I received this voicemail today; not sure who it is or what they’re talking about, but it’s quite funny.

Today, I was quickly perusing over the daily news headlines on my Google Personalized homepage, when I misread two adjacent headlines and thought I saw something about a bombing in Madrid killing 41 people. I did a doubletake, worried that Spain had been targetted again. I then realized it was Iraq, and went back to going about my business.

A minute later, I realized how indicative my behaviour was of the typical, indifferent Westerner. Hearing about bombings and deaths have become so commonplace in Iraq that it hardly catches our attention anymore. Each of those victims must have a family; for each of those families, they will always remember that day when a loved one - perhaps a father, perhaps a daughter, maybe a sister - left this world forever. They will cry uncontrollably, while others will try to comfort them to no avail. While these events may hardly catch our attention now, they are changing the lives - nay, destroying the lives of thousands. The losses can never be recovered.

Had it happened in Europe or Canada, it would dominate headlines for weeks and months. The date would become synonymous with the event, as if everything else on that day stood still watching tragedy unfold in our world. Talk shows and newspaper columnists would keep putting the same question forth, how could this happen to us?

Instead, the question must be raised, that how have we become so indifferent?

I didn’t want to write about the whole cartoon “crisis”. I really didn’t. But something that has been lost in this whole issue has been the Prophet himself, peace be upon him. Not enough people know about this amazing personality, though there is probably no one in history whose life has been recorded as extensively. There is no shortage of material on the life of the Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, but there is definitely a shortage of Muslims willing to deliver those materials.

Since at least one person has questioned my imaan altogether because of my lack of outrage, I felt compelled to write on this topic. Others have told me that the worldwide reaction was justified, as defence of the Prophet should be our number one priority as Muslims. Some are outraged that Canada hasn’t done enough to make Europe apologize. All this just doesn’t make sense to me, even though I did find the pictures offensive and insulting. Personally, I feel that even if every single European nation decided to apologize, there is no way that such an apology would be sincere.

“We’re sorry a bunch of cartoonists accused your Prophet of being a terrorist. And thanks to your violent protests, your burning of our embassies, the dozens of deaths which have been caused by your riots, and the death threats we’ve received, we can now say that we were wrong, and we regret the error.”

That seems highly unlikely. I’m not saying that no apology is necessary, but this is not what we need right now; an apology at this point would only be a political gesture that would do nothing in addressing the root problem. It amazes me that this is what it took to finally unite the Muslim world on a common cause, even after we remained silent on much larger issues.

Regardless, I wanted to write about the Prophet himself and leave the politics aside. Regarding provocations and ignorant talk addressed to Muslims, the Quran states:

“You shall certainly be tried respecting your wealth and your souls, and you shall certainly hear from those who have been given the Book before you and from those who are polytheists much annoying talk; and if you are patient and guard (against evil), surely this is one of the affairs (which should be) determined upon.” (3:186)

“And the servants of the Most Gracious (Allah) are those who walk on the earth in humility, and when the ignorant address them, they say, ‘Peace!’” (25:63)

Regarding the Prophet, peace be upon him, the Quran says:
“And most surely you conform (yourself) to sublime morality.” (68:4)

“And We sent thee not, except as a Mercy for all the creatures.” (21:107)

“You have indeed in the Messenger of Allah an excellent exemplar for him who hopes in Allah and the Final Day and who remember Allah much.” (33:21)

“Say (O Prophet): ‘If you do love Allah, follow me; Allah will love you and forgive you your sins, for Allah is Oft-Forgiving, Most Merciful.” (3:31)

There are many more verses which illustrate how highly a Muslim must regard the Prophet, and how Muslims must follow him in all aspects of life. There is no doubt that reverence of the Prophet is fundamental, and thus any insult to him is something every Muslim will take personally.

