israel! Or as Aisha Hussain points out, let’s get under the sheets with them for a one-night stand!

Oh, and I don’t know what’s the deal with making alcohol available in inhabited islands. How on earth is that going to help the Drug Problem? And finally, I am extremely dissatisfied by the way his government treated the post-secondary students. Those who got the best results in the A’ levels in my batch (which ended 18 months ago) are still awaiting good scholarships. Whenever we make some noise regarding this, Uz. Hassan Latheef would come out with a handful of scholarship offers from places like Bangladesh, China (and once, even the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus!), dump them under our noses then declare something along the lines of, “Are you happy now, little whelps?” Politely of course.

I think Danny Boy will be the first person to admit that he’s nowhere near perfect. After all, his Islamic knowledge is no better than that of the average 12-year old Maldivian. To his great credit, he acknowledged this during the start of his tenure, and decided to let the people who know their stuff to control the Islamic affairs of this country. I think he should consult these people more often, rather than wasting all his energy desperately vying for the position to be the darling of the Tories.

Anyway, the decision to bring Islamic issues under the control of the Ministry of Islamic affairs made certain people rather unhappy. You know the apostates, the contributors at Minivan News and the cronies who support everything they say. Together, all these Brown Sahibs will vilify the great religion of ours, mock our Prophet (s.a.w) and his companions and label anyone who defends our religion as a Wahhabi at every chance they get. (They also appear to think the rise of Salafi knowledge in this country is going to make us all run around the streets, waving knives and screaming, “Kill all Amreekans!” May Allah provide them the right knowledge) I sincerely hope Danny Boy’s ideas are not on the same wavelength as the Brown Sahibs. Because if they are, then sorry, I’m going to refrain from voting for him next time around.

Sometimes you’d wonder if there is any difference between the Brown Sahibs and the Islamophobic bigots we see elsewhere around the world. So quick were they to praise Danny Boy’s decisions to strengthen ties with Israel, to legalise the sale of intoxicants in inhabited islands. They freaked out at the news that Dr Bilal Phillips was going to visit our country, and constantly bemoan about the fact that more and more of our women are adopting the burqa. It’s funny how certain people become so bothered when women decide to cover up, as in accordance to how it is explicitly prescribed in our religion.

“Me, wear the burqa! Never! Do you really think I’m going to let the chance to show my stuff slip away like that? Maybe, just maybe, when I grow older and everything starts to get all saggy, then I might change my mind.” – What the anti-hijabi activists are really saying.

They want us to take heart from the so-called developed, forward-thinking nations who have made several attempts to ban the wearing of the hijab yet have no problem in allowing people to strip naked in public. This attitude is not new for Maldivians; I suppose some of our ancestor’s more eccentric genes must have sneaked through. Remember when the famous Islamic traveler, Ibn Batuta visited our country? He acted as a Qazi here for several months and was understandably dismayed to find that our women strutted around topless. His advice fell on deaf ears.

Brown Sahibs, especially the ones who consider themselves Muslims, dislike being reminded about their religion. Maybe it’s because of guilt or embarrassment. Whenever they hear a learned scholar preach, they’ll attempt to find faults to mock them. And if by chance they’re stuck in the same room with an Islamophobe and a learned, respected sheikh, you can be certain that they’ll always side with the Islamophobe. Whenever a bigot insults our religion, the Brown Sahib won’t defend it but will end up sheepishly siding with the nutter.

Anyway, I’ve managed to rant a lot but cut me some slack; I haven’t had time to write a reasonable post for a long time. The message I want to give to all the open-minded folks out there is to be careful of the enemy within. The Brown Sahibs are more dangerous to our society than those dodgy missionaries who’re constantly trying to infiltrate our ranks. We should all do our best to advice each other, to correct the faults of one another and to hold on firmly with our faith.

"By the 'Asr,
Indeed all of mankind is in a state of loss,
Except those who have eemaan,
Conduct righteous actions,
Call each other to the Truth,
And call each other to having patience."

- Surah Al-‘Asr

Also recommended: The Basis of Unity by Yasir Qadhi

What really is freedom of speech?

