Nasrudin's Frog Experiment

From Nasrudin@yahoo.group.com. I'll try to copy some of my favorite stories from Idries Shah books once I've time. Meanwhile:

Nasrudin trained a frog to hop everytime he said "Jump!".Then, for reasons known only to himself, he surgically removed the frog's lefthind leg."Jump!" he cried. The frog jumped. Veered badly to the left, but it jumped.
Nasrudin wrote in his journal: "Left hind leg removed; frog still jumps."And then he removed the frog's left fore leg."Jump!" he cried. The frog jumped. Almost rolled over on it's back, but itjumped.
He wrote in his journal: "Both left legs removed; frog still jumps."And then he removed the frog's right fore leg."Jump!" he cried. The frog jumped. Actually it was more of a 'scoot', but itjumped.
He wrote in his journal: "All but right hind leg removed; frog still jumps."And the he removed the frog's right hind leg."Jump!" he cried. Nothing."Jump!" he cried. The frog twitched a little, but just sat there."Jump!" he cried. The frog just looked at him pitifully.
Nasrudin wrote in his journal: "All legs removed; frog has gone deaf."

Greek Proverb

Was browsing www.deenport.com and intrigue by this Greek proverb:

“A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade, they know they shall never sit in”.

May we have lots of those men and women.

Black Magic in Malay Society

Just a rambling off my head and not meant to be an academic study. What prompted me was something that happenned to my mom few weeks ago. After a few visit to the doctor and not seeing an improvement, coupled with strange finding of several nails tucked neatly into a papaya tree in front of our house, grandma old school intuition wanted to try different avenues. After a few visits to several experts in the area, one of which head of top 'pondok'/madrasah in Kelantan, grandma's intuition seems correct.

We hope we could be among those who would be happy with our Lord in any situation. Shaykh Nazim taught to say 'syukurillah' (sp?) when something good happens and to say 'alhamdulillah' when in difficulty. Which to be honest, when I first heard it, it sounded strange to my Malay psyche upbringing; until I heard on IKIM radio something that suggests a similar manner.

But what I want to write is more about the usage of black magic or 'sihir' in our society. What happenned was, when we visited a particular healer/'bomoh' back home, it struck me that in the short span I was there, about 5 other people was seeking her service. And most of the cars are registered outside Kelantan! Now, forget about ntv7, this is a real 'fear factor'.

And from talking to several friends about this, it seems that sihir is quite prevalent. One friend who works in banking industry, is frequenting the famous Darul Shifa now for what thought to be a 'santau'. Another, a business owner in construction industry, told several scary stories about his friends who'd been had.

I thought 'wow', the only thing we can do is to turn to Him; Helper for those who are helpless, Pillar for those who has no pillars, and Guide for those who has no guidance.

And on this blessed Friday and 2nd last day of Rabiul Awal this year, may our Lord increase our love for His most beloved servant, place us among the Righteous here and hereafter, and place us in safety. Salawat & Fatihah. Amin.

Note to Myself 1

Dear Self,

If you happen to go to any celebration for Mawlid, Bercukur Rambut, etc. please don't place the 'bunga rampai' (spelling?) together with your asthma inhaler. If you do, everytime you use the inhaler after that, you will also inhale the bunga rampai smell. It just does not feel right.

Note:
Photo of Mawlid in Janda Baik, Pahang last Tuesday.

Once upon a time in Middle Earth

Thought it was really funny and put it here. Got it from http://alaydhien.blogspot.com

Imagine if you will ...

Imagine if you will, a 30-something Malay male sitting in front of an elder in a living room somewhere in KL. The young man could sport a nice hair cut, slightly on the big size (either life has been good to him or he’s not watching his diet), casually dressed and not too sharp; and a small goatee on the chin.

Clearly the young man is spiritually inclined; though he does not seem too religious. The elder can be any venerable elder who has gone thru the good and the bad in life; somebody who's not only knowledgeable but also wise (there's distinction between the two you know).

So the young man asked, “when I look at my life, it seems that whenever I have good intention to do something, somehow I can't do it. It seems that there's bad energy or jinn or shaitan trying to pull me away. What can I do sir? May be certain Quranic practice I should do. Your guidance is much welcomed”.

