Comments on The Square Circle: The Arab connection

@AMIT well, not exactly "becoming" Arab, but yes I...

2009-09-16T10:31:02.076+02:00

@AMIT
well, not exactly "becoming" Arab, but yes I am quite fond of the Arabic language; not to mention Arabic food.
:)

So you like becoming Arab? Domain registration i...

2009-09-15T10:24:44.461+02:00

So you like becoming Arab?

Domain registration india

@Prasanna Actually a lot of languages are written...

2009-08-29T22:01:40.748+02:00

@Prasanna

Actually a lot of languages are written right-to-left:
semitic languages like Hebrew, Farsi...
Asian languages like Urdu...

Even Greek is written right to left
:D

So I guess Arabic's not alone there.

I'd surely say that one language whose pronunciati...

2009-08-29T18:32:26.431+02:00

I'd surely say that one language whose pronunciation stunned me is Arabic.

Bcoz I've wondered a lot many times while passing thro' a few 'Islam-propogating' channels here in India.

And I don't think no other language than Arabic has reverse scripting...
Good luck!

@Dhanya Yeah, but not that I mind that. Most peopl...

2009-08-09T14:14:17.696+02:00

@Dhanya
Yeah, but not that I mind that.
Most people's idea of a "Tamilian" seems to be a skinny person with too much oil in their hair
:D

@Shimmer
Yeah, just yesterday a guy asked me where I was from, and then quickly guessed,
"Pakistan or Afganistan?"

But I think that's at least better than a friend of mine who was asked if he was from Thailand
:D

Haaahahaha i spent 10 school yr trying to lrn arab...

2009-08-09T08:29:31.821+02:00

Haaahahaha i spent 10 school yr trying to lrn arabic, or rather just scraping thru. the skool arabic is quite useless.. and i still dnt understand arabic.. hmmmmmm

so u nt recognised as an indian .. me tooooo :((((((

ppl ask me if im frm pak 9(y dont they rather slap me!) i thot i looked perfectly south indian. the moment i landed in chennai the airport customs person ask me if i was frm maldives :| :O

at least i looked indian to him.......... i shud also write a post on this.. hmmm :D

Oh my... you're from Tamil Nadu... you don't look ...

2009-08-08T16:19:32.800+02:00

Oh my... you're from Tamil Nadu... you don't look like a Tamilian though (which I'm sure you must have heard from lotsa people as well)!

:)

@RukmaniRam Thx for the tip! Kinda worked...excep...

2009-08-08T14:47:37.336+02:00

@RukmaniRam

Thx for the tip!
Kinda worked...except that it drives my roomie crazy because we already have more than our fair share of TV channels in German.

@Lena
Somehow, I have a feeling this public promise is gonna blow. :(

Btw, sorry if you took offense to my last comment.
I don't normally do that; it was sort of a half-asleep-not-enough-coffee-what-was-I-thinking kinda thing.
So, we good? :)

@A new beginning Urdu? Now there's a language I've...

2009-08-08T14:40:59.508+02:00

@A new beginning
Urdu?
Now there's a language I've never even attempted to learn :)
But you really think it has any similarities with Arabic?

@Dhanya
LOL.
Just so you know, you're not the first person to ask me that either:)

I'm from a place called Cuddalore in India (though I've never really lived there); grew up in a whole bunch of cities in Saudi Arabia, and currently live in Germany.

In a way, I've never been "home".
:)

I started learning italian, and then spanish and o...

2009-08-06T14:36:12.508+02:00

I started learning italian, and then spanish and one time even hindi, too good i didnt make any public promises :D

Good luck!! :)

ooh. learning a new language is always fun. and ev...

2009-08-06T00:26:05.233+02:00

ooh. learning a new language is always fun. and even better when is 'teach yourself'. My best tip: Find movies/tv shows with subtitles. Esp if you want to do the "spoken" version of the language.

WHERE are you from actually? :P Always wanted to k...

2009-08-03T23:47:06.445+02:00

WHERE are you from actually? :P Always wanted to know this but never asked...

Urdu definately becomes quite easy once you've rea...

2009-08-03T04:15:54.294+02:00

Urdu definately becomes quite easy once you've read the Quran, with translations given after everyline it becomes easy to understand whats been given, but its great if one learns Arabic.Nothing like it!
All the very best to u!

^^ Thx..strange they have no ISBN btw, I guess bot...

2009-08-02T19:41:55.598+02:00

^^
Thx..strange they have no ISBN
btw, I guess both darussalam.com and co.uk are mirror sites?

http://dar-us-salam.com/ is the US site, and it has the link to the other .com site.

But I guess its better to telephone in anyway.

Bad news - here is the REAL website http://dar-us-...

2009-08-02T18:37:52.306+02:00

Bad news - here is the REAL website http://dar-us-salam.com/
The other two may be fake.

In the UK, the Volumes are distributed by Al-Hidayah Publishing and Distribution, 522 Coventry Road, Birmingham, B10 OUN, UK
Tel: 0044-121-753-1889

Better to Telephone Al-Hidayah than to search for the real distributor.

There isn't one actually and what is more strange ...

2009-08-02T18:29:52.098+02:00

There isn't one actually and what is more strange is that there are two Darussalam UK websites ! You may be looking the .co.uk one where as I found it at the .com one here http://www.darussalam.com/product_info.php?products_id=524

If you know of an Islamic Book store near where you live you may have a chance of getting a better deal - haggle a little.

@Jaffer btw, can you please gimme the ISBN of the ...

2009-08-02T15:56:00.346+02:00

@Jaffer
btw, can you please gimme the ISBN of the word for word translation?
Can't seem to find it on the UK site..

@Jaffer No actually I don't. Think that would be ...

2009-08-02T15:51:04.201+02:00

@Jaffer

No actually I don't.
Think that would be more useful any day.

What I use now is a set of audio files from book2.de
Quite handy for putting on your iPod and listening to it on the way to/from work and stuff.

@Musthafa
Actually I think what you really need is the interest...everything else should fall into place on its own.
:)
For the record, I learnt arabic at school for over 8yrs and still struggle to speak two sentences.

I studied arabic for about 4 years from a madrassa...

2009-08-02T08:07:04.811+02:00

I studied arabic for about 4 years from a madrassa....and within 6 months since leaving, forgot almost everything...guess all u really need is dedication...some ppl who really wanna understand the quran learn arabic quickly....even when they're in their 40's! best of luck!

I picked up a Teach Yourself Arabic book last year...

2009-08-02T07:36:29.629+02:00

I picked up a Teach Yourself Arabic book last year, worked very hard on it for 4 weeks and never touched it again.

Do you have a word-by-word meaning of the translation of the Quran ? (Published by Darusalam).
I learn from it time to time and reading the Quran becomes a lot more enjoyable when an Ayah contains words that I just learned and it seems to pop right out of the page !