It's the right of every human being, I'm sure there aren't any disagreements there. It is the right of a person to stand up and speak against an iron-fisted ruler, to spread knowledge to the uneducated and to generally express your own opinion on various matters. But of course, there are always a few idiots who're going to abuse this right.

There's the saying "Freedom of speech does not mean you can yell "Fire!" in a crowded room." Although there are people who're always going to think the opposite. Just look at the recent uproar at UK when the fascist Dutch MP, Geert Wilders was barred from entering the country.

For those of you who don't know, Geert Wilders is a fascist, right-wing, anti-Islam politician (which basically means Idiot in a Nutshell), who spends all his energy, as with all attention-seeking, power hungry politicians, attempting to boost his popularity and get lots of votes. He was banned from entering the United Kingdom earlier this year and while this decision was supported by many, a few were left disgruntled and complaining about the lack of freedom of speech in Britain.

Geert Wilders, snorting ink

Allowing someone like Wilders to share his retarded views is like letting someone with no knowledge on physics to teach the quantum phenomena. He made a short film called Fitna, which was highly critical of Islam and was supposed to show everyone what bloodthirsty creatures we Muslims really are. I have to say that I found it to be something of an anticlimax; if I never knew who was behind its production, I would've thought it was a 12-year old. I'm not going to go into details, you can read an excellent response to the film here:

http://english.islamway.com/bindex.php?section=article&id=346

But anyway, after witnessing all the hysteria in Britain, people running around, flapping their arms in a demented manner, eyes rolling in their sockets, foam dripping out from their mouths and shrieking "Freedom of Speech, whatever happened to it?", I don't quite get the meaning of the term now. In my religion, we only do things which benefit people and stay well clear from things which induce harm. When we speak, we are told to speak only the truth. We are asked to spread knowledge so that the society can benefit from it. I just cannot see the point in letting a fascist bigot expressing his opinions. Opinions which are only meant to harm and isolate a group of people, to create instability and uncertainty throughout a country just so that his political party would get a few votes in his own country. That's how all racists and fascists obtain votes; by spooking you out with terrifying stories about The Others, or in today's world, Muslims. During the 1930's it was the Jews. Facists always attack you when you're most vulnerable, which only proves what cowards they really are. That's why the popularity of facist political parties have grown in Europe over the past year or so, which of course coincided with the global financial crisis. Apparently it's our fault that people are losing their jobs and are being forced to beg for a living.

I miss the days when common sense prevailed over everything else...

Greetings, an apology & and RMs

Without further ado, I'd like to wish all my Muslim brothers and sisters a very happy and blessed Ramadan! Let's make the best use of our time while we still have it, and may Allah grant us the strength to do so.

I know how long it has been since my last post, and believe me, I'm not proud of it. If this blog were my wife, she would've filed for divorce and left me by now and I'd probably be trying to piece together my life again. Luckily though, this is just a blog and I can toy with it however way I wish. In my defence, I've been extremely busy, doing lots of traveling around the country and abroad. So I managed to interact with some very interesting characters which is good news since it has given me a lot to write on this blog. But let's leave it to another day and make an in-depth study on those quirky characters we see during the blessed month of Ramadan every year; the Ramadan Muslims.

I think it's safe to assume that the term probably started out as an inside joke within a circle of Islamic scholars. Here's my definition of the term:

Ramadan Muslim - A peculiar species of Muslim which comes out of its shell of excessive materialism during the first week of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Now, there are many ways in which you can identify RMs. The most widely used method is by observing the way people behave inside mosques. RMs just aren't used to spending time at the mosque. During the other months, while attending Friday prayers, they
1. turn up late so that they do not have to listen to the whole khutbah
2. sleep throughout the khutbah or
3. stay outside the mosque so that they cannot hear the khutbah. Or all three at once, if possible.

Of course, during the first Friday of Ramadan, RMs take special care to attend the prayers on time. They even try to stay awake through the whole sermon without thinking about food. They try. Of course, succeeding is a totally different issue.