Regarding the Prophets love for his followers:
“Now hath come unto you a Messenger from amongst yourselves: it grieves him that you should suffer, ardently anxious is he over you; to the Believers is he most kind and merciful.” (9:128)

The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, was known as a “Mercy to Mankind”, but he underwent years and years of suffering in order to guide people to the Truth. Prior to Islam during the early sixth century, the Arabian peninsula was mired in the heights of depravity and ignorance. Outside the Arabian peninsula, the rest of the world was also at a moral and intellectual low. The Sasanid and Byzantine Empires, the dominant world forces at the time, were worn out and weary, as noted by H. G. Wells in A Short History of the World:

“Science and Political Philosophy seemed dead now in both these warring and decaying Empires. [...] In both Persia and Byzantium, it was an age of intolerance. Both Empires were religious empires in a new way, in a way that greatly hampered the free activities of the human mind.”

Ancient India, relatively free from the traditional Imperialism of the age, was doing fairly well in scientific fields. Morality was dead, however, and the social conditions were even worse. Women were dealt out and traded in games of chance, the caste system had rendered most of the people into slaves, and lawlessness was rampant. Europe fared no better, caught in their Dark Ages during which men were barbarians, women had no rights, and the religious elite had no morals.

Effectively, the entire world was in the most squalid and humiliating conditions, and there was no reason to believe things would change anytime soon.

Enter Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him. An entire biography of his life is well beyond the scope of this post, and there are numerous books which can do a much better job than I ever could. However, it should be sufficient to state that within a matter of 23 years, a worldwide revolution had begun that we are still benefitting from today. In brief, Islam conquered the tribalism that sunk Arabia to barbarism, and propelled the land to the heights of enlightenment and progress. The people united, women were honoured, the poor benefitted from generous social programs, and the entire population enjoyed the benefits of a well-governed society which brought them both spiritual and worldly advancement.

Within a century, more than one third of the known world was benefitting from the revolution brought forth by Islam, and the rest of the world started waking up in awe of the massive changes which had taken place.

And it all began with that one man, Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, whose mission was only to call people towards their Creator, teach them the Quran, and serve as an example for them. The root was Islam; the fruits were the advancements and innovations brought forth by the rising Islamic world. The Muslim world excelled in math and science; the Prophet was neither a mathematician nor a scientist. The Muslim world excelled in art and literature, though the Prophet himself was unable to read or write. The Muslim world pioneered some of the most important social programs we know today, including welfare and the protection of minority rights. The Prophet Muhammad brought forth all of this change not because he was an expert in these specific fields, but because he brought people towards obedience to their Creator. And the system of the Creator will always benefit the creation; the manufacturer of any product knows best how to operate and maintain their works, and humanity is no different.

One cannot judge the Prophet in the context of the Muslim world of today. It is embarassing to see how so much of the Muslim world is in shambles, but one cannot attribute that to Islam. If anything, it is the lack of Islam, and the lack of respect for the teachings of Prophet Muhammad that has caused the ruination of the Muslim world today.

Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, did not effect this change without facing adversity. He suffered much at the hands of his own extended family, and at the hands of the rulers of Makkah during the early years of Prophethood. He was insulted, cursed, and pelted with stones by children at Taif. He was conspired against, slandered, and opposed by people who claimed to be his friends.

He took it all in stride, knowing that he was suffering for a greater good. Instead, he prayed for the forgiveness of those who persecuted him. And as his followers were being tortured, he still pushed on with his mission, and his followers continued to support him. He urged his companions to remain discrete about their Islam so that they would not suffer. But those same companions refused to remain silent about their new way of life, also understanding that their suffering was for a greater good, and that such a valuable gift should never be kept hidden.

When that gift was exposed to the world, the world as a whole benefitted from it.

In the famous book “The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History” by Michael Hart, Prophet Muhammad ranked #1 for turning the world around when it was approaching complete failure. George Bernard Shaw wrote about Muhammad, “I believe that if a man like him were to assume the dictatorship of the modern world, he would succeed in solving its problems in a way that would bring it the much needed peace and happiness.”

