The Reader

Good bye 2005...

Let me say good bye to 2005 and I take this opportunity to thank all of you who keep on visiting and reading my blog.Special thanks to those who took time to write comments.I reallly appreciate your inputs.And thanks for sharing your knowledge and wisdom with me and other readers.Along the way, I have made new friends online as well as off line.

Today is the last day of 2005.We can now look back on what has taken place in our personal and business life. As a muslim,I believe in qada' and qadar.What is good comes from Allah swt and what is not comes from my weaknesses. I hope and pray,the new year 2006 will be better than the year 2005 for everyone.

Happy New Year 2006!

To my fellow muslims/muslimahs:

Tomorrow is the beginnig of the month of Zulhijjah,insyaAllah.We are given another great opportunity for ibadah sunat.Please click on this for more info.

Qiamulail

This is to remind myself and others of the importance of Qiamulail or the night prayers.By the way ,when was the last time I did the Qiamulail? If the answer is "I can't remember...",then may I remind myself and others to take some time to do this special ibadah for our own benefits-in the world and the hereafter.

Personally I found it a bit difficult to do it individually.It is better to participate in group prayers organised by our masjid. I am pleased to announce that our masjid As-Shafie at Taman Maluri,Kuala Lumpur is organising the qiamulail tomorrow morning at 3am.All are welcome.

Below is an excerpt of the article mentioned below:

39:9	أَمَّنْ هُوَ قَانِتٌ آنَاء اللَّيْلِ سَاجِدًا وَقَائِمًا يَحْذَرُ الْآخِرَةَ وَيَرْجُو رَحْمَةَ رَبِّهِ قُلْ هَلْ يَسْتَوِي الَّذِينَ يَعْلَمُونَ وَالَّذِينَ لَا يَعْلَمُونَ إِنَّمَا يَتَذَكَّرُ أُوْلُوا الْأَلْبَابِ

 

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"Is one who is devoutly obedient during periods of the night, prostrating and standing [in prayer], in fear of the hereafter and in hope of the mercy of his Lord [like one who does not]? Say:' Are those who know equal to those who do not know?' Only they will remember [who are] people of understanding." [Az-Zumar, 9] The meaning of this, is that there is no comparison between one who has these qualities and one who sleeps throughout the night and neglects his soul, not acknowledging the promise and threat of His Lord?

Here is a link to night prayers.

Books to read..

The new year is drawing nearer and the best I could do is to finish reading another book.In fact,I have at least ten books waiting in the queue...

I could not exactly remember when was the last time I read a novel by Sir Jefferey Archer. However,yesterday I could not help but ending buying one of his latest books even though I have a few books bought earlier but have not read.Old habit dies hard.Sound familiar to you? The soft-covers is not available yet, but I closed one eye and shut the other to buy the hardcovers version because I was given almost RM25 discount of the list price by virtue of my bookshop membership. By the way, I am a member of two bookshop chains and the advantages of being a member is worth many times over the cost of the membership fees.

A few months back,I tried to listen to an audio-book but I decided it is not for me.I could not listen at the rate it is being read and personally I prefer the written words to listening books being read by others. At certain nice phrases and clauses,I prefer to re-read them and digest at my own pace.As the saying goes,one man's meat is another man's poison.

This weekend I am going to list all the books that I bought and find out which ones I have not read yet.From my experience,I did discover that a few books were bought but never read.There was one book that I bought and only read it five years later:-(

On reflection, I bought books without proper planning-just buy the book when I see and like it or recommended by friends.For next year, I think I must plan so that I buy books in all areas of personal interests.

During the last  29 years of my working life,I discovered that my formal education is inadequate  to guide and assist me in my personal and working life.I need more information ,knowledge and wisdom as I travel along my journey.Reading books is one of the ways that we can continuously improve ourselves to live a better life,not only for ourselves but also for our family.

Talking about reading, we must also read what is not written as well.When I heard creaking sounds from my knees,it is a sign of me has entered the senior citizen group.But that is another subject to blog about.

By the way, would you be kind enough to recommend a book that I and other readers should read next year? Thank you.

 

May I take this opportunity to wish all my friends and readers a Happy,Prosperous and Blessed New Year.God bless and take care.

NB: My Reading Room which is not updated as regularly as it should.Below is the books I recommend to read:

1.The Ideal Muslim by Dr Muhammmad Ali Hashimi

2.The Collected Short Stories by Jeffrey Archer

What I did last Sunday..

You can have a peek at some grown up men and a few ladies got engrossed at Station No 16,KLCC garden.My special thanks to Euphoria for a nice collage of photos.It proved that a picture tells a thousand words,may be more.

If you are a palmOS pda user,you are welcome to our homepage.

Root beer float

Time :16:10pm Location : Restoran Jejantas Air Keruh

It is time to stop for my favourite drink at A&W Restaurant.

Twelve years ago I was a director of the company.

Everything is okay except the chicken.