RMs have their religious batteries charged to the brim during the first week, and this, unfortunately, lasts only 7 days. They'll attend prayers on time (some even manage to wake up for Fajr, to their enormous surprise), but their lack of mosque etiquette will be there for all to see.
It is evident from the Hadeeth of our beloved Prophet (s.a.w) that we should attempt to fill the rows while preparing for the prayers in an orderly manner. Fill the rows starting from the front, begin from the middle directly behind the Imaam and gradually fill the sides. This undoubtedly will make it easier for everyone. Unfortunately, RMs have other ideas, all of which center around, "I have to get outta here as soon as possible." They stay at the back rows, and believe me, there are a lot of RMs when you think about it! This usually gives rise to a horrendous bottleneck at the mosque entrance and several people will have to make do by praying outside amongst the slippers and shoes, some of which do not smell very nice.

Obviously, due to their apparent tight schedules, RMs don't bother performing the sunnah prayers. They leave as soon as the fard prayer ends, causing yet another bottleneck around the entrance. Personally I find it rather odd that they prefer getting jostled around in the middle of a crowd for ten minutes rather than taking that time to perform the sunnah prayers.

With Ramadan comes the Tharaaweeh prayers. Most RMs perform these prayers and are proud to do so. Until the end of the first week, that is. Afterward, they'll begin to skip this particular prayer by leaving after 'Isha, sheepish expressions plastered on their faces. The speed at which they leave the mosque is quite astonishing; they will shame any Olympic athletes who're lucky enough to witness it.

A Ramadan Muslim, leaving the mosque after 'Isha

After the first week, everything will go normal for RMs. They won't touch the Quran, set foot inside a mosque and will sleep till noon. An exception will be the eve of 27th, which for some reason they are convinced is THE night; Laylath-al-Qadr. I wonder who started this rumour, because it really isn't helping the RMs to carry out their religious duties properly.

And so the process repeats itself, once a week every year.

So, ask yourself this; are you a Ramadan Muslim? In any case, here are a few articles that I hope you will find to be useful.

http://www.khutbah.com/en/ramadan_hajj/warriors.php
http://www.khutbah.com/en/ramadan_hajj/sand.php
http://www.beautifulislam.com/fasting

Sex education in Maldives - it's a total failure!

Yes, let's talk about sex! Me, being a tad melodramatic, will start by telling you all a little story.

The first time I was made to sit down and listen to The Talk was a few weeks after I began grade 6. I was eleven years old at the time. My classmates and I were taken to the school hall where our Assistant Principal was waiting for us, a book on her lap and her face bearing a very serious expression. We were immediately wondering what we had done to displease her.

So we tentatively seated facing her while she patiently waited till we settled down. Then she opened the book and held it up. We squinted to see what it was. It was an illustrated diagram of the male genitals. Several people sniggered, but the noise was instantly quailed when she glared at us.

"Do you know what this is?" She asked us. Of course we do, I thought. It's the male genitals. You can close the book now. She didn't, and continued with this rather unusual session.
"These are called the private parts. I'm going to tell you a few things you need to know about your private parts..." and she told us how important it was to not let our "private parts" be seen by anyone else, unless during unavoidable circumstances like sustaining an illness (I thought getting hit by the ball while out playing football and sustaining testicular torsion would have been a better example; the mind conjures horrible images sometimes).

But anyway, during the days that followed there were plenty of private part jokes floating around. Most of us didn't really take the session too seriously. We were made to sit through plenty of similar sessions and I noticed that the attitude of my classmates were pretty much the same.

This type of attitude is not limited to just immature adolescents. You make someone talk about sex on television and you'll hear people all over the country either freaking out or cracking dirty jokes. I suppose this is understandable to an extent, since quite a lot of negative Western aspects have seeped into our once disciplined culture. But if you take one brief look into our past, you'll discover that we have a rather cringeworthy history whenever sex is involved.

Remember the story of how we converted to Islam? About the Rannamaari? Weren't you surprised (and somewhat amused) to discover that the frightful monster that for some reason always feasted on young, virgin girls was merely the king carrying out his part time duty as a rapist? How about the way our earliest type of poetry, the Raivaru, lost its credibility when it was used as a tool to hurl out X-rated lyrics towards our pious women? Or how the discipline of our nation was on the verge of a serious meltdown when Mohamed Amin Didi came to power? Yes, homosexuality was common practice back then, bet your Dhivehi teacher never told you that, eh? Our first president managed to stamp it out of course, let's give credit to him for that. But what was his reward for all the positive changes he brought to this country? Getting beaten up, tortured and banished until he passed away. He forgave all Maldivian citizens except for the two blokes who injured his genitals. And recently we discovered this guy. One would fear that this is not an isolated case. Not only do we have such perverted sickos lumbering all over the country, but cases of premarital / extramarital sex and sexual assaults are on the rise. We've undone all the good work Amin Didi did for us.

