Secret to Longevity

Bismillah al-rahman al-raheem

What is the secret to longevity?

Syed Qutb, was once a prominent revolutionary figure wrote in his book about the secret to longevity. His idea was proven throughout the entire history of mankind. He, himself is still "alive" in his idea of longevity. Unbelievable? His name was recorded and still mentioned in any revolutionary history books. A prominent figure, tremendous influence, burn jihad flame within shabab until now.

According to Syed Qutb, strive and struggle with good intention are the ingredients to keep one alive. He was imprisoned for taking up justice on his head, hated by the Western for his extreme dogma of religion. Nonetheless, he survived in every hearts of mujahidin today. Every commemorations find his name from lips to lips, from books to books, from cultures to cultures across the world. To this day, his struggle inspires shabab to continue spreading the risalah at-tauheed. To this day too, in every souls, lived the inspiring great Muslim, not only figures, but also great thinkers such as Hassan al-Banna, Fathi Yakan and a lot more to be mentioned here. 

Thanks to these great thinkers, their advice and their thoughts enlighten the spirit of dakwah, breezing in the atmosphere of jihad and calming those restless souls. SubhanaAllah, how much these thinkers inspired by you, ya Rasulullah..lau kana bainana...

>>.<<

Today is the big day, as part of the Tucson's Muslim community, even a single vote counts. I recalled my conversation with my father few years back, why everyone has to vote? Why bother voting if you can't even make any change?

"Allah will ask you on the Day, what do you do for Islam? If you can't go on a battle, do your best with amar ma'ruf wa nahi munkar"-I miss you dad.

>>.<<

Today is a big day again.

For 22 years,

Thanks mak,

For giving me the opportunity to see the beautiful world,  

Thanks ayah,

For your hardship, for your love and for your inspirations,

Thanks adik,

For being a good adik, a loyal friend of mine

Thanks all,

For being there,

In my frame of life,

Making this journey beautiful and exciting!

Abi Barzah al-Aslami r.a, dari Nabi SAW:

"Tidak berganjak kedua kaki seseorang dari tempat berdirinya di mahkamah Tuhan pada hari kiamat sehingga ia disoal tentang umurnya pada perkara apakah ia dihabiskan"

Doakan kakak jadi anak yang solehah dunia akhirat! :)

30th March 1990

Sabak Bernam, Sel.

Bulat-bulat Pau

Bismillah al-rahman al-raheem,

Let's make this a routine (for those who haven't) to recite basmalah for everything we do daily (except for certain things which we shouldn't!). Every deeds we do preceded by basmalah, will be counted as our ibadah, insyaAllah. Similarly, do not forget to recite basmalah before cooking your meals. 

Bismillah

Good food 

Good ingredients

Good health

Just add a little bit more;

Awesome flavor of Alhamdulillah ^_^

Pau Sardin

Bread maker (optional - just to make life easier)
3 cups of flour
1/4 cup of yeast
1/2 cup of milk
1/4 cup of sugar and milk powder
Cooked Sardin
8cm x 8cm white paper

With bread maker, pour in the liquid ingredients first followed by the dry ingredients. Dump everything into the mixer except for the cooked sardin. Set the machine to make dough, not bread!

Depending on the type of bread maker used, after the dough is ready, make small spheres and flatten them out. Put a reasonable amount if sardin at the center and close up the pau. Let them rest a little while on the white paper (approx. 20 mins). Get ready with the steamer and steam the pau for about 20 minutes per batch. 

Tadaa!! 

Though this is not as good as the one in restaurant or pasar malam, I satisfied with my pau ^_^

My crave for pau get me to learn making this instead of counting days to eat this in Malaysia! 

 Siapa kata busy belajar tak boleh belajar masak?

*nak seribu daya, tak nak seribu dalih*

Divine Signatures

Bismillah al-rahman al-raheem,

Is is He who made the Earth tame for you - so walk among its slopes and eat of His provision - and to Him is the resurrection [67:15] 

Look up,
Look at the blue sky,
Charming, calming, so close to the heart,
Yet,
So far away to be grasped
SubhanaAllah,
All praises to Allah!

Look around,
Mafic and Felsic band,
River channels and the highlands,
Alhamdulillah syukr ya Allah for the beautiful lands!

Cacti,
Rattle snakes,
We will get to the top whatever it takes!

So which of the favors of your Lord would you deny?
[55:13]






Izzati Hatta,
March 24th 2012
Geomorphology, Spring 2012

The Young Ambassador

Bismillah al-rahman al-raheem,

"Our high school time was a total joke" (the-one-who-should-not-be-named,2011)

Wow, really?! hmm...

Yesterday, I went to Safford Middle School in Tucson for a participation in cultural presentation. Well, I was supposed to be helping my Saudi friend, Hala, to present some cultural stuff in Arabic. Turned out, she made me my own slides to talk about Malaysia. How lovely! oh wait, in Arabic though...

