Which crescent is new?
بسم الله الحمد لله
A lot of the muslim world is currently getting ready to crescent watch and work out the beginning of Eid-ul-Fitr. Here are some tips to sky gazing.
First get our terms right
Waxing moon : increasing, the new hilaal is therefore waxing.
Waning moon: diminishing in size.
Using your hands
The angle of the tilt varies depending on which country your in.
You can use your hands to work out what is happening. You can make a crescent shape using your forefinger and thumb. If the crescent you see fits the crescent you make with your right hand then this is a waxing crescent. If the crescent fits your left hand’s crescent then it is a waning crescent. This rule works in the NORTHERN hemisphere and is reversed in the SOUTHERN hemisphere.
For mnemonic enthusiasts the shape of the letters in the capitalised word DOC can be used to remember this. The letter D without its vertical line is a waxing crescent and the letter C is a waning crescent. This rule is reversed in the Southern hemisphere.
Some pictures
View from the SOUTHERN hemisphere is below
View from the NORTHERN HEMISPHERE
Acknowledgements:
Woodlands Junior School
Add comment September 18, 2009
I don’t have time! Do you?
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
As the years have rolled on, I have noticed on asking may of my acquaintances and friends to do something which requires them to go out of their way a common response: ‘I don’t have time!’. When I was younger I would struggle to understand what people did with their time, but as the years have piled on, I now understand what people said. The vacuous nature of life acts like a black hole. It attracts the most time drenching activities from television, surfing the net, latest gadgets, having a good time visiting restaurants, going to shopping centres further and further away to buy what I could have bought at the click of a button.
While the world offered to save our time, instead we became busier. Computers were meant to save paper, instead I now see paper being sold at a tremendous rate and rapidly coming out oflaser printers. Now we have so many programs to teach us Islam and an internet full of knowledge I find people less educated about Islam. It is indeed a world of contradictory principles.
Alhamdulillah Allah has provided the slowest month in the year, Ramadan. A month when we are given the opportunity when fasting to watch the passage of time slow down for a few hours, to contemplate where we have arrived after so many Ramadans on this planet. What goals have we achieved, what goals do we have let to aspire for. What have we prepared for tomorrow when we shall stand in front of Allah, all alone, perhaps blind perhaps sighted. Perhaps we will have a good answer for what we did with our spare time. May Allah make us from those who spend their time wisely.
One goal that many of us have an aspiration to achieve is to read and understand the Quran. I would like to invite you all to have a look at this project which offers a ‘new’ approach to learning the Quran. It offers electronic (web or Excel) or paper based worksheets to learn the Quran. It takes a simple commentary of the Quran written in Arabic and encourages the reader to learn new words and understand the Quran at the same time. Please make time and have a look at the following two links:
List of Quran Worksheets This link has all the worsksheets done so far. For a quick start, begin here.
Introduction to TMArabic : This introduces the concept.
Power point presentation : This gives a power point presentation of the idea behind the concept.
This is an ongoing project and if you have any feedback, spotted any errors please give your feedback.
May Allah give us the time to appreciate His final message to us.
Add comment August 23, 2009
Simple Tafsir – Surah 1
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
Taken from www.islam2u.com the following is a simple commentary on the Quran. Check out the original website for an interesting breakdown of the Arabic text. It offers a word-by-word translation using floating boxes. Just place your mouse over the word and see what it means. Original link is here. Other formats are available.
LINKS: Excel worksheet | PDF worksheet | About TMArabic | Vocab Tool | Surah Index
Commentary Text for Surah Al-Fatiha Verse 1
*[I begin] in the name of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful (1.1)
‘In the name of Allah’ other than who there is no true god (who) is described with every perfect (attribute) free from any defect He is the Merciful who pours His great blessings in general and specific on His creation He is described by the attribute of continuous mercy
*[Every] praise belongs to Allah the Lord (of) the worlds. (1.2)
Every beautiful praise of every type and in every condition belongs to Allah alone and we praise Him profusely for He originated creation and is (continuously) looking after it
*The Beneficent, the Merciful. (1.3)
And He is one who is constantly merciful and the source of every mercy He blesses His creation with every blessing, whether large or small
*The Owner of the Day of Judgement. (1.4)
(Owner) He alone is the owner of the day of reward and accountability and that is the Last Day, (when) He will act as He wishes and no one will share (the ability) to act as they wish.
