Project 365

I was sent an invitation to attend the UQ Centenary Reception in London both via post and email. The event will be held to celebrate the 100 years of UQ. Too bad I can’t attend the event. The idea of applying a UK visa is already too complicated for me. And I won’t be in Europe during that time.

It’s just crazy how much money UQ has spent for these centenary events since the beginning of this year! The reception itself has been held in 12 cities in 9 different countries! It was even held in Jakarta, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, and Bangkok all together. Sadly, I missed all of them and I’ll miss another event again.

Things I miss about UQ:

• The multicultural friends I had
• Pizza Cafe, which served the most DELICIOUS Italian pizza I had ever tested! I couldn’t find the replacement of it, yet!
• The cozy, quiet, and homey libraries scattered around the campus. My favorite was the Biological Sciences Library.
• The ITEE (IT & Electrical Engineering) building! This was the place where I spent my sleepless nights with my project mates, tweaking codes and starring at the computer. My longest record staying in the building was 13 hours straight.
• The lake. The parks. The green spaces. The scary birds that attacked my head :D. And definitely, The Great Court!!!
• The weekly market which used to sell high quality & sweet strawberries!
• Jenn and Mayu, two of my closest friends and housemates during the time when I was in Brisbane 🙂

Happy 100 birthday, UQ!

I’ve been getting many postcards lately. Some of them were sent by my friends. Some were sent by the PostCrossing.com members. I’ve been a member of this cool project for few weeks now, exchanging postcards with people around the globe. Hope to receive more postcards from Latin America, Africa, and small islands in the Pacific Ocean!

Among the Muslims the most perfect, as regards his faith, is the one whose character is excellent, and the best among you are those who treat their wives well.

— Prophet Muhammad SAW [Tirmidhi]

I just love to read and hear everything about Aisha RA, the third wife of our beloved Prophet Muhammad SAW. She made a great contribution to Islam and became a role model for Muslim women all over the world, including her participation in the politics. Her loving and compassionate relationship with her husband and their fondness to each other is also something I really love to read; how she used to treat him and how he used to treat her.

(As I’m too lazy to write right now, I’d put some interesting aspects about her and Prophet SAW in bullet points)

• When the Prophet SAW was asked who the most beloved person to him was, he answered, “Aisha”. And when he was asked who the most beloved man to him was, he answered, “her father”. [Sahih Bukhari Vol. 5, Book 57, No. 14]
• She’s the complete example of what Muslim women should be like. She’s very charitable and generous, as well as soft-hearted.
• She contributed greatly on preserving the Prophet’s sayings and actions to be set as an example followed by Muslims. There are 2210 hadiths narrated by her.
• She possessed a great knowledge about Islam, as said by Abu Musa: “If we, companions of the Messenger of God, had any difficulty on a matter, we asked Aisha about it.”
• The Prophet SAW once said, “Whoever wants to see a woman from the women of paradise, then let that person look at Um Ruman RA.” Um Ruman is Aisyah’s mother. Her parents definitely made a good example for Aisha.
• The Prophet SAW asked his daughter, Fatima, “Do you love what I love?” and she responded with a yes. Then he said, “Then you must love this woman [Aisha].”
• The Prophet SAW one day said, “O, Aisha, I know when you are angry or pleased.” She then asked, “How do you know that?” The Prophet answered, “When you’re pleased, you say, ‘Yes, by the Lord of Muhammad SAW’ but when you’re angry, you say, ‘No, by the Lord of Ibrahim AS.’” [Sahih Bukhari Vol. 8, Book 73, No. 101] I just love this! This was how she displayed her anger towards her husband! No screaming, calling each other’s names, arguing, and other things you could possibly think of. What an amazing woman she was.
• The Prophet said, "The superiority of Aisha to other women is like the superiority of Tharid to other kinds of food." [Sahih Bukhari Vol. 7, Book 65, No. 330]
• Whenever the Prophet would leave for the mosque, he’d kiss his wife.
• The Prophet SAW and Aisha RA used to share utensils together. She’d take a drink from a cup, then she’d give it to him, and he’d drink from the same place she drank. She’d also eat some of the meat and she’d give the plate to him. Isn’t it wonderful? He would let his wife ate first before him. In today’s world, we call this “ladies first”.
• The Prophet SAW used to recite the Qur’an to Aisha during her menstruation period
• She used to participate in the battles of the Prophet SAW, collecting arrows or bring water to the fighters.
• On jealousy, she said: “I never felt so jealous of any woman as I did of Khadija, though she had died three years before the Prophet married me, and that was because I heard him mentioning her too often, and because his Lord had ordered him to give her the glad tidings that she would have a palace in Paradise, made of Qasab and because he used to slaughter a sheep and distribute its meat among her friends.” [Sahih Bukhari Vol. 8, Book 73, No. 33]
• During the Prophet Muhammad SAW’s last illness, he’d go to Aisha’s apartment and he passed away with his head in her lap.