This is the personality we’re talking about, about whom all this debate surrounds. Ignorant insults to him do not lower his stature and legacy in any way, and we will always be benefitting from that legacy whether we know it or not. Learning more about his life is left as an exercise for the reader.

* * *
Regarding the cartoons themselves, Imam Zaid Shakir has written one of the clearest and most reasonable responses to the issue I have read thus far:

Clash of the Uncivilized: Insights on the Cartoon Controversy

Regarding media responsibility on the issue, CBC editor-in-chief Tony Burman seems to have gotten this one right:
Why CBC News Drew the Line

I woke up this morning and looked out the window as I always do. This time, I was met with pitch darkness. I looked over at the clock - nothing. My computer, typically on for weeks at a time, was off. The power was gone.

I headed to the washroom, and flicked the light switch. Nothing. I turned the taps, and a few drops came trickling down the faucet. Finally, the water started spurting out, and I used whatever little remained in the pipes to perform wudhu. Finally, the water supply exhausted, and I was left with only a little lota water. The toilet would not flush either.

After prayer, I stepped outside my 18th floor apartment. There were no lights in the halls, and no power to work the elevators. I could not see anything in the darkness. I went back into the apartment, searching for a flashlight. I knew I didn’t have one, but hopelessly searched regardless. Perhaps something was left behind by the previous tenants when I moved in over a year ago. I found nothing, and gave up my futile search after some time.

It was now 7:25am. I picked up the phone to call my supervisor that I might be late this morning. But there was no dialtone - I’m a subscriber of VoIP technology, and thus internet or power outages mean I am also without phone service.

It would have been a difficult trek to navigate my way down 20 floors to the parking garage to get to my car. At this point, I thought to myself, WWBD. “What would Batman do?”

And so I threw a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste, and some clothes into my bag. I pulled my laptop out of its bag, and powered it up. The LCD monitor provided enough light for me to navigate my way down the dark and dirty stairwell. Finally, I reached the second basement, where the laptop monitor continued to be the only light in the pitch black garage.

I reached my car, and turned on the radio. I heard no sign that this power outage affected anything outside my street, so I decided to head out to work.

Alas, on driving up to the first level of the parking garage, I saw a number of other cars waiting by the exit to leave the parking garage. The garage door was electronically controlled, and we could not open it manually during the power outage. I waited and waited in the parking garage, until finally, building security initiated a manual override of the parking garage controls, allowing the door to open. The garage became flooded with natural light from the outside world, and we all broke free.

I was still in pajamas, however, with an unshowered body housing unbrushed teeth. I could have gone down to my company’s main office, but downtown traffic would suck me in. Fortunately, I still had the access card for an old client site I worked at, and recalled that there was a shower there. So I drove down to the old client site, snuck in through the side door closest to the shower room, and got ready. I brushed my teeth, showered, got dressed, and was soon inconspicuously on my way to the office; no one caught me during my brief intrusion.

I drove back down to my current clients office, and reported in for another fun day of consulting. In the end, I arrived only ten minutes later than usual.

Part of what inspired me to write that previous post was my frustration with people who pretend to be things they’re not. I see lots of these people particularly in Toronto, though this happens everywhere else. In particular, I was tired of seeing people posing as thugged-out gangsters living in ghettos when they actually live in posh, expensive neighbourhoods in suburban Mississauga.

So in tribute to those posers, I present “Bugs in mah Cereal“, the thugged-out version, courtesy of the Dialectizer.

Click on the “Dialectize” button for thugged-out fun!

It has been almost two weeks since I had opinions lacking enough relevance to post on this site. This was the direct result of having too many relevant opinions and contributions towards the launch of the system my team at work had been working on for the last year; almost every night was a late night at the office, with a brief and unplanned trip to Toronto thrown in the middle to further exhaust me. Alhamdolillah, things have relaxed since then, such that I even see the light of day after leaving work.