*You (alone) we worship and You (alone) we seek help from. (1.5)
and we only worship You O our Lord! We do not seek help and goodness (from anyone) except You
*Guide us to the straight path! (1.6)
(The Path) We ask You to grant us success (in attaining) the path of truth, goodness and happiness. And it is the straight path that takes us to You.
*The path of those whom You blessed and not the path of those who earned Your anger or went astray. (1.7)
(The Path) It is the way of Your slaves whom You granted success (to achieve) belief in You and (those to whom) You granted guidance and Your pleasure and not the path of those who deserve Your anger and strayed from the path of truth and felicity because they shunned believing in You and submitting to Your guidance.
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Add comment August 22, 2009
Indian creepy crawlies
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
Being well bitten and covered with itchy lumps and bumps all over is one of the necessary evils of a visit to India. Mosquitoes are ubiquitous especially where standing pools of water lie nearby in the form of wells or shallow underground sewer systems with open lids. The swarm of mosquitoes can be readily noticed as they form an attack formation close to sunset time and hone in on their victim with unswerving accuracy plunging their nozzles into bare skin, with the kind squirt of an anaesthetic to prevent us from splatting them to death. The odd time a mosquito is laden with human blood it can become sluggish and a quick splat will result in an exploding mosquito and small splatter of red blood on your clothes.
Mosquitoes are not the only creepy crawlies that are famous in India but other common varieties include, red ants, battle ants, cockroaches, bed bugs (Ur. khatmal) and lice (Ur. juwwa).
Bed bugs, casting my mind back to the late seventies were quite ubiquitous in houses, known to entomologists (insect experts) as ’structural bugs’ they can colonise cracks in bed frames and even the round buttons that occur on mattresses. But recently, over the last 10-15 years, advances in the widespread use of cement in building houses has resulted in a much decreased incidence of bed bugs. Visits to houses where the traditional mud walls are still in use still suffer from the bug of bed bugs. According to entomologist experts at the centre for entomology (the study of insects) at Cambridge University in the UK, the only way to get rid of bed bugs under such circumstances would be to call for professional help from pest control agencies as available insecticides available to the public are insufficient.
Mosquito repellant netting on windows have become popular and more widely used, coupled with insect repellents that are released into the room via small electrical devices these give a relatively mosquito free night. These kits are widely available from shops for a cost around 45 Rupees. Some people have inventively placed a mosquito repellant liquid atomiser in every single room and keep the house therefor covered. The 45 Rupees is meant to last 40 odd days but will finish in a third of the time if kept on during the whole day.
Body repellents are not widely available and there is only one which is widely available called Odomos, it comes as a liquid or a green cream which is applied to the exposed areas. I was unable to locate DEET based repellents and had to rely on my ‘imported’ stores of DEET canisters, which very very effective. Many people mentioned that dark clothing was attractive to mosquitoes and brighter clothing was unattractive to them. In fact someone mentioned that his wife was hardly ever bitten while he was bitten quite a lot, this in fact reflected a similar distribution of bites in our own family.
After a little bit of research on the topic it seems that mosquitoes detect their prey by a combination of carbon dioxide gradients, heat and body odours. Male odours are clearly preferable and they are supposed to expire more carbon dioxide, supposedly through their skin!
I though I would leave you with a paragraph from the Entomology Centre talking about mosquitoes and how to prevent their breeding:
Thus, a more effective form of control is to control the larvae, either by actually killing them or by destroying the breeding grounds of the mosquito. Mosquitoes lay eggs in standing water, close to the water surface. The larvae, when they hatch remain under water either hanging down from the surface or laying parallel to it. Hence larvae can be controlled by removing all standing water in and around human habitation or draining the land using narrow, steep-sided ditches in the case of wet, marshy areas. A new technique that has proved successful in the case of pit latrines is to add expended polystyrene balls to the water which prevents larvae from reaching the surface to respire and adults from being able to lay eggs.
Acknowledgements
Pictures are taken from the Medical Entomology Centre website.
1 comment August 15, 2009
Indian or Muslim first?
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
As a minority living in a non-Muslim country this is a question faced not just by Indian Muslims but by many minority Muslims all over the world. A now retired politician from the conservative party in the United Kingdom once devised a cricket test to show the dubious loyalty of Pakistani immigrants to the UK. If England and Pakistan were playing who would you be supporting?