After a deep breath, the elder said, “well son, there's no jinn trying to divert you, you are just one lazy son of a bitch”.

And with that, they both took a sip of the still hot Ahmad Tea (London) brought earlier.

An interesting read. http://www.daruliftaa.com/Docs/Blessed_Lands_of_Yemon.htm

Wish that I would have some means in the future to travel the world and partake its blessings.

You may check this site http://www.aljenderami.com.my/home/index.php to see if the Habibs is visiting Malaysia.

A good 'adab'

I happen to be in Balikpapan, Kalimantan Timur last Chinese New Year and saw a good adab in a mosque there.

A few days I was there, I went to this mosque in front of the hotel only once for Fajr and after the prayer, zikir and all, everybody stand up for 'salam'.

In most mosques in Malaysia, the act of salam, while prominence is given to the imam, is still done in a random manner. Such as, if one is a bit far from the imam, one would 'bersalam' with those nearer first before going to the imam.

However there, at least in that mosque, everybody would que to salam with the imam first and those who did their salam, would stay put next to the imam and thus create a circle so that in the end, everybody would salam with everybody else. And while doing that, salawat would be recited out loud.

It was such a lovely setting that I would not doubt creates a much more brotherhood atmoshpere.

While I do not know the Malaysian scene in general, I know that the same adab is practiced by some here.

Bangkok II

One thing I guess that the Thais are different from other ASEAN nations is that they do and show their respect for their king. It was the king’s birthday when I was there last year and everywhere you could see the king’s pictures. A few cab drivers I talked to invariably loved their king whereas not all like the prime minister.

In front of the hotel entrance, they placed a big size photo of the king, perhaps A2 size, and they decorate around the area. Next to the entrance, there’s one convenience shop and once, I saw a man getting there and before he went to the shop, he placed his hands together and showed his respect to the king in front of his photo.

And this is our lives. Not all men are created equal. That’s one thing I find it difficult to reconcile with ‘democracy’. Democracy gives all eligible men and women equal amount of power, i.e vote. Be honest here, not everybody is bright and cheerful. Some are not too clever and can be manipulated easily. The liberals would say, if we don’t give equal rights to everyone, then who’s to decide what is right or wrong. It can’t be placed in a few hands. And as I said before, even if the right is placed in everybody’s hand, it won’t be fine and dandy.

Though I’m not inclining towards return to Kingship, I just hope that the world would be a better place. And I guess I have to start with me. Allah Hu, Allah Haq.

A tale of two Doa

I'm a bad, bad man. Last Eid-ul Adha, while the imam was saying the doa after the khutbah, I was thinking about another doa that I just heard on a mawlid vcd.

You see, the Eid doa was in my kampung in Kelantan and the other doa, I supposed was in Yemen since Habib Umar was in the mawlid.

If I remember correctly, the Eid doa was like this, among others:

"... Ya Allah, destroy our enemies and failed their plans against us ..."

While Habib Umar's was:

"... Ya Allah, bring those who are astray back to the right path ..."

Of course, this is not a judgement on one person against the other. By any accounts, I'm nothing at all compared to the Eid Imam.

The thing is, given two choices, with whose company do we rather be. And whose guidance would have more lasting impact on our soul. I believe the answer is as clear as daylight.

Though it might be difficult to find such a person among us, I'm sure our good Lord grant to those who asked. Knocked, and the door shall be open.

And here's one advice by Habib Umar:
http://www.guidancemedia.co.uk/mustaffa/articles/seminaladvice.pdf

Bangkok

Not much I can tell about Bangkok except that the place is huge. I felt like a 'katak gemuk di bawah tempurung'. You know how some places they put sign 'take only pictures and leaves only footprints'. Well, I followed that to the 't' and left my new Lumix camera there as well. He he he. So much for a picture worth a thousand words.

With a few days there and one of it for diarrhea, I did not have much chance to absorb the place. Only visits to a few touristy places. So here are my takes:

1. Shopping
I would recommend to go to MBK first just to touch base with the prices that Bangkok has to offer. I think the place is much like our Sg. Wang. The famous Chatucak Weekend market is also a good place to visit; even if just for the experience of it. I definitely wouldn't want to go to the Night Bazaar if I had a chance to go there again. The place is much too expensive compare to MBK and the stuff are about the same.

