££ Ching Ching $$

Salaam,

This entry is dedicated to Ms (soon to be Mrs) "Bushraaa" who recently got engaged...! Yippee...! And as a gift, i now add your blog to the selected reads i recommend on the left...lol

With that piece of good news, some other good news (for some..) - last Wednesday was "B-Day" or Bonus day. I'm sure the people in the UK have been reading about the obscene amounts of money people in Banking are earning as the media seem to be obsessed about it all. B day was quite weird as there was a general atmosphere of apprehension all around and as people got called in every half an hour to have their chat and ultimately get told how much they will be getting paid...so all day there were some very happy people wondering around the office...and others who were not so happy (nb graduates get their bonuses in Jul...so i didn't get a share in the pie..!)

Having spent a yr abroad in some very very poor countries, no matter how hard I've been working it never feels like I deserve my pay..ok now it wounds like I earn loads...just to clarify, I don't. The first few years you work pretty crazy and are paid OK, but after a few years when you're actually bringing in money for the company is where you make serious money. But nevertheless having seen certain scenes in Bangladesh etc....sometimes I end up feeling quite sick about the discrepancies in life. Like the guy who I worked for in my internship two years ago got paid....lets say above £9m and below £11m in bonuses....OK, I'm sure he works hard but....! Then you think about what footballers are getting paid and then compare it to nurses and teachers (NOT doctors..!!) ...it's all about supply and demand I suppose as its because 60,000 people are prepared to pay £50 each to go and watch a football match that football players are getting paid £100k per week. And to be fair for every £1 you earn in banking its probably because you made the company £5 i.e. you don't get free money.

Anyway to those who know me and think they will soon be cruising in my ferrari in a few years (ie my fake friends, u know who u r...! Lol) you're be waiting a long time as fortunately/unfortunately I moved divisions last yr so I'm in equity research now which is pretty much the lowest paid division in Banking...i'm not regretting it at the moment as in the first few yrs everyone gets paid similar amounts but in 3yrs + everyone else in other divisions will be racing ahead of me..... I made the move cos in research you can actually have a life outside of work so long term you can have a family life and also in my long term plan I was thinking I would try and get married before I start work or a few years after....so since I had to chose last yr I thought I'd take a risk and go for the division with reduced hours from the outset just in case.....but evidently things didn't work out on the marriage front hence a single Me with evenings and weekends free but emptier pockets. Ahh well who wants to be a millionaire anyway? More money more problems.

Salaam
ps, The Fri after i wrote the above (early last week) i was leaving work and randomly outside the building was my ex-boss who i mentioned above. I was just gonna walk past him as i thought he wouldn't even remember who i was..but he came up to me and was all like "hi, how you doing, nice to see you again...blah blah"...and then basically he said it was a shame i had decided to move divisions but if i wanted to move back to where he worked, for me to let him know and he would sort me out...so maybe i was lying about the ferrari after all...! lol

Gender Relations

Salaam,

Hahaaaa...you thought I had disappeared off the face of the earth...well sorry to disappoint but I am still here...just about. I'm at home now for the xmas break and inshaAllah will be here until the 1st of Jan and then back to work. I'd like to dedicate the coming resurgency in my blogging to S.A.M (aka "The fake Sheikh" (a good nick name I think..lol)) who has had trouble living without my ramblings...he himself now runs a blog from the distant lands of Qatar..I would advertise it here but I fear some of his content may be inappropriate for my innocent masoom readers...if you clean it up, I may well advertise..anyway here you go sidi...:

A few weekends ago I had a much delayed reunion with some friends of mine from university. Alhamdulilla it was really good to meet them all as for some, it was nearly a year and a half since I had last seen them.It was quite a "unique" thing as all the people I met were non-Muslims. This might sound an odd observation, but all my life I've always lived around Muslims - my primary school was 100% Muslim, secondary was 80% and even the college I went to for A levels was 70%. The area I live in is also pretty much 100% Muslim (I know, I know, for my US fan base this will seem incredibly odd....). So going away to university was the first time I was faced by having to deal with being in a majority non-Muslim environment and to be honest, it pretty darn hard at first.