Where the values of Islam and the host nation overlap then there is no conflict of loyalties, the belief in truth, the rule of law, the right to an abode will not generate protests or awkward questions in the minority Muslims. But if we look at the other spectrum of loyalty testing issues, perhaps there can be no greater issue than that of giving up one’s life for the bidding of one’s nation, we are faced with some difficult issues.
The purpose of this blog was to describe the situation as far as is visible to me with Muslims and their readiness to serve in the Indian military or lay down their life even if this entails war against neighbouring Muslim nations such as Pakistan or Bangladesh. The Indian paradox shows the effect of time on the way a Muslim minority population behaves and feels with respect to its host nation.
Let’s go back to 1965, Indian forces are on the verge of invading Pakistan at a border station called Atari, known as the Waga border from the Pakistani side. A young 22 year old soldier is lying in his self dug trench, 6 feet long and 3 feet wide. It’s the first time he is taking part in active duty and after the first night of hostility he is very scared. Pakistani artillery has a reach of 14 km while the Indian military artillery could only reach 12 km. While lying under his army supplied mosquito net he is summoned by a messenger, the major under whose command he is working wants to see him. Its pitch black in the dead of night and he is a bit surprised at this request, but now with years of military training under his belt he doesn’t question further and reports to his major.
The major is a Sikh, serving in the Indian military and is sitting at his table and orders the young soldier to come closer. In front of him is a book lying open on the table and he asks the soldier what book is it.
The soldier peers at the book and immediately recognises the book being read as the soldier’s Holy book. The soldier steps back and has a faint smile playing on his face.
The major snaps, ‘Why are you smiling? Don’t you know I can read this book as well as you?’
The soldiers smile has vanished in surprise as the major starts to recite in a sweet melodious Arabic verses from the Holy Quran.
The soldier, a Muslim, stares at the major who has by now stopped reciting and turning to the soldier says, ‘I recite this every day before going to sleep. I don’t feel at peace until I have recited it. Do you pray?’
The soldier responds, ‘You don’t give me time, I am busy working for you all day from sunup to sunrise.’
The major responds, ‘That’s no excuse, you should ask for 5 minutes and pray whenever your prayer time comes.’
The conversation ends and would be repeated many times in the future with a look of fond reminiscence on the soldiers greying features because of its profound effect. As the Indian forces advanced towards Lahore in the fourteen or so days the battle lasted whenever they would pass by Muslim villages the major would be seen picking up pages of the Quran lying strewn on the floor and restoring them to book shelves.
Half way through the hostilities the young soldier had forgotten his plate in the major’s vehicle and was standing on guard duty at a new outpost. The importance of the plate is that a food supply van would supply the soldiers with food and it would be placed on their plates. No plate meant no food till the next meal supply time. The young soldier watched as the food supply van pulled away, his plate missing it was time to grit his teeth and wait for the hunger pangs to subside. His fellow unit’s soldiers were busy tucking into food. One of them was Brahman Hindu, he would always sit away from the main group, being a Brahman, he would maintain his distance from people of the lower castes. The Hindu soldier on this occasion noted that the young Muslim soldier was standing without eating. He walked over to him and asked him what had happened. The young soldier explained he had forgotten his plate and he would now wait till the next meal. The Brahman Hindu did something extraordinary for himself and offered his food to the young Muslim soldier.
‘But your Brahman’, protested the Muslim soldier, ‘You don’t even eat with us in the mess.’
‘Here we are neither Brahman or Muslim, here we are all the same.’
On asking the soldier many years later about his time in the military and whether or not he had any regrets, the answer was a flat ‘No’. In fact the opposite was the case, he loved the military discipline and regrets leaving early then he had wanted to.
‘Were you afraid of ever killing a Muslim during your active duty?’ I asked trying to understand the thought process lying behind this attitude.
‘We were fighting for our nation, we don’t worry about the religion of the opposing forces. The scholars tell us what we are doing is jihad as we are defending our nation, and defence of the home is jihad.’
‘Do any Indian scholars speak out against serving in the Indian military?’ I ask surprised to note this understanding by the now much older ex-soldier.
Another voice adds, ‘No they can’t They would be accused of treason so they maintain a silence in general. But Muslims have traditionally stayed away from the military especially from Hyderabad. But now the government is setting up Muslim units in Kashmir, and there are Muslims from Kerla and UP who serve more readily in the army.’