Now, the solution. Predictably, I'm going to say it is our religion, Islam (I'll just ignore the groans coming from the Kemal Ataturk Brigade). In Islam, sex is not considered to be dirty or a source of shame. Rather, it is one of the natural inclinations given to us by Allah that need to be fulfilled every now and then, similar to the same sort of unavoidable desires such as eating, drinking, sleep etc. However, like everything else sexual desire can only be fulfilled by following a certain set of rules which can be clearly learnt from the Quran and our beloved Prophet's (peace be upon him) Hadith.

Don't get me wrong now, it's not that I'm against the awareness sessions being conducted in schools and youth centres. I just think the information are not being provided in the correct manner. Having attended plenty of such sessions, I can say that I've always felt there was an important element missing from them; the religious perspective. Brilliant though our psychologists and behavourial experts are, they simply don't have sufficient knowledge when it comes to religious matters. For an example, they can tell us about all the different types of contraceptive methods and when the session ends, some of us would be under the impression that as long as we use contraception, everything will be alright. For an instance, I was questioned in a survey conducted by WHO recently and the interviewer asked me all sorts of awkward questions (my cousin, who was with me at the time, was kicked out of the room to give me privacy). He began listing all sorts of contraceptive methods, most of which sounded rather repulsive, and he finally quzzed me about the diaphragm.
"Diaphragm?" I asked incredulously. "How on earth does that work?" I was thinking about the diaphragm pumps used in chemistry labs while transferring solutions into pipettes.
The interviewer did not appear to share my amusement.
"So which methods will you use?" He asked.
"Let's see, er...which methods..that's a tough one. I don't like many of the methods you've mentioned."
"Just name one or two then."
"I'll definitely not use a diaphragm."

These people never mention things like the importance of abstinence before marriage, the dangers of homosexuality and incest etc.

As a result today, we have an underground gay community and ignorant dunderheads who're always quick to say, "Oh, I don't have a problem with a person's sexuality." Oh yeah? Look what happened to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. And before you think of pelting me with hollow insults, take a look at the statistics provided by the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, an agency that is always on the frontline when it comes to infectious and dangerous diseases in the United States:

http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/topics/surveillance/basic.htm#exposure

Compare the number of cases of AIDS transferred by male-to-male sexual contact to that of high-risk (note the word high-risk) heterosexual contact. Interesting, isn't it? Of course, such statistics are rarely spoken aloud. It's called political correctness, see, which roughly means manipulating the truth in such a way that people are made to hear things the way they want to hear them.

It always amuses me how the many so-called developed countries of the world actually consider pornography and incest to be perfectly acceptable. Look at this:

"In Israel, incest between adults (of the age of 18 years and above) is not a crime"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laws_regarding_incest

Ha! Ridiculous! Not only are such atrocities legal in some countries, but pornography is a billion dollar industry, and cases of pornography-related sexual assaults are not rare. In fact, plenty of serial killers have admitted that the motivation of their crimes were as a result of watching violent pornography.

We all know that incest, pornography, sodomy and fornication are crimes in Islam. So how can we curb all the immorality that are rapidly spreading throughout our society? Well for one thing, we shouldn't just shun them into a dark corner and pretend they don't exist, which was a habit of a certain former President of ours. You might remember him; huge ego, has an irrational fear of fireworks...yes him. No, we should tackle the problems head-on using the powerful tool we call Islam.
Oh, and I've managed to find a couple of excellent articles:

Islamic perspective on homosexuality
Homosexuality in the light of Islam

Maldivians turning into Rednecks

Don't we all feel annoyed by the stereotypes attached to us? Say you, the Maldivian, were in a foreign country, England for an example, and it's the middle of winter (a time of the year when people over there are unusually edgy). You walk into a small shop owned by a middle aged white man. He gives you one long, searching look of deepest loathing and utter,

"I don't bargain here."
"What? I had never thought of bargaining."
"Oh really? And am I supposed to believe that?"
"Well, I can't see any reason why you shouldn't."
"Oh I can tell you plenty of reasons. You see, don't think that, just because you worship three million false gods you can do whatever you like with us Englishmen."
"Ah! You think I'm from India then?"
"You ain't?"
"No, I'm from the Maldives."