During this time, a historic motion was passed in the Canadian Parliament, dissolving the existing minority government and forcing another election this coming January. The effective fall of the government was big news, even earning the Top Headline honour on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and a mention on the Colbert Report; you know a Canadian news story is big when Americans acknowledge it. The election is in late January; the politicians are in campaign mode now.

I don’t know who I’m going to vote for, if I vote at all. I won’t dwell on specific issues at this time. My qualm right now is not with a specific party or issue, but with the inadequacies of the system altogether.

In almost every field of effort, the best in the field are the ones that move on from one level to the next. In academics, the best students are the ones who advance to the highest levels of education. In sports, the best players reach the professional leagues and represent their countries internationally. In business, the most effective entrepreneurs rise to the top of their profession and end up earning the most money. This is obvious and hardly worth a paragraphs worth of irrelevance.

However, politicians do not follow that trend somehow. Are the leaders of our political parties the best we have? I would hope not! There are very few who trust them, and just listening to them is often painful. Even worse is the political landscape in United States. I’m less bothered by the fact that Bush won their last election than the fact that the only two candidates for the president of the United States were both idiots. Surely, there must have been better people for that job? When politicians have such a huge responsibility to their constituents and the world in general, why are we leaving that responsibility to the gunk in our talent pool?

I already know the answer to these questions, but it still bothers me. It takes a lot of money to start a political party, to promote it, and to bring on the people who share your vision. I’m sure most of us can name at least a few people we know personally who would be very effective political leaders, but the financial barrier is overwhelming. As such, many talented people who could have otherwise been great leaders end up relegated to posting irrelevant opinions on a blog somewhere.

At the same time, there is much to be said about the effectiveness of grassroots, individual efforts. Maulana Ilyas rahmutallahi’alayh did not rely on political power to launch the most significant Islamic revival effort in the world. Gandhi did not need the support of powerful businessmen to fight back British rule. Tim Berners-Lee did not wait for wealthy venture capitalists for his vision of the World Wide Web to come forth. And community-driven open-source software like Firefox continue to chip away at commercial market dominance.

That talent pool is still rich in resources, but leaks with disunity. Unless we can channel those talents in the right places, the world will still be run by a bunch of drips.

Beep. It’s from Hamlet. 2B? NT2B?=??? | Yahoo! News

The above news posting made me feel sick. For a while, I considered writing a piece about how instant messaging, e-mail, and SMS has tainted the value of the printed word, but I often felt that the situation was not as urgent as I originally suspected. When I first heard someone actually say “Lol” in a spoken conversation, I knew things were bad, but I thought we were still some years away from disgusting constructions like “2B? NT2B?”

How wrong I was. I’m not part of that generation where computer ownership was considered a luxury for most high school children; we were expected to submit most things typed and printed. However, back then, we still used our pencils most of the time. We were accustomed to writing out entire words, articulating our feelings with a healthy supply of adjectives. Abbreviations were frowned upon, and we were aware that contractions weakened the language already. Consider the following two statements; it is clear which one is stronger.

“I won’t eat this spinach.”

or,

“I will not eat this spinach.”

The contraction used in the first statement weakens the emphasis of the negation; I would expect that with enough coercing, I could convince the writer of the first statement to eat the spinach. The second statement, however, signifies a bold defiance against spinach-eating that one would take all the way to the grave. For example, it would have been much less effective had William Wallace told the Englishmen that “You can take our lives, but you can’t take our freedom.” in Braveheart. That he explicitly says, “You can not take our freedom” emphatically suggests that this mans freedom was not something he would compromise under any circumstances.

You will not find many contractions in classical texts. They became common because of tongue laziness, as pronouncing too many syllables can quickly become tiresome; now, it is a perfectly common and normal part of speech. Lots of abbreviations have also been accepted as common enough to be used in formal writing. Nowadays, we do not even know what the acronyms mean, but still use them in our writing.

