East Beach

Sana as a Muslim girl

20:42 |

Assalamualaikum peeps!

In this post, we are going to talk more and more and more about our friend, Sana.

As we all know, China is one of the countries with the most Muslim populations. However, it is unfortunate for Sana as she lives in a non- Islamic state as a minority. So, it wasn’t easy for her and her family to practice Islam in their daily lives.

She shared that women are not allowed to wear hijab and can’t wear it outside in public such as school, workplaces and etc. So, Sana told us that she only able to wear hijab at home and cover her aurah to her non-mahram relatives.

COUPLE IS HARAM!

We were quite surprised when she asked why a couple can’t sit close to one another and can’t even hold hands? Thus, we explained to her that it is forbidden for two people of the opposite sex to be dating. This is because such relationship often leads to haram and if you are alone the third person in the room is shaytan. Thus, we told her that the best solution is to get married if she has a boyfriend. But, she told us that she doesn’t have a boyfriend and would like to find a future husband in Malaysia (AWWW so cute!)

She even asked, it is true in Malaysia, man are allowed to marry more than one? So, we explained to her that it's not just in Malaysia but actually Islam allowed men to marry two, three or at the most four wives. However, according to al-Quran, if a man fear that he is not be able to deal justly, marry women of his choice, two, or three, or four; but if he fears that he is not able to deal justly with them, then marry only one. Additionally, the first wife MUST approve of an additional wife. EACH gets equal housing, staff and budget. Hence, the husband MUST be able to afford that second wife. In short, that man must be quite well to do, economically. His wives must agree to the new addition to the family and he gets additional expenses of the extra households.

To conclude, based on the sharing by Sana, we find that it is not easy living under a control of non-Muslim countries as there are certain things you are restricted to do as Muslims.

Thus, we should be lucky as we were born as a Muslim living in a Muslim country.

Love,

N & A.

Read User's Comments1

International Friend: Differences

20:11 |

Hi.

Today we are going to write more on our international friend, Sana.

Since Sana can only understand simple English (for now) we can only communicate in a way she would understand. Even so, we already manage to get many information and learnt new things from her! (thanks to her for being cooperative and talkative hee)

So, instead of asking her about prejudices we asked her the differences she had and experienced from her country, China and Malaysia.

MALAYSIANS ARE FRIENDLY

We were genuinely shocked hearing about this to be honest. We thought Malaysians would somehow ignore foreigners but Sana said NO. According to her, they are really friendly and always willing to help her with anything.

Even when she got lost, Malaysians would help her find her way (good job Malaysia!). Different from her country, Sana stated that in China everything is so fast. Everyone seems to be rushing to somewhere and when she wanted to ask for directions, she would be asked to seek help from someone else.

MALAYSIA HAS FRESH AIR

We know, we can't believe it either. The thought that Malaysia has fresher air (you know with the air pollution and the haze) seems a bit....unimaginable. But that's the truth according to Sana.

She then showed us a picture of her friend wearing a mask in her country as the air was really bad. Wow.

Alright, for now that seems to be it. STAY TUNED with our blog if you want to hear more stories from this cute dimpled cheek girl. Adios.

Love,

N & A.

Read User's Comments0

International Friend & How We Communicate

14:01 |

Hello.
We hope everyone would be in their pink of health.

For this post, we will introduce our International friend whom came all the way from China to study in our university, IIUM.

Our International Friend: Ji Xiao Yuan a.k.a Sana

We first texted each other before actually meeting up. Since, we both are usually awkward with people we're not close with, we were anxious of making new friend. But after meeting her, we hit it off rather quickly!

A little bit about our friend, her name is Ji Xiao Yuan and also know as Sana (her Muslim name). She is two years younger than us, 19 years old. She's still new and just got here for about two months or so.

Sana is a very friendly person and tried hard to start conversation with us despite still in a process of learning English. Through out the meet up, we quickly got over that awkward phase and the next thing we know we were teasing her about finding a husband in IIUM! Not to mention that she's very expressive so when we teased her on something her facial expressions were priceless!

