The Reader

Misleading road signs..

I have encountered many misleading road signs as I travel more on the roads lately...

Just to quote a few examples here:

1.Just after the toll from KLIA, the direction to KL is on the same signboard as the direction to Shah Alam. It should be on the same signboard as the direction to Seremban and Johor Bahru. Any foreigners and those new comers to KLIA will surely be misled.

2.Multi-layered interchanges have problems to tell motorists of the directions of destinations.One example that I usually get lost is the one near Ikea next to One Utama.

3.I noticed that there is not enough road signs to public buildings.When I was in Ipoh yesterday to see someone at Ipoh City Hall,I only saw one sign as I checked out at Simpang Pulai and another about 10km away when I was about to arrive.From Ipoh City Hall, I had another appointment at PKNP,next Ipoh Railway station.I had no clue how to go there and no signboards at to assist me. Luckily,I had my GPS device to guide me and we arrived without getting lost.

From the above and previous  experience ,before I go to new places or places that I seldom go ,it is better to study the map first and plan my journey.

May invite fellow readers to share your observations/experience regarding misleasding road signs. Thank you.

Opportunities

For the past three decades of my working life, I have taken a few  career changes and business ventures - some were successful but quite a number I had failed.I knew a few of my friends who never failed because they had never took the risks when opportunities came to them. C'est la vie..

To young men/women out there, please read this short article.Personally,I have been using the techniques mentioned without knowing them for the last 10 years.It helped me in some of my business ventures.

From my personal experience in business since 1989, almost all of my business opportunities came out from my personal network.A few months ago, I bought a book entitled The Little Black Book of Networking and my 17 years old son is reading it. He told me it is a good book even for him as a student.I strongly recommend the book,especially if you are going to be in business for yourself.

As they say, opportunity knocks once and when we are not ready it is gone to someone who is ready and willing to grab it.

Some experience with GPSmap 60CSx

6 Since the second week of June,2007 I always carry my GPS  device whenever I am on the road.So far, I found it useful and interesting...

Let me share with you of some encounters I had in a few situations.

Familiar locations and routes:
I don't need the device to show me the way, but it is useful in telling me how far I am from the location and the ETA.(with an error of 5min).I found it useful to inform my friends  when my car got stuck in a traffic jam.

In another case when I was in JB a few days ago, the road that I was familiar with was closed and I had to make a U -turn. After making that u-turn, I was lost. By using this device, it showed me another alternative route and informed me the new ETA.

Unfamiliar locations and routes:
I wanted to meet a friend for some business discussion. He suggested a restaurant located at Ara Damansara,Subang.This is a totally new place for me.By using my GPS, I managed to go to Ara Damansara and then I checked the waypoints, the restaurant where we were supposed to meet was listed and I marked the located and arrived at the door step of the restaurant on the doorstep and on time!

During the long journey, I can check my maximum speed, average travelling speed and how much time I stop at R&R along the highway.This information is useful to monitor and control my journey in order to arrive  on time at my destination.Another interesting feature I discover that  is that I  can get some informations on some POI's( points of interest) along the vicinity of my route which otherwise I would not have known.

However, in some cases I was given the wrong information when to make the right turns due to the differences in the map and the actual road situation as they were at that time.

In summary,this GPS gadget gives me additional confidence in navigating my way during my road travels-either in known or unknown territories.

Poem: To my students

This morning I received this poetic wisdom from my teacher Prof Dr Wan Mohd Nor bin Wan Daud, a Fellow of ISTAC. Immediately,I got his permission to post it here so that my fellow readers can enjoy and benefit from reading and contemplating its meanings.By the way, he asked me to qualify himself that he is not a professional poet,only a teacher.Talking about my teachers, Prof Dr Wan Mohd Nor is one of my best teachers that had enlightened my understanding of Islam.Thank you,Sir for your kindness.Jazakallahu Khairan

To My Students
By
Wan Mohd Nor Wan Daud

You have drained your mother’s tears
And denied your spouse’s warm embrace
For months and years
With cold sweat and silent prayers
Seeking neither reward nor praise
Except God’s pleasure and grace

Scaling the summit of the academic prize
Is full of slippery ravines and tricky slopes
So pardon me for this unsolicited advice
A tonic of grave warnings and great hopes:
On your shoulders lies the ummah’s adventure
In your hearts springs Islam’s future

So strive hard, get your doctorate
But never ever be a hypocrite
Master your courses, finish your thesis
Betray not trust nor break a solemn promise

And strive even harder to be a professor
Publish your findings and contemplation
But never ever be a traitor
Just to secure a promotion
To colleagues of greater ability
And works of higher validity
And usher an era of spiraling mediocrity:
Committees and meetings can’t hide
The emptiness inside

Be true to true teachers
Who build schools and characters
Whose thoughts and ideas are Heaven’s gift
To souls floating adrift

Let not your vain desires conspire
And destroy a noble empire

A garden of the learned and virtuous
Now an altar of the greedy, the ambitious

This religion
Spreads its sweet fruits and soft fragrance
From the souls of Mustapha’s real heirs
This nation
Manifests God’s Love, Omnipresence
With happy masses and wise leaders.