//adib//

Traffic jam

Time 1524: I am passing through Seremban on the way to Melaka. I observed there is at a few km of traffic jam on the way to KL.

The weather is cloudy and the temperature is 27C.

-Adib ,reporting alive from PLUS highway.

//adib//

Reading jawi is cool!

Lately, I have been making some efforts to read jawi by buying and reading Utusan Melayu-a weekly Malay newspapers with jawi alphabets. My objectives were to improve my jawi reading/writing because I have not been reading jawi texts for umpteen years.What I discovered was that my reading rate is not as fast as when I used to read Utusan Melayu way back in the 60's. Not only that, I found that certain words were spelt differently.

One other thing I discovered that some topics which affect the Malay community and the some issues that are close to Malay hearts are reported and discussed but not reported in the mainstream national newspapers. How I wish my children and younger Malays could read jawi and have access to this information and discourse.

To all Malay parents out there, may I suggest you buy a copy of Utusan Melayu for your family every week.It only cost RM 1.00 but the benefits are manifolds.If I could not get my kids to read,at least I could maintain my command of reading and writing jawi. Since two weeks ago(very sad really),I am struggling to write my personal thoughts/notes  in jawi.

While waiting to get my new IC last week, I was reading the Utusan Melayu. A younger man ( about 30+) approched me and asked what newspapers I was reading.I told him it is Utusan Melayu. He confided to me that this is the first time he saw a Malay newspapers written in jawi.Honestly,I don't blame him for that-only certain shops sell the jawi Utusan Melayu.(I bought mine at Petronas Petrol station along Jalan Kg Pandan).

Many,many years ago....................a few resolutions at a national seminar were made to promote the jawi writings at public buildings etc,etc,etc...Then what happened?

From now on,I will try to read Utusan Melayu at Starbuck or SFC or other public places so that I look real cool -as cool as someone who reads Le Monde at Delifrance;-)

Do you wish to look cooler than that? Join me with kopiah putih and iPod and read Utusan Melayu and drink cafe latte at Gloria Jeans...

Now, I am starting to fall in love with nice Arabic words...Just look at those words on the billboard-they are beautiful:-

The tears keep on flowing...

From Utusan Malaysia today: Air mata terus mengalir...

Last year,on this day,tsunami came and took away more than 200 thousands lives and millions of people lives were devastated and billions of damages to properties and business.

Billions were promised and only 75% were delivered (as reported) but how much is on the ground to provide helps and assistance to the victims? There are so many hurdles(legal and bureaucratic) to overcome for the goods to be delivered even to those who really needed helps.I am glad to note that the hostel for the orphans undertaken by Mercy Malaysia is almost completed.

To get things done we need a working delivery system in place.If not,delays and wastes and leakages will happen along the way...

Templates

By defination,template is a thin board used as a guide.I think it is a useful invention to enable products to be produced many ,many times over and over...

This blog that you are reading now is 'designed' based on a ready templates.I am not qualified to write a software to enable me to produce what you are reading now.All I have to do to select one from a ready made templates with a few menu driven variations.After that I have a nice lay-out for my blog.

I started writing blog using blogger.com since 2002 because it is easy to use and I just need to select one format from a few made available.Similarly,I got interested to snap photos and post online using textamerica.com because of the same reasons. With templates, ordinary folks like me need not know how to write programmes in order to  get involved in blogging ( and moblogging) without much hassles. Just click on my Berisman Digital Captures to see what  I meant.

My first encounter with templates was when I saw my mother was making dresses.Later on ,when I went to a technical school where I had to cut metal plates. And now,I see and use the electronic version. The concept of using the templates has not changed but the material the templates is made of varies from cardboard,metal and electronic papers.

Template is a very useful concept. Just look around in your work areas where you can create a few templates to facilitate your work efficiently and effectively.

Minhaj Al-Qur'an

Yesterday I bought a book entitled Minhaj Al-Qur'an (The Qur'anic Way) written by Dr Burhan Ahmad Faruqi. Let me qoute the first two ayats mentioned in its first chapter(Surah al-Maidah):

15. O people of the Book! There hath come to you our Messenger, revealing to you much that ye used to hide in the Book, and passing over much (that is now unnecessary). There hath come to you from Allah a (new) light and a perspicuous Book,-

16. Wherewith Allah guideth all who seek His good pleasure to ways of peace and safety, and leadeth them out of darkness, by His will, unto the light,- guideth them to a path that is straight.

The year 2005 is coming to an end in a few days time.It is good if we could take time to reflect on the life we live in this year so that we can evaluate ourselves how far we have followed or deviated from the Guidance given in the Qur'an and The Sunnah. Most of us prayed to get Guidance from Allah to live our lives, but have we put in enough efforts to live by the Guidance in the Qur'an and The Sunnah? IMHO,how could we be guided if we don't even know the guidance in the Qur'an and the Sunnah?

All of us are on a journey that will come to an end one day.Let's make a real effort to be guided in our journey.Like it or not,all of us shall return to Allah swt and all of us will be accountable to Him.