It is possible, perhaps likely, that common internet and SMS terms like “lol”, “brb”, and “l8r” will embed themselves into regular grammar in the same way. Some may say that this is just the natural evolution of language, and there is no reason to prevent it. However, many of these terms are incredibly stupid and ingenuine, and for the later generations who have been writing like this all their lives, that lack of authenticity will likely weaken the language even further.

Seriously, who actually laughs out loud when they type “lol”? Is there anyone who actually rolls on the floor laughing after typing “rofl”? Originally intended as abbreviations, these have become terms in themselves now which have been corrupted even further through contructions like “lolz”, “loooooll!!11″, and “rofflez!!”; these are indications that mainstream acceptance of the original terms has already begun. I do not want to even get started on the unpronounceable, meaningless terms like “pwn”, which is at least two mistakes away from actual English.

Text messaging on mobile phones, or SMS, has made things far worse. Nowadays, most mobile phones are advanced enough that users can send full sentences, without resorting to abbreviating every second word. However, the culture of abbreviation in mobile technology has been so pervasive that these habits have persisted, and it is considered uncool to actually write out entire words. Grammar and spelling is so 20th century, after all. I remember watching a cousin of mine in India chatting on MSN. When accidentally writing “How are you?”, she promptly deleted her last two words and wrote “How r u?” instead. After all, those pesky vowels sure complicate things.

For Muslims, the Islamic greeting of “Assalamu’alaykum” has not been spared from this corruption. This is a beautiful greeting which is shared by over a billion people worldwide, irrespective of language, culture, or sect; there is probably no other phrase in any language which matches the prevalence of this greeting. Every once in a while, however, I will get contacted on MSN Messenger with the message “aa”. Many Muslims will reply with “ws”, to imply “Wa’alaykum assalam.” Our greeting is beautiful, “May Peace be with you.” The more people use “aa” and “ws”, the more likely this greeting will go the ways of “Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem”, which has been reduced to a meaningless “786″ in much of the Muslim world.

For those of you who continue to spell out words entirely in their instant messaging conversations, kudos to you. You will find me responding accordingly. But if you insist on “aa”ing me, then I can not promise you a meaningful discussion. And if you ever say “rofl”, you better be rolling on the floor, laughing. Otherwise, I will have a very hard time believing anything else you say.

Update 8.1.2006: Apparently, research has proven my assertions false:
Texting helps teens’ grammar | The Globe and Mail

The ironic part is the “verbing” of the word “text” in the title of the article, which is a grammatical failing in itself.

When attempting to retrieve a recordset for a web application developed in ASP.NET, I encountered the greatest runtime error ever:

Run-time error ‘-2147418113′ Catastrophic failure
There has been a catastrophic failure. Please stand by.

Catastrophic failure! Run, children! Save yourselves!!

This now surpasses the Quartus “This operation is legal, but highly suspicious” error message I encountered in fourth year university as the greatest error message of all time.

This happened over a week ago, but since everyone found this story funny when I told them in person, it has now officially been relegated to an Irrelevant Opinion. Generally, I’ll try to keep work-related stuff out of here, but this is an exception.

I was working on the integration of a third party tool into the system we were developing for the federal government. We had been waiting for months for the company to deliver this product, and finally last week, they told us that it was ready to be tested. We scheduled a conference call between a few of us from our company, with the third party vendor joining us from locations in Toronto and Arizona. I had not met any of these people previously, and didn’t know most of their names either.

So after everyone introduced themselves on the call, someone asked: “Do we have a jew on the line?” I gasped, perplexed by the question. “Not yet,” another replied.

Later, after our test failed, I was told to “touch base with a Jew” before I continue with my testing. I was confused, but didn’t inquire further.

Finally, someone else joined the call. He had a heavy Indian accent, and introduced himself to the rest of us on the conference call.

