what on earth are you doing here?!

i took a metered cab in cairo to the train station a few days ago.  the driver and i started talking, and amidst our discussion, i told him that i lived in the us for the greater part of my life.  he asked, “what on earth are you doing here?”  in other words, “who in their right mind would come here when they have the option of living in the us?”

i gave him my reasoning and he wasn’t at all convinced.  the conclusion of the discussion was this translated and paraphrased quote (based on my memory and understanding):

“in 20 years, you’ll think back and realize that you wasted your time here and that you should have stayed there.  regardless of what good you see here, you’ll realize that things are better there (whether in terms of work, money, religion, or anything else), and you’ll regret the time you wasted here.  at that point, i want you to remember that the old man who drove you in the taxi said so, and ask Allah to have mercy on me regardless of whether i am alive or not.”

i posted this so that 2 decades from now (if i am alive), i can insha’Allah remember to look back to this conversation and say, “al7amdulillah, he was wrong - i have no regrets.”

google walking directions im egypt

it’s nice to have directions (walking and navigation) in egypt - quite useful (albeit imperfect).

sheikh-ul-masha'Allah

in the words of wael:

“he is sheikh-ul-mashaAllah.”

suhur...

عسل و طحينه

ramadan in egypt – first impressions

salam 3alaikum -

first off, belated ramadan mubarak.  i wanted to take a moment to write a bit about ramadan here in egypt.

the first note is that about the ambiance and overall mood - apartment buildings, masajid, and streets are all decorated for ramadan.  cans of pepsi contain “ramadan mubarak” messages.

for those in the us, think of the overall ambiance around christmas time - it’s the same here during ramadan.  in addition, you hear Quran almost everywhere you go - taxis and busses (which usually are either playing quran or music) are mostly playing Quran.  the masajid are a lot more full.  you’ll see people on trains reading Quran to pass time.

there is a lot of khair going on - “ma2idat ramadan,” or “ramadan tables,” provide food for the needy and the traveling during ramadan.  the “shantet ramadan” (ramadan bag) project prepares a bag filled with rice and other necessary food items to feed a family and gives them to the needy.

many have told me that at iftar time, people walk around busy intersections and give food, dates, and water to those in their cars.

most masajid have taraweeh.  friends have told me that some masajid have tahajjud from day 1.

anyhow - that’s it for now, insha’Allah will perhaps write more later.

walsalam 3alaikum.

city cab is garbage...

i spent the night at my aunt’s house in cairo yesterday, and had a ticket for the 8am train to alexandria. i figured, “rather than hassle with n different modes of transportation, especially while fasting, why not call city cab?”

city cab (aka cairo cab) is a “professional” cab service, similar to what we have in the us. i called last night around 1am and asked for a cab to the train station to pick me up at 7am, figuring it’d be good to give myself some extra time (just in case).

so 7am came and the cab didn’t show - so i called them back and they said “let us give you the driver’s number”. i said, “isn’t it your job to make sure he’s on time rather than asking me to call him?” they said, “ok hang up and we’ll call you back and connect you to him.”

long story short, he promised he’d be there by 7:30 and that he’d get me there in time - i later called back and got his number - yet 7:50 came around and he still hadn’t arrived.

i called him and said “forget it - i lost the value of the train ticket thanks to you, not to mention the difficulty and inconvenience of getting to alexandria when you don’t have a train ticket.”

he apologized and said that he had another job and the cab company told him to get me when he was done (rather than dispatch a cab just for me). only in egypt…

quran android released!

ramadan kareem! just in time for ramadan, we’ve released the first version of Quran Android. download it and let us know what you think! the source code is on github.

"tomorrow is friday..."

(well, in reality, today is friday).  in santa clara, sheikh mohamed used to give a short 3 minute reminder after isha on thursdays.  each time, this reminder would start with the phrase, “tomorrow is friday,” after which he would remind us the virtues of salah on the Prophet (ﷺ) on fridays and would mention something from his sunnah.

one of the most beautiful du3as i used to always hear sheikh mohamed say was:

اللهم اجعل سرنا خيراً من علانيتنى، واجعل علانيتنا خيرا

“Allahuma aj3al sirana khayran min 3alaneyatina wa aj3al 3alaneyatina khayra” - the rough meaning of which is, “oh Allah, make what is hidden (from our actions, intentions, deeds, etc) better than what is latent and visible to people, and make what is visible to people good.”  may Allah grant us all ikhlas - ameen!

happy friday!

what on earth, etisalat?

#!/bin/sh
APP_NAME="Etisalat_3.5G_USB_Modem"
APP_PATH="/Applications/Mobile Partner.app"

sudo chmod -R a+rwx "$APP_PATH"

chmod -R a+rw "/usr/local/"

the above code snippet is from the first few lines of one of the etisalat 3g usb modem’s postinstall script on osx - seriously, why chmod -R a+rw "/usr/local/"? no one uses /usr/local except etisalat?

the modem is a huawei e1550 hsdpa usb stick.

update (june 16, 2011) - @AhmedElGamil sent this post to @EtisalatMisr over twitter, and they said they would forward it to the responsible team insha’Allah.  you can see the conversation on twitter here.

mesh awel mara nerkabooha...

something interesting always happens whenever i make the trip from alex to cairo.  the past two times i went, i encountered some sort of major discussion over the fare of the mashroo3 (micro bus).

during the first incident, i was leaving from sidi gaber - as those in alex may know, how long it takes to fill the mashroo3 depends on what time you leave (esp since sidi gaber doesn’t have as much traffic to cairo as ma7atet masr does).  anyhow, after waiting ~45 minutes and finally having enough people to be ready to go, the man announces that the charge will be 25le (the normal is 22).  people were outraged and argued, etc - mainly because of the chicanery involved (waste 45 minutes of our time and then tell us that you’re charging more, so we either go ride another bus (and wait another 45 minutes to save 3le, or we deal with it and pay)).

the man didn’t budge about the price, and people stayed on board (but were disgruntled).  one lady, during the argument, said “mesh awel mara nerkabooha”  (this happened to be the first time i heard the alexandrian slang of changing the form of a verb to something i can’t yet explain - it should be “mesh awel mara nerkabha…” - go figure).  later, the man decided to stop on the way to use the restroom and the lady became angry - he offered to let her take another microbus the rest of the way if she wasn’t happy (but she decided to stay).

i had a similar experience yesterday when coming back from cairo - the man wanted 25, but the people got their way of paying 22.  afterwards, a huge argument broke out with the driver about turning the ac on (he didn’t want to turn it on until we got on the highway).