I'm hoping they finish the brand new mosque nearby before Ramadan insha allah. Contemplating a dash for Umrah in the last week of Ramadan. Visas not accepeted if passport has less than 6 months before expiry :rolleyes: Less than 4 weeks to go.

Me a fan of Arab originated design? :eek: Saxib, i dont see any Somaliness in the designs, they look as arab as the buildings in Muscat. I cant see where/how they have been adopted to show a Somali aspect. I think a continuation of the Arab inspired designs are impossible today. The building will most likely be dark and will therefore require more lighting (costs more money). The Aqal Somali is also not possible with bricks and mortar. Again it will boil down to cost of building and cost to the life of the building. I'm talking of buildings with a degree of natural lighting, limited mechnical ventilation (plenty of natural) with atriums, high ceilings etc. Eco freindly and little cost is whats important these days. Design development on SOL :cool:

Congrats Duke, you will be blurry eyed for a while due to lack of sleep. Enjoy!

Me, never got the opportunity, do you have any pics? Although i suspect many of the designs to have originated elsewhere. I smell a new SOL competition

^architect student ey? hows the Autocad? hhmmm, certainly not a fan of stacking them high with a glass envelope. A little tradition should do the trick. But what is a somali design? or east African design? or even an african design?

NG Although i agree with you on most points, but i think the british media has won this one. The constant berating of anyone who talks any kind of sense is disregarded with the populace on too willing to do the same based upon what they read/hear/watch. The MCB nead some PR work and they also need to be more proactive in their actions both toward the media and to the muslims community. Here is a response for your NG. I yearn for a foreign policy of which we can be proud The Muslim community is asking for dialogue, not appeasement, says Muhammad Abdul Bari Thursday August 17, 2006 The Guardian Polly Toynbee was right in stating that "British foreign policy has helped foment murderous extremism" (We can't let God-blinded killers set our foreign policy, August 15). She was also right in claiming that "there are 1,001 good reasons why we should never have supported, let alone joined, the war in Iraq. The one truly bad reason would have been fear of terrorism." The open letter to the prime minister - which I signed alongside more than 40 Muslim groups, MPs and peers - has been subject to deliberate misinterpretation, suggesting a willingness among Muslim leaders to excuse violence and promote a simplified view of how extremism takes root. Toynbee's accusation - that the letter sails "perilously close to suggesting the government had it coming" - may be an unintentional misrepresentation but it is a grave one. The letter articulated the need to base foreign policy on principle. It condemned attacks on civilians wherever they take place. It also sought acknowledgement that, though the causes and motivations are complex, British foreign policy contributes to the radicalisation of Muslims here and elsewhere. The welcome debate that followed the letter illustrates that this has been widely accepted. I believe there was merit in laying this fact on the table so that a consensus could emerge. As early as May 2004, Michael Jay, permanent under-secretary at the Foreign Office, acknowledged in a letter to the cabinet secretary that the perception of foreign policy was a "key driver behind recruitment by extremist organisations". In this context, as Toynbee asserts, government denials of this reality are absurd. But pushing for this recognition is not an argument that a priority of foreign policy should be "sparing us from threats by God-blinded killers". I do not advocate a policy of appeasement, tailoring UK foreign policy to win global popularity and insulate ourselves from threat. I yearn for a foreign policy that engenders a feeling of pride among this and future generations, and attracts respect from others. When difficult decisions are made, we must be ready to tackle the consequences that ensue. But these decisions must be principled and be seen to be so. Successive British governments' foreign policies, demonstrated recently by the refusal to call for an immediate ceasefire in Lebanon, have left many Muslims and others feeling aggrieved and powerless. As Muslim representatives, our letter sought to engage constructively in this debate and give voice to many Muslims who feel alienated. Toynbee is right that we are not alone, nor unique in this respect yet it is important that this widespread sentiment was aired. The Muslim community is not homogeneous. Our response to the encroachment of extremism must address the diversity within the community as much as the complexity of root causes. But Muslim leaders, parents and communities will be better positioned to defuse the potency of extremists' arguments once the impact of foreign policy has been acknowledged. Without a willingness to have an honest and open debate, the government is in danger of wishing to hear only echoes of its own voice. · Muhammad Abdul Bari is secretary general of the Muslim Council of Britain sg@mcb.org.uk Guardian And another about the media bais The venomous media voices who think no Muslim is worth talking to As government efforts to 'tackle' extremism flounder, it should beware the advice of armchair warriors and fantasists Madeleine Bunting Wednesday August 16, 2006 The Guardian One could almost feel sorry for them. A minister like Ruth Kelly is wrenched from her bucket-and spade holiday on a rainy British beach with the kids to launch yet another push to "engage" with Muslims and to step up efforts to "tackle" extremism. A ministerial tour of nine cities to meet Muslims is announced. It's all designed to sound energetic and purposeful. We pay fat cabinet salaries and we want our politicians to sound like they are earning them. But in truth, beneath the rhetoric - an odd verbal combination of rugby tackles and romantic engagement - is a profound confusion in government policy as to what to do about British-grown Islamist terrorism, apart from large amounts of surveillance and frequent use of detention. Beyond that, the hearts-and-minds strategy is running on empty. Article continues -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I've seen government ministers do "engagement": Paul Murphy, when he had the