“Hey everyone, this is Aju.”

Finally, it all made sense. A few hours later, I was explaining to others within our company how to conduct the tests I had just run. When I told them to “get in touch with a Jew before you move forward,” I was greeted with lots of furrowed brows - their confusion was probably amplified since this was being explained to them by a devout Muslim with a thick beard.

Ah, multiculturalism at work! It’s a beautiful thing.

Ramadhan is a particularly interesting time of year in the West because religious expression extends over the course of the whole day. As a result, questions will always arise in classrooms and workplaces, such as “Why aren’t you coming out with us for lunch? How come you’re leaving work at this time? Why are you never home in the evenings?”

Some answer with awkwardness or deliberation, and fail to provide good answers. Consequently, an excellent opportunity for educating people about Islam becomes lost. This feeling generally prevails when we develop a sense of disconnect from the lives and practices of non-Muslims; we feel that since we don’t want to be involved with their activities, we don’t them involved in our activities. Unfortunately, this only further alienates the community, and makes it harder for such opportunities to arise again in the future. This is a major problem within the Muslim community, and needs to change.

In the past, I’ve always been fairly up front regarding my beliefs and practices, but this year I wanted to take it a step further. Weeks before Ramadhan began, I started talking about it around the office, in elevators, and wherever else would I find myself. I work for a large consulting firm, and before Ramadhan began, my whole team knew about it and kept asking if it had begun yet.

So when it finally did, I was amazed when some of my non-Muslim colleagues expressed interest in fasting for a day themselves. I did not need to convince anyone or even encourage them, but of their own volition, they agreed to try it at least once. This was an opportunity not only to help others become more understanding of Muslims, but to engage them in a Muslim experience. To this end, I contacted the Ottawa Food Bank to turn this day of fasting into a charity event, where my whole team would fast, and others would contribute to a worthy cause in support of it. I was calling it Fast-a-thon, as the event was similar to ones organized by some MSA’s with that name, but others called it Ramathon as an homage to the month of Ramadhan.

We set the day of fasting to be Wednesday, October 19th. I did not want the fasting to affect the productivity of my colleagues, so I told them that they could cheat if they really needed to, but they insisted on going through with it fully. On that day, they all woke up at 5:30am for an early meal, and then fasted from just before 6:00am to sunset at 6:14pm. They even avoided brushing their teeth during the hours of fasting, something many Muslims fail to do even though it is considered to be makruh, or undesirable. (See here.)

Two of them could not get by without at least water, so they drank throughout the course of the day. Even then, they strictly avoided any other drink entirely. The rest made the full fast until sunset. Most of them found it very difficult, with one wondering whether just licking an apple would break the fast. In the end, they made it through, and we broke our fast with dates and Timbits.

One noted, “It’s strange we never see Faraz complaining about this.”
Another replied, “Yeah, but he’s got Allah.”

Throughout the day, there was a buzz around the office, with everyone asking about the progress of the fast and the charity efforts; we had two donation boxes set up around the office and another at a client site. In the end, we raised just over 250$ for the Ottawa Food Bank, an impressive amount considering our rushed preparation. In spite of the fact that it was very difficult for most of the non-Muslim fasters, some were already talking about holding such an event next year with better preparation and more participation.

The Fastathon website expresses their vision as one of a nation as one that is not only accepting of Islam and Muslims, but one that is better because of them. This should be the vision of all Muslims living in North America. We tend to complain about injustice and intolerance and condemn whatever we find condemnable, but we have done very little to alleviate the problems. We lose ourselves in rhetoric, and our action falls short as a result. In the past, entire nations accepted Islam not because they were simply tolerant of it, but because they realized that society as a whole was better with Islam.

Huge thanks go out to CC, TT, TB, and JM for their patience, support, and dedication! And thanks to everyone else who helped out in supporting the event! I know at least some of you read this.