2. Food
Amazing as it was, there was this road called Soi Nana off Sukhumvit that is catered to Arabs. You can see Arabs there in their traditional wear (for lack of better word) and smoking that what the name 'water pipe'. So, halal food is plenty here. And as we moved around the city, we showed the van driver a list of halal restaurants and he would take us there. Plus, we stayed at a hotel with kitchen area so cooking was not a problem.

3. Floating Market
I think this one is a total rip off. It was about 2 hours drive from Bangkok and once there, we had to pay about RM40 per person to be driven in 'sampan' around the klong and not far from the jetty there is this area where traders set up stall on the klong bank and try to sell you the same stuff that you can buy at much cheaper price at MBK or Chatucak. And this place is mostly for tourists and I felt like it was a pure trap.

Overall, I think it was a good trip and would not mind going there again. From the plane, we could feel how small KL really is and once in the city, how blessed we are in terms of traffic.

Bangkok, hopefully

Hopefully, when you see this, I'm somewhere in a boat on Chao Phraya partaking of its fragrance or haggling with some vendors on a 48" Levi's knock off. Patpong, here we come (strictly educational of course!).

Interesting read ...

Last Day of Ramadan 2005 with Shaykh Adnan

It was the last tarawih for this 2005 Ramadan and deep down I know I have not been doing much. Shaykh Adnan Kabbani, a big figure among the earliest murids of Shaykh Nazim and Grandshaykh Abdullah Ad-Dagestani, had been in Malaysia for sometime now. And not once I went to his tarawih in Damansara.

Nietsche, I think a German philosopher, said many things, but one I remember most is his saying, “reason is a whore”.

I don’t know what he meant by it but I take it as to give reasons for something is basically useless (not that I think the whoring profession is useless, but that for later). And there are many reasons I could give for missing the golden time to be in the same company as Shaykh Adnan; and they will just remain as baseless excuses.

But last night, much thankful to our Lord Almighty, I joined the folks for tarawih with Shaykh Adnan in Penang (it’s the wife turn for Eid this year). After tarawih and short zikir, Shaykh Adnan gave a memorable ‘sohbet’. From my damaged recollections:

He said 500 years after the trumpet blown, all children of Adam will congregate on the Judgment day and will feel the burden of their sins and the incoming waves of Jahanam. Not able to stand the situation anymore, 124,000 prophets go to Sayyidina Adam to ask our Lord Almighty to open the court. To cut the story short, Sayyidina Adam a.s is afraid to do it and so are the other Prophets (Nuh, Ibrahim, Musa, & Isa a.s) except for our beloved Messenger pbuh. It is one of the honors of our Prophet to ask our Lord to open the court.

Continuing what I’ve written earlier (about two weeks ago), I can’t seem to recall much. I think it’s more about what are we doing to prepare for that day.

Now I’m reminded about something that Gurdjieff wrote about two monks – one young and the other old. While the young monk could always give a fiery speech, it is what the old monk said always sink to people’s heart.

Though I can’t fully remember what Shaykh Adnan said, the thought and feeling of what he described is still inside and sometimes, it pushes us to the good side; for now at least.

It is precious indeed to be among their company; regardless whether the sweet scent comes from Central Asia, North Africa or Yemen.

Not a complaint

To get to Glenmarie from my house in Saujana Puchong, I usually take the Sunway LDP route rather than USJ. And now at LDP Sunway toll, they have the banner above. Emm, I thought it's a little weird to have the phrase 'minumlah air' and 'selamat menyambut Ramadhan al-Mubarak' in the same banner. But we all have our own things, let's leave it at that instead of complaining about things.

One time in life, mid 20's I supposed, I learned the word 'utopia' and being rash and foolish like any youth, I'm fixated about it. I like that word 'rash'. Dostoyevsky use it as ... where others flinch, rash and foolish youth will dare. Together with 'carpe diem', those were my favorites catch phrase at one time. Until I thought, well, this business of trying to find utopia is not that easy. The fact was, I have not tried or expand my resources on anything but just thinking about it was like hard labor to me. And so, I bought a first-generation Nintendo and choose to expand my energy and together with it, my waist line, in playing Mario Brothers.

