It is so hard to see what is allowed and what isn’t, without appearing dull. Click on the image below.
Muslim Survival Guide For Christmas (Part 1)
It’s not easy being a Muslim at Christmas, so here is our handy guide to help.
- * Whenever the opportunity presents itself, eat mince pies, dawah works both ways, and most mince pies are now suitable for vegetablarians. Just to clarify, mince pies are fruit pies and not kheema pies (though come to think of it, kheema pies sound like a very good idea).
- * When carol singers come, why not give them your ‘foreign’ currency. We are sure they will appreciate the dirhams, riyals, rupees and dollars you have collected on your travels. The nice carol singers will be too busy ding-dong-merrily-on-highing to notice.
- *Explain to children that we are different, and our lack of jolliness is due to eschatological and ecumenical schisms. Use those exact words. When your little ones look puzzled, explain how both Christians and Muslims believe that Jesus will come back, and based on current trends, it looks like we will be having some fisticuffs over who lays claim to him. When your children look even more puzzled, point to the weather outside to change the subject
- *Muslims may not celebrate Christmas Eve or Christmas Day, but we firmly believe in Boxing Day. The lure of wanton abandonment of decorum during holiday sales will appease those who accuse Muslims of not integrating. We will be there, at the front of the queue, in our hijabs and beards and irritating sobriety, and join the rest of the UK in it paean to the UK Retail Shedding-Of-The-Skin
- *On Christmas Day itself, most of the shops are shut. Why not use the extra time to set up a local bartering system with your Muslim friends. A word of warning though, the swopping of children should only be done with mutual consent and appropriate legal advice being undertaken.
- *Those that have extended families who are celebrating Christmas, and are joining in with the family dinner, transfer your feelings of guilt by asking for really odd requests and pretend it is to do with religious requirements. Just make stuff up. For example,
- -Ask that no yellow coloured foods are touching green coloured foods
- -Ask that all vegetable are washed three times in metal containers
- -Ask that no pork, alcohol or giraffe meat be present. Make a point about mentioning the giraffe meat. Have a slightly wild-eyed look in your eyes when talking about this
- -Ask all female members of the household who are not Muslim, to wash their index fingers.
Remember to improvise. This time comes once a year, so make it special
Chopsbics
Another fine use for ballpoint pens.
I made this all by myself, with a little help from a website somewhere. BIC pens are just the best. They are even good to chew. Seriously, if you like eating pens as you write, BIC pens look good and taste great!
Brass Crescent Awards: Winner of Best Humour Blog
Just saw that this blog has won the ‘Best Humor Blog’ at the Brass Crescent Awards. I would have preferred to win ‘Best Humour Blog’ but it’s no use nitpicking over details. Congrats to all the other winners, especially Faraz Rabbani, Indigo Jo and Muslimah Media Watch.
To paraphrase Bob Monkouse:
When I was younger I wanted to be a satirical writer, and they laughed at me.
Now, I’m a satirical writer, no-one’s laughing now.
Three Things: Eid Appeal
Eid Mubarak. May you be free of second-rate ‘Muslim’ design: Mosques and/or Arabic in Space.
Oh is that the time? I have washing up to do.
Halal-Meatarians
There is a BBC article “The rise of the non-veggie vegetarian” that discusses the more nuanced classification of almost-vegetarians
Classic vegetarian: Eats no part of any dead animal
Vegan: Eats no animal product
Meat-avoider: Tries not to to eat meat but has occasional lapses
Meat-reducer: Is trying to eat less meat, probably for health reasons
Green eater: Avoids meat because of environmental impact
We at Mooslim.com realised this was not enough for our Muslim brethren and sistren*. What follows are further definitions, for your education and entertainment.
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Loc-halal-ivore – eats only halal meat from their local shop. Often, this is because they know the uncle, he is a nice man, and they don’t know any other butchers.
Botivore - will only eat neatly chopped cubes of boneless meat, or kebabs. No bones, brains, offal, anything shaped like it was a bit of an animal
Haich-em-ceelian
only eats HMC** approved meat.
Kullu-halalwala
Eats McDonalds, KFC, Burger King, actually, anything that is not pork. The logic here is that all is halal, and as the UK is a Christian country, the food is of people of the book***.
Meatarian – only meat is food, everything else is garnish
Middleclassangstivore – Eat only local halal organic happy animals. Imagine the nice forest in Bambi, where chicken, lamb and cows who, having lived a fruitful life play with each other all day long, whilst a nice farmer comes along and massages the little animals by hand. Then, in a spontaneous act of bliss, the cutey animals happily and willingly plunge their necks onto the knife, knowing their Soil-Association approved carcass will be made into a nice middle class roast.
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* Sistren is a word. You should use it all the time.