Sources:

• Aisha bint Abu Bakr by Suhaib Webb [YouTube]
• Great Women in Islam: Aisha bint Abu Bakr
• Jannah.org: Aisha bint Abu Bakr
• Islam’s Women: Aisha bint Abu Bakr

Allahumma innaka ‘afuwwun tuhibbul ‘afwa fa’fu anni

O Allah, You are Most Forgiving, and You love forgiveness; so forgive me.

Yummy foods at the Turkish mosque today, alhamdulillah 🙂

And I met a really friendly Turkish girl! I always feel happy to meet fellow Muslims, coz I don’t have that many Muslim girl friends here. I’m not picky when it comes to making friends, but it’d be convenient for me to know them, especially when I have to go to the mosque or Islamic events — I won’t be the only girl around.

A friend of mine tagged me on Facebook a few days ago. She went to Berlin and found this book which apparently had ME on it. LOL.

So, yes, as you can see, I’m on a cover (and back cover) of a German book, titled Indonesisch Slang: Bahasa Gaul by Bettina David. Published on 2007, this book is all about Indonesian slang. I found it very informative and useful as I learnt quite a lot of new words from this book hahaha. It’s a good book!!! The downside is that it’s only available in German.

Bettina and I used to comment on each other’s blogs back in the days. Since she hid her real name, I used to think that she was an Indonesian. Her blog was written in Indonesian, sometimes using our informal language. Usually, if a foreigner writes or speaks  in Indonesian, you can spot it very easily that he/she isn’t a native Indonesian. But Bettina speaks (both formal and informal)Indonesian, just like any Indonesians do! So that’s why I was surprised when I discovered that she’s a native German!!!

One day, she contacted me, asking me for a permission to use some of my photos published on my online photo gallery. I was honored to be one of the people contacted for this purpose. The picture itself wasn’t THAT good. After all, it was taken with my high school friends… long before she contacted me. But this was my first time to be on a cover of a book!!! So it was so cool!

My boss invited me to see his presentation about the NGO he founded. The event was held in Delft and it was presented for the TU Delft students. It was very interesting, I must say. I had been working on developing the website of this organization for few months now, but I hadn’t really understood how they did it until today! The organization currently focuses on getting African people out of darkness and at the same time creating jobs for them. The concept is to have a docking station so that lamps and batteries can be recharged at affordable prices. This docking station uses a solar energy to supply the electricity for recharging. It can be set up in different villages (through franchising) and will be run by the local people. I like how you can get profits, help people through creative innovation, and create jobs at the same! It’s great! The organization itself is going to expand to other countries and continents in the near future once the first implementation is successful.

After the presentation, I had a meeting with him and few other people to talk about the improvement of the website that we could make. Then there was lunch, of course! Damn, I envied TU Delft students to be honest! They got sandwiches for their lunch! (TU Eindhoven only gave snacks and snacks) The sandwich looked so delicious with many different types of CHEESE. Damn! I couldn’t eat because of Ramadhan of course!!! I was thinking, hmm… could I take some of them home?? Hahaha. Oh I wish I could. LOL. But the good news was: my boss would pay for my transport cost to Delft! Yay! 🙂

I went around Delft for half an hour before heading back. I always loved Delft. It’s a typical Dutch city. Very medieval. Very “Vermeer”. Too bad I didn’t bring my camera. I took the pictures with my mobile phone, hence the poor quality.

Before reaching home, I went to Den Bosch to pick up my residence permit! 🙂 My old permit is supposed to expired today. I was almost illegal! Hehehe. Going to Den Bosch without buying a bossche bol was definitely not a cool thing. So I decided to buy some :). Bossche bol is an EXTREMELY DELICIOUS dessert ever made! It’s a famous one, only available in Den Bosch. As I’m writing this post, I’ve been waiting the time when I can eat. Seriously, I can’t wait. Haha.

Love has no other desire but to fulfill itself.
But if you love and must needs have desires, let these be your desires:
To melt and be like a running brook that sings its melody to the night.
To know the pain of too much tenderness.
To be wounded by your own understanding of love;
And to bleed willingly and joyfully.
To wake at dawn with a winged heart and give thanks for another day of loving;
To rest at the noon hour and meditate love’s ecstasy; to return home at eventide with gratitude;
And then to sleep with a prayer for the beloved in your heart and a song of praise upon your lips

— Kahlil Gibran

AMAZING!

Tanah airku tidak kulupakan
Kan terkenang selama hidupku
Biarpun saya pergi jauh
Tidak kan hilang dari kalbu
Tanah ku yang kucintai
Engkau kuhargai

Walaupun banyak negri kujalani
Yang masyhur permai dikata orang
Tetapi kampung dan rumahku
Di sanalah kurasa senang
Tanahku tak kulupakan
Engkau kubanggakan