An Excerpt from Yasmin Mogahed's Article on SuhaibWebb.com 


Allah gives us gifts, but then we come to love them as we should only love Him. We take those gifts and inject them into our hearts, until they take over. Soon we cannot live without them. Every waking moment is spent in contemplation of them, in submission and worship to them.

The mind and the heart that was created by Allah, for Allah, becomes the property of someone or something else. And then the fear comes. The fear of loss begins to cripple us. The gift—that should have remained in our hands—takes over our heart, so the fear of losing it consumes us. Soon, what was once a gift becomes a weapon of torture and a prison of our own making. How can we be freed of this? At times, in His infinite mercy, Allah frees us…by taking it away.

As a result of it being taken, we turn to Allah wholeheartedly. In that desperation and need, we ask, we beg, we pray. Through the loss, we reach a level of sincerity and humility and dependence on Him which we would otherwise not reach—had it not been taken from us. Through the loss, our hearts turn entirely to face Him.

What happens when you first give a child a toy or the new video game he’s always wanted? He becomes consumed by it. Soon he wants to do nothing else. He sees nothing else. He doesn’t want to do his work or even eat. He’s hypnotized to his own detriment. So what do you do, as a loving parent? Do you leave him to drown in his addiction and complete loss of focus and balance? No.
  ~~You take it away.

Then, once the child has regained focus of his priorities, regained sanity and balance, once things are put in their proper place in his heart and mind and life, what happens? You give the gift back. Or perhaps something better. But this time, the gift is no longer in his heart. It is in its proper place. It is in his hand.


Yet in that process of taking, the most important thing happened. The losing and regaining of the gift is inconsequential. The taking of your heedlessness, your dependence and focus on other than Him, and the replacing it with remembrance, dependence and focus only on Him was the real gift. Allah withholds to give.


See Full Article here : http://bit.ly/1kJ7Zgj 

How to Change your Joomla Meta Content Generator

I know a lot of Joomla Developers would want to change this to either say something else or just get rid of it,  and don't want to get into installing a third party extension. 

Here's an easy way to do this, roll up your sleeves lets write just 2 lines of Php code to get the magic done.


--> go to your template index.php file and add this line to your header section.
                   
                   <?php $this->setGenerator(' type what you want to appear here '); ?> 
                  e.g
                           <?php $this->setGenerator(' ALagiboy '); ?>
will appear as 
                           < meta name="generator" content="Alagiboy" />


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Changing your MAC address in 5 easy steps [Linux]

Step 0:  Open your terminal window, Login as root and type the following commands ...

Step 1:

       ifconfig | grep HWaddr   /* This lists your mac addresses eth0 and wlan0 */

Step 2:

      ifconfig wlan0 down   /* Closes your current MAC adddress*/

Step 3: 

      ifconfig wlan0 hw ether  [type preferred address  e.g 00:A0:22:A1:12:DD]

Step 4: 

        ifconfig wlan0 up /* adds new mac address */ 

Step 5: 

        ifconfig wlan0  /* test setup, you should now see the new address you entered */ 

Back to the Manual

Upon Installing Drupal 7 i ran into this error on the installation page:

PHP extensions Disabled

Drupal requires you to enable the PHP extensions in the following list (see the system requirements page for more information):

* gd .

I've enabled gd, I've removed the comment from php.ini enabling the line "extension=php_gd2.so",
I am running Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick, So I tried different things and keep hitting a wall. Took a break from it, drank coffee, played some fifa,came back and still couldnt fix the problem.

So I went ahead and hit up a friend (@jjlieza) to see if he could find something I missed (my version of rubber ducking). As I explain the problem I had, he also suggested the same solutions I had tried and didn't work, he then asked if the Installation Manual was no help?  something I almost never really look at.( sure am not alone on this) but since I was already frustrated, I took advice and opened the doc, there it says: "Note: PHP 5.x no longer enables the php extension by default. Please read the links above for installing and enabling your chosen connector"

After reading then I manually install the GD Library sudo apt-get install php5-gd and there my problem was solved.

Never Too Early Album Review

Gee formerly “G-Baby” releases his latest album “Never Too Early” which is a follow up to the double album in 2008 “Behind the Scenes” co-emceeing Sweden Based Gambian Rapper NUBE and “Freedom of Speech” which is an album with positive messages, energetic beats, and very unique wordplay. Upon listening to the album, you will be extremely impressed because he has a creative and unique style, but his lyrics are what set this album apart from others in the genre.

Right after the album release of his 2 albums at a radio interview Gee admitted that he already started recording his next album, when the presenter said if it wasn’t too early for another album yet then Gee Responded the album title was going to be “Never Too Early” After a few months Gee drop a pre album mixtape “Never Too Early –the mixtape” which he specially gave out to his fans for free as a warm up for his album.

The Album:

December 17th marked a day to remember in the history of Gambian music as Gee staged a show at “La Diva’s” which was his album release party, having seen a sneak peak on YouTube I could tell how big the turnout was and the performances were great too.

The approach that artists use to incorporate each element into their songs is the most varying characteristic of hip hop, and the benefits of that are very clear when you listen to Never Too Early. It comes as no surprise that there are a number of great featured artists on the album like (Fata, Gaindeh, Nube, Omid, Nix. Esaay, Barz, Smoke Doctor,IB. etc.)

“Questions for Questions” is by far the most unique song on this album. The lyrics are very well done, and the combination of the melodic chorus by IB and the rhythmic Back to Back verses explaining the interaction of two couples who fail to trust each other makes it interesting.