As Sana is still a beginner in English language, we communicate in simple English and tried to use other methods in communicating. Her for example uses dictionary in her phone which can translate the word she wants to English. We on the other hand, tried drawing on a piece of paper when explaining something so that it would be easier for her to understand hehe.

Thankfully, even though there are language barriers it did not stop us from talking to her for hours! (to the point that the cafe was closed and the workers had to ask us to leave)

All in all, we meet a very nice girl (with dimples!) and are looking forward to meet her again in our free time. For now that will be it but in shaa Allah we will post more on our friend soon!

Love,

A & N.

Read User's Comments0

Prejudice

08:20 |

Heyya,
Hope you are having a good day.

Today we learn about PREJUDICES.

What is Prejudice? Discrimination? Bias? Stereotyping? *Note that these are all negative words okay*

Although all these words have different meanings, but they are rather similar. All in all, it means the perception/opinion one has that is not based on actual experience or reason. Usually it is something negative, like your thoughts you have onto other even when you actually do not personally know him/her.

To get the rough ideas, here is a table on Stereotype, Prejudice and Discrimination

For this post, Dr. asked us to write about four things:

1) Identify a prejudice of your own.
2) What is the prejudice in your head?
3) Have you been the victim of bias, prejudices and etc?
4) Greatest fear related to the stereotype.

*Note: Aisha's writing*

Alright, to answer the first and second question, I may or may not had a prejudice towards these certain group of people. But again, it was in the past and over the years it is lessening. As I grow up, I learn people are different and we all have different ways of thinking or doing some things. So I try not to judge or being prejudiced but of course, things are easier said than done huh However, I will not write further about these prejudices of mine in here as it might unintentionally hurt other people upon reading it.

I don't think I actually experienced bias or prejudices on me (nothing that i can remember of) but I did have stereotype implied on me. Heh. Well, it was not something major or totally harmful for me so in that sense, I'm fine. Like we had in the introduction post, I stated that I came from Kelantan. One of my roommates back in the Foundation years once told me she doesn't like Kelantanese as they always seem a bit arrogant and they like to stick with themselves, speaking their own dialect even though other people might not understand them.

So she always had this kind of stereotype, until she met me *flip hair* *cause I am cool like that* ngehehe. I always shrug it off though as it was NOT the first time I heard these kind of stereotype on Kelantanese. I learn to acknowledge it and take it as my duty to break off the stereotype.

To say about fear I guess I have to say that I am slightly worried if people were to know or define me through the stereotypes they have thus restraining them to actually got to know me.Well simply because, I want to be defined as what I am rather what I was perceived as.

*Note: Nur's writing*

Do I have prejudice?

Well, I do have some kind of prejudice over my family. Now don’t get me wrong. Listen(?) Read (?) to my story first.

When I was in high school, my friend asked me to take care of his pet hamsters on holiday break. As an animal lover, of course I was happy and ready to help him. However, I am sure that my family would be very skeptical of me. My family really hated rat-species animals(?). They would described rats as disgusting, possibly slimy, just terrible creatures. But I kept it in mind, if I kept them out of their sight in a spare room, everything would be okay. ;p

Two weeks later, I noticed that one of the hamsters was looking a bit chubbier than before. Turns out that my dad and brothers had been fully won over and they would sneaked in to the spare room to feed the hamsters handfuls of “kuaci”. They loved watching them and petting them a bit especially my father (HAHA). The hamsters started to really like him. He even had his favorite. He still claims that he hates rats, but the rest of the family knows better.

Thus, my prejudice over my family was totally wrong as my opinion was not based on reason and experience.

******************

JUST REMEMBER to take it easy. Sometimes, stereotypes are not THAT BAD. It can also be well..compliments (in a way). Like in this video below. Be proud but humble. Just laugh and shrug it off. You'll live.

Love,

A & N.

Read User's Comments0

I am...

20:44 |

Bonjour.

Today, our lecturer, Dr. Afiza asked us to draw our faces (from memories) as well writing a poem. So, here it is! (Don't judge, we suck, we know *cries*)

Aisha's face

Hahaha alright, like you have seen above that is my (Aisha) face. As I know I am terrible at writing poem so I am willing to sacrifice by putting this uninteresting picture here *sobs*

[Enough of that picture, here is the poem by Nur ]

All of Me.

