There are very few moments in your life when you are forced to draw lessons from your experiences, right there and then; sure, there are times when you could retrospectively learn some sort of lesson from what you’ve been through, but very rarely are lessons imposed upon you at the time of the experience, making you learn things about yourself and others that you otherwise would’ve ignored.

Eid Mubarak, Eid Sa3eed, Eid Kareem! To all my brothers and sisters in Islam, I hope you all had a lovely Eid filled with happiness and joy.

In my three years at university, nothing has beat the experience of going around London during Charity Week, especially during tube and street collections,  and being able to speak to a complete stranger (I come from the North, so I truly appreciate those instances when London’s social norms are broken), just because they are wearing the same t-shirt and shaking a bucket for the same cause as you. The Charity Week Annual Dinner brings all those who meet for a moment on a busy day, together.

She had a brilliant mind and a remarkable memory. Her knowledge of the many branches of religion like Fiqh and Shari’ah, her wisdom and interpretation, her mastery of the teachings of the Prophet (SAW), her trustworthiness and integrity- all these qualities made her one of the most remarkable personalities of the time. She was very tender hearted and generous, no needy person left her house empty handed.

Imagine your perfect society. Picture it in your mind, what does it look like? Who lives there? Who is the leader? Are the streets paved with gold? Is Mr Whippy ice-cream still extortionately expensive? Now and again, it’s ok to get lost in our dreams about Utopia, because sitting here in the dark dismal corners of the DMS Watson with journals coming out of our collective ears (metaphor) sometimes, we need a break… So this is me, on my break, musing about my perfect world…

One of the highlights for Islamic Societies at UK universities is the establishment of Charity Week with Islamic Relief. It is a rare and outstanding student based initiative with the aim of raising the standards of orphans and needy children throughout the world which began in 2004, improving each year Alhamdulillah.

9/11 – a day which haunts American history every year. It is a day when widows and children weep at their losses. It is a day when offices and classrooms stay quiet for two minutes in remembrance and respect for those who tragically lost their lives. It is also a day when most Muslims wake up with an uneasy feeling.

In the village of Jayan, in the town of Asfahan lived a boy named Salman, who was the son of the village chief. The chief of the village loved Salman very much, but was so over-protective of him that he kept him locked up at home, isolated from the outside world. So Salman spent all his time at home studying the fire-worshipping religion, until he became so knowledgeable that he was given the noble position of guarding the fire.

OXFORD: A common theme amongst the political elite of this country is their schooling in Oxford University’s famed “Politics, Philosophy, and Economics” degree. From the brothers Miliband to David Cameron, Ed Balls to Edward Heath, Conservative, Labour, or Liberal, this instruction has nurtured generation after generation of politicians towards a civic duty to their fellow citizens, and to the highest offices in the land.

It was the summer of 2005 and I had just completed the gruelling final two years of high school. With university life in London looming over the horizon and my 2 year stay in East Africa coming to an end, I decided I would finish on a high note, quite literally. A group of 6 of us from high school decided to climb to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro in northern Tanzania a couple of weeks before I moved back to the UK.