I'm back

Alhamdulillah. After about a week in Saudi Arabia I finally arrived back at home. Exactly at 11.18am 30^th June 2009 my flight from Jeddah landed at the KLIA. It was really a great journey. This umrah trip was my 2^nd time to Medina but my 1^st time to Mecca. The last time was in 2002 where on my way to Mecca, I involved in an accident. Actually this trip was a replacement to that of the 2002 trip because as a result of the accident, I couldn’t perform my umrah back then. Therefore, the travel agent agreed to replace us with a new one. I am very much thankful to my travel agent because they treated my family and I like VVIPs. They gave us special mutawwif (tour guide), special transportation, 5 stars accommodation and one of their managers even came to send us off. I have nothing to complaint. Really thankful!

Here are some pictures that I would like to share.

Inside KLIA Limo

At KLIA before departure

Me before departure

Inside the airplane. Our tickets were upgraded to business class. :-)

Inside the airplane. Tak der keje. So, tangkap gambar awan. :-)

More awan pics

Masjid Nabawi

Perkuburan Baqi'

My father and I. Inside Masjid Nabawi. I don't know why I really like this pic.

My father and I infront of Masjid Nabawi. This picture made me realise that I'm shorter than my father. For all this time, I thought that I have the same height as my father.

Kaabah

Kaabah

Masjidil Haram

Gua Thur. Prophet Muhammad and Saidina Abu Bakar's hiding place before Hijrah to Madinah.

Jabal Rahmah. Tempat Nabi Adam dan Hawa berjumpa semula selepas dikeluarkan dari syurga.

Jabal Rahmah

Gua Nur where our prophet received the 1st revelation

Ladang unta

Masjid Terapung, Jeddah

Laut Merah

Laut Merah

Laut Merah

Infront of Masjid Terapung

Again, Masjid Terapung

Jeddah Airport.

I started with a picture of my mother and I, so I will end with a picture of my mother and I as well. Notice that I have become darker now. Sun burn!

Hamba mu dating menyahut panggilanmu

This will be my last posting before I leave this Monday to Saudi Arabia. My parents and I are going to perform umrah. I’m really excited! I will be departing from KLIA on the 22^nd of June at around 3.15pm and will be coming on 30^th of June. So, I’ll be there for 9 days.

So, my friend, I would like to take this opportunity to ask for forgiveness of all my wrong doings. Minta maaf kalau ada salah dan silap. Minta maaf kalau ada yang terguris perasaan. Minta halal semua makan and minum. Doakan saya mendapat umrah yang mabrur!

HUMAN TRAFFICKING

This week United States published Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report 2009. The report added six African countries to a blacklist of countries trafficking in people, and put Malaysia back on the list. Among the countries are Chad, Eritrea, Niger, Mauritania, Swaziland, and Zimbabwe. The report or list is based on countries’ efforts to fight trafficking in humans for forced labour, prostitution, military service and other reasons. Malaysia is on the list because according to them Malaysia does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking and is not making significant efforts to do so.

I am shock to hear the news but I am not surprised with Malaysia getting back on the list. It’s not that I am not satisfied with Malaysia’s efforts to curb this issue. I am sure that our government has done their best to prevent human trafficking. The reason that I am not surprise is that the list was produce by US who is known to be bias. They acted as if they are the good and nice one. Everything they did is always for the benefit of humankind and everything other countries did is always harming to humankind. You can judge by yourself. Each year, they will produce a list of the top universities and each year the no 1 spot is always a university from US. Are they really good? NO! If you study the list of top universities, you can see that there is an obvious element of bias. For example, some of our universities are in the list but not universities from Indonesia. Indonesia has many outstanding universities. Most of them are even better than our own universities yet there are not in the list. Possible explanation for this is because Malaysia has a better relationship with US compared to Indonesia. The problem is when everyone uses this list as the key indicator and US’ universities are very good. We have been cheated.

Back to the issue of human trafficking, Malaysia being back on the list has opened our eyes. We should take this opportunity to evaluate our performances. Maybe we are not aware that we have not done much. Accepting criticism is one way of improving our self.

Note:

I would like to take this opportunity also to correct the misunderstanding among Malaysians. The ranks that our universities usually get are between number 100 to 150. Many of us laughed looking at this result. For your information, there are more than a thousand universities in US alone and therefore to be able to be listed at that spot is indeed something that we should be proud of.