community-cohesion brief, listened carefully, answered questions patiently and got precisely nowhere. His young, angry Muslim audience heard him out but were profoundly cynical; their views didn't change a jot. Events of the last few days will have immeasurably increased that cynicism: Muslim MPs and peers have been roundly ticked off by a succession of government ministers as if they were imperial vassals who should know their place. Yet they were simply stating the obvious - that British foreign policy is incubating (we can argue whether it's the root cause another time) Muslim extremism. Given that kind of opening salvo from her colleagues, perhaps Kelly should save herself the trouble and return to the beach for some more sandcastles and rock pools. While she's there, the best thing she can do is to get a bit of perspective on a worn-out policy. Even more importantly, she would do well to take stock of a pernicious media onslaught in danger of spiralling out of control. The ministerial tours, the meetings with selected Muslims - most of whom are as baffled by Islamic extremism as ministers - were the responses to last summer's London bombings. The danger is that as the government's "community cohesion" policy flounders, there is no shortage of media commentators pouring out a flood of venomous advice on exactly why no Muslim is worth talking to anyway. If, reader, you're short of time and need the summary, it runs thus: the government can't talk to extremists because they endorse violence and/or are nutty and irrational, and can't talk to "moderates" (warning: the word is on the point of becoming a term of abuse in the Muslim community) because they're not representative. These methods of dismissal are so frequently used by journalists that the only possible conclusion is that there are many people in this country who have no interest in listening to any Muslim unless they can chorus their own loathing and suspicion of Islam - the former Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali is the case par excellence. Some of this armchair advice to government can be pretty briskly dismissed, such as the paranoid fantasies of the rightwing Daily Mail commentator Melanie Phillips in her book Londonistan or those of the Conservative MP Michael Gove in his book Celsius 7/7. Both authors haven't troubled themselves to get much beyond revived imperial delusions of demented, violent Muslims (check out Britain's history in India, Sudan or Egypt). More insidious is the comprehensive attack on Whitehall's policy towards the Muslim community over the last decade by the New Statesman's political editor, Martin Bright. He argues that the government should have no truck with any Muslim organisation in the UK that has had any involvement with any person who has ever been influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood, the political Islamist organisation. That rules out the Muslim Council of Britain, the Federation of Student Islamic Societies and other mainstays of the government's "engagement" policy of the last 10 years. It would even include intellectuals such as Professor Tariq Ramadan (grandson, no less, of the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood), who was a member of the government taskforce set up to tackle Islamist extremism last year, and a star turn on its travelling roadshow for young Muslims. We are talking sweeping here. In fact, implement Bright's advice and you've got a pretty small tea party for your next round of engagement. The Muslim Brotherhood is a global phenomenon that has taken many different guises in different places. It has been very successful at the ballot box in a host of countries, particularly Egypt. In some countries it has developed an armed wing, in many others it has not. Many of those in this country influenced by this strand of anti-colonial political Islamism have subsequently developed their thinking in entirely different directions. Almost every thoughtful, educated Muslim in this country has been exposed to - and to varying degrees influenced by - the Muslim Brotherhood, the 20th century's most influential political Islamic movement. The obvious historical analogy to Bright is those US cold war warriors in the 50s who smeared anyone who had ever read Marx. For a story to really work you have to have good guys as well as bad, so the critics conjure up another absurdity - the "silent Sufi majority" of British Muslims. These are the gentle, peace-loving Muslims at the grassroots who have been betrayed, so the argument runs, by those who claim to represent them, such as the Muslim Council of Britain. One can argue for hours about how to define a Sufi in this country; and, leaving that aside, the characterisation of Sufism is wide of the mark: some of the most violent anti-colonial struggles have been led by Sufis, for example Chechnya and Algeria, even the Mahdi who did for General Gordon in Khartoum. Furthermore, some argue that Sufi-inclined traditions such as the Kashmiri Barelwi have failed to travel well to urban Britain and that it is precisely their youngsters who are most disorientated and likely to fail prey to extremism - as was the case of the July 7 bombers from Leeds. The main target for Bright is the Muslim Council of Britain; he loathes it with a contempt that is hard to explain. Given that the MCB is in effect a small volunteer parish council scrabbling to represent a hugely diverse - both ethnically and theologically - community, it's not surprising that it has scored own goals in its time. It's a young, underconfident institution and falls short in many ways, but the fact remains that of all the Muslim organisations to emerge in recent decades it has proved the most successful in winning affiliates. There is no comparable substitute waiting in the wings. The Sufi Muslim Council of Britain has been in existence all of a month; I wish it well, but unlike the MCB it cannot claim to represent anything like the 40% of British mosques affiliated to the MCB. Kelly has an urgent task ahead to assuage anxiety as the possibility looms of a second-class status for Muslims in this country - profiled, suspected, searched, endlessly quizzed and found wanting. As for the armchair warriors so keen to proffer advice, one has to question the motives of those intent on undermining the meagre organisational capacity the Muslim community has managed to weld together to combat just such a threat. · Madeleine Bunting will become director of the thinktank Demos next month Guardian

