السلام عليكم و رحمةالله و بركاته

أهلاً بكُم

(R-Evolution) Team APEX

OK.. i know this is a very late article, but i’m very excited. This is my first time writing a blog..ever! Woohoo!…

Ok let’s start this with a picture! The Awesome…. TEAM APEX!! 

R-Evolution, as it was called, organised by NUS muslim society, was a night cycling event, on the 16 January 2010. A strong team of 8 members consists of 5 lovely and very beeaAUttiful beautiful ladies (Gadisti,Ana Bibi,Wani,Syamim and Ika) and 3 hunky munky men (haha) (Abbas, Ishak and Farhan)!

My first time participating in a night cycling event, so i’m ecstatic! Super duper OOONNNsssss. And what makes it more special, is that i’m going to spend a night with my Apex Mentors. Super Awesome! Our dear Gadisti bought us a bunch of lightsticks which were used to decorate ourselves! We were like walking Christmas Trees. Oh no… Cycling Christmas Trees. I like it! Its for safety purposes, besides attracting attention.

We met at Kampong Siglap Mosque ( starting point ). After the speech, safety guidelines, warming up… we started the event approximately at 11pm. Our facis for the night are Izzati and Yusri. Great people! Together as one, with a lot of help from the facis ( although we got lost once… haha.. ) we cycled. From Kampong Siglap Mosque, we made our way to the first pit stop which is the Indoor Stadium. Rest, drink up and made many many practises for the perfect jump shot but to no success.. haha… Abbas’s attempt to take jump shots was the best! Apex Mentors without their heads. But of course, we cannot expose that picture. Obscene. So i’ll put this up.

We cycled and cycled and cycled and cycled and finally reached Fort Canning, our second pit stop. After a short rest, we had to cycle up and around and down. Follow the lightsticks they say. So we did. It was lovely to be able to see the night lights that lit Singapore and made it glitter like gold at the top of Fort Canning. A nice and peaceful Singapore up there. Such serenity was long forgotten.

After Fort Canning, we cycled to Sultan Mosque. By that time, we’re starting to feel the fatigue of cycling for many hours. Tired and sleepy, yet Team Apex endured and persevere on finishing the night cycling together. At Sultan Mosque, we freshened up, had bread for supper and played games. The time was, approximately 4am.

Caption:Yusri, one of our facis showing us how to play the game.

It was time to head back. We had to cycle a long distance back to East Coast Park. There were no cars, no motorbikes on the road, except for the NUS riders as the road marshalls. Strange and eerie. Worst thing, out of the blue,the team started to sing Phua Chu Kang’s SAR-vivor Rap! “SARS is the virus.. that I just want to minus…” Strange stuffs happened at night to my people. I think they’re hallucinating. Haha.

So finally, at around 5.20am, accompanion by the sound of kompang, we arrived at the end point and managed to complete the night cycle event. Alhamdulilah! What a night!!

 

(Written by Sister Zulaikha Surip)

APEXarabiah First Day

We were all excited to be at Madarasah Al-Arabiah… It was officially APEX first day there. New place, new faces… Scary. But Alhamdulillah things turned out fine. Better than fine actually. AWESOME!!! We had fun and this is what we have to share.

Sis Dora entertaining the students with name game. Haha… While waiting for me, the star karat. Haha… Once in a while must be a star karat what.

Getting ready for our first activity of the day. Sis Siti Sarah was so excited lah to blindfold the students. Haiz… I wonder why? Then we grouped the students according to animals. From then on, they could not talk but only make animal sounds. Hehe…

Little kittens, wolves, cows, ducklings and chicks looking for their mother. It was chaos I tell you. I almost felt as though I am at a farm. Only with wolves.

Look at this mother cat? Supposed to find her kittens then she go and laughed at them… Haiz…

Found at last…

Makan time!!! Mee goreng with fish balls and ayam goreng. Yum, yum…

Ohh and not forgetting, we had the “Drawing of myself” competition. For the mentees and the mentors… Here are some of their masterpiece.

