Slam Dancing for Allah - The Muslim Punk Band 'The Kominas'

Check out The Kominas, a Muslim punk band based in Boston, MA.

Muslim punk rockers call their unique brand of music taqwacore--a blend of the Arabic word for piety, taqwa, and 'hardcore,' the English word for politicized musicians who write songs that are loud, brutish and short. The Kominas, a Punjabi punk band from the Boston suburbs, write songs that speak to the band’s frustrations with both fundamentalist Islam and how devout Muslims are portrayed in the American media. Their funk-infused Bollywood songs--with titles such as 'Rumi Was a Homo,' 'Sharia Law in the USA' and 'Suicide Bomb the Gap'--have been on rotation on BBC Radio. Here, photographer Kim Badawi followed the band's frontman and bassist, Basim Usmani, and snapped a series of photos that took us from the 'burbs to a nightclub, and a dorm room to a mosque.

Check out The Kominas' MySpace page and download their latest songs.
Listen to a clip of 'Suicide Bomb' here.
Audio clip of 9000 here.

MTV Desi - News story on the "boston-based taqwacore/punjabi punk band)

MTV Desi - News Video on The Kominas

More on their official website!

Newsweek Article on The Kominas

Slam Dancing for Allah

Muslim punk rock—it's not as bizarre as it sounds.

By Matthew Philips

Newsweek

June 11, 2007 issue - It's near midnight in a small Fairfax, Va., bar, and Omar Waqar stands on a makeshift stage, brooding in a black tunic and brown cap. He stops playing his electric guitar long enough to survey the crowd—an odd mix of local punks and collared preps—before screaming into the microphone: "Stop the hate! Stop the hate!" Stopping hate is a fairly easy concept to get behind at a punk-rock show, and the crowd yells and pumps its fists right on cue. But it's safe to say that Waqar and his band, Diacritical, aren't shouting about the same kind of hate as the audience. Waqar wants to stop the kind that made people call him "sand flea" as a kid and throw rocks through the windows of the Islamic bookstore he worked at on 9/11. Waqar, 26, the son of a Pakistani immigrant, is a Muslim—a punk-rock Muslim.

Article continued...

The Family Guy (in Punjabi) - Video of the Day

Warning - The end of this is really, really gross!!

Shall We Dance? A Bollywood Parody

Full Swimming Pool Stolen, Not a Drop Spilled

I don't even know how to begin commenting on this story!? Someone clearly has too much time on their hands... either that or its REALLY REALLY hot in New Jersey right now!

As they say, only in Jersey! - CRAZINESS!


From the Associated Press - July 26, 2007

Full swimming pool stolen, not a drop spilled

• Story Highlights
• Hip-high, 10-foot diameter inflatable pool disappears from New Jersey yard
  
• No sign of the 1,000 gallons of water it contained
  
• Pool's owner says theft must have occurred within four-hour time frame
  
• Police tell newspaper pool heist must have been planned
  
  

PATERSON, New Jersey (AP) -- Daisy Valdivia is annoyed that someone stole her backyard pool -- and baffled at how they did it without leaving behind a splash, drip or trace of the 1,000 gallons of water it contained.

Valdivia awoke to find her family's hip-high, inflatable, 10-foot diameter swimming pool gone from her back yard Wednesday.

Valdivia told The Record of Bergen County the theft must have occurred between 1 a.m., when her husband went to bed, and 5 a.m., when she awoke.

She's amazed someone could steal the pool that quickly and just wanted to know "what the heck they did with the water," she said.

Valdivia told The Herald News of Passaic County that she was surprised the thieves chose the pool to steal.

"We have two grills, chairs, umbrellas, they're much easier to take," she told the paper.

Paterson police told The Herald News the theft was apparently planned.

"Someone took a little time and effort thinking about this," Lt. Anthony Traina of the Paterson Police Department said. "This wasn't just walking by and snatching a bike. That tells us something, too."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Swimming Pool and Water Stolen From Yard

Thursday July 26, 2007

PATERSON, N.J. (AP) - Daisy Valdivia is annoyed that someone stole her backyard pool - and baffled at how they did it without leaving behind a splash, drip or trace of the 1,000 gallons of water it contained.

Valdivia awoke to find her family's hip-high, inflatable, 10-foot diameter swimming pool gone from her back yard Wednesday.

Valdivia told The Record of Bergen County the theft must have occurred between 1 a.m., when her husband went to bed, and 5 a.m., when she awoke.

She's amazed someone could steal the pool that quickly and just wanted to know ``what the heck they did with the water,'' she said.

Calling It a Day - Religious Joke of the Day

Calling It a Day

God: "Whew, I just created a 24-