^^are you serious? What truth did he speak?

I often read these msg during times like these. A very interest read on people perceptions. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/default.stm

^^go back to school saxib, your running late

I think you need a break from Canada mate :rolleyes:

SB, i dont know ninyo. But what diff does it make?

Congratulation to Mo, he got Silver at the European Championships in Gottenberg, Sweden! Britain's 23-year-old Mo Farah ran the best race of his life to win silver behind Spain's Jesus Espana, with Juan Carlos Higuero third. Farah went to the front with 800m to go and burned off all but Espana, who battled past him on the home straight. Farah said: "I wanted to win and it was close. I gave it all I could and saw a gap. "I tried but it wasn't enough. I've worked hard and it is paying off slowly - hopefully we'll be back at the top like Brendan Foster and Steve Cram." Well done son! :cool:

lol, brownie fair enough. Its funny how you read a woman getting rid of her new born in an airport toilet by throwing him in the bin and then read of a baby snatcher who did this act due to her inabilty to conceive in the space of two days.

and there will be undercover taxidrivers who are Somali that will take u to hotel so don’t worry lol, i was ripped off by one. He charged me 60 Dhs for a ride that should have cost 35 Dhs, only found out later :rolleyes:

^^lol waiting for the game hoping Mohammed Sissoko does a crazy tackle on a a Haifa player.

Hospital baby snatcher is deported from UAE By Bassma Al Jandaly, Staff Reporter Sharjah: A woman who kidnapped a newborn baby from a hospital has been deported, according to sources from Sharjah Courts. The source said the woman, who worked as a gynaecologist in a private hospital in Sharjah, tried to kidnap a newborn from his mother in Al Qasimi Hospital while she was asleep. On December 2 last year the woman went to the hospital during visiting hours and stayed there until the morning when she kidnapped the baby and put him in a carrier bag. The woman searched numerous rooms before selecting an Iraqi baby, identified as Mohammad Eyad Kadhim. She was spotted by nurses at around 4am as she tried to run out of the building. When they questioned the woman as to what was moving in the bag, she broke down and the nurses called the police. Earlier, Sharjah Sharia Court sentenced the 30-year-old Indian woman to six months in jail to be followed by deportation. However in his defence the woman's lawyer asked the court to transfer her to the Al Amal hospital to evaluate her mental health because she was suffering from psychological problems. He said she was under pressure from her husband because she was sterile. However, the court rejected the request stressing that the woman was not suffering from any mental problems and that she was responsible for her actions. The court stressed that the woman was working as a doctor and it was unacceptable behaviour from a physician. The woman's advocate appealed the verdict. On June 20, the Appeal Court in Sharjah rejected the case and upheld the lower court's verdict of six months imprisonment and deportation. The woman served her jail term from the date she was arrested on December 3 last year until June 3 in Sharjah Central Jail. The child's father Eyad told Gulf News yesterday: "The incident has affected our lives and my wife Azhar is constantly worried for our son. But we are happy that our son is back with us. He is eight months old now and is growing fast." gulfnews

Sky News should be watched along with FOX News, its a learning process. Alot can be learned on there.