Sis Zahidah’s shining sun. She wants to be like the sun bringing light to everyone. Cheers!!!

Sis Sutini drew a crying smiling clown. Reminding us to always smile even when times are rough. Look at that smile…

Our first runner up, Bro Faizal with his colourful rocket with a powerful thrust that pushes the rocket up high.

And… our winning entry… Awesome Sis Tassha with her Awesome heart with Awesome APEX written all over it. Hehe… Btw, the judges are the mentees which comprises of mainly girls. I think that’s why a girl mentor won. That’s just my point of view ahh… You can disagree but you have to write another blogpost. Haha…

Fun first day. Really awesome. Thank you mentors for being with us. Wherever you may be… Irsyad, MWTI, Arabiah… We are one big, happy, (Tassha’s AWESOME) APEX family.

Mentor Toolkit Experience

Alright. It’s my turn to write an entry on this blog. And… I will write on the Mentor Toolkit. Why do I always get the serious serious ones to write on. Any way… Here goes…

I have been in APEX for 2 years now. And this was our first time conducting the Mentor Toolkit. As suggested by many of our mentors, the Mentor Toolkit was a training session before the start of the term to prepare ourselves, mentally, and for some physically to start the new year afresh. Our distinguished guest speakers include Dr Albakri Ahmad, the Dean of the MUIS Academy and Mr Shaheed Salim, an experienced Education Consultant from Edupolis Pte Ltd. And on top of that, we have our own mentors to share their experiences and their journey in APEX. In this blog post however, I will not touch on the mentors’ sharing as I believe they deserved a blog post of their own. I will focus more on Dr Al-Bakri’s and Mr Shaheed’s session and the introduction by Farhana Bibi.

The morning started off with the bright sun shining and Noor Sarah’s face beaming (I will tell you why later). It was a nice weather, and sharp at 9.30am, ok slightly later, Azry (Laili) our emcee of the day started the ball rolling.

First up, we have Farhana Bibi who shared with us what APEX is all about. Yup, it was an introduction to the new faces and a reminder to the old birds. And ohh boy, I sure do need a reminder. Ana refreshed our niyyah for the coming year while reminding us our motivation and our trust to get us going. So what’s our motivation and trust again?

Reported by Abu Hamzah Anas bin Malik, radiyallahu ‘anhu,

“None of you truly believes (in Allah and in His religion) until he loves for his brother what he loves for himself”

Here, Ana stressed on the word “love” and explain the difference between love and want. As Muslims we love for our brothers what he would love for himself and what better way to show love than the sharing of knowledge and wisdom. This is our motivation. The APEX motivation. And where do we get the strength to do this?

Reported by Abu Hurairah, radiyallhu ‘anhu

Allah will aid a servant (of His) so long as the servant aids his brother. Whosoever follows a path to seek knowledge therein, Allah will make easy for him a path to Paradise.

The strength comes from our trust in Allah that with the right niyyah, insyAllah, guidance will be provided to the believer and so worry not. This trust kept me going and hopefully it will do the same for the rest.

The second highlight is the discussion conducted by Dr Albakri on the Complete Student. To be a Complete Student according to Dr Albakri, is to first cover the basic fundamentals. They are 1) worships Allah in true sense and 2)knows and performs duty towards oneself, family, neighbours and humanity and live honestly. He also shared that our behaviors and more often dictated by how we view and interpret the world with the influences of our intention and values and this occur in a cycle. Dr Albakri gave us tip on how to manage time and identifying and getting rid of “time consumers” and setting time frames for our work. He taught us the Re-designing of lifestyle to remove distractions and to focus better. I must say that it was a beneficial session. It gave me more confident to mentor as together with the trust mentioned above and the skill to manage life and time more effectively, I would be able to manage my own school work and other commitments as well as APEX.