Original Divine Message

In one booklet I read about knowledge, Dr Kamal Hasan from UIA has written about three domains of knowledge-wahyu(revealed knowledge),empirical knowledge and scientific knowledge. From my understanding ,Wahyu is the only absolute knowledge because it comes from the Owner of All the Knowledge and the last two are acquired knowledge which are relative to time and space. However, we do need the last two in order to understand and believe in the first knowledge.

Below is a relevant ayat :(taken from Nasiha)

Al Najm (The Star)
Chapter 53: Verse 28

                        

Original Divine Message
"They [the unbelievers] have no knowledge whatsoever of the claims they make; they merely succumb to conjecture, and conjecture is no substitute for truth."

                        

Throughout the ages, religion, revealed and unrevealed alike, has been the subject of much abuse, distortion, and corruption. Myths and superstitions about the Divine Being have crept into many religious beliefs, bringing religion into direct conflict with science. Religion and science are legitimate means for seeking the ultimate truth, but human caprice and tendentious manipulation have, in many cases, distorted the original and pristine divine message.

                        

Religious knowledge is absolute knowledge, upheld and protected by divine revelation, based on rational argument and common sense. Any religious proposition or argument that does not stand up to rational and intellectual examination is not worthy of being approved or believed.

                        

Source:
                          "A Thematic Commentary on the Quran" - Muhammad al-Ghazali, p. 595

Metallic spider

Metallic spider
Originally uploaded by Adibi

This photo is a part of a school notice board.Normally, the notice board is two-dimension but now it has becomes a three dimension work of art.I love to see the students' creativities being literally displayed.

Another part that I observed is the collaboration of art and science in the creation of the metallic spider.

Don't lose your passport..

Bruce Chatwin 

   

'Losing my passport was the least of my worries, losing a   notebook was a catastrophe'.

I am no Chatwin because I was worried sick when I lost my passport (stolen) when I was resting at the waiting lounge at Changi Airport on the way to US in 1992.

Berisman

'I like moleskine because it makes me write and keeps me writing..'

By the way Bruce Chatwin was talking about his moleskine notebooks. Mine is not as precious as his.

Below is the latest notebook at MPH that looks like moleskine..It costs RM14 compared to moleskine RM 50.Btw,I use moleskine.

Readers Digest Online

Yesterday I bought the July RD magazine because  of one article about being fat.I consider myself as a fat person and still looking for ways to reduce my BMI.The recent report about obesity is not good-globally(1 billion persons) and locally(?).

For those who love reading some articles and jokes from RD, let me share with you the Online RD and with a few sms(text messages) features for Malaysians.

Price wars of HP

I am on the way to TESCO now..

Continue our learning..

After we finished our formal education and started a family and/or a career or a business, how do we go on learning more about our religion?One of the easier way that my friends and me do are to allocate time to attend lectures at masjid and read religuos books. By the way, please check your diary how many times have you gone to attend tazkirah/kuliyyah in the last six months of this year? And also check how many books on Islam have you bought/borrowed  and read? These are a few metrics to measure our seriousness or commitment to improve ourselves as muslims and muslimahs.

Below is a short note I copied from Nasiha to share with you the importance of learning...
       

         

The Teacher

Masjid al-Nabawi (The Prophet's Mosque) was not only a place of worship, but also the first Islamic university. In the Masjid, there was an elevated platform known as the Suffah.

         

Sometimes, people who had no place to live stayed on the  Suffah, but more often, it was occupied by people who loved the Prophet, peace be upon him, so much that they did not want to part with the Masjid. These people came to be known as the Ashab al-Suffah.

         

The Ashab al-Suffah spent their days and nights praying,  reciting Quran and studying Islam. They sat in groups and performed Dhikr  (remembering Allah), or they studied Fiqh.

         

Once, the Prophet saw two meetings of Ashab al-Suffah taking  place. In one assembly, people were making Dhikr. In the other, they were studying the religion of Islam. The Prophet said, "Allah likes both of these assemblies. Both are blessed."

         

Then he said, "I have been sent as a Teacher" and  he joined the assembly where the Sahabah were engaged in learning about the  Deen.

Note: The photo just below the words "The Teacher" is the photo of my teacher Prof Dr Hashim Minhat, who has been teaching at our masjid for the last two decades.