While my friends in Pakistan have been keeping me up to date on the country’s Facebook ban and associated saga – I was intrigued to learn of another virtual controversy… this time in Turkey.

Thanks to my dear Turkish friend Lamia, who returned from Istanbul yesterday and tipped me off, I found an article in Today’s Zamman about the country’s ban on YouTube and some Google listings. Both the ban and the response to it are food for thought.

Banned Out of Respect

The Turkish courts have blocked access to YouTube since 2008. The measure was implemented after Greek users posted videos alleging that Mustafa Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic and its first President was homosexual.

Last week Turkey extended the ban to some Google pages that use the same Internet protocol addresses as YouTube.

Twy Saying “Tweet Tweet” in Turkish

Turkish president Abdullah Gul has voiced his opposition to the ban in a rather unique way: through his Twitter account!

Turkish President Abdullah Gul uses Twitter to voice his opinion.

In separate tweets, said he did not approve of the bans and had instructed officials to examine legal ways of reopening access.

This bid to bring back virtual freedom in Turkey isn’t Mr Gul’s first bold stand as President. The leader attracted his fair share of friends and enemies as he broke the mold by becoming the first former-Islamist President in the modern history of Turkey.

If It’s Good Enough for The President…

At the turn of this year, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe pressed Turkey to abolish or reform a law allowing it to block around 3,700 Internet sites.

By law websites can be blocked under article 5651 of the Turkish penal code for a range of offences including insulting Ataturk, child pornography and encouraging suicide.

Do any of you Turkish readers out there have anything to add to this? We’d love to hear from you!

A Kuwaiti friend of mine passed me an article about a new “diet” program on Kuwait TV that I’d like to share with you…

The article in The National spotlights Kuwait’s unprecedented growth – its rapidly expanding economy – and… waistlines. Thanks in part to the arrival of International fast-food chains, and to modern, “convenient·· sedentary lifestyles, many Kuwaitis have found themselves battling with the bulge. It’s a familiar story: many other countries around the world, including Spain, where I live, are wrestling to reverse such trends piled on by our “modern lives”.

Kuwaiti TV challenge: Svelte intentions

One Kuwaiti dietician has come up with a new, and equally international solution to this problem in his country. Ahmad al Haifi, assistant professor at the Kuwaiti College of Health Sciences, has created a pilot for a reality television program featuring 20 young Kuwaitis as they try to shift the pounds.

Based on the US TV show “The Biggest Loser”, the show will be the first of its kind in the Gulf region. It has already received the “Ethical approval” of the Kuwaiti ministry of health.

US TV show "The Biggest Loser" helps Americans to lose weight and to change their lives for the better.

“The aim is to reduce about 10 to 20 per cent of the excess body weight within six months for the obese adolescent boys – this is the main goal.” Mr. al Haifi told the National.

Rewarding Success

Cameras will accompany boys in their daily lives, while dieticians monitor their progress and educate them, their friends and their families on the best ways to lose weight. The show will also consult “celebrities” for their advice and award prizes, including “maybe a car” to the most successful slimmers.

Mr. al Haifi describes the program’s strategies as “pinpointing the causes of obesity, identifying where the calories are coming from, co-operating with friends and monitoring weight-loss.”

The idea of the new TV program has been well received by Kuwaitis, 100 of whom turned up to a lecture given by Mr. al Haifi, to potential contestants, and their friends and families. Teenagers hoping to be selected filled in forms about their eating habits and got weighed.

Friends and Family Pitch In

“I’m so fat, and I want to be smaller,” said Mohammed al Moumen, a 15-year-old who weighs 95 kilograms. “Maybe I’ll have health problems in 20 years. I eat junk food every day and I never do any exercise. This is a real problem with the youth of Kuwait.”

Hussein al Sayer took his son, Ali, 17, who weighs 103kg to the lecture. He said he liked the show because the diet is supervised by experts and “takes it easy on the children”.

“Ali sits and watches Real Madrid and Barcelona play football on TV, but he doesn’t play himself. The Internet and the PlayStation have affected all children in Kuwait. Twenty years ago, you had to do sport because there was nothing else to do,” Mr. al Sayer said.

Sign of the Times

Kuwait’s oil wealth has brought wonders and woes to this Gulf country, magnetizing International companies such as McDonalds, which opened in 1994. The first day the fast-food chain opened, 15,000 Kuwaitis and a seven-mile-long queue of cars lined up to be served.