Very sad. The perceptions of non-muslims have changed so much in such a short space of time that he thinks its a joke!. :mad:

^^ You dont notice it when you are just passing through but there is alot of Dawa, Charity, Quran classes etc. I should'nt be surprised infact. Still in a hotel :rolleyes: , should have a place sorted tomorrow IA. Looks like the Dubai nomads are a boring bunch

Very good question that has had people thinking. The powerful Sunni states have stated their stance by simply criticising Hezbollah bt not doing the same when Hamas did the same thing a week or two earlier. It is obvious what is going on here. Hezbollah are trained in Iran, not just in milatary tactics but they also have to attend lessons on Figh. This came from a captured Hezbollah fighter. The west is fanning the flames of division, while the Arab governments are worried about Iran more than they about Isreal. Deplomatic ties with Isreal are so far advanced most people underestimate it. There is more freindship and truct with Isreal than Iran. This war and Hebullah's losses are good news to the big Arab states. Its a tough one to call but the outlook of Iran in trying to destroy Isreal and spelling it out compared to that of sitting in lavish complexes talking about Emaritisation or Saudiasation while there people are struggling to understand what work really entails are completely different types of leadership.

I dont know, we are can be the best and the worst all at the same time. But i dont think we are any different to others. If you compare Somalis with Asians, then thats a whole different issue. In 30 years time who knows how 'liberated' we will be.

Saw this programme last night. The harsh realities of trying to get into europe! Article

Saudi farmers 'kill' date palms to sell their land Habib Shaikh (From our correspondent) 6 August 2006 JEDDAH — As the real estate market booms in the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah, agricultural land is gradually disappearing from within the limits of these once-pastoral cities as farmers discover that selling the land for development is more lucrative than selling dates. The only problem is: It's illegal. The law in Saudi Arabia prevents land producing agricultural products, such as dates, from being razed to make way for building projects. So some farmers have taken to making the viable unviable by starving trees of water, or burning trees in the middle of the night. Once the crops are dead, the land can then be legally sold to developers. These landowners earn millions of riyals by selling land, putting aside the environmental impact resulting from losing the trees. In a city where average daily temperatures can sustain 45 degrees Celsius for a good part of the year, green areas offer some respite from the heat. According to a recent report in a local daily, Abdul Rahman Abdul Aal, a resident of Madinah's Gurban neighbourhood, complained recently to municipal officials about numerous cases of farms being burned. He said that the problem was raised in local newspapers. "The burning stopped for a while but it started again, albeit less than before," he said. "It is sad that the farms in the middle of Madinah which made the city unique are now disappearing because of greed." For their part, farmers dismiss the charge that they're being greedy. They claim that it's a simple matter of economics. For example, the plot of a former dates farmer near Qiblatin Mosque no longer produces that fruit. Instead, the trees are dead, ready to be cleared to make room for yet another residential unit of Madinah's current real estate boom. Instead of burning the trees, the farmer simply stopped watering them, saying it cost more to keep them alive than the money he was making from selling the dates they produced. "There were problems (with farming), like lack of water," he said, requesting not to be identified. Another farm owner admitted that he stopped tending to his crop and was preparing to sell the land. "A farm needs a lot of care and attention. That costs a lot of money," said yet another date farmer in Madinah's Al Shuhada neighbourhood. The municipal authorities are encouraging people to respect the diminishing urban green zones. No statistics are available from government officials regarding the undeveloped land in Makkah or Madinah, but a recent awareness campaign launched by the Madinah municipality indicated that officials are concerned about the depletion of urban green areas.

^^i have managed to avoid hat place so far To be honest i didnt want to leave Oman, it was very nice and calm. Its been raining there and i missed it :rolleyes:

What do you and they mean by liberated?