As usual with most foreigners who discover that you're Maldivian, the shopkeeper will then undergo a drastic and frankly alarming change in his mood. He'll become so warm that you're sure the snow outside will melt at any moment.

"I am so sorry. You must be terrified! Please do forgive me, but those brown tossers are nothing but trouble, I'm sure you understand. But ah, Maldives! It's a beautiful country! You're so lucky to actually belong there!"
"Er...thank you?"
"Yes, yes, but anyway, what was it that you wanted to purchase? That watch? No, c'mere, I can show you even better ones. Here, a Rolex. No, no need to bother. I can make it cheap, you know. 20% discount, what do you say?"
"No sir, it's alright. I'm not really fussed...er I'll be happy with a cheap one. You know, I just need something to make myself keep track of the time."
"Oh, so modest. But tell me; how many times have you been hit on the head by a coconut?"
"A co- what? A coconut? Never."
"Never? But there probably ain't a scrap of land that ain't occupied by coconut trees!"
"Coconut palms, sir. But I assure you, I've never fallen victim to a coconut. And I've lived there most of my life."
"Ah yes. You must be one of the few lucky ones then, boy! I shudder to imagine the number of coconut-related injuries your people sustain every year."
"Well, to be honest such injuries are pretty rare."
"Rare! Hohoho! I don't know who you're kidding boy. Are you pulling my leg?"
"No, no, I'm being serious. Coconuts aren't nearly as dangerous as you appear to think!"
"Hahahaha! Oh, you've made my day, boy! You Maldivians have a good sense of humour too! I'll tell me wife of that. Incidentally, do you know anyone who could help me wife and I to go over there for cheap? It's our 25th anniversary this summer and what better way than to spend it in the tropical sun, eh boy?"

Yes, stereotypes and generalisation; two extremely annoying traits you're likely to encounter in foreign lands. Although some of them can be pretty amusing like the example mentioned above, others can be downright nasty. The nasty stuff can be attributed to racism or xenophobia. Or even fascism, but they all promote the same thing; hatred.

Which reminds me of Paulo Di Canio, the former Italian footballer who infamously made the Nazi salute after scoring a goal. When accused of being a racist, he replied, "I'm not a racist. I'm a fascist." What an idiot...

An even bigger douchebag than you previously thought

And it's a growing trend here in Maldives. Some of us appear to have the illusion that we Maldivians are superior in front of our fellow South Asians, and I'm sure that the rest of us are thoroughly mystified. If the historical facts we've come up with by collecting various evidence are accurate, then we're descendants of a mixture of tribes; Dravidians, Arabs, Black Africans and North Indian Aryans. But does any of this matter? Well, no, unless you're a completely ignorant fool.

And unfortunately, some of us appear to have happily embraced the Completely Ignorant Fool tag. I've seen plenty of blogs owned by Maldivians which shamelessly conjures articles week after week containing shocking derogatory language against "Bangalhis". Recently, several groups have popped up on Facebook calling for the expulsion of "Bangalhis" from Maldives, and their grotesque members have even uploaded photos of immigrant workers being subjected to all sorts of discriminatory acts, which the members of the groups appear to find amusing. Of course, if you confront any of these bigots then they'll always give you the same, Redneck answer:

"I don't like 'em immigrants. They come 'ere 'n steal our jobs."

Fine, then. Why don't you cycle to the garbage dump every evening with bulging bags of rubbish that makes you smell for weeks on end, or get involved in the construction of buildings from eight in the morning till sunset and risk getting baked in the sun, or perhaps maintain the sewers which, once again, will make you smell bad for weeks on end. What? No? It's not your job? Well then, what's with the double standards?