Sami al Bader is a dietician with Diet Care, a health-food company that has run the Get Healthy Kuwait program in co-operation with Taiba Hospital since June. It’s as bad as it can get anywhere in the world,” Mr. al Bader told The National.

“Around 80 per cent of Kuwaitis are overweight or obese and around 26 per cent have, or will soon have, diabetes.” According to Mr. Bader, Kuwait’s harsh weather encourages people to stay indoors and travel in their cars, while Bedouin traditions encourage people to eat more.

Food Glorious Food…

“Our lives revolve around food. If I visit my family today, I’m going to be given seven or eight plates of food. If I visit my friends after that, I’ll get another seven or eight plates,” he said.

While international imports can take the brunt of the blame, Mr. Bader adds that many young Kuwaitis socialize with their friends in restaurants serving meals packed with twice as many calories as their home-cooked equivalents and points out that “a shawarma is just as bad as a Big Mac in terms of calories and fat”.

While it may be a unconventional approach, I’m inspired by this Kuwaiti initiative and believe a lot of other countries could take a leaf from its book.

I am absolutely enchanted with the Arab Jewish culture – it seems like such a potent blend of flavors and sounds. It all started when I made a couple of Mizrahi (Arab Jewish) friends in the US. They kindly introduced me (sonically) to Om Kolthoum, and fed me some of the most extraordinary hummus I’ve ever devoured!

It’s hard to estimate how many Arab Jews there are today – according to an Aramica article from 2002, 800,000 Arab Jews lived in the Middle East prior to 1948 and by 2002, there were around 8,000 Arab Jews left in the region.

Why do we never hear about Arab Jews?

The Aramica article includes three fascinating interviews with experts on the subject of Jewish Arabs in America. The first is with Professor Ella Shohat, an Iraqi Jew who teaches in the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at New York University.

She talks about mutual discrimination of Arab Jews within both the Jewish and Muslim communities and the choice Arab Jews are pressurized to make between being Jews and being Arabs. The professor describes the fragmentation of the Arab Jewish community within the Arab-American community, concluding that Arab Jews don’t really interact with the Arab American nor the European Jewish communities.

Unfortunately, the events of September 11^th made it especially complicated for this small community, with members targeted on the streets alongside other Arabs and Muslims who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

An Active Approach to Honoring Arab Jewish Heritage

Aramica also interviews David Shasha,  an American born Arab Jew living in Brooklyn. David holds a Master’s Degree in Jewish/Middle Eastern Studies from Cornell University and works as an activist, educator, author and archivist. He is the Director of The Center for Sephardic Heritage.

David explains how records and documentation of Arab Jewish history are far less prolific than that of Jewish history during the Russian revolution or the Holocaust. As such, it’s hard to get a clear idea of what life was like for Arab Jews, as very little reflection has been produced by historians.

David dedicates his career to changing this and dispelling some of the clouds on some of the historical and cultural issues surrounding the US Arab Jewish community.

Can you Be Both an Arab and A Jew?

The final interview in the article is with Professor Ammiel Alcalay, who teaches at Queens College and is the author of numerous books on Arab Jews and Levantine culture.

Professor Alcalay talks about the cultural creativity of the Arab Jews in countries such as Iraq and Spain. Sadly this became muted in the face of integration issues the community had to endure trying to fit into America’s Ashkenazi Jewish community.

He concludes that the political situation in the Middle East has further isolated members of the Arab Jewish community. Not  fitting in with the Arab community and wanting to associate with Israeli politics has left the community somewhat adrift and rootless within the US.

“In America, it seems very strange to people that you can be both an Arab and a Jew.” The professor concludes.

Did you know London footwear guru Dato’ Jimmy Choo OBE, was born and brought up in Malaysia?

Maybe I’ve had my feet in the sand, but I didn’t!

In fact, Choo, (born Jimmy Choo Yeang Keat in Penang), made his first pair of shoes in his native Malaysia when he was 11 years old.

Tiptoeing up to the Red Carpet

Jimmy was born into a family of shoemakers and went to London to study, graduating in 1983. He worked part time as a waiter and a shoe factory cleaner to help pay for college.

In 1986 he opened a workshop in an old hospital building in Hackney, North London, where he garnered rather of a lot of attention. In 1988 he earned himself an 8-page spread in Vogue, and in 1990, Diana Princess of Wales became his patron, which planted him well and truly in the public eye.

In 1996 Jimmy founded Jimmy Choo Ltd with British Vogue accessories editor Tamara Mellon.