Hence, it came to mind at the time that, why is that my religion which I was born into, instead of searching and paying for it, can't create this utopia on earth during my lifetime. It was not a good thought process to be in at the time. Especially since I was also reading a bit into other religions and in Christianity, you will find this huge concept about 'Love'. More so about unconditional love such as Jesus so loved the world that he redeemed it with his life.

Plus, we can't deny that our Islam is manifested by many kinds of groups. One group will emphasis a certain aspect much more than others. At the time, the kind of Islamic literature that I read does not have much of these 'love' and other soft concepts. And I felt, in a way, a wee bit down.

This is not about Christianity vs. Islam thing. If anything, our Christian brothers are very close to us; more so since we both believe that Sayyidina Isa a.s. will come back towards the end of time and through him, all the righteous will unite.

And now, reading some of Shaykh Nazim sohbets and other venerable wise guide, I'm happy to note that I'm much more reconciled now. Instead of the word love, we have other words like 'mercy'. And it is such a huge thing that even our beloved Rasul is called as 'mercy to the worlds'. And I'm such a jahil to talk more about this.

In Christianity there’s this thing Jesus as the logos made flesh. And I’ve find in life that, it is much beneficial to us if we could find somebody that actually manifest in everyday life the beauty of Islam.

Truth is, though there are many kind of jewels out there, some are really precious. And if we seek, so shall we find. Knock, and the door will be open. Happy Eid.

Mengidam

Somehow la, satu dua hari ni, saya dok mengidam dengar lagu lagu rock zaman 70's or 80's gitu. I find listening to these songs is like having a good jeruk manga, you know, those yang tak masam sangat, tak masin, and the manga is not tua, or too young, just crispy gitu.

So these songs are playing frequently on my laptop at work:
Queen : Bohemian Rhapsody
Pink Floyd : Learning to Fly
Skid Row : 18 and Life, Wasted Time
Warrant : Heaven
Santana : Black Magic Woman
Moody Blues : Dust in the Wind, Night in White Satin
Harry Chapin : Cats in the Cradle (if u never listen to this, go find it)

After this phase, I think it will be lagu raya, though I don't think I like those as much. Coz I feel that I don't deserve to raya since I don't take advantage of those blessings that came down during Ramadan so much.

Shaykh Hisham once said (roughly la kan), if we are involved in business, we will do more if the market is on the upward swing. It will be crazy for traders not to sell or invest more during good times. The same with Allah, the months of Rajab, Sha'ban, & Ramadan are like the best months to do business with Him.

Emmm, kena pi terawih la kot malam ni. Semalam dah miss.

A Dress

I was listening to Syakh Hamza's 'Marriage & Responsibilities' the other day and was struck by his explanation on one Hadith about women who are dressed but naked.

He said that, and I'm writing this from memory so hopefully the gist of it is correct, the Tradition was not clear to some scholars of old and they interpreted it metaphysically as women who dressed in this world and naked in the next world.

It's not my intention to take a jab at our esteemed scholars or women but more about the miracle of our Prophet (saw) that his saying became clear after hundreds of years later. I mean up until our modern times, people can't imagine how a person can be naked while dressed.

Wow, and to think of it, Hijaz was like a backward place at the time. The centers of civilization were Persia or Byzantine but here comes a man from out of nowhere and telling people of things to come.

And we are grateful that even though we are thousands of miles from that blessed valley, we are counted as his ummah (hopefully).


Note 1:
I later found a reference to that Hadith in a book 'The signs before the day of Judgement' by Ibn Kathir, published by Dar Al Taqwa, London. The Hadith:

Abu Hurayrah said, "The Prophet (saw) said, 'There are two types among the people of Hell whom I have not yet seen. The first are people who have whips like the tails of oxen, with which the beat people, and the second are women who are naked in spite of being dressed; they will be led astray and will lead others astray, and their heads will look like camels' humps. These women will not enter Paradise; they will not even experience the faintest scent of it, even though the fragrance of Paradise can be perceived from such a great distance.' " (Muslim).

