Amar Razali

Intro to Islam Class 1

It is Dr. Awadh's favourite surah. The same goes with my buddy Hasan. The meaning of the verses inside this surah are soo deep.

I am still learning and memorizing the surah. Currently I am listening to recitation from Shaykh Muhammad al Mohaisany. You can listen it too here.

I received an email from Auntie Fiza 3 days ago. In her email she stated the current condition of Puan Zaimun. She was at the 4th stage of some types of cancer. Puan Zaimun was the accountant at Malaysia Student Department (MSD) Washington DC couple years back. I first met her at MSD Office when I was stranded at Washington DC en route to London because of the transit visa issue at Montreal, Canada 3 years ago.

From the first moment when I met her, I quickly knew that Puan Zaimun was a very kind person. She always smile, and very humble. She also came to Vanderbilt couple of times and masha Allah when we met, she still remembered me.

And today, a friend of mine told me that Puan Zaimun just passed away. What kind of cancer I don't know.

May Allah grant her the highest paradise, make the questioning easy for her and make things easy on her and her family. For her family members, please accept my sincere condolence.

Amar Razali
Nashville, TN

India to launch cow urine as soft drink

Feb. 11 09 - Does your Pepsi lack pep? Is your Coke not the real thing? India's Hindu nationalist movement apparently has the answer: a new soft drink made from cow urine. [Continue reading.]

Pufft.. What the heck is going on?

For your information, RSS is an extremist Hindu organization based in India with affiliates in the West. May Allah guide such people to recognize their foolishness of shirk (worshipping cows) and accept Islam.

Ali Jaber Sourate An-Najm
Uploaded by abderahim82

Aahh.. 'Abdullah Ali Jaber (may Allah be pleased with him). For the past few weeks (!), I have indulged myself with his beautiful recitation of Surah An Najm. As a result, Alhamdulillah I'm nearly memorized the surah. I want to go to Hajj (Oo Allah, please make it easy for me). I want to be in Masjid al Haraam again. I still remember the moment when I was sitting in Masjid al Haraam, have my sight fully filled with the Ka'abah, in the beautiful morning during Summer 2008 for my Umra. It was so beautiful, and I felt very peaceful.

Certainly, Quran is the only delight of the heart..

Peace to you all.

As some of you know - Olive Tree Education has been organizing courses on Islam and providing an opportunity to the public and Muslims to learn or refresh their knowledge about Islam. Here is a course that is for 3 weekends in February and an excellent opportunity to learn about Islam from a reputable instructor.

Our instructor for the course is Gyasi Mckinzie who studied Islam and Arabic at the Islamic University of Medina, Saudi Arabia and is now doing his graduate studies at the Divinity School at Vanderbilt. Please distribute this information to others. Our website www.olivetreeeducation.org has more information.

Please contact us at info@olivetreeeducation.org or call at 615.579.1943 to register for this course. For a person, the fee is $75, and for student, it will be $25. The spaces are limited, so register now! Hopefully we will see you soon on February 14 2009.

Olive Tree Education Team

First, watch this short clip:

"O Allah, please make it easy for our Muslim brothers and sisters in Gaza to go through their life. Shower them with your mercy and forgiveness, and for those who have passed away from this tragedy, place them among the syuhada’ and the saleehen, O Allah."

There are a lot of ignorant people out there, who doesn't know much about Islam. What they know, see and hear about Islam mostly come from the wicked western media. So, what we can do as a Muslim? Well, we have to educate them, teach them what Islam is all about. And most importantly, we need to show the example as a Muslim. Sadly enough to say, Muslim nowadays, they don't really do what Islam thought them to do. We need to stop hate and blame. In sha Allah we can change this thru education.

So here you go:


This poster still in not the official version though, many revisions is needed. So if you have any comment, feel free to do so.

p/s: I want to try something different this time. After using Adobe In Design and Photoshop to design the previous posters, I would like to try using CorelDRAW X4. But heck, it's quite tricky. Anyway, this poster has been designed 100% using CorelDRAW X4, alhamdulillah.