Anyway I'm digressing here. At the meal I sat next to one of the guys who I know pretty well and the topic of gender relations came up. He at the moment is sharing a flat with a "feminist" Muslim girl (*SIGH*)....who was complaining to him about why women in mosques had to pray behind men....so I replied back saying the debate really isn't on where women pray, but on whether women should be in the mosque in thefirst place... (he wasn't too happy with this). So from here we got into a debate about the role of men and women in society.The debate wasn't really to do with the Islamic perspective per se ora ny religious perspective (he's quite a hard core Christian himself) but more general than that. For example he was saying why is it the norm that women stay at home and look after the kids and men go to work..why can't it be the other way round...? And why is it that men are taught that they shouldn't cry whereas this is OK for girls etc etc...and his reason was that this is what society forces on them and thus they are made to conform with the "norms" of society...to which my response was although this might be true to a certain degree biologically men and women are born with difference which make women intrinsically more caring and "soft" whereas men who have more testosterone and are more aggressive (don't know if this is actually true...but I had to saysomething..!).

Then he replied back saying that studies had shown that as kids, girls are equally as likely to get into fights as boys and boys are equally as likely to cry at things as girls (I was thinking Damn...lol). Then I reverted the topic back to the specific prayer one saying obviously if you're trying to be holy and connect with God, if women are in front of you or next to you, it's not going to exactly help you concentrate..and the guy opposite who was a Hindu came to the rescue saying he could understand this and that segregation was present in many Hindu festivals. To which the Christian replied with the classic "why can't the women pray in front with a barrier separating them and with the men at the back?"....and so the conversation went round and round...

Anyway at the end we concluded that we were all correct in some way and parted ways. But I thought the whole conversation was interesting. I suppose for me the key thing to the Islamic perspective on Gender relations is accepting that women Are different to men and that what is expected off each is different, but this in no way means that onthe whole one gender gets a rougher deal than the other. For example...if I was a girl....(you won't hear me say that again..! Lol) I'd love to work for a charity and help the needy, but because I'm a man (grrr..) I feel that I need to be able to provide for my family and give them a platform to do well so I need to work in a "proper" job where the pay is better so I can do these things. This problem doesn't exist for muslimas as they have no obligation to provide money for the family and so they can easily work for a charity and the low pay they get paid doesn't matter that much as their husband is paying for everything. And loads of other examples I think where females in Islam get a better deal than males.

So yes - men, women, men and women, it's all a messy world out there.But with trust in Allah coupled with compromise, patience, sacrifice and just treating others how you would want to be treated, I'm sure we'll get there.

Salaams

Qur'an

If God supports you, there is no one who will overcome you; while if he should forsake you, who is there to support you? On God should believers rely (3;160)


My prayer and my devotions, my living and my dying all belong to God, Lord of the Universe (5;161-162)

Balkhi

Late, by myself, in the boat of myself
No light and land anywhere
Cloud cover thick, I try to stay
Just above the surface, yet I am already under
And living within the ocean

-

Who sees inside from outside
Who finds hundreds of mysteries
Even where minds are deranged?

See through his eyes what he sees
Who then is looking out from his eyes?

Twelve

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls, all silvered o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves,
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves,
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard,
Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow;
And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence
Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

Betrayal

When Satan possessed his heart,
Then Judas sold Christ at mart
For silver they gave,
The price of a slave.

Though Jesus had washed his feet
And offered him bread to eat,
His false-hearted kiss
Betrayed him for this.

As innocent blood was shed,
He tied his own noose and, dead,
Was better unborn
Than hanging in scorn!

From Judas, O Lord, we see
Betrayal of you would be
A choking of breath
More deadly than death.

*@&£^*(£&*£&£*@(&£^^%^&

Lots of things have happened...but i can't be bothered....sigh......you've got used to waiting so i'm sure you can hang around for a while more...


Salaam