See my eyes.
See my nose.
See my lips.
See my face.
Now you have seen all of me!

See, we told you we both are horrible with these kind of thing. Hee hope you enjoy laughing at this post. Until next time.
Love,

A & N.

Read User's Comments0

What are they saying without saying?

20:39 |

Hallo.

So, from the video (here’s the link) Scallon had stated something along the line "people often don't say what they mean and they often don't mean what they say".

But what is it though?

Something that was said but did not contain any meaning.

Something that was NOT said but have meaning.

Hmm, that is totally something that we are pondering about.As much as confusing it was (gah!), we tried to wreck our brain to think of the example from our own culture, Malay culture. So yeah, in our culture there’s this one habit/act which has been practiced since EVER.

THE ACT OF ASKING WHEN YOU ALREADY KNOW.

Confuse much? Let us explain.

Usually when people (usually older people) accidentally met or

saw their friends, one would greet the other by giving out

statement like “Buying groceries are you?” (or in this case when they happen to meet at the mall or the market) and the other would say “yeah”, agreeing to the statement and then the conversation flowed.

From here we can see that sometimes mothers, grandmothers or

anyone for that matter was just asking and stating of the obvious

fact. And why would they do that? Because basically that is thought to be a GREETING.

No, this does not mean they CAN’T SEE what the other person is

doing BUT RATHER doing that as TO START THE

CONVERSATION IN THE NICEST AND FRIENDLIEST WAY

POSSIBLE.

And this is the example of something that was said, but did not

contain any meaning as they are just asking but semantically they meant differently.

And to clarify, this act is not even close to weird as it is like

unspoken rule (?) with us, Malays.

Until next post, Adios.

Love,

N & A.

Read User's Comments1

Different Culture? Accepting & Respecting

20:22 |

Welcome.

We hope you, readers have a very fine morning/day/night/life!

Let’s learn something new shall we? Yes, we shall.

So for this entry we will give a review and comment a bit on this

video (see the link)

All in all, it’s about Pellegrino Riccardi, a cross cultural expert

shares his personal and professional experience on how very

different cultures can successfully coexist next to each other.

Riccardi comes from both an English and an Italian background,

and is currently living in Norway (WOW) Okay so for the past 27

years he has travelled around the world and interacted with

countless different cultures and nationalities.

In the video, Riccardi's approach is about understanding what

people see and understanding the difference between perception

and normality. Small details are often overlooked within one’s

own culture which can be identified as a cultural norm but poses a

challenge as it may be perceived differently by other cultures or

nationalities.

For instance, what seems strange or baffling to a foreigner may,

however be perfectly normal to a Malaysian. It all depends on

one’s perception.

WET BATHROOM? Completely NORMAL.

On the subject of bathrooms, it may seem STRANGE to the

average foreigner of the wet typical traditional bathrooms in

Malaysia. A traditional Malaysian bathroom contains a trough of

clean water, from which water is scooped up in a plastic dipper

(gayung) and poured over the body while standing on the floor of

the bathroom. After soaping up all over, more dippers full of water

are splashed over oneself to rinse off. This same practice is utilized

when going to the toilet, resulting in very wet toilet seats (which is

completely different with the Western’s bathroom which is VERY

DRY).

Plastic Dipper (Gayung)

Thus, despite this differences that we have, what Riccardi was

trying to point out is to be “accepted and familiar” in adapting with

other people’s culture as a sign of respect.

So take note Malaysians, when visiting country which values

dry bathrooms and toilets, restrain yourself from making it wet!

That’s all. Sayonara!

P/s: Feel free to comment for any questions to feed your curiosity.

We won’t bite……..probably. Hee, joking…..Maybe not.

Pp/s: Totally joking….or do us? Hehe

Love,

A & N.

Read User's Comments0

East Beach

Followers

Blogroll

Archives

Sana as a Muslim girl

International Friend: Differences

International Friend & How We Communicate

Prejudice

I am...

What are they saying without saying?

Different Culture? Accepting & Respecting