Assalamu'alaykum Warahmatullah Wabarakatuh,

AlKuliyyah January 16 2009 menampilkan Ustaz Zahazan, Ummi Rose dan Puteri sebagai ahli panel. Ummi Rose memaklumkan kepada saya kemunculan beliau ke rancangan tersebut pada petang Rabu. Terima kasih Ummi kerana memaklumkan. Tentunya saya tidak dapat menyaksikan rancangan tersebut secara live, tetapi mujurlah TV3 ada membuat archives kepada rancangan tersebut.

Bersama-sama dengan entry ini saya postkan rakaman alKuliyyah untuk tontonan semua. Tajuknya kali ini ialah "Akibat Cinta Melampau." Oh, perlu saya mengkhabarkan, saya sangat tertarik dengan cara penyampaian oleh Ustaz Zahazan, dan mulai hari ini beliau menjadi salah seorang kegemaran saya.

p/s: Kak Roha ada memberitahu saya akan kemunculan beliau dalam slot 3:15 petang di Radio 24 Bernama, namun maaf Kak Roha, saya dah tak tahan dan sudah tertidur pada waktu itu. Jika tidak, mungkin saya boleh merakam slot tersebut.

Welcome back students to the year 2009! New Years is a time when you recollect about the past, make resolutions for the future, and celebrate the present. However, when the clock stroke midnight January 1st 2009 in Gaza and Israel, the only fireworks lighting up the sky came from bombs and rockets. While politics have fine lines, gray lines, skewed lines, there is no line, no border, no excuse that justifies the amount of civilian casualties caught in the crossfire of political motives. We would like to cordially invite you to a peaceful interfaith event in remembrance of all those lives lost in the current Gaza & Israel humanitarian crisis. We wish to educate the Vanderbilt community about the current situation in Gaza and Israel and to collectively stand up against the killing of all innocent civilians, whatever side they may be on.

This program will offer religious perspectives on the killing of innocents and the value of life for all people. *No politics.*

Thursday, January 15th, 2009
6:00pm - 7:00pm
Benton Chapel, Vanderbilt University, 444 21st Ave South, Nashville, TN

Featuring:
Professor William Longwell (Ret.), Dr. Awadh Binhazm, Rabbi Saul Strosberg, and Dr. Todd Lake

SPONSORS:
- Muslim Student Association
- Vanderbilt Interfaith Council
- Vanderbilt Hillel
- Malaysian Student Association at Vanderbilt
- Middle Eastern Student Association
- Amnesty International

Please join us this Thursday in commemoration of the innocent lives lost.

Salaam,
Hassan Atassi
MSA President

Assalamu'alaykum,

My team is designing a small blood pump, referred to as the ventricular shuttle device (VSD), and to produce a prototype for further testing after the project's completion in sha Allah. So, briefly about our project. Specifically, the implementation of this VSD is designed to target Congested Heart Failure.

The intent of the device is twofold:
1) assist the patient by collecting blood from the left atrium and
2) pump collected blood to the outlet which passes through the aortic valve for systemic circulation.

The design will make use of the centrifugal pump with a magnetically suspended rotor. The prototype of the VSD with accessories (structural support, intracardiac tubing) will be roughly the size of a AA-battery. The key characteristic that separates the design from progenitor will be its insertion and removal technique. As opposed to the open heart surgery procedure that is needed to insert current LVAD designs, the VSD will be implanted via a catheterization procedure – entering from the femoral vein and going through the inferior vena cava into the right atrium, through the atrial septum and into the left atrium. The pump will rest in the left atrium and blood will be bumped through the left ventricle and out through the aorta. In addition, the novel design will incorporate a percutaneous charging mechanism void of external battery power meaning that the patient does not have to use battery packs. An ideal ventricular shuttle device that we are aiming for would suitably act as both a bridge-to-transplant device or as a long-term ventricular assist device as necessary.

Initially, our team is planning to enter 3 major competitions - CIMIT Prize for Primary Healthcare (worth $150,000), NCIIA March Madness of the Mind (free trip to DC exhibition) and and BMEidea Competition 2009 (worth $10,000). But because there are some patent issues with our design, and "too specialized to be considered for CIMIT prize in primary care", we have to cancel our participation from CIMIT and NCIIA competitions, and BMEidea is the only competition that we are going to enter, hopefully. Thanks VU Division of Cardiovascular for not giving us the support to enter the other two competitions - we have worked so hard since the beginning of spring semester to finish up all the documents required for those competitions. Even Dr. King and Dr. Giorgio already wrote recommendation letters for our group to enter all the competitions.