** Halal Meat Committee
[26/32] A Spoonful of Sugar Makes the Medicine Go Down
This post is about medicine folk. As I child I was a short and skinny, and my parents thought there was something indeterminably wrong with me. Various experts were consulted. A Hakeem was visiting Loughborough Road Mosque, and we dutifully went to see him. The Hakeem diagnosed a generic liver ailment, and gave some kind of sweet fig-based paste. On comparing my medicine with that of my cousin, we concluded the Hakeem dispensed this same medicine regardless of the ailment before him. (These childhood visits to medical experts continued until a gentle paediatrician, with the aid of growth charts, diplomatically explained that I was short because, erm, my parents were short)
However, Hakeems were statistically a rare occurrence. In practice we also had herbal and traditional food-based remedies. My mother would cook strong curries with exotic spices to ward of colds and flu. We knew about the benefits of turmeric before we were told it was good for us. In addition to food-as-medicine, my father also had a prized copy of ‘Tibe-Nabvi and Jadeed Science’ – Medicine of the Prophet and Modern Science’. We consequently ate a lot of Olive Oil, before the River-Cafe-walas made it popular.
For the sake of balance, I should make reference to another medicine man, a friend of my family. In central Mumbai he had a very ingenious* line in wealth redistribution. He would take free sample drugs from medical reps and crush them into powder, and mix them into a generic pink chalky base. Wealthy clients inadvertently subsidised those unable to pay, equalized by the uniform brown bottles filled with pink medicine. My two visits, for completely different ailments, resulted in the same tasting medicine. The Pink-Medicine-Doctor of Mumbai was probably the most cost-effective and efficient MD in the whole of the subcontinent. His son is now a radiologist and avoids pink at all costs.
Finally, in terms of medicine folk, there is however, one topic that I have been resisting ever since I have been blogging: My antipathy to homeopathy, perfectly illustrated in the video below http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathy#Medical_and_scientific_analysis
(stethoscope wave to Dr M)
Homeopathic A&E
*or, as he would say, indi-genius
Muslim lolcats VIII: A Design For Life
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Just heard the a certain leader has made his son in charge of everything. Such a shock, I may have to lie down.
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Brethren, and sistren, but mainly brethren: Mona Eltahawy calls Palestine
‘“the opium of the Arabs”: an intoxicating way for them to forget their own failings, or at least blame them on someone else.’
I liked this article by Abdul Hakim Murad: A warning we should heed
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I saw this article on Cif, on how the ritual slaughter of animals without stunning is cruel. A reasonable and well written position is put here. The obsession with HMC is funny.
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Harun Yahya, Harun Yahya, what a strange man are ya.
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I’ll respect the BNP when they agree that the family of Germans and Greeks who live in Windsor Castle need deporting, and try to do something about it.
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Gentlemans whose children are getting married, please be easy on the kids. That is all.
The reinvented eco-fridge
The BBC have featured the following article:
Prize for electricity-free fridge
A 22-year-old Leeds student has been named one of the Women of the Year after inventing a “sustainable” fridge.
However, I have seen similair inventions before. Shaykh Google revels:
- A fridge that needs no electricity – The Times of India
- A Low-cost Clay Fridge
- Inventor of no-electricity refrigerator wins Rolex award – Boing Boing
- Pot-in-pot refrigerator – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Treehugger has the best article describing this ‘reinvention’
Solar Fridge Invented (Again) by UK Student
I hope my invention of a circular disc, that can spin on on its axis and can be used for efficient horizontal motion will be viewed kindly by commentators.
Legal and official
The only advantage to having my name misspelled on my passport was I never got stopped at immigration. Like most things, I blame my parents. Unlike most things, it really was down to them. Actually, it was down to them, and the Tabligh Jamaat.*
See, when I was born, and they were deciding names, my dad asked a chap from the Tabligh what should I be called?
“Musab is a good name, after a companion of the Prophet”
Yes, agreed my Father, except the fathead at the agency where they registered my birth misspelled it. Today, it has been rectified, and a nice lawyer has made me Musab, legal and official (in triplicate).
Of course, it means I am more likely to be stopped by and join the masses who feel the ‘Flying While Muslim‘ phenomenon. But, its a small price to pay for having consistency.
Because this album contains the track 'You know my name (look up the number) which is actually quite inappropriate as I don't want you looking up my number. Seriously. Mail me.
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* Just for the record, I have no issues with the Tabligh Jamaat, as one of the worlds largest Muslim groups, I would be silly to start a declaring any issues I had with the Tabligh Jamaat, they would not leave me alone. I have done my time and that is all I will say on the matter**
** Oh bother, its 11.35 pm, and I can’t resist. Okay, here is my idea. I want the Tabligh to introduce a seventh point: FUN. Oh bother, I have said too much. And now you know my real name too. This warrants a post or two in itself, I have baggage to unload.