Our second speaker of the day, Mr Shaheed Salim shared with us the Art of Mentoring. He began his session by first asking us to write down the name of who we regard as our mentors. It took us a while to write down the names. Then, Mr Shaheed got some of us to share who these people are. Both Mussadiq and Rufihaza mentioned their mothers as their mentors. They would want to model their life similar to how their mothers live their life. Gadisti on the other hand, mentioned her lecturer as her mentor. Her lecturer whom conducted his lectures very differently from other lecturers she knew and one whom she admired. And lastly, Abbas mentioned Malcom X as his mentors and inspiration. From this short exercise, it made us understand the impact of a mentor on a mentee. A mentor is one who inspire, a role model and one who the mentee can look up to. Only when we understand the meaning of being a mentor, can we be an effective mentor.

Mr Shaheed also shared with us a simple analogy relating to mentoring. He said that if  want to create a fire using a magnifying  glass and the beam from the sun, we must hold the magnifying glass at one spot and hold it long enough. This is how mentoring should be, according to him. To see a change in a mentee, the mentor must be focus, committed and consistent, long enough to spark the change. This is something that a lot of mentor forget. Changes cannot occur instantaneously, it takes time and effort and of course commitment.

At the end of the day, I must say the Mentor Toolkit had been a beneficial session for me.  It gave me new confidence and refresh my spirit of mentoring.  I would just want to end this blog post by quoting Bro Mas’uud, “The plaforms are there, the cause is clear, the consequences rewarding, the people inspiring, and the support? Only YOU have the answer to that”.

Smile…

Food was awesome. Thank you Mas Aini.

Ladies of APEX…

Now, you know what I mean? (Why Noor Sarah beaming…)

The Mentor’s Tool-Kit

To register for the below event please click here

To register for the above event please click here

Survivor Ubin: APEX Style!

Ever heard of the Malay phrase, “perlahan-perlahan kayuh?” Figuratively what it means is to take one’s time, slowly but steadily in achieving a particular goal. But well, last Wednesday, the 9th of December 2009 i could only grin to myself when this phrase popped up in my head.

You see, “Perlahan-perlahan kayuh” literally meant “[take your time to] cycle slowly”. For someone who spent his childhood indoors reading books and playing with WWF figurines, Pulau Ubin, with its narrow roads and treacherous slopes indeed provided me with quite a challenging cycling experience! Truth be told, it wasn’t the first time i was actually cycling on the island and i thought it was going to be a breeze. However i suppose, what was in store for me was a lesson in humility. Humility and patience! I must have stopped my bicycle like a hundred times before we even officially stopped for lunch-time. Unlike other times, i was actually carrying a pretty heavy load on my shoulders. A heavy bag which included a first aid kid and notes from a fellow brother made balancing on the bicycle even more difficult!

I was mostly at the back and had the brothers to thank for being patient with me, as they accompanied me and never once complained about my lack of skill in maneuvering on two wheels.

Thanks to our two guides, Brothers Mokhsin and Ishak, we were brought to the Ketam Mountain Bike Trail in the northwest side of the island. The view from there was breath-taking. And despite the many falls we had to endure there, you could see the smiles light up on the faces of our mentors as they rode up and down the slopes of the trail.

The day before, i had told the mentors coming to pray for good weather. Well, not only did it not rain, the heat from the sun was scorching! We appreciated the momentary breaks we took under the shelters as we took pictures to remind us of this day. We stopped for lunch at the house of the “Makcik with the Cookie Monster”. We called it that because her house, which was along the main road, had a “statue” of Cookie Monster that you could not miss! The Makcik sold drinks, so it was a welcomed break for us to rehydrate amidst the heat of the afternoon. There, we also had our lunch – packed Nasi Lemak purchased earlier in the morning on mainland.

