Cool Blog: 40 days and 40 nights in Yemen

A really cool blog which details the life of a student at Dowra 2008 in Tarim.

"Tarim feels like a different world; it makes you want to be a better person. You're better not because you feel everyone is better so you imitate them blindly, but because Tarim somhow inexplicably gives you an extra drive—almost as if the very air is embodied with little spiritual 'infusions.' It sounds silly when I read it, and I know I'm being repetitive, but it's true."


"There must be bad people in Tarim, it's not paradise and I'm not naive enough to think there aren't any. But here, you feel that the inherent goodness in people, the fitra (priomordial nature), is truly present, and not buried like it is with so many of us in this day and age. And it's a goodness that I'm sure needs no religion—an atheist could come here and still be moved by these people, who truly embody the spirit of al-Ethar so much more than I could ever dream of being: They give away what they have to others, even if they need it, and are happy about it."

Scholarly quotes from the blog:

"The secret of knowledge is acting upon it. The secret of dhikr is copious amounts of it. The secret of prayer is presence in it." Habib Kathim.

"Don't sin and say: 'God will forgive me, He is Merciful and Forgiving.' Yes, he His, but don't be like the fisherman who sits on the shore and waits for a jewel to land in his lap. Yes, the sea is full of jewels but you have to go seek it. So if you sin you need to seek forgiveness for your actions. You need to shamar [roll up your sleeves] and be diligent. " Habib Kathim.

"Just like you die if you stay three days without water, your heart will die if it stays three days without listening to anything that reminds you of Allah, whether it is Qur'an recitations, lectures etc. So what if you're not only not listening to things that remind you of Allah, but listening to things that make you forget Him? " Habib Umar

Go check it out!