Those kids are the IB's candidates and they choose (rather have to) take elementary Arabic class. Cool, no need to pull out fancy-fancy words out of my head and just be me, quarter-fluent speaker.

Very often, American kids were somehow very keen to know more about something that was "bizarre" to them. Non of them ever heard about Malaysia before. How sad...Nevertheless, they finally gained new insights about the location of Malaysia on the globe, and diversity of cultures that the country has.

It was not quiet a surprise when few students finally asked about muhajabah in Malaysia and in Saudi. Some of them speculated the constraints of wearing hijab to do daily life and why would they have to hide something precious they have, when they can be proud of them? 

As a Geology major student, my outfits did not get in the way for me to do outdoors. I still can do hiking, camping and whatever I want without removing my hijab, and the explanation goes on and on and on....

I see this opportunity as a platform to have them dwell more into Islam, insyaAllah. There'll be more presentations coming up! Your high/middle school would not be a joke! (Volunteering works are my pleasure!)

Obedience and good words. And when the matter [of fighting] was determined, if they had been true to Allah , it would have been better for them.[47:21]

*Dakwah itu dalam pelbagai cara, untuk yg tua, muda, remaja dan semua. Sampaikanlah Islam itu walau sekecil-kecil menjadi contoh yang baik kepada mereka kerana sesungguhnya Muslim Mukmin yang hebat itu, bukan hanya menjaga ibadahnya sendiri, bahkan mengajak manusia lain kepada jalan tauheed.  Perjalanan dakwah itu pula, bukanlah ditaburi bunga-bunga yang harum, walhal duri-duri yang amat menyakitkan sekali. Walau apa pun, para dai'e tidak akan pernah keseorangan, Allahu ma'ana :) *

Halaqah Spring 2012

Ethos

Envy.
The moment he began speaking
I sensed his zealous courage


Envy.
He stood there
Barely anyone 
Turn their face away 


Envy.
Biblical evidences which he conveyed
The remnant of literate entity
Who found God in scrutiny


Envy.
I wish
I could stand there, one day
Have the confidence in the same way
To open their hearts
To the beauty of our way

The Realm of Possibilities™

Get ready for exam(s) next week, no procrastination this time!!

Zuhud itu Penawar

"Dan janganlah engkau memalingkan mukamu (kerana memandang rendah) kepada manusia, dan janganlah engkau berjalan di bumi dengan berlagak sombong; sesungguhnya Allah tidak suka kepada tiap-tiap orang yang sombong takbur, lagi membanggakan diri" [31:18]

or in Japanese:

他人に対して（高慢に）あなたの頬を背けてはならない。また横柄に地上を歩いてはならない。本当にアッラーは，自惚れの強い威張り屋を御好みになられない。

apabila Dunia itu Racun, maka Zuhud itu Penawarnya...

do not forget to keep yourself humbly down to the Earth when you are already looking far at the sky 

Goal!!

Dedicated to Husna: see you tomorrow at 6.10 a.m ^_^

Kawan saya nak 50, saya nak 45 lah

InsyaAllah, Ameen ^_^

*gambar google.com

Mahal dan Murah

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

Seorang musafir yang keletihan setelah berjalan jauh tiba di sebuah kampung. Setibanya di kampung itu, beliau terus pergi ke pasar yang berhampiran untuk membeli makanan. Kemudian, beliau singgah ke sebuah kedai yang menjual roti. Alangkah terkejutnya musafir itu, harga roti yang sudah lama jauh lebih mahal berbanding roti yang baharu saja di masak. Beliau pun bertanya kepada tuan kedai.

"Megapa roti yang lama ini lebih mahal berbanding roti yang masih baru? Bukankah yang masih baru ini lebih enak rasanya?"

"Tuan memang benar, tetapi roti yang lama ini lebih mahal harganya oleh sebab yang lama ini lebih dekat waktunya dengan Rasulullah S.A.W, juga supaya manusia tidak mensia-siakan masa"

Si musafir tadi tersenyum.

Home made bread

*emak ayah selalu pesan, apa yang kita makan akan jadi darah daging dan makanan yang tak baik akan buat hati kita gelap dengan tompok-tompok hitam. Ilmu pula, susah nak lekat dalam hati yang tak bersih. Jadi, berhati-hatilah memilih makanan oleh sebab antara hak-hak jism yang kita perlu tunaikan adalah mendapat makanan yang sihat :) Jom buat roti sendiri!

The Beauty of Ukhuwah

Taken in front of Kautsar's house, Golden, Colorado.

المؤمنُ للمؤمنِ كالبنْيانِ يشُدُّ بعضهُ بعضًا

[Riyadhus salihin]

Locked!

Spring break is officially over today. As for public middle/high school, Spring break is officially on yesterday!