There are so many great tracks on this Album, but one that deserves accreditation is the track, “Keeps it Gutter” where Gee talks about how important it is to him as an artist to carry message in his songs. The production quality of each song is indicative of a lot of time spent in the booth, this album sounds more complete than any other I have heard yet from Gambia. As listening to the Album from Track 1 you do feel like you just watch a movie part one and moving to part 2 as the album has a connection from track to track. So far it is the Best Hip Hop/Rap Album from The Gambia.

• I am still doing this because of my fans –Gee
• Three albums, two mixtapes and another album and a mixtape on the way; I AINT NEVER HAD A SINGLE SPONSOR! --Gee.

So get your copy to support your very own “For the Gambia (y)our Homeland”

Where to get it:

Spotify: http://open.spotify.com/user/12237271/playlist/635RhWFctpiTDZEz6suSdE

"OFF THE RECORD" NEW Mixtape by ACE tha GodFather... REview

Although the most salient attribute of hip-hop is the words, the production behind it is equally important. It turns rhymes into song, into something you can feel. And while ACE certainly has the lyrical aspect down, often his mix-tape - and to be fair, those of other so-called conscious MCs tend to suffer from a dearth of good beats. ACE released on his own mix-tape which, despite its production never quite seems to take off to claim the beat and make it his own.

Being a big fan of his previous release “Sweet Pain” I listened to the new mix-tape right away, and even picked “voicemail” to be my track of the month in October – before getting caught up in other music. I listened to 'Swag' and 'Like a star' and I was so impressed with them that I gave the mixtape another listen – and I’ve been bumping it nonstop ever since.


Why I Like This Mixtape? It’s very personalized – In the Mixtapes’s intro, ACE tells us that he is liable inside the booth to make complex contents simple as tying shoes. I got that statement more and more as I worked my way through this mixtape, because several tracks tackle serious topics by explaining them in the light of everyday stories and personal experiences. Which turns the struggles of a starving artist into a series of amusing personalized stories.


He is talented – You’ll find in hip-hop that a lot of emcees who start out as raw underground lyricists eventually polish their flows to make them more mainstream accessible. And following his last album, I guess I expected the ruggedness to disappear over time as ACE polished his flow. But it hasn’t. While ACE has obviously improved his skills as an emcee and producer, he has also managed to maintain the raw style that makes him who he is. ACE just has this crazy raw in-your-face flow that doesn’t sound like anyone else. And it worked out brilliantly on this mixtape.

Overall: Ace the Godfather’s “off the record” combines hard-hitting beats, raw underground lyricism, interesting subject matter, and ACE’s unique way of viewing his surroundings to provide a great mix-tape. It’s one of those mix-tapes that I find a new favorite song on every day. Pick up a copy and check it out for yourself.

Peace [Jaaama]

Without a Title

My observation on the Face of Gambia Event.

It was  a somewhat boring Friday night, One of those nights that you would use any opportunity to leave your man-cave. My then distraction forced me out to this 'Face of Gambia' event.

I've been to the one that took place in 2008 (to Support a Family member) and it turned out good so my expectations were high. without wasting much time I change into some descent and was ready for the party.

I had high level expectations hoping that I was coming to see another amazing 'Miss Gambia' with beautiful ladies all up in the place, well; this time it was the opposite, the place looked so different from the last one. The setup reminds me of that of a FURAL.

I remember back in 'my days' when every guy wanted to attend the Miss Gambia because that’s where you will find the most beautiful ladies and all, but this time around the dress codes of some of the contestants I spotted there took me back to the early nineties. (The Jumbah Out, Soul 2 Soul, Tiger Skin, velvet ...etc).

Some of the Contestants were OK though, but to be honest it takes so much to make a Miss Gambia.

As the rounds goes, Came the last round, during this round every contestant have to do their katt walk while Singateh performs his live it up track, for about 10 contestants, ( you can imagine the pain of listening to the same song for 10 times, talk less of this was Singateh, the worst artist at the time). 

Singateh (his swagger,  can he be k'naan?,  the dress code,  the dark shades and the 1 fan dancing to all his songs). Joint performance with the Nigerian artist to their song 'Gambian Ladies' wasn't too bad as the crowd moved a bit while Singateh was jumping like a clown and doing his 'harlem shake dance moves. 9 would be cool if this was in the late nineties.

Here comes the DJ - this dude really do need a hook up, The only track he played through all the rounds and breaks was Michael Jackson ROCK MY WORLD.

To sum it up!

The Good

The presentation was awesome, it couldn't get better than that because you can tell if this was an inexperienced presenter the audience would walk out the door as the round goes.

The Stand-up Comedy by Modou Musa was dope too, this should be done more often.

The UGLY

One of the questions the judges asked I found so dumb.
Which two countries bordered The Gambia? (I've looked for answers everywhere but evcryone else seem  to think, there's only one. I refuse to believe you all. The Judges knew what they were talking about. )

In the end the results where to everyone's disappointment. I think this issue of the Miss Gambia / Face of Gambia should be looked into and taken more seriously because this is a National event and not just a one promoter thing. If a face of Gambia is chosen this is the person that will represent Gambia and us Gambians in other nations, these contestants should be experienced, responsible, somewhat educated and not just anyone that can make it through "auditions".

 In the end it comes back to all of us as one nation, so let’s join hands and make a better Gambia, this review you just read is my personal opinion, and believe I am qualified as an attendee to form one. 

I personally rate this event / 1.5 out of 10.

Merci for reading, and do post your comments.