I stop to contemplate what I have heard. The trend continues till today as modern generations of Muslims continue to serve in the Indian military. Fellow Muslims do not see it as a source of shame but usually as a source of pride. To be able to acquire a military job implies access to the amenities given to soldiers and the respect of fellow countrymen. In fact I was surprised to find out that the highest medal of bravery called the Param Vir Chakra (equivalent to the British Victoria Cross) during the 1965 war was given to a Muslim soldier called Havildar Abdul Hamid, the only Muslim name in the list of recipients of the Param Vir Chakra. The name means little to a new generation of Indian Muslims and is left on the lips of a dwindling number of senior citizens.
Randomly asking the question, are you Muslim or Indian first is resoundingly met with Muslim. But when asked the question are you prepared to fight and if necessary kill Muslims if required by the Indian state, the answer, is after a very short pause, a resounding ‘yes’.
2 comments July 15, 2009
Welcome to India
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
Over half a decade had passed since my last visit to India, Hyderabad. The plane was due to land at night and the sight of a carpet of street lights marked the beginning of Hyderabad as our Airbus 330 began its descent to the brand new Rajiv Ghandi airport.
Stepping of the plane into a shiny connecting gangway, I marveled at the architecture of the airport. The tiles were smooth and clean. The glint of shiny polished metal beams gave the airport that futuristic look. The signs were in that crisp sans-serif font with a clear background. Shiny new trolleys that were easy to manoeuvre were easily positioned for the convenience of disembarking passengers. The temperature was well regulated with hidden ducts silently venting air conditioned air.
As we turned the corner towards the immigration counter we were confronted by a line of white saree clad ladies, nurse, armed with ear thermometers. Seated behind them were a line of 4-5 doctors seated at desks. As we got closer they made sure we had filled our Swine flu forms.
‘Do you have any flu like symptoms?’
I said, ‘No.’ being careful not to cough as that would be misinterpreted in this futile attempt to control the spread of Swine flu.
‘Do you have a temperature?’ one of them asked.
‘No.’ I replied, thinking to myself that even if I did I would have taken an anti-pyretic such as Paracetamol (acetaminophen 1 gram) and probably some ibuprofen (400mg) before touch in an attempt to lower any temperature.
They just let me pass until I reached the line of doctors who repeated the questions, being doctors they were skeptical of my answers and asked me to go back to have my temperature taken. I made my way back knowing that I had to cooperate otherwise I faced the possibility of being put into confinement for 7 days if they suspected Swine flu or at least a few hours while they subjected me to a rapid blood test to see if I had the influenza virus type A.
Returning back to the nurses I noted that they were not using disposable covers for the ear thermometers and instead were swabbing them with a cotton wool bud soaked in spirit. I pointed out that this was rather unhygienic. Not used to protesting people the nurse did what Indians tend to do when they don’t know what to reply and just smile. Though to her credit she replied she was using a swab to clean the thermometer probe. I pointed out it would take at least a few minutes for the alcohol to sterilise the surface, and in the case of other blood borne diseases it could take much more than simple alcohol to sterilise the thermometer.
Anyway somewhere in the conversation and dealing with the next passenger I just walked back to the line of doctors avoiding having my ear poked with an unhygienic thermometer probe. I had got through the health cordon and made myself down to the immigration officer.
The contrast with the Pakistan attempt to isolate passengers with flu symptoms though was quite stark. At Karachi airport a banner had hung asking patients to volunteer themselves to come forward and effectively ruin their holidays. The Indians were definitely one up on their neighbours at this first comparison.
The immigration officer was quite efficient and soon had all our passports and PIO cards processed. I had been quite skeptical that the flimsy PIO card would work and wondered whether I would have to boarding a plane to return to my origin, but I was pleasantly surprised to see that the paper based PIO card in passport shape and size did the trick and gave me entry into India. While there were no fancy logitech cameras taking photographs of passengers unlike Karachi the officer had the same passport scanning equipment present at Dubai international airport and did not have to do any laborious typing as in Karachi.
A short trip down the escalator led us to the conveyor belt where porters met us and asked if they needed our services. I asked how much, they answered pointing to a notice board that read porterage services 200 RS per porter. Same figure price as Karachi, though from an exchange rate point of view Karachi porters are in real terms cheaper.