I missed my students, even though we will only meet once a week. I wasn't at school last week, took my weekend off visiting friends in Golden, CO. I was really surprised, the class was unusually half-emptied. I saw tiring, unfocused faces in class and decided to give extra credits to those who attended today's session. How lovely, admirably little faces sitting in front of me. They sacrificed their leisure time just to come to school. They could have just be absent and spend days playing video games or go on vacations.  

I was asking one student to repeat after my readings when she asked me to repeat myself as if it was an incomprehensible instruction. I thought she was focusing on the readings, listening to the proper tajweed. This reminds me to a verse in the Quran:

Then do they not reflect upon the Quran, or are there locks upon [their] hearts? [47:27]

Astaghfirullah astaghfirullah, may Allah forgive us for our sins. Some of us may occasionally became blurred after listening to a simple lecture, or majlis ilmu or anything. Pray to Allah, may He opens our heart, our senses to grab these knowledge and not to be among those who He locked their hearts. Astaghfirullah.

This is indeed, a reminder for myself.

 

-This was taken last year-

Whatever happened today, thank you kids, you guys made my day :) Alhamdulillah!

It's not 100 light years away from now

Bismillah al-rahman al-rahim

Semoga segala perkataan, perbuatan dan buah fikiran kita ini dari ilham Allah, bukan atas dorongan nafsu dan godaan syaitan semata-mata, InsyaAllah.

Muhasabah diri, walaupun hanya renungan sejenak selepas hari yang sangat panjang membolehkan kita sebagai manusia yang sentiasa lalai ini, kembali kepada track yang sebenar. Pernahkah kita, tatkala membaca ayat-ayat Allah SWT, bergetar jiwa, timbul rasa gerun dan tunduk padaNya? SubhanaAllah, jika perasaan ini hadir, andalah orang yang jiwanya masih hidup dan mampu menghidupkan jiwa-jiwa yang lain.

>>….<<

When I was small, I recalled my ustazah briefly taught the class about the hostile situations of the yaumul hisab. Little did I know about how tremendous will the situation be at that time. I remained adamant to the notion that the Day is still far away from my generation. As I looked up at the window, I saw the sun shone brilliantly and I was wondering, if the sunlight went off, there will be night forever and I do not have to go to school anymore. Little childish Izzati barely hated school because teachers told her what she supposed to know, not what she wanted to know.

As I grew older, I started to understand, even not entirely, this very crucial verse from Allah SWT:

Do you not know that Allah knows what is in the heaven and earth? Indeed, that is in a Record. Indeed that, for Allah is easy. [22:70]

Allah gave us clue, whatever we wanted to know, Quran is the answer.

I attended many lectures ranging from Physics, Geology and my all-time favorite, Astronomy. Those lecturers were brilliant. They found the dark matter, the birth of the stars, this and that, but they failed to find the mastermind behind all of these. They don’t find God.

Isn’t this ironic? They just mathematically proved that the universe is just like a flat 2D scroll paper, but Allah SWT, through His messenger told us 1400++ years ago about this:

The Day when we will fold the heaven like the folding of a written sheet for the records. As we began the first creation, We will repeat it. That is a promise binding upon Us. Indeed, we will do it. [21:104]

In addition, Allah SWT said in another verse:

On a Day when their tongues, their hands and their feet will bear witness against them as to what they used to do. [24:24]

During the folding of the universe (scrolling), a phenomenon called “Time Reversal” will happen. People will go back in time as though as they came back from the future BUT, nothing they can do to amend their past mistakes. At that time, all of our senses will be the witness for what we have done before.

It is really scary to imagine when we refuse to do something, we have no gut to stop whatever we are doing. Life then, will be just like a movie. When we die, that will be the end. In anything that we do, we have to remember, our decisions will be permanently recorded in our movie. We are also unable to foresee the future, neither we know when we are going to die. Myself too, might not have the chance to live in the next seconds. Therefore, should we have something that we want to change in life, of course for the better, do not wait, do not hold back. Do not wait until we “really” get prepared, because we do not know how many times we have left in this world.    

The Day is not 100 light away from us. Fear Allah. Divine secrets are utterly His.

Indeed, those who dispute concerning the signs of Allah without any authority having come to them -  there is not within their breasts except pride, [the extent of] which they cannot reach. So seek refuge in Allah. Indeed, it is He who is the Hearing, the Seeing. [40:56]

Wallahu’alam  

*Happy doing my groceries today, just found out a shop selling really cheap organic foods! * Syukur ya Allah!   

Never Ready for Anything!

Misleading title, do not get me wrong. 

This is not an encouragement, rather a morning kick to any lazy-to-do-anything-today-including-myself.

How many people realize that they will really get prepared for the end of the day?

Many stories were told, since we were small, till we get older, what did we do to improve ourselves?

Next: "It's not 100 light years away from now" based on "The Resurrection of Mankind Through The Reversal of Time" by Dr. Humayoun Khan, Illinois.