In 2000 Jimmy earned the Malaysian honorary title “Dato’” for his achievements, granted by the Sultan of Malaysia’s Pahang State.

You can take the Man out of Malaysia but You Can’t Take Malaysia out of the Man

In April 2001, Choo sold his 50% stake in Jimmy Choo Ltd for £10 million. Since then, he has been working on an exclusive couture line, within the company.  Tamara Mellon runs the ready-to-wear line, which now includes handbags. In 2002, he was granted an OBE by Queen Elizabeth of England and in 2004 he was awarded Darjah Setia Pangkuan Negeri by the Governor of his home state of Penang, which also carries the title Dato’.

How many titles does a man need? I guess that’s a bit like asking how many pairs of shoes a woman needs…

Jimmy Choo lives in London, but his heart is still very much entwined with his native Malaysia, where, not surprisingly he has become a hero to young shoemakers and fashion designers.  He  is presently setting up a shoemaking institute in his homeland. There are 39 Jimmy Choo stores worldwide.

I’m very interested in the issue of interfaith between our global Muslim community and those of other religions around the world. In 2010, there are almost as many Muslims in the world as there are Christians, and the religions are full of similarities and parallels. Some would say it’s time Muslims and Christians recognized just how similar we are, and that the fate of the world depends on it.

This was in fact the subject of an open letter signed in 2007, and launched from Jordan to the Vatican by 138 Muslim leaders and scholars.

First Class from Jordan to The Vatican

The 29-page letter — entitled A Common Word between Us and You  was organized by the Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought in Amman, Jordan.

The letter was addressed to Pope Benedict XVI, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and 25 other named Christian leaders.  It emphasized that world peace depends on greater understanding between the two faiths. This powerful message for mutual understanding represented the first time so many high-profile Muslims united to make such a public call for peace.

A Call for Mutual Understanding

A Common Word between Us and You was first signed in Jordan on the morning of October 11^th 2007, then in other countries throughout the course of the day. It was finally unveiled at a Muslim-Christian press conference  in Washington, D.C., by Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti of Bosnia, and John Esposito, director of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at Georgetown University.

This positive call for world peace detailed the similarities between the Bible and the Koran, and between Christianity and Islam. It reached out to Christian leaders to “come together with us on the common essentials of our two religions.”

High profile Muslim signatories included Sheik Mohammed Nur Abdullah, vice president of the Fiqh Council of North America; Sheikh Salem Falahat, director-general of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan; Hasan Shariatmadari, head of the Iranian National Republicans party; and Sheikh Ikrima Said Sabri, former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Imam of Al-Aqsa Mosque.

Finding Common Ground in the Name of World Peace

According to an article in Time Magazine, the letter notes that whilst the faiths are clearly different, both require believers to believe in only one God, and it’s the same God. Both religions are founded on goodwill, not violence, and  many of the fundamental truths that were revealed to Muhammad — such as complete devotion to God, the rejection of false gods, and the love of fellow man — are the same that form the basis of Christianity.

Because of this, the letter says, Muslims are bound by the Koran to treat believers of other faiths with respect and friendship — and that Muslims expect the same in return. Finding common ground is essential for the survival of humanity.

“The relationship between these two religious communities [is] the most important factor in contributing to meaningful peace around the world. If Muslims and Christians are not at peace, the world cannot be at peace. No side can unilaterally win a conflict between more than half of the world’s inhabitants. Thus our common future is at stake. The very survival of the world itself is perhaps at stake.”

Yes, I’ve been tracking down love poems for my collection again! This time I jumped on a cyber train to Karachi.

I’d heard of Zeeshan Sahil before but I’d never gotten around to looking him up. Turns out he was an extraordinary, shy, gentle Karachi writer who loved his country, his family and life’s simple pleasures and beauties.

“I love trees, the air, travelling and dreaming. I love flowers, colours and words but water and skies are my favourites. I am afraid of loneliness and stagnation.” – he said in a 2002 interview with dawn.com.

All You Need Is…

Love, is indeed the focus of Zeeshan’s work – more than anything his love of Karachi, and his love of poetry, so much so that he named his 1995 anthology after the city.

Karachi aur doosri nazme, is his poignant Urdu documentation of the city torn apart by trouble in the nineties, written with a vision of truth and a heart filled with love.

“I fell in love with this city filled with life and people, it gave me a place in its heart. …My brothers and sisters and my friends have spoiled me with their love and affection and perhaps this is what continues to give meaning to my poetry.”

