Berakhir sudah Ramadhan..

Selamat tinggal Ramadhan .. sedih jugak sebenarnya meninggalkan Ramadhan kali ini — mungkin sebab Ramadhan kali ini lebih bermakna dari yang dulu2– OK I have to admit I was not terawih regular before..selalu skip especially yang hujung2 tu.. Tiap2 hari kami yang dok di Apartment “Sri Wangi” Riyadh , berbuka bersama kemudian terawih pun bersama beramai2 ke surau di hadapan rumah. Imamnya al-hafiz so solat terawih kami memang lengkap 30 juzuk bacaannya sepanjang Ramadhan– terbayang2 angan2 suatu hari nanti anak2 menjadi hafiz dan hafizah walaupun perjalanan masih jauh — Imran dan Sabrina akan masuk ke sekolah Arab 11 hari lagi (Imran keluar dari Multinational School — he told his teacher that he moved because he wanted to be a good Muslim! That was exactly what I repeatedly told him — explaining about the move to the new school to get him mentally prepared for the new school) — after a year of soul searching+ fact finding we decided they better off going for “a classical education” (hey! they like watching The Smurf too!) and science + math and english can always be homeschooled .. Dah terbayang masalah yang akan kami hadapi di sekolah baru memandangkan ilmu agama kami yang cetek ditambahkan lagi dengan “arabic vocabulary” kami yang masih “limited”. Tapi kami percaya dalam perjalanan menuntut ilmu ni — yang penting usaha dan banyak berserah kepada Allah insyaallah akan ditunjukkan jalan

Sambung cerita puasa , anak2 makin membesar — Imran , 7 tahun Oktober 18 ni buat kali pertama puasa dan cukup sebulan! Seronok agaknya bersama rakan2 sebaya walaupun liat nak bangun untuk sahur dan solat subuh. Ammar skipped few days of school because abahnya liat nak bangun 7am untuk hantar ke sekolah (Saudi working hours untuk Ramadhan pukul 10am – 4pm! ) Sabrina pun sibuk ke hulu hilir dengan 2 rakan sebaya main bersama dengan adiknya Alysha.

Aktiviti Ramadhan yang lain? Seperti biasa resipi.net hosting overloaded! Kami berpindah lagi buat ke sekian kalinya –trafik naik 4 kali ganda! Leceh sebenarnya kerja pindah hosting ni — ended up all other (at least 5!) websites have to be moved too..
Other than that I got back into old hobbies — electronics but this time its more serious — bought few books from Amazon dan other gadgets like multimeter, oscilloscopes, Arduino microcontroller and the mission– to learn building a robot! . Cisco CCIE project also still ongoing now I have 5 routers with NM-4A/S as frame relay switch + the NM16/A as the terminal server — maybe considering CCNP first to force myself get into it seriously.

Raya? Today is the first day!
Akhir kata Salam Hari Raya dari kami sekeluarga di Riyadh -Maaf Zahir dan Batin !
Some pictures here .

Values matter!

Have you heard about Carly Fiorina recently? Me neither .Somehow, I heard that her succeeder, Mark Hurd decided to buy EDS last week to make HP one of the big players in IT services next to IBM . For those who does not Carly Fiorona , she was the CEO of Hewlett Packard Co. from 1999 until she was ousted in 2005 and for the record I have nothing against her of being a woman CEO (once quoted as the most influential woman in IT) , it just that being a typical engineer, I always admired companies who is led by someone with an engineering background –in short things about Carly never interest me much unlike stories of the nerds at Google or even Steve .

But recently upon reading a book that I newly bought, I came across an interesting part of her speech [about Islam] which was given just ~ two weeks after September 11,2001.

Quoted :

There was once a civilization that was the greatest in the world.

It was able to create a continental super-state that stretched from ocean to ocean, and from northern climes to tropics and deserts. Within its dominion lived hundreds of millions of people, of different creeds and ethnic origins.

One of its languages became the universal language of much of the world, the bridge between the peoples of a hundred lands. Its armies were made up of people of many nationalities, and its military protection allowed a degree of peace and prosperity that had never been known. The reach of this civilization’s commerce extended from Latin America to China, and everywhere in between.

And this civilization was driven more than anything, by invention. Its architects designed buildings that defied gravity. Its mathematicians created the algebra and algorithms that would enable the building of computers, and the creation of encryption. Its doctors examined the human body, and found new cures for disease. Its astronomers looked into the heavens, named the stars, and paved the way for space travel and exploration.