But anyway, for me personally, this project means a LOT. Congested Heart Failure was the cause of my father's death. This is a great blessing from Allah, for giving me the opportunity to find a way on how to solve this leading cause of death in the world. Moreover, 3 days after I arrived from Malaysia for emergency visit, our group was exposed with the real heart, where I saw the human corpses the first time in my life. I am not medical student, nor want to be one, so the experience to see these human corpses, as well as the real human hearts, was amazing for me. When I saw the human heart, and got a chance to play with it, deep in my heart, I remembered almarhum papa. The malfunction of this part of human body made papa collapsed and lead to papa's death.

For sure – I will give everything to make sure our project goes extremely well. At least, from this project we can contribute something to the humanity, to a better healthcare, and most importantly to the society.

Download the poster (.pdf)
Assalamu'alaykum,

Peace to all,

My dear brothers, sisters and friends, I hope and pray that this article will reach you while you are and your families in the best of health. Many of us have been following what has been happening in Gaza lately. A small strip of land that has the most concentrated population per square foot on earth. A one and a half Million people under occupation for the last four decades. Recently under a blockade for over a year and a half, prevented from the basic needs of survival, just because they voted for a group that the occupying power did not like.

It's unfortunate to say, that our media in the US has been very bias in the way they handled the Palestinian issue or any Arab and Muslim issue in that manner. Our own government has not done a good job in being an honest broker as well. It's also true to say, that the American public has been exposed all along for only one side of the story. It's time now for the other side to be exposed as well.

If you think of yourself as a fair human being, then we invite you to come and get exposed to the other side then, make your own judgment. It's our duty as Americans, as a great nation and as the most powerful nation on earth, to be fair and help those who are oppressed. It will be UN-American to see our government making unwise decisions and just set and watch. But first, we have to be educated before we could help in making a change.

The safety of this great country lies in the hand of its people. Our foreign policies in the Muslim and Arab worlds has caused that part of the world and us a great deal of pain and distrust. Sep, 11th is never far away. We should all ask ourselves what caused it to happen! (Not that it was justified in any way). Shouldn't we work hard to prevent another one, God forbids! Yes my dear, we have to do something or we will suffer again. Revenge is a cycle that never ends and ignorance is a very powerful tool that causes that cycle.

So let us work really hard into bringing peace and reconciliation to our world through fairness and justice to each other and through the acceptance that all of us has the right to exist and live in peace, Muslims, Jews, Christians and everyone else. The power is in the hand of the people and we should use it for the good of the human kind.

Forgive me if I have offended anyone for that was not my intention. I do believe that when we express our true feelings to each other, we will help and support each other to overcome the negative ones that is, If we are truly friends. I will welcome your opinions and critiques at anytime and to be honest to all of my dear friends, I'm really angry about what is going on in Gaza. However, I choose to direct my anger in the positive direction which is, to educate people more just like I have been doing for the last 13 years.

My dear, give yourselves the chance to reach out to the other side and let us all be a part in protecting this great country of ours from itself and from the outside world.

What: Palestine The Untold Side of The Story

When: Sunday, Jan 11th
11 AM - 5 PM: Office Visitations (Open House) Refreshments will be served
5 PM - 7 PM: Main event (a lecture, movie clips and dinner)

Where: The Islamic Center of Nashville, 2515 12th Ave south, Nashville TN, 37212

Come and bring your family and friends.

Thank you and God bless.
Yasser S. Arafat
ICN, member of the board of trustees
For info, please call me at (615) 738-7717

Tiba-tiba ingatan aku melayang mengingati almarhum papa.

Aku terkenangkan jam-jam awal setelah mendapat tahu akan berita pemergian papa. Disebabkan aku kebatasan maklumat, maka aku pun singgahlah ke laman-laman web politik, forum-forum, manalah tahu kalau di sana ada pelawat yang kebetulan berada di sekitar tempat kejadian, maka bolehlah aku mendapat maklumat tambahan. Tetapi, lain yang dicari, lain pula yang aku jumpa. Terdapat juga sesetangah ahli forum atau pelawat yang aku rasakan terlalu taksub pada parti-parti politik dan taksub kepada pilihanraya.