Thanks to Mokshin’s Ubin connections, we were invited by Makcik Kamariah, the owner of one of the few remaining kampung houses in Pulau Ubin to do our Zuhur. It was an exciting if not humbling experience for many of us, to take our Wudhu’ from the nearby well. This trip definitely strengthened our Ukhwah as sisters helped each other give massages and the brothers helped each other to take their Wudhu’.

By the time we were done with our rest, it was nearly 3pm. We were contemplating whether we should continue with the plan of heading to the Chek Jawa wetlands on the eastern part of the island. And honestly, i’m glad we did, for visiting Chek Jawa was the highlight of the day. Walking along the boardwalk, staring into the horizon where the clouds and the sea seem to merge seamlessly, marvelling at the way the waves crashed into the rocks, feeling the breeze blowing in our faces and against our hair, it was an experience not to be forgotten anytime soon.

Being so close to nature gave me much time to contemplate the Majesty of Allah. I was reminded of the ayat from Surah al-Baqarah:

Lo! In the creation of the heavens and the earth, and the difference of night and day, and the ships which run upon the sea with that which is of use to men, and the water which Allah sendeth down from the sky, thereby reviving the earth after its death, and dispersing all kinds of beasts therein, and (in) the ordinance of the winds, and the clouds obedient between heaven and earth: are signs (of Allah’s Sovereignty) for people who have sense. (2:164)

It may have been a tiring, even painful experience for some of us. But by the time the day ended, you could tell from their faces that the mentors enjoyed every bit of it. And though some would say they’ll never want to step into Pulau Ubin for the foreseeable future, the bonds that were built and the experiences that were shared were some things to bring back with us as we looked to another year in APEX.

Thank you everyone who made this experience possible.

(Written by Brother Abbas Khan)

Apex Appreciates 2009

Bismillah walhamdulillah

Thank You So much dearest Mentors for gracing the occasion last Saturday.

I would like to attach here the

1. APEX Appreciates Opening Speech 2009 for our Mentors

2. APEX Appreciates Closing Speech 2009 by Brother Mas’uud dedicated to Teachers and those who made it possible this year

Appeciates Video 2009 By Brother Norhafiz

The Keys to Acceptance

Bismillah

Wassolatu wassalamu ‘alaa Rasulillah =)

Here, I would like to attach two documents

1. The Keys To Acceptance and Etiquette of Supplications by Sister Farhana Munshi that she presented to the kids last Saturday

2. Apex Appreciation Speech 2008

Hope it is of benefit. Amin

Card From NUSMS 45th Executive Committee

A lovely card from the 45th NUSMS Executive Committee for the Apex Mentors. It came together with the two super-nice-yummy cakes. =)
It is hard to find such wonderful and graceful leaders, whom truly lead by example. Many of them are apex mentors themselves, Masha Allah!
May it be a form of motivation for all of us in our insya allah noble pursuit for the academic excellence of our community. Amin!

On behalf of the Apex Exco Committee and the Apex Mentors, allow me to express our heartfelt thanks to its President, Syed Harun Al-Habashi and the formidable line-up of excos for their strong support to the Apex Programme!

May they achieve their goals for this working year! Amin!

An Elite’s Credo (for all Muslim learners)

“To begin my every action with a niat,

 

To be able to define exactly what I want,

 

To be so strong that

nothing can disturb my peace of mind.

 

To wear a cheerful countenance, a tranquil smile,

and charm every living creature I meet.

 

To focus only on the best,

to ask questions for the best results and expect the best.

 

To rehearse and rehearse; improve and improve;

in a relentless pursuit of excellence.

 

To give so much time to the improvement of myself

that I have no time to criticize others.

 

To find something that I like in my friends,

say good words to them,

let them see themselves in the best light possible

and know that they are special.

 

To put behind the mistakes of the past and

press on to the greater achievements of the future.

 

To be too large for worry, too noble for anger,

too brave for fear and too wise for vain talk.