As we were working out our luggage two smartly dressed men in suits came and asked us for our baggage checking slips and quickly compared the serial numbers with our luggage. Having confirmed the numbers we were allowed to proceed. Customs check involved passing all the items through an x-ray machine and then we were out. The outside of the airport had an equally impressive facade and the car park was well laid out but Indian craftmanship, or the lack therefor, began to show through with a poorly leveling for the trolley pathway causing our suitcases to tumble off their trolley. Once our bags were loaded up in a hired Tempo van the paid porters hung around hoping for a tip. No difference there between Indian and Pakistan.
Alhamdulillah, we had arrived in India.
1 comment July 13, 2009
Nokia N97 – keyboard thoughts
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
I asked myself why did I not like the Nokia N97 keyboard? The main thing having contemplated over it was the lack of tactile feedback when the buttons are pressed. But what exactly is tactile feedback?
Tactile feedback to me is the ability to tell that a key has been pressed without looking at the screen. The way we detect movement of keys is a combination of two primary feedback systems. The first are proprioceptors and the second are pressure sensors. Pressure sensors lie under the skin and are onion layered like structures which help us determine pressure. These are the primary receptor behind the sense of touch. Proprioceptors are receptors which are attached to joints and muscles, these send back information to the brain on the degree of angular movement of a joint, degree of stretching of muscles fibres and tension in ligaments.
The human hand has five fingers, one of which, the thumb, is positioned so that its movement is orthogonal to the natural movement of the other four fingers. So when we use a full size keyboard the thumb is effectively rendered with little function apart from pressing the space bar as the position of the hand when typing help is in consonance with the movement of the four fingers rather than the thumb.
The opposite happens to be the case when we use a thumboard if the phone is held by both hands the thumb is positioned in a way that allows for its easiest and most natural movement which is across the surface of the palm of the hand.
Though a statement of the obvious, it is worth stating, with normal keyboards we use our four fingers (fore, middle, ring and little finger) and with thumboards we use our thumbs.
Our four fingers primarily detect movement through proprioreception when typing hence movement of the key in and out of the surface of the keyboard aids the feeling of what makes a good keyboard. But the thumb when using a thumboard relies more on pressure detection rather than movement of at the thumb metacarpophalangeal joint (detected by proprioceptive receptors). An easy way to realise this is to try and detect your pulse with the tips of your fingers and then detect it with the middle of the pulp of your thumb – you will notice that the thumb is very much more sensitive. Hence a thumboard which enhances pressure detection of keys and allows from some deformation of the key when it is pressed will enhance the tactile feedback of the the keyboard.
Turning back to the Nokia 97 keyboard, the keys are flat and fixed in shape. This reduces the pressure the thumb when it is placed on the keys, hence reducing the tactile feedback, further the degree of movement of the keys into the keyboard are also limited reducing the proprioceptive feedback. Putting this all together an ideal thumboard should have rounded keys rather than flat keys, which deform slightly allowing the sensitive pressure receptors in the thumb to detect that they have been pressed and some degree of movement all together would enhance tactile feedback significantly.
And Allah knows best.
Add comment July 13, 2009
Poem – Our sister’s 18 stabs
Bisimillah, alhamdulillah.
18 stabs by an axle whirring
Through Sherbini’s breast and baby murdering
In a Faranji court they let her fall
Their response – silence from their pedestals tall
Let the memory fade, a short story,
An aberration consigned to history,
Media complicit – inert and silent
Her hijaab rendering her a miscreant
Consign her to the African page
From the European conscience purge
Wrap her in an Egyptian flag
Muslims – divided and ruled their tag
Will her memory cease
Drowned by their unholy sleaze?
Her crime modesty and purity
Their rule devilish depravity
Can the two compare?
Shall we drown in this miserable sea of despair?
Western silence bears witness
To their concealed malice
Is the French tsar cozy with his fire of hate?
Didn’t you smile as you heard of her fate?
Will hands move or have we no shame?
Is there not a flicker of belief left in our limbs lame?
____________________
On July 1st Marwa El Sherbini, an Egyptian researcher living in Germany, was stabbed to death 18 times inside a courtroom in the city of Dresden, in front of her 3-year-old son. She had won a verdict against a German man of Russian descent who had verbally assaulted her because of her veil. Her husband, who rushed in to save her when she was attacked in the courtroom, was shot by the police. Marwa’s death was not reported by any Western news media until protests in Egypt erupted after her burial. The reporting that followed focused on the protests; the murder was presented as the act of a “lone wolf,” thus depriving it of its context and its social meaning. (Walid El Houri, 8th July 2009)
10 comments July 9, 2009
Pakistan parting thoughts
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
We made our way through multiple checkpoints on our way out. Cars were carefully checked and men with machine guns and pistols at the ready were in full view. In the few days that I have been here I have seen more guns than I probably have seen in my entire life and that is counting the screen variety too.
