Random thoughts

1. Could we consider those who hate black cats as having traits of racism? Maybe partially racists, they are?

2. If we label a certain portion of people with certain tags, example 'Kedahans are kiasu' or 'Perakians and Penangites are perverts', is that too, considered as a mild form of racism?

3. If PAS ever unites with UMNO, what will Malaysia be like? Will the other races form their own racial political conglomerates? UMNO now is at a weakened state. So if one day UMNO reaches the same zenith of politics again, gaining maximal power along the way, will they kick PAS out of their supposed coalition?(if they were ever to unite that is)

4. On another note, i find myself not as creative as i want myself to be. While people would usually create their own pnemonics, i prefer to google for them.

5. I found out what twitter is all about few days ago. Maybe these are the type of stuff i would write if i have a twitter account.

6. At the age of 23, i found out that if baju melayu is soaked too long in water, the color will come off. As i was smart enough to soak my kepiah together with my red baju melayu, now the kepiah has become a bit pinkish tinged. Is this the shape of fashion to come?

Hot and humid

This is my first post from my iphone and the mega tiny touchscreen keypad doesn't help much.

At 2.29 in the morning, my skin wets of salty sweat. Drops running down my forehead, maybe el nino is hitting Russia too. My head is densed partly with medical knowledge, mostly with crap.

That tachycardic heartbeat after reading Cristiano's transfer to Real Madrid has long gone. 80 million pounds for a player is really breathtaking.

And insulting at the same time. It's a cruel world we are living in.

And i pondered for a moment what could i have done with that amount of money.

The disneyfication of Real Madrid continues.

Kaka is mickey mouse. Cristiano is minnie mouse. Soon David Villa will be daffy duck.

Where does that money come from?

Loyalty in football is the least of priorities these days. It's manifested with people prowling for money. No more Giggs or Del Piero. Extinction of the generation.

Money is in fact, the new God. Slaves to the material world, are we?

God save us all.

Dawud Wharnsby Ali sings good nasyeed

I'm very picky when it comes to music. To be dead honest with you, i don't listen to nasyeed except for Raihan's music because they are the pioneers to the nasyeed scene in Malaysia. They're like Helmet who kick started the nu-metal birth, like Black Sabbath to the metal world, Kraftwerk to techno music. Well, that's strictly from a musical perspective.

And so i discovered something good a few months back from Dawud Wharnsby Ali. The song above just makes me want to strum the acoustic guitar yet again. It's a nice song with meaningful lyrics which makes it much more meaningful although some might condone the usage of guitars or stringed instruments in nasyeed. Another song at the moment which makes me want to pick up the guitar is 'The times they are a'changin' by Bob Dylan, the anthem for the 60s hippie era.

Another good song by this guy is The Prophet and my other favourite is Zain Bikha's Heart of a Muslim. Not that i dislike Malay nasyid, just that most other nasyeed are rip off rhythms from Raihan with different lyrics. To quote from Rob Zombie about Black Sabbath's reign as metal pioneers, "Every cool riff has already been written by Black Sabbath, anything anyone else does is basically ripping it off, either playing it slightly backwards or forwards, faster or slower, they did everything already." I could say the same thing of Raihan but of course, i do fully comprehend and aware that nasyeed is all about the message and the music is a mere secondary in stature. But then again, like i said, i'm mega picky in music and i prefer reading religious articles or listening to lectures/sermons.

And i questioned the real purpose of the nasyid bands after Raihan. Their intentions. Well, maybe that's just me and my underground philosophy. But then again, the rapid births of nasyid bands were for me just a tool to get money. What's the difference of the pop punk bands that appeared after Offspring or Green Day, or the bands that immitate Eddie Vedder's voice or the nu-metal explosion after Korn and Limp Bizkit? They were all tools to get money. The same cycle of things. Music pioneers get famous. Recording companies try to find the next thing closest to the original band. Gets money. Becomes rich. It's the same viscious cycle for one thing. Money. Well, that's my view of things. Some bands really sold out.

And so i came about this article a few months back about the stance of some scholars regarding music. The article punches me directly to my face, a total KO. This is strictly personal through self experience. From the article, "His state of emotions becomes less passionate when he hears the Qur'aan........He dislikes listening to the Qur'aan and does not find beauty in it while reciting it..." And this really happened to me. Again, to be dead honest with you, I would be high listening to Bob Dylan or say, the Beatles. But listening to Quran won't evoke such responses from me. It might be partly due to the fact i can't grasp Arabic, but then again i would still be high listening to some instrumental songs by Explosions in the Sky.

For some people who could manage to control themselves without getting too much engaged into the songs either musically or lyrically, maybe it's ok to listen to some songs. But i'm a music geek and the way i listened and am listening to music is way too obsessive, too enticing to the point of controlling my conscious (believe me when i say this). It makes the songs stuck into my head for a very very long time. Which i think is not that good to say the least.