Note 2:
Sadly, I'm not that good yet. I still support Women’s Movement; especially from behind. And more so if the way they dress, one could guess the size of their well endowed upper parts. And my gosh, when I was still going to school, those parts are not developed until they have a few kids. But now ... emmm ... puasa puasa!

Hai Kersani Mengalirlah Dikau II ...

To update, I went to Kulim again last week and asked the guy who bought some RM100.00 stuff from Pak Kob if it works and he said, "tak banyak peluang la, asyik lampu merahhh je". Emmm, if only it's like tap water where you can turn it off at will :)

Anyway, to answer Nazrah's, it's nothing lika a spa. Because, with respect to people there, the place is near a place where Tunku met Chin Peng. And as far as Chin Peng is concerned, the area can't be like those Hindustani movies. It is deep inside the kampung where instead of fresh earth smell, it's more like cow manure. The urut itself is done on a used up foam mattress with regular plywoods as walls. But we don't complain.

As far as the urut goes, I think it needs to be done on regular basis to show some results. We went there once just for the experience of it.

Hai Kersani Mengalirlah Dikau ...

Around once a month or so, I would drive up to Kulim for work related trip. I usually would spend one or two nights over there. Call me coward if you want, but I never like spending my night in a hotel room alone. I never got a good sleep that way. And since I'm not the type who would call up suppliers to be entertained, my companion would be whatever is on the tv.

But last week was different. During lunch, a few of us got to talking about finding a good, old style 'tukang urut' for traditional massage. Our local friend said we have two options – normal body massage or special massage. We opted for the first. But, … our story takes a turn here.

Our first masseur was not available so we drove up to the 2nd masseur and were greeted by two angry ‘angsa’. Now, if you lived in a kampung before, you know how boisterous and terrifying an angsa could be. The four of us waited for about five minutes in the car not daring to get out of it.

Once out and after a short chit chat with our masseur Pak Kob, I was the first to go. I changed into an old ‘kain pelikat’ that double its original thickness due to oil residues from previous massages. Heck, Pak Kob could probably wash it every few years.

He started from around the knee area and right there I got a strange feeling since normally people will start from the feet. As he pushed his fingers deep into the vein, which is quite painful even though he’s close to 64 years of age, he hand would accidentally touch my ‘konek’. Aha, so this is the special part. I said to him, “dah malam ni kot, buat urut badan cukup la”. He replied, “eh tak pa ehhh, dah mai jauh2 tu”. I knew then that with two angry ‘angsa’ outside, I could not run away. Sounds of Hotel California keep playing in my head as Pak Kob made his moves.

I thought to myself, lucky I’m not gay. If not, I would have been excited by another man touching me ‘there’.

The session itself was quite short since there were 3 of us and we got to his around close to 10:00 p.m. already. As usual, afterwards Pak Kob tried to sell us a few of his traditional medicine. I did not buy anything but one of us spend around RM100.00 for the 3 kinds of ‘jamu’.

I’ll ask him next month if it works.

Nama Manja

Masa sekolah dulu2 kat MRSM Beseri kita ada geng jugak la. Kira macam nak buat apa2 pun satu geng join jugak la. And dalam geng ni, masing2 ada nama sendiri la. Contohnya:

Zakir
Kita panggil dia 'Guna' sebab dia hitam skit. So masa tu Punch Gunalan kot famous player or coach badminton, dah lupa dah, so dapat la nama dia 'Guna'.

Azreen (nama cam pompuan tapi laki)
Dia ni cam cina sikit. Masa tu Tan Koon Swan punya cerita pasal songlap duit ke apa tengah famous. So nama dia jadi 'Swan' tapi pronounce 'Swon' sebab kita banyak budak Klate, jadi nama dia pun di Klate kan. Kelakarnya budak2 pompuan pangil dia dengan manjanya jadi 'Suwaannn'.

Riza
Sebab dia ni maqam tinggi sangat, orang dok story pasal Wings & Search dia dok cite pasal 'metaphysics' ngan Aristotle, so panggil la dia Riza Proffessor.

Me
Sebab itu perut ada besar sikit, kita kawan2 pangil 'bucit'. Kira singkatan pada buncit la tapi buncit tu tak best sound dia. So jadi la bucit.

Dan yang lain2 tu dah lupa lak.