An Untimely Ending

Perhaps my only regret is not finding Zeeshan before his untimely death in 2008. No stranger to struggle, this incredible poet maintained wit and humour in his prose and poetry, despite a physical disability that left him unable to live independently.

Sometimes I wonder if some artists weren’t simply born to do what they do, and this would certainly hold true in Zeeshan’s case. In his own words:

“If I did not write poetry then I would not have done anything. Writing poetry is my vocation and not a hobby or habit.”

My favourite of the Karachi poems is simply entitled A Poem for You. I hope you like it!

A Poem for You

The world is the wrong place to live

if one had to live forever.

Each day life

would become more unbearable.

But the happiness of traveling on the bus

with Saiduddin,

and the melting wax from the burning candle

on your dressing table,

and the smoke collecting on your mirror

make up for everything.

The flowers pressed in my book

grow in to jungle dreams.

Your fingers trace many different paths

in the dust on the Formica.

And in the city with many blank street signs

when the night becomes darker,

your uneasy presence makes

the stars unnecessary, the moon redundant,

and the sea superfluous.

Your memory and the mounting pressure around my

heart

make me pray.

Despite the eternal anger of God toward poets,

my prayer always begins with you.

As a Muslim who lived and studied in the UK for a while a few years back, I like to keep up to speed what’s going on there, particularly when it comes to the Muslim community.

The UK has a thriving and well-integrated Muslim population for the most part and London has long been known as one of the largest centres for Islamic finances. I was still quite surprised to read last month that Sharia law is going to become part of the UK’s tax budget!

How? Ah, that bit’s simple: The UK Treasury plans to simply rewrite Britain’s tax rules to incorporate elements of Sharia law that deal with lending, borrowing and taxation and therefore make money matters easier for Muslims.

The question is WHY?

Putting your Money where your Mullah is

The Sharia finance market is growing at the speed of light and looks set to top £205billion a year. Not surprisingly, the UK Government wants to tap into it and turn London into the “global gateway for Islamic finance”.

Here comes the tricky part: Sharia law dictates that conventional loans that involve repayments with interest are forbidden, so the UK is going to have to adapt if it wants a piece of the pie.

It doesn’t seem like such a far-out idea, given that The UK Government was one of the first Western countries to issue a state-backed sukuk (Islamic bond).

Sharia-compliant mortgages, car insurance and even baby bonds are available for UK Muslims who want to avoid “riba”  (interest payments).

In December ‘09, the UK treasury proposed rewriting the present tax laws so that Muslim businessmen aren’t unfairly taxed if and when they try to raise money on their companies.

Jackpot or Hotpotch?

In an article in The Express, Mohammed Amin, head of Islamic finance at PricewaterhouseCoopers, said: “The UK has become the leading Western country in Islamic finance by taking a series of measures to ensure that Islamic finance is taxed no worse and no better than conventional finance.

Supporters of the proposed legislation say the Government is wisely knocking on the door of a market that could net London a fortune in the future.

Critics say that it’s rushing into a financial system it does not fully understand and question the extent to which British laws should be rewritten to accommodate Muslim practices.

The Financial Services Authority says its policy is one of “no obstacles, no special favours” for Islamic finance.

Sophie Ashraf has recently shot to fame in and beyond her native India as The Burqa Rapper. This 21-year old Muslim wordsmith is to all intents and purposes making a rather revealing statement with her art. Let’s take a quick look at how this feisty young Indian woman’s donning of the “burqa” while rapping has placed Islam on centre stage and right at the heart of her art.

As Sobia points out in her wonderful article on Ashraf in Muslimah Mediawatch, watching Sophie proudly sport her headscarf in her pics and vids, one’s first reaction might be:

“Wait a minute: that’s not a burqa!”

See for yourselves here.

A Veil, but Not as They Know It

I’m with Sobia – there are two feasible explanations for Sophie Ashraf’s choice of headwear that spring to mind. The first could be that she’s making a point about what she perceives to be the world’s largely inaccurate and generic notion of the burqa.

The second, more plausible possibility is that she’s wearing a Middle Eastern hijab and abaya, both of which have been recent imports into South Asia.  As the word abaya is a foreign term, and burqa a native one, so it stands to reason that foreign clothing may have been tagged with a familiar name, in order to make it more appealing to locals.

However you translate it, as far as Sophie’s concerned, she’s covering herself in her faith:

“It’s like when you really like a band, you wear T-shirts of that band, Well we really, really like Islam, so we wear the burqa.”