And so i'm having my serampang dua mata project. First i want to reduce my time listening to too much music. Secondly i want to try and understand bits of the Quran through the learning of basic Arabic. I found this good dictionary which i hope may help you and me to understand the Quran better. I found out that there are 569 words which are repeated over and over again in the Quran which makes up about 80 % of the revelation.

54 : 17 And certainly We have made the Quran easy for remembrance, but is there anyone who will mind?

Hopefully it won't turn out to be one of those failed projects of mine.LOL.

Temptations, temptations

I asked for an ampoule of Sol. Confidencium 100 % from Azizi but he declined my request. Now i need to try and search it myself. My exams are around the corner.

TV will be showing the Roland Garros final. Federer vs Soderling. Afiq, are you sure you're gonna switch me off?

I need 132 Newtons of force to push me to study. I need 5 kilograms of confidence. Where could i find them?

Football is on Wednesday. You would not want to miss it! It's Russia vs Finland.

Give me an ounce of hardwork and a pascal of persistence and i'll be as busy as a bee.

If that's not enough, there's the NBA finals. Lakers vs Magics. Howard against Kobe. You're not gonna miss watching your favourite player Pau Gasol playing, are you?

But i've poisoned myself with 25 litres of laziness.

Hey look at me! Jenson Button just won the race in Turkey. These are the moments you wanted all the while right? These great sporting moments.

I need to detoxify myself with decibels of discipline and pack myself with 70 volts of seriousness and start to study tonight!

You're still bidding for that Real Madrid jersey on eBay right?

Temptations, temptations.

Covering my eyes from the sinful sight of the surrounding of summer

Summer's back and the birds return from their long migration cum vacation. Chirping, maybe chatting between them in language inconceivable by human understanding.

Tweet. Tweeeeet. Twititit. Titititutu Kenya. Twaeeaet! Translates as, "I went to Africa! OMG! It's owh so fabulous. You have to go to Kenya. It's heaven!"

And the other bird replies. Twat! Tetetetoto. Titititutu USA. Twiiiituituo. Vultures tototo. Eagles tweiaot!

"What! That's cool! I went to USA. It's you know, very metropolitan. I met your cousin the Vulture. Almost got bitten by an eagle!"

And as i wonder what the birds chatter amongst themselves, in that funny language of theirs, there's a much more problematic situation going on. The preying eyes of men, with their radars swithced on are dangerous when the summer arrives.

It's hot, so people wear less. Oh! Cover my eyes! Cover my eyes!

24 : 30 Say to the believing men that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty...

The eyes perform adultery by gazing.

"...the adultery of eyes is looking (at [that] which is not allowed)..." reported by al-Bukhari and Muslim.

So your eyes are basically the weapons of mass destruction in terms of wrecking and damaging your soul or your iman. The iman fluctuates and oscillates at intense speed, sometimes never managing to return to its normal state.

Owh. Such a sinful summer i'm having. Need. To. Cover. My. Japanese. Slit. Like. Eyes.

The Prophet once said to Ali, "Ali! Do not look once after another, for the first look is for you (since it happens accidentally) while the second is against you."

First look is not a 2 or a 3 second look. It's probably a milisecond look. It's accidental. Of course you can't prolong your gaze!

I need to try and and cover my eyes from the sinful sight of the surrounding of summer.

23. Masih muda.

(((((Sila pasang Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-Flat Major oleh Beethoven untuk memantapkan pengalaman membaca post ini)))))

Kata-kata Ustaz Ayob (atau kadang-kadang dikenali sebagai Ustaz Boya jika namanya dibaca dari belakang dan juga kerana kegarangan beliau) di tingkatan 3 masih terngiang-ngiang di setiap pusingan koklea ku.

Ayat keramat.

"Lepas 23 tahun, kena insaf dah. Sebelum tu nak enjoy boleh la." Ia diingiringi dengan senyuman sinis penus sangsi.

Mungkin di sebalik senyuman itu, ustaz ini punk rock dulu. Dengar the Ramones? Lepas tu insaf pada umur 23?

Harini aku dah ganjil 23 tahun. Kata orang, "Age is just a number."

Lonjatan dari nombor 22 ke 23 disulami dengan adegan-adegan pelbagai rupa bukan saja kepada diriku, tetapi juga di sekelilingku. Ada sulaman yang halus, semestinya wujud sulaman yang kasar. Jika digambarkan, mungkin hasilnya satu lukisan abstrak yang tidak difahami maksudnya. Jika dinovelkan, mungkin nukilannya merupakan epik tetralogi yang belum ada penghujungnya.

Tiada siapa yang nampak kesudahan hidup masing-masing. Kecuali Tuhan yang merancang. Yang aku boleh buat ialah menapis pengalaman, mengambil yang positif dari yang negatif, baru boleh progresif.

