Front of flyer for Islam expo 2008. Click image to enlarge.

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This year the festival will offer Muslims and non-Muslims alike an ideal opportunity to learn and deepen one's understanding and knowledge of Islamic heritage and culture in fields including arts, culture, science, philosophy and history.

Designed to celebrate the Islamic contribution to human civilisation, the four day family event will touch on all aspects of Muslim life through a vibrant series of exhibitions, workshops, live shows, concerts and debates.

IslamExpo has been conceived as an open forum where people from different backgrounds come together to discuss key contemporary issues that are affecting the wider society.

There was once a Lion who came across three bulls: a red bull, a white bull and a black bull. The Lion tried to attack them but because they were strong together he decided to bide his time. He befriended the bulls and told them he was protecting them.

One day he called the Red Bull and the Black Bull and said ”My friends I am really concerned for you.”
“Why?” they asked. The Lion responded “The White Bull represents a threat to you; he stands out with his complexion and he is going to make you a target for other predators and hunters; the lives of both of you at risk, let me eliminate him.”

[b]By Majed Iqbal-[/b] [i]www.majedsblog.wordpresss.com[/i]

The Four part episode titled "Blood, Sweat and T-shirts" drew to an end this week. The TV show Followed Six young fashion addicts who swap shopping on the high street with working in India’s cotton fields and clothes factories. Amrita (21), Georgina (20), Mark (24), Richard (24), Stacey (20) and Tara (21) decide to visit India and witness first hand the role of this country in supplying the UK with high street fashion

[b]By Majed Iqbal-[/b] [i]www.majedsblog.wordpresss.com[/i]

Salaam

As part of a project I'm working on I decided to write some short pieces. Snapshots of life that are useful to see. I call them, 'lifebites'.

This is #1. I wrote it after thinking that the...

...difference between a painting and a photograph is that they both capture something beautiful, But a photo locks it away forever like a bird in a cage or a butterfly under glass. Whereas a painting captures but also sets free like a beautiful lifechanging moment that whilst intense is fresh every time its experienced.

Hope its useful. Enjoy.

I love spring. It is a wonder to behold Allah's Creation coming to life again. I remember before I had converted, but was reading about and contemplating Islam, it was spring time. I sat in the park next to my work and watched the pigeons chasing each other in circles. This was one of the things that convinced me of God, and that all of creation has not occurred by some random accident.

So the hard part is over. I've told my mum, dad and brother that I am converting to Islam, alhamdulliah, and am going to wear the hijab asap. Coming from a family of agonostics (my mum and brother) and a new revert to Islam ( my Dad) this wasn't as hard as I thought. Now it came to telling everyone else.

My mum and Dad came from a very strong Pentecostal church- which I used to go to in my search for God- where Christianity was the [b]only[/b] religon and if you mentioned another one prayer immediently followed. To my aunties, grandmother,uncles and cousins, Islam was a made up religon which was all about violence etc. I never thought this even when I was a christian, I knew Islam came from the word Salaam which meant peace ( I had a lot of muslim friends).

www.majedsblog.wordpress.com

By Majed Iqbal- “They appeared normal, just like any other family,” Guenter Prameiter, who runs a bakery just down the street, said. “They had a swimming pool in the garden. We would hear them [the children] laughing, the three of them,” said a third.

These were the comments raised by neighbours describing the Austrian father who kept captive his daughter Elisabeth, now 42, in three windowless underground rooms ever since she disappeared in 1984.

www.majedsblog.wordpress.com

By Maqsood Ahmed and Majed Iqbal-

Borat approached a passer-by in a New York street and said in the style of his Kazakh alter ego: “I like your clothings. Are nice! Please may I buying? I want have sex with it.” But the target of his joke didn’t see the funny side and punched Cohen repeatedly in the face.

This is not the first time Americans failed to get the Borat joke. Two US students who appeared in the Borat movie are suing Sacha Baron Cohen, the architect and player of the notorious Kazakh Borat character claiming they have suffered “mental anguish” after they were filmed making racist and sexist remarks.

www.majedsblog.wordpress.com

By Majed Iqbal-

It was on September 30, 2005, when the Danish daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten’s, published cartoons depicting the Prophet of Islam in an attempt to “test the level of tolerance of Muslims” living in Danish Society.

Two years on from the international furor created by these publications, a sequel with an even more loaded message to this issue is about to re-kindle another international situation.

Dutch lawmaker, MP Geert Wilders, who last summer called for the Quran to be banned in the Netherlands has now made a movie, entitled “Fitna”, to support his contention that the Koran inspires “intolerance, murder and terror.”