Comfortable in Her Own Skin

Ashraf’s music and lyrics brim with her Muslim identity. The burqa, universally understood as an Islamic symbol, and her rapping have become  inseparable. In her own original way, it appears that this extraordinary rising Indian star is working to dispel some of the stereotypes about Muslim women and destroy misconceptions by working with and not against her faith.

“People tend to think that someone who tries to be different and someone who breaks the rules are the same. I work within the rules, but I find those little loopholes that allow me to do my thing.”

The Star of India

We’re not talking about a young woman who’s making a controversial fashion statement: Sophie seems from what I’ve read of her, comfortable, confident, self-aware and all wised-up about Islam.

As unconventional as it may be, her desire to defend and celebrate Islam is music to our ears here at LoveHabibi.

“When you see me / Is this all you see? / Oppressed coz I’m dressed as my creed has decreed” – Sophie Ashraf

There’s a rather extraordinary Italian Muslim woman I’d like you to meet. In fact, I’m willing to bet my bottom bite of bolognaise that this is an Italian Muslim woman unlike any you’ve ever met before.

Burqa Barbie was designed by Italy’s Eliana Lorena in cohoots with Mattel, who are celebrating 50 years of everyone’s favourite plastic blonde. BB, as we’ll call her for arguments’ sake (and believe me she’s caused a fair bit of argy-bargy) is being auctioned online for a Save the Children fundraising campaign.

BB Who you Want to Be

In an interview with The Daily Mail, The Italian designer behind the controversial doll defends her decision:

“I know Barbie was something seen as bad before as an image for girls, but in actual fact the message with Barbie for women is you can be whatever you want to be.”

There’s an interesting article about BB by Raaz in Muslimah Media Watch. Raaz raises the point that while Barbie promotes and unrealistic and unhelpful self-image among the girls, if you gotta have your doll, it might as well be a culturally appropriate one in the name of self-affirmation.

Flaming Lips

Everyone from NOW to Fox News has been waxing lyrical about how inappropriate BB is – critiques have ranged from feminism to terrorism and over in Italy, Lorena’s having to fight to defend her corner.

She maintains that her doll was created to represent Afghan culture as part of a series of 500 dolls depicting the diversity of errr… female fashion the world over. She insists that BB was never meant to embody a political statement.

Again I stand with Raaz who rightly states that:

“Burqa Barbie, in the end, merely represents a form of cultural dress (albeit tinged with a contentious political history and a little misrepresented in lime green and radioactive orange), a one-time design to be auctioned for charity.  Not every Muslim woman will necessarily identify with her culturally, but that does not necessarily mean that her existence as a form of cultural expression is wrong and degrading to women.”

Which leaves me with just one (burning) question… Who’s going to be BB’s Ken?

Love poetry in the form of letters has been a part of Arabic culture for centuries. Not just a way of expressing feelings, these intricate and eloquent declarations of love were also a sign that their author was educated and cultured.

From that day to this, classic Arabic love letters have generally fallen into one of 4 categories:

Sacred Love Poems

Sacred love poems often invoked God, as He is all loving and contains sacred or spiritual over tones. These half hymn-half poems speak more of beauty and emotional union that of physical love, although they often include depictions of physical beauty.

Profane Love Poems

In Arabic tradition, a profane love poem is essentially a secular poem, and one that doesn’t encompass a spiritual or higher realm of romance.

There is a school of thought, however that argues that “profane” love poetry is an allegory for spiritual truth and that any poem (profane or otherwise) that speaks of love also speaks of faith, spirituality and a higher plane of romance.

Illicit Love Poems

An Arabic love letter may also be considered illicit, by other nations’ standards. Classic Arab poetry includes a piece entitled “A Father Advises his Son About Love.” (Sounds perfectly reasonable to me!)

Illicit love may also refer to a secret love that has to remain hidden for a whole variety of reasons. Often in these poems, love is hinted at but never really spelt out.

Mystical Love Poems

A mystical Arab love poem is one, which has power in the words that are pronounced. These poems are customary as a way of winning the love of the person to whom you are writing it. Mystical love poems can also spark controversy, such ass Ibn al-Farid’s love poem of the Sufi Way.

The fact that the Beloved — God — is referred to as “Her,” rather than in the traditional masculine gender caused plenty of waves back in the day when the poem was published. Unfortunately Ibn’s misconstrued intention is thought to have been a celebration of the fact that God is both man and woman at once.

Goes to show I guess that poetry, like any other art and rather like love itself, depends on how you interpret it!