As we're all aware of, the racist attacks on foreigners, particularly Bangladeshi immigrant workers have been getting increasingly gruesome. I won't even bother to discuss them. And the abuse is not just limited to bodily harm, but you get the feeling that the verbal abuse is even worse.

What we Maldivians don't like to admit is the fact that we're getting increasingly unpopular amongst the South Asian countries. A friend of my mother's once told us how her family were residing in an area in Sri Lanka far away from where Maldivians usually stay.

"They call us drug dealers," she said. And you wonder why, looking at the way young Maldivians who go over there to "pursue their education" behave themselves.

All this hatred that has crept into our society wouldn't exist if people really acted like true believers. I recently read an interview of a man, who used to be a hardcore member of the KKK (that is a racist organization in the USA) who converted to Islam. In it, he said something that was really interesting:

"The other element [of my change] was [that] when you hate somebody so passionately and you just live and just consume the hatred everyday, it starts to deteriorate. It's like a cancer because it destroys your personality, it distorts your soul, and it destroys [those] close to you because it wears off on other people. I was inflicting more harm on myself than the people I hated. I was basically destroying my family and anyone else who had contact with me."

You can read the full interview here:
http://www.beautifulislam.com/converts/kkk_to_islam.htm

In a country where the majority of its citizens claim to followers of Islam, it is embarrassing to witness such acts of cowardice. If only these cowards bothered to learn more about the way of life, I'm absolutely certain that ones race will not even be considered an issue. That is because racism has no place in Islam.

Which brings us to some wise words said by the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).

A man once visited the Prophets mosque in Madina. There he saw a group of people sitting and discussing their faith together. Among them were Salman (who came from Persia), Suhayb who grew up in the Eastern Roman empire and was regarded as a Greek, and Bilal who was an African. The man then said:

"If the (Madinan) tribes of Aws and Khazraj support Muhammad, (it is understood because they are Arabs like him) they are his people. But what are these (foreign) people doing here?" (Implying an obvious dislike for foreigners) The Prophet became very angry when this was reported to him. He went to the mosque and summoned people to prayer. He then addressed them saying:

"O people, know that the Lord and Sustainer is One. Your ancestor is one; your faith is one. The Arabism of anyone of you is not (by virtue of the nobility of) your mother or father. It is no more than a tongue (language) The Prophet further said: Let people stop boasting about their ancestors. One is only a pious believer or a miserable sinner. All men are sons of Adam, and Adam came from dust." [(Abu Dawud, Tirmidhi)]

"Humanity is the family of Allah, the best human is one who is kind to His (Allahs) family. (Mishkat) Extending a helping hand to a foreigner is extending your hand to your own family member."

The highs and a pesky low

Today, people flocked over to the east end of Male' to witness the first ever sunrise at Aneh Dhivehiraajje. No, I'm not going to get all emotional and type something full of poetry "straight from the heart". That's mainly because I'm not a very poetic sort of person and my attempts to write poetry often include trying to find words that rhyme and ending up with something that doesn't make any sense. Like this verse of a poem I wrote when I was around nine:

Grandmother Willow,
She loves to hug the pillow,
and she looked down below

Enough blabbering. I didn't go to witness the sun rise because I've seen it a million times before and it always looked the same. Also, I had collapsed onto bed out of sheer exhaustion and, according to my friend who phoned me at that time, I spoke absolute nonsense and he came up with the conclusion that I wasn't in the right mental state to do anything due to severe sleep deprivation. Which is a shame as he's one of those who have their heads stuck up Maumoon's behind and was expecting a victory speech from me.

Anyway, I was walking along a very pro-Maumoon neighbourhood today and witnessed two people trying to vigorously remove posters of him from their walls. They caught me staring and gave me the 'what are you looking at?' look. I pretended to scratch the tip of my nose in an attempt to conceal a smirk and walked on, keeping my head bowed until I'd got myself out of that area. It was unusually quite during the late morning wasn't it? Probably because most people were in bed having stayed up all night, or that the whole thing hasn't quite sunk in yet.

The purpose of this post is not about basking in the glory of a sweet victory or gloating over it. In fact, it doesn't have any clear-cut purpose, so I would like to advise all of you, whether you voted for Maumoon or Anni or for the third candidate who never campaigned, i.e Mr Baathil Vote, to act like adults. People like me who voted for a change should stop rubbing it in the faces of the Maumoon supporters, whom by the way, should quit throwing tantrums. I mean, 30 years! For how long could you possibly stand him? Whoops, there I go again!