 

Life’s victories don’t always go to the stronger

or the faster hand;

They go to the one who has faith in God;

has faith in himself;

has good conduct and always think ‘I can’.

 

It’s in the heart;

It’s all in a state of mind”.

————

Alhamdulillah now that I have my own account,  I can post this by myself. Syukran bro Azhar for the invite

The Lesson in a Spoon

 

“You can do it! You must believe in yourself… you have it in you. You CAN do it!”

How many times have we heard that? Be it from our parents, teachers, coaches, or even friends. Oh, it’s such a cliché. Yes, yes, I knowww I can do it. Yes, it’s so easy. All I have to do is believe in myself.

Yeah, right.

So often, when someone comes along giving you the “You Can Do It” lecture, you give a weak smile saying, “I will try harder the next time“ but in your mind, you shrug it off, thinking, what do THEY know? It’s just my nature that I cannot do Math. I just don’t get it. No matter how hard I try, it is just not in me.

It’s just not in me.

Do you really know what is in you? And for that matter, what isn’t?

Personally, I’ve always thought I knew what was in me, what I was capable of, and I certainly always thought I knew what were my limits. But all these firmly established beliefs crumbled on the day I bent a stiff metal tablespoon with my bare hands.

Wait, a METAL table spoon? Did I REALLY bend the spoon? Me? Someone who would often shy away from arm wrestling competitions? Seriously?

MasyaAllah, yes I really did bend the spoon. But how was this possible? It was definitely not within my physical ability to accomplish such a feat. What happened?

Honestly, I am not so sure myself. All I remember was the overwhelming sensation that came over me, that engulfed me, on every level of my being. Never before have I experienced something so incredible.

But the question still remains, how?

It all started on the cold, cold floor of a quiet musollah in a small Madrasah tucked in a cosy corner on Windstedt Road. The Primary 6 cohort, together with their Apex mentors, was around me, all of us with a spoon in hand, and very nice stranger named Ameerah was talking to us. She was guiding us with her voice so soft, yet filled with unmistakable conviction. After explaining to us the purpose of this exercise, she began.

Bismillah, close your eyes. Slowly, let us recite Al-Fatihah. Alhamdullillahi Rabbil ‘Alameen… I began. I tried to focus on my recitation of the opening chapter, but the whisperings in my mind were too distracting. Honestly, I was highly skeptical of the whole idea. I didn’t believe we were going to really bend the spoon ourselves. There must be some trick, some strange illusion… or maybe it wouldn’t be a literal bending of the spoon, but more so a metaphorical one. This is such a waste of time, scoffed my skeptical mind.

Wa la-dhooleen. Amin. Ya Allah, please guide us, I whispered, now my fearful heart over-taking. With that, I allowed myself to be immersed in the darkness of my mind.

“Only if you fully believe you can bend the spoon, that you will bend it”, Ameerah disrupted the lull of my thoughts. What nonsense… whether I believe it or not, the fact of the matter is, I’m holding a thick steel spoon. Does she know what is steel? Does she know its structure? You can’t bend steel, my skeptical mind retorted. But hey, what’s the harm of believing the illogical? I can simply discard it as soon as I get out of here. So let’s just give this a chance. After all, I do enjoy a little fantasy in my life =P.

Alright, I will play along with this.

Oh my skeptical mind, edit your thoughts. From now on, think:

I CANNOT BEND THE STEEL SPOON.
Focus, now. What is she saying? Imagine a white line in the 3-D blackness of my mind? Oh yes, there it is. Focus, focus… bring the line closer to you and at the same time condense it till its just a point. Focus the point between your two eyes. Focus, focus, focusss! Ya Allah! What line is this? It is causing my head to throb. My heart is suddenly excited! It vigorously pumps adrenaline to my head, causing my head to throb to its rhythm. What is happening? My mind and my heart are in sync, with every pump the intensity of the little dot on my forehead doubles, then triples! The intensity of this dot is now overwhelming… this is truly exhilarating! Faster and faster my heart and my mind raced. Faster!

