whats the plot

versus

an interesting thing happened a few weeks ago…  i was walking with my friend heading to the excellent restaurant, dahab.  on the way, we heard the adhan for maghrib and decided to stop and pray.  we saw a sign for a masjid, so we started walking in that direction.  to my surprise, as we closed on the masjid, i saw a brother with a big beard walking in the opposite direction – away from the masjid.

i was confused… “wait, this guy has a big beard, why would he be walking away from the masjid when the salah is about to start?” – so anyway, i ignored the thought and continued walking with my friend towards the masjid.  when we approached the door, the masjid seemed empty… i saw one guy inside praying maghrib (leading himself and only himself), so my friend and i went in and joined him.

the odd and eerie thing was that we were the only 2 people to pray in that masjid with him.  after prayer, i turned around, thinking, “maybe there’s a grave here?” – but i didn’t see a grave or anything suspicious.  we walked out, puzzled at what had happened, and continued our journey towards dahab.

on the way, we passed a huge gathering of people leaving another masjid – and i saw the same guy with the big beard that i had seen earlier.  i went up to him and asked him, “brother, we prayed at the masjid over there and there was no one else there – what is up with that?” – and he said, “the person that leads there is sufi and has lots of bid3a – we tried to advise him but he won’t take our admonition.  in addition, he’s not very polite with the people – for example, someone will pick up a mus7af to read and he’ll say, ‘shouldn’t you ask permission before taking that?’ – etc.  so as a result, we no longer pray there.”

well, i guess that explains that…

electricity is human too, you know.  it works really hard, so it deserves a break.  let the people walk up n flights of stairs (where 0 > n > 14) in the pitch dark.  i asked someone at a store, “why is the electricity cut off in this entire area?” he said, “because the circuits get hot, so they turn off the electricity in one area for 1-2 hours every period of time to give the circuits a break.”

the return of the electricity was greeted with cheering that i could hear a good distance away.

today is friday…  and in just 2 hours, i’ll be attending my 5th khubah here in alexandria insha’Allah.  unfortunately, i only mentioned 2 of the prior khutbahs in a previous blog post, and still haven’t talked about the other two yet.

so the 2nd khutbah i attended in alexandria was also at masjid al hedaya.  the sheikh was visiting the masjid and gave a good khutbah about the tafseer of surat al 7ujurat.

as is the seeming norm for masjid al hedaya, the sheikh gave an additional (optional) talk after the khutbah.  during this, he mentioned a story that i’d like to share.

there was once a sheikh who was invited somewhere – so he went, sat down, had a good time, good chat, etc.  when all was done, the sheikh needed a way to get home (he didn’t have a car, etc).  he was too shy to ask any of the people with him to drop him (especially since those people had their family with them, etc) so he went down to the street and tried to decide how to get home.

he thought, “i could take a taxi, but i don’t have any money…” – not knowing what to do, he raised his hands to Allah and asked, “oh Allah, give me x money” – afterwards, he found some money that he had missed in his pocket or bag.  he said, “great, i can go home now!” – but there was one problem – no one would stop for him (no taxi would stop to drop him home).

he then realized his mistake – so he raised his hands again and said, “oh Allah, i want to go home!” – a short while later, a brother was driving and recognized him – he said, “oh, you’re sheikh so and so!  come let me drop you!” – and he dropped him off, refusing to take any money from him.

moral of the story – instead of just asking Allah for the means, ask Allah for the end that you want to reach!

when i came to alexandria, one of my newly made friends suggested that i come with him for jum3ah rather than go to the masjid near my home, and offered to pick me up – may Allah reward him!

my friend picked me up, and together we went to masjid al hedaya, located close to the hedaya medical facility on the path of the tram.  the masjid had two people outside sitting with a huge box of clear plastic bags for people to put their shoes in.  after the prayer, people would return those bags to the people outside for use the following week.  the masjid is a nice masjid with no cell phone reception – apparently because they installed a reception-blocking device in there.

needless to say, the khutbah by Dr. Shehab was a breath of fresh air given the previous khutbah i had attended in cairo.  in the first khutbah i attended for Dr. Shehab, he talked about “علو الهمة” (which i can’t think of a good translation for) – it was masha’Allah a really awesome khutbah.

two weeks later, Dr. Shehab gave a very moving khutbah in which he spoke about our role and duty towards the people of Palestine, especially given the then-recent flotilla incident.

during the khutbah, Dr. Shehab was talking about justice and how we have to help those who are being transgressed against and such.  immediately after the salah, a man stood up and said out loud, “Sheikh, you talked about justice, help me get my right from this man – he  stole my life’s earnings during the many years i was away in Suez…”  an argument erupted, and the sheikh took them both to his office to resolve it, thereby skipping his normal post-khutbah talk.  sub7anAllah.

sadly, Dr. Shehab apologized from his lectures, classes (he teaches in Tanta, in a university that is part of al-Azhar), and khutbas until the beginning of july for medical reasons.  may Allah give him shifa’!

for more info on Dr. Shehab, see his website or facebook page.

place names in alexandria are eccentric to say the least.  many places here have names that are not arabic in any way possible.  here are some examples:

• abou quer – you can see this famous and large road on the map in the previous post.  because egyptian slang has the qaf switched with a hamza, it ends up being pronounced as “abou ear” – the only arabic part about that is the “abou” (father of).
• san stefano – an area with one of the largest malls in Alexandria.
• kirosez mall – pronounced kiro-sees.
• assid – pronounced as “acid.”

speaking of abou quer, it was named after a good guy, abou quer, who had an evil brother, abou seer.  abou seer killed abou quer and dragged him from one side of alexandria to the next, and hence they named the road abou quer.  go figure.

i guess i can’t really complain, as egypt as a whole (outside of cairo and alexandria) has even more eccentric names (come on, seriously, who on earth names an egyptian city “zefta,” especially given its connotation in slang egyptian!?)

on may 17th, 2010, i left for alexandria.  comparing it to cairo, girls seem to be slightly more conservative (in terms of the way they dress), people seem more religious (at least in terms of “outwards” religiosity – there are more bearded men to be seen on the streets), the weather is much nicer, and it’s a lot less crowded.  after nearly a month of being in alexandria, i definitely can say that i like it better than cairo!