Its writers created thousands of stories. Stories of courage, romance and magic. Its poets wrote of love, when others before them were too steeped in fear to think of such things.

When other nations were afraid of ideas, this civilization thrived on them, and kept them alive. When censors threatened to wipe out knowledge from past civilizations, this civilization kept the knowledge alive, and passed it on to others.

While modern Western civilization shares many of these traits, the civilization I’m talking about was the Islamic world from the year 800 to 1600, which included the Ottoman Empire and the courts of Baghdad, Damascus and Cairo, and enlightened rulers like Suleiman the Magnificent.

Although we are often unaware of our indebtedness to this other civilization, its gifts are very much a part of our heritage. The technology industry would not exist without the contributions of Arab mathematicians. Sufi poet-philosophers like Rumi challenged our notions of self and truth. Leaders like Suleiman contributed to our notions of tolerance and civic leadership.

And perhaps we can learn a lesson from his example: It was leadership based on meritocracy, not inheritance. It was leadership that harnessed the full capabilities of a very diverse population–that included Christianity, Islamic, and Jewish traditions.

This kind of enlightened leadership — leadership that nurtured culture, sustainability, diversity and courage — led to 800 years of invention and prosperity.

In dark and serious times like this, we must affirm our commitment to building societies and institutions that aspire to this kind of greatness. More than ever, we must focus on the importance of leadership– bold acts of leadership and decidedly personal acts of leadership.

With that, I’d like to open up the conversation and see what we, collectively, believe about the role of leadership.

Darn! And I thought who this woman really is? While the West was busy condemning Islam in the midst of September 11, 2001 — she couragedly stand by her principle did otherwise. Too late to know her? I hope not!

I found a video on her talking about ethics , something that I think most of the top management up there less interested than getting “the results” . As she said “Values are the only one that lead you when no one’s watching and when you think that anyone will ever found out. Values matter!

Carly rocks — gotta find her book!

The Malaysia holidays..

To friends and relatives I didn’t get the chance to meet/call when I was in a 7 days’ holidays Malaysia — I am deeply sorry. I spent 4 days in my hometown Batu Pahat so that I could share my time with my father who got a stroke 3 weeks ago. Alhamdulillah , Praise to Allah All Mighty his condition is better now, I am happy to have the chance chatting and laughing with him while I shaved his beard on my last day in BP, also to see my mom started smiling again perhaps happy to see her son and the family again since last 2007 summer

Some photos ..

Finding the GPS coordinate with my Nokia E90.

(more…)

Heading to KL

I am on my way back to Kuala Lumpur — will be in MY from 21st to 30th April 2008 .
Currently on a five hours transit in Doha, Qatar before leaving to KL at 1am tonight.The kids was having fun on the playhouse, I just hope that they don’t get exhausted/sleepy before boarding!

Pelan Pendidikan National?

Ferdaus  brought this issue to ITTutor.net  with a diagram . Picture speaks a thousand words – every Malays (I believe) aware about this issue.
Please click here to discuss about it.
Personally , (like other concerned Malays!) I think Akademi Fantasia is a serious social epidemic . Should it be banned?
But would it be effective?

My idea is — we should start another epidemic for the youth, something that would overwrite/counter all this ..
Malcolm Gladwell in his book Tipping Point (How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference)  wrote about the human behaviour that can be changed/triggered  by the so called epidemics. Even small ideas can triggered something big , spread like virus at the national level. His studies supported by few examples such as the resurgence of this Hush Puppies shoes brought by a  group of teenage boys at one part of the country but later  spread at national level. OK, maybe it sounds too easy, but who knows by Allah will we can start one! But then how?

Hmm..

A student at MMU already started one . A simple idea no rocket science , what he did was to add Quran features into PSP . Now we have a portable Quran at the hand of  youths that would be carried anywhere they  go. Implementation? Up to creativity of parents -of course, parent had to play some roles on this. say a rule – for every game played they have to recite few verses of Quran. Cool isn’t it? Thats the whole idea, its cool to read Quran 

Also stated in the news article he was said to be inspired by the same concept designed for Bible in PSP. And I thought-  for my friends at  ITTutor.net who  were always comparing/arguing/flaming to  what Linux/Microsoft did to compete with each other, why not we start  looking at what other people did to spread their dakwah? Islamic Web 2.0 apps?

* Additional to that , being a parent I am also learning how to raise my children. According to a  research in ScienceDaily , it is proven that "Kids with religious parents are better behaved and adjusted than other children" .Being a Muslim, this findings are not new to us.

My question to myself is today — "How religous am I?"   Hmm…

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