Pada umur 23, rambut ku menipis, cermin mata menebal, musculus rectus abdominis 6 ketul yang aku idamkan mungkin sudah tak kecapaian. Perut ni satu bungkusan pukal, berlipat-lipat macam tayar basikal.

Petang ini sejuk, bukan sejuk cuaca. Sejuk dngan kesyukuran kerana masih dikurniakan peluang.

Satu petang lebih untuk berdoa.
Satu petang lebih untuk bertaubat.
Satu petang lebih untuk merenung diriku dalam cermin dan berkata, "aku masih hidup rupanya, dan masih handsome rupanya."

The trick to keep alive is to keep breathing. Dan Alhamdulillah, aku masih bernafas walaupun tersekat-sekat akibat allergic rhinitis.

PS : Selamat hari lahir Chapo (6 June), Pidud (8 June), Abe (9 June). Aku tak ingat sangat birthday orang, tapi yang ini aku ingat gak.

A Jihad for Love?

“Are you gay?” quipped one of my friends a few years back at high school.

It was not actually out of context, since I did spend a lot of time (9 years yo!) studying in all boys’ school. I would answer his question with an expression of a serial killer gunning for the headshot of the president. I guess it was this schooling period that made me rather shy and unnatural towards girls. But hey, if I am not shy and unnatural, I won’t be the Afiq Fikri you know (or don’t know) right now. But I’m improving and evolving all the time. I guess.

And so, I was at the receiving end of gay jokes most of the time. Sometimes those jokes really hurt me that I would just retreat at some spot alone and start to cry. It was a really dark period of my life. As dark as night, as lonesome as a dove.

Ok. I was just joking. The last few sentences were there to amplify the experience of reading this article.

But as time passed by, I got used to those jokes. And I couldn’t help but laugh off at the fact that people think I’m gay.

Now, it seems there are really gay people out there, which I thought was just a myth. I stumbled across a documentary called ‘A Jihad for Love’ about gay Muslims when I was hunting down for quality documentaries during the winter break. I was a bit surprised and angered by it. I tried to look find the illegal copy of the show but it was to no avail.

Luckily, there was another TV program called simply ‘Gay Muslims’ in the UK. And it was available on YouTube. When asked what is the basis of such behavior on their part, since Islam doesn’t tolerate homosexuality, one of them had the explanation.

7 : 80-84 And (We sent) Lut when he said to his people: What! do you commit an indecency which any one in the world has not done before you? Most surely you come to males in lust besides females; nay you are an extravagant people. And the answer of his people was no other than that they said: Turn them out of your town, surely they are a people who seek to purify (themselves). So We delivered him and his followers, except his wife; she was of those who remained behind. And We rained upon them a rain; consider then what was the end of the guilty.

We all know of the story of the prophet Lut in the al-Quran. And so they argued that, in a verse above, the usage of the word ‘lust’ (shahwat in Arabic) referred to indecent sexual behaviors. It didn’t apply the word ‘love’ in the sentence.

And what he is experiencing with his partner, he says, is called love. So he deems his actions are right because probably he isn’t involved in any abnormal sexual doings.

From the stories of the prophet Lut in the al-Quran, the gist of the verses tells us that homosexuality is intolerable in Islam. Unacceptable. There are a lot of non Muslims who are already confused with the religion and the production of such documentaries won’t be of much help.

I have to admit my 2 favourite writers are gay. Douglas Coupland and Chuck Palahniuk are both gays. I hate this fact but in their environment it is considered acceptable.

But what I am surprised is that there is a freedom to interpret such verses according to their personal thinking. It’s true that al-Quran is a revelation meant for everyone and at times we are able to interpret some verses ourselves. But the way they have interpreted it is blatantly out of context for me.

This is due to the large chunks of ‘freedom movement’ and ‘human rights’ going on in the world. There is also the Al-Fatiha Foundation in American for gay rights. Freedom this freedom that. The thing is there is a fine line of demarcation of freedom, a border which can’t be crossed. This freedom movement puts desires and the human mind and emotions ahead of anything else to quench their demands for a just life, with full freedom of expression. The human mind is limited, and the divinity of religion seems to have lost its cause.

Freedom is just a state of mind. If freedom refers to 100% being able to do what you want to do, then the word itself should not have even existed. If freedom is limited, then it's not the freedom those philosophers and activists are preaching about.

As for the interpretation part, there are scholars us who have studied, understood and mastered the al-Quran. So if they are confused about anything, they should always refer to their commentaries on the al-Quran.

In the end, there are those who really want to change. I’ve read a letter sent by a husband of his troubles with the feelings of homosexuality. But he is trying hard to overcome such emotions and that deserves a salute.

I hope we are always led to the righteous path. Amin.