The gun culture is one of the lasting images that I leave with from Pakistan. Best exemplified by an elderly man who was sitting outside a chemist in a plastic chair. Dressed in a simple white shalwaar and khamees, his thin and wiry build allowed him to cross his right leg over his left easily. He sat with his left elbow resting on his knee while his right hand dangled down by the side of the chair. On the way in to the chemist we had passed the man and I had only noted his presence.
It was only when we came and sat back in the car and my vision was now at the same level as his right shoulder that my gaze traced his right arm down to his pistol holding hand. His forefinger was lightly resting by the side of the trigger, ready for action. I was informed that the gun was loaded and the man was a Pathan. If someone had asked me to judge his age I would have put it in the mid 60’s, it seems retirement is not an option for armed security guards.
Where the government has failed, the enterprising nature of the people of Pakistan have plugged the gap, whether in the provision of electricity with their generators, the provision of education through private colleges or the private provision of law and order there is an entrepreneurial flare that touches upon all these activities. Another example of the peoples entrepreneurial nature was a middle aged man who knocked on the car window as we were waiting for the rest of the group to finish their shopping.
Intrigued by the man’s briefcase though a bit wary of a pistol being produced from it I lowered the window and greeted the man. Reading the interest in my face he quickly opened his metal briefcase to reveal a folder with laminated copies of supplications. He quickly handed me two of the A4 posters, on had prayers that could be read when performing tawaf (the circambulation of the Ka’ba in Makkah done during the pilgrimage Umrah and Hajj). He explained that he had found the duas on the internet and had printed and laminated them and they would be very useful for Hajj or Umrah. I thanked him and apologised that I had just been in Umrah and so would not be needing the laminated posters.
Holidays for the average middle class in Pakistan does not involve trips to the United States or Europe but trips to the local shops to try and fix long overdue home improvement projects. There seems to be a constant low level struggle getting things done and wading through the corruption that infests the corridors of power from the lowest to the highest levels. Simple things such as getting an electricity line fixed will take the better part of a few days as repeated calls need to be made to the electricity board. Eventually through a combination of persistence and a hundred rupee note the required technician will turn up at your property to fix things.
This daily struggle to achieve simple things seems to sap the energy out of people leaving them less time to sit, think and innovate. In western countries where the administrative structure on the whole is well run common citizens are left with potentially a fair amount of free time. It is a pity that countries that most need innovation do the least to provide a conducive environment.
As we stand at the departure waiting zone, a well planned circular hall with glass windows allowing you to see people arriving and departing I set my daughter a quick task. To carry out a survey of the number of ladies wearing an Islamic attire arriving by plane.
At a first impression Karachi comes across as a very liberal city with respect to ladies and their attires, but first impressions can be misleading. She counted 100 ladies of which 30 odd were wearing some sort of head covering in the traditional Pakistani style. Of these 8 were wearing a full Islamic attire, with an outer garment and head cover. The statistics seemed a little skewed from our first impression on the streets of Karachi but nevertheless painted perhaps an encouraging figure that would not leap to mind if I had been asked to guess. Like all statistics there was an attached health warning, my daughter pointed out that the plane that had just arrived was from Dubai and a fair number of the arriving passengers were Arabs, who traditionally wear a more stricter female attire.
3 comments July 4, 2009
Nokia N97
Bismillah, alhamdulillah.
Just in case you are waiting with baited breath for this supposed super-duper mobile phone and you like the idea of a flip-out keyboard and screen, Nokia mobile phone technology, fantastic camera… I had a quick chance to set my hands on one in the Dubai Duty Free. My main aim was to have a feel of the keyboard, would it feel tactile enough, would it be easy to type with?
The phone fits well in the hand and the spacing of the keys feels allright but the keys feel, sorry to say so Nokia, terrible. It’s feels like one of those keyboards you get in public internet cafes that are made of metal and are designed to take a good beating and to be hard wearing.
The keyboard punctured my bubble of expectation.
1 comment July 4, 2009