Ya Allah, bayangkan, belum sampai 24 jam pemergian papa, sudah ada yang sibuk bercerita akan pilihan raya kecil Kuala Terengganu, mencanang dan meramalkan siapakah bakal mengisi tempat almarhum papa, sibuk bercerita alangkah indahnya sekiranya sekian, sekian parti atau sekian, sekian orang yang akan menduduki kerusi tersebut. Ya Allah, hanya Engkau mengetahui betapa pedihnya hati ini menahan rasa marah dan kecewa yang amat sangat. Mereka ini, tak ada perkara lain ke yang nak difikirkan? Politik saja 24 jam. Tak ada sedikitkah rasa sensitif kepada keluarga almarhum?

Ya Allah, aku rasa nak tumbuk-tumbuk saja pihak yang berkenaan!

Ok, sekarang kamu-kamu semua, yang tak sabar-sabar untuk berkempen, yang nak sangat mencanang-canangkan calon pilihan raya, parti-parti politik yang berkenaan, ha masa kamu semua dah sampai. Apa lagi?

Aku teringat ketika almarhum papa mula-mula memutuskan untuk menyertai pilihanraya pada tahun 2004 itu. Kalut. Kalut kami satu keluarga. Kalut! Aku masih teringat esakan mama, yang tidak merelakan sama sekali almarhum papa untuk menyertai politik. Kami semua mahu almarhum papa terus kekal di Kementerian Pelajaran. Ketika itu almarhum papa sudah menjadi Pengarah Bahagian Pendidikan Guru (BPG), dan kami, sebagai satu keluarga, semua sudah berasa memadai dan cukuplah dengan posisi itu. Tetapi, almarhum papa memiliki visi yang sebaliknya. Ketika itu, aku sibuk dengan jadual SPM, tetapi aku teringat suatu kisah ketika musim berkempen untuk pilihanraya tahun 2004 itu.

Seingat aku, ketika itu cuti sekolah. Justeru, aku memutuskan untuk membantu almarhum papa dalam kerja-kerja kempen. Sungguh, aku membantu almarhum papa dalam kempen pilihanraya itu, bukanlah disebabkan aku menyokong mana-mana parti, tetapi aku menyokong almarhum papa. Kami semua satu keluarga, dan kami akan menyokong akan perjuangan almarhum papa. Almarhum papa sebenarnya nampak keberatan untuk memberi kebenaran kepada aku terlibat dalam kerja-kerja tersebut kerana aku masih di bawah umur - 17 tahun. Tetapi aku buat keras kepala. Satu hari itu, aku sudah bersiap-siap dengan topi dan vest berlambangkan parti politik almarhum papa. Tetapi almarhum papa memandangku dengan pandangan yang kurang selesa. Tiba-tiba sahaja beliau mengambil topi itu, dan memberitahu sekiranya aku mahu mengikutnya, aku tidak perlu memakai vest berlambangkan parti politik itu.

Akhirnya, aku tidak banyak mengikut gerak kerja kempen almarhum papa. Aku hanya berada di rumah, dan ketika almarhum papa pulang, aku akan memberikan kata-kata semangat kepadanya, dan tolong-tolong mengurutkan badan almarhum papa yang kepenatan, kerana kerja kempen ini sangat-sangat meletihkan. Aku menyedari, dan mamalah yang mengkhabarkan, bahawa almarhum papa turun berat badan ketika proses kempen pilihanraya itu.

Hanya itulah kenangan aku bersama-sama dengan almarhum papa untuk kempen pilihanrayanya pada tahun 2004. Pada tahun 2008, aku berada jauh di perantauan, tetapi aku sentiasa mengikuti perkembangan almarhum papa dari kejauhan.

Aku tidak berapa ambil peduli siapakah yang bakal menggantikan tempat almarhum papa, tetapi aku berharap semoga pengganti almarhum papa akan dapat memberi khidmat kepada masyarakat tanpa mengira fahaman politik, agama, bangsa dan sebagainya, tanpa sebarang kepentingan peribadi, yang nyata menyebabkan masyarakat kita sangat membenci sesetengah ahli politik yang tidak bertanggungjawab.

Ah, setiap kali aku menatap gambar-gambar lama, sukar menahan deraian air mata!