Ya Allah protect me, Ya Allah protect me, Ya Allah protect me… my heart suddenly feared. This is so strange; let this not be something that would lead me away from You. Oh Allah protect me.

Open your eyes, Ameerah brought me back to the musollah. I looked around me, everything seemed normal. Everyone seemed as they were just ten minutes ago. But my head was buzzing. What really happened? I couldn’t comprehend it though it all happened within me. What happened?

No time to think. Ameerah says close your eyes once more. Now you see colours. Swirling, majestic colours. All signifying the energy in the room. Oh let the energy swirl around you. Let it engulf you. Just focus yourself in the room of colours, in the room of energy. Embrace the moment. And let the moment embrace you.

Listen to Ameerah. You must remember that the spoon bends because of Allah. The energy to make the spoon bend, all comes from Allah. We come from Allah. My hands are from Allah. The spoon is from Allah. It is Allah who will bend the spoon for you. It is Allah who has given you all that you have. Allah is everything, you are nothing.

The swirling colours of energy are now so concentrated around me. Direct them up and into your head. Let all of if flow into your head, until no colour is left in the room.

Then just as suddenly as before, my mind and my heart united, throbbing in rhythm at an unfathomable rate. I feel it again! The mysterious, yet harmonious, partnership between these two components of my being. I don’t understand it! Yet strangely, the familiarity of it happening for the second time has caused a deep sense of delight within myself. I found myself feeling terribly excited!

Now the energy was so intense in my head, I felt it was literally going to burst. It had to be directed somewhere… Ameerah said the shoulders. You’re supposed to bend the spoon, remember? So slowly, direct the energy into your shoulders. Do you feel it all concentrated in your shoulders? Then slowly, from the shoulders to the arms, then down to the hands. Focus it all on your palms. Now with all you’ve got, push the energy into the spoon. Yes, that’s it, let it flow into the spoon. Let it flow. Feel it, feel the energy from every level of your being flowing into the spoon. Everything. Do not fear, just let the energy flow. Focus, focus…

My mind has stopped throbbing. Now my hands were beginning develop a prickly hot feeling, the blood buzzing and filling up every corner of my palms clasped around the spoon. I was focused, I was pushing the energy into the spoon. I was fully wrapped in this belief. I truly believe that I can bend this piece of steel. With Allah’s help, I can definitely do this. I have no doubt.

Suddenly it came – Bend! Bend! Bend! Bend! Bend! The gentle tone of Ameerah’s voice broke into a hasty and forceful command: BEND!

The sudden change in pace disabled any form of rational thinking and my hands obeyed the one command that was filling the room – BEND! It pushed, and the spoon followed! All too easily! Suddenly reality dawned upon me and I couldn’t believe what just happened. In shock, I dropped the spoon and opened my eyes.

Ya Allah! It bent! It really did bend. MasyaAllah! My heart was still racing, my mind was so confused, my hands were unable to move. It bent!

It took me a few seconds before I picked up the spoon to inspect it. MasyaAllah, masyaAllah, masyaAllah. Look at the spoon. I felt truly humbled.

Oh my believing mind, embed that thought:

I BENT THE SPOON.
Oh my believing heart, cleanse yourself:

ALLAH BENT THE SPOON.
The spoon in hand is bent. My heart beats, La illaha illaAllah! Allahu Akhbar! Allahu Akhbar! Allahu Akhbar!

 

 

MasyaAllah, it all started with Bismillah.

BismillahiRahmaniRahim. Don’t you understand? With Allah’s name, anything is possible. With His power, with trust in Him, with a heart devoted to Him only. Anything is possible. Because everything is from Him. You have to believe that first; you have to truly believe in Him first, before you can ever believe in yourself.

Yes! You can do it… it IS in you. Because Allah is with you.

InsyaAllah.

 

 

Verily Allah has Power over All things