I hate Anni! I hate him! I don't wanna stay here anymore!!

See, this is the reason why you've to be at least 18 in order to be eligible for voting.

There's something else I'd like to mention; the darn mark. I predicted in my previous post that the new method wouldn't be one which we would enjoy and I turned out be be right, didn't I? Here, have a look:
My index finger looks dead! It reminds me of the irreversible injury Dumbledore sustained on his hand when he tried to put on a cursed ring. All thanks to our whiny journalists who're so incompetent that they couldn't come up with better topics than the issue of a mark. Yesterday my cousins were making a little too much noise, so I raised the finger to my lips to say, "Shh" and the smallest one freaked out. According to her, I shouldn't have voted in black. She thinks voting means applying colours on our fingers, bless her. In my defense, it turned black because of unavoidable contact with water and sunlight.
I've also heard of the incredible lengths people have gone to in order to remove this. Like using lemons, as cologne proved to be unhelpful this time round, or even strong hazardous solvents! My suggestion is concentrated sulphuric acid. It'll definitely remove the mark, although side effects include your skin melting to the bone and the acid entering your bloodstream causing damage to the optic nerves.

Secularism shouldn't affect us!

I received a fair amount of stick for my response to a post by Raniya last month. The post appealed for a very noble cause, and I sincerely wish her all the best for the work she's doing.

My comment stated that the majority of social issues our country is facing today are down to the weakening of our faith in Islam. Some people failed to comprehend, or rather, preferred to misunderstand this statement and asked me to "give religion a break because it is the cause of half the problems of the world." Some even went as far as to accuse me of turning a blind eye to all the problems and their victims. No, I never mentioned anything of that sort, and doing so will be an act of utter stupidity.

Anyway, this "fiasco" got me thinking. Why do some people think religion is the root of all the atrocities that are taking place, not just here in Maldives, but all around the world? So I thought hard and did some research. And what did I find out? Religion really is partly to blame, but not in the way many so-called liberals think. With the increase in secularist societies, new laws are being established with the aim of providing the population with as much independence as possible. Many of these laws, in layman's terms, usually comes back to bite the population on the backside. Why? Because they contradict religion, and therefore contradict the natural laws of the human race.

If you look around, you may notice that this is particularly noticeable in Islamic countries. After many countries with majority Muslim populations "abandoned" our religion, we started to go backwards. After Europe (the so-called Christian continent) abandoned Christianity, they flourished. My point here is that the belief that religion is a ridiculous figment of human imagination most probably sprouted from societies with majority Christian populations. It is, after all, a religion created by fabrication, and has been undergoing fabrication for more than 2000 years. The iron-fisted ruling by churches, their detachment from the world we know, their ridiculously easy ways of "erasing sins", their methods of spreading the religion and their denial of key scientific theories resulted in many getting disillusioned. People began to treat religion as an obstacle that prevented them from modernizing and living their lives fully. They started to believe that religion and the laws within their societies were separate things. Thus secularism was born.

Naturally, with the widespread of mass media, many Muslims fell head over heels in trying to implement such beliefs within their societies. Look at us Maldivians, for instance. For many of us, religion is merely praying, fasting, ablution etc. I find it highly amusing to see people suddenly switching to "Religious Mode" when they're about to pray. From what I've learned, Islam is a way of life. It is a religion which states that the purpose of your life is to worship God. Of course, people from Western backgrounds (i.e, where concentration of Muslims are low) usually misunderstand this statement. For them, total devotion means spending the whole day at church, praying on their knees with their heads bent. This is largely due to the fact that there actually are people who act this way. In Islam, total devotion to God means doing everything in life the way we were instructed to. A few simple everyday examples include avoiding haram foods, avoiding the usage of foul language while communicating, keeping yourself in good shape, spending quality time with your family and friends etc. Islam does not separate the worldly affairs and religion. It is a religion that covers everything that is connected to our lives, encourages free thought and promotes education and modernization as long as we hold on to the Islamic values. People usually don't realize that these laws Allah asked us to follow are really for our own good.

Tying the knot...or everything else?

"When I get married, I won't be bothering with any of this nonsense. You can all wear what you like, and I'll put a full Body-Bind Curse on Mum until it's all over" - Fred Weasley

Do wedding ceremonies these days make you go, "Oh, what the hell??!" If not then you'll probably not understand the rest of this post. So read at your own risk.

Personally, I love weddings. The food is usually great and....yeah that's it. I've been unable to find any other good reasons to attend them. I know that many are going to say, "But don't you even feel happy for the newly wed couple? Don't you share their happiness, you selfish brat?" Of course I do, but let's stick to the topic of wedding parties, shall we? Once I watched a report on BBC about the lavish wedding ceremonies held in India, and how many families go bankrupt over them. Even we're heading in that direction I suppose, especially these days when people are so obsessed with taking loans.

Let's start off with invitation cards. Basically, they let the invitees know about the date, time and venue of the ceremony. Simple right? Well, apparently not. The cards should be unique, that is to say, totally different from those made for other weddings. These invitations are usually made by an expert on designing stuff (who wouldn't care less if the whole ordeal is ridiculous or not: they make money by doing this, see). I think there's a high probability that invitation cards alone cost more than weddings used to 20 years back.

The couple are next. The bride will usually be caked under layers of makeup and sporting a cross between I'm so pretty! and I can't believe this is happening! looks. She will never laugh, but have a permanent-looking smile plastered to her face. If a situation where she just has to laugh arises, she'll just gasp extremely softly. Most people aren't able to hear this. The guy, well they say men are easier to read. He'll just have the simple When will this darn thing end so we can go and... look. The couple won't even realize you're right there in front of them, shaking their own hands until they run through the photos several days later.

What about the excessive unnecessary stuff? My best friend rang me up last year while he was at one such party and told me about a chocolate fountain. I thought he was talking about a new type of dessert, but it just happened to be that...a chocolate fountain. Not for edible purposes. A wedding I attended had fruits carved out in fancy ways as decoration. Fruits, for heavens sake! Totally fail-safe methods of throwing money out of the window!

Lastly, the giveaways. These are usually stuff that have no use whatsoever, and I just can't wrap my head around the idea! Sometimes this makes me wonder whether people are just looking for more ways to inspire from riches-to-rags stories. If I live long enough to get married and someone asks me for a giveaway, I'd probably say, "You've just stuffed yourself with food I gave away. What more do you want?" I've received all sorts of ridiculous stuff from weddings (or rather, had them stuffed in my hands) and they always go where they belong; into the dustbin.

People forget the real reason of celebrating weddings these days, don't they? The process where two people are tying the knot is paled into insignificance, but what comes after are deemed to be of utmost importance.

And two months later, the couple get divorced. The typical Maldivian wedding..

This is Ms Apple Slut. I received her as a giveaway at a recent wedding.

I feel so red!

What a magical night that was! The whole country was throbbing with emotion. I really thought I felt the ground rocking beneath my feet when the goal went it...aaah I'll never forget that.
The most impressive thing about it all , I'm sure you'll all agree, was the way the whole nation got together. There were plenty of people knew next to nothing about football, who used to think that its a game where you weren't supposed to touch the ball with the hands, cheer on until their voices turned hoarse.

There were plenty of positives to take from the whole tournament. The most important thing is, of course, our country FINALLY getting hold of a trophy in football. For a football mad nation such as ours, theres none more fitting reward. Next was our fans. We ALL got behind the team. For once we didn't care about all the problems that have been casting shadows over our global reputation. We were able to say "Screw you MDP, DRP and all those other political parties! Screw you gangsters, thieves & druggies! Screw you all!" The way our fans presented themselves to the audience abroad did no harm to our reputation at all, so congratulations to everyone!

I did get outside last night after the game as there was a lot happening. Unfortunately, amidst all the excitement I forgot to take a camera so I missed the chance to post a few photos here. The streets around my place were absolutely jam packed with traffic, but no one seemed to give a fiddler's fart about it. Instead, they were honking their horns in different tunes so that people screamed along with them. There were even two white guys prancing along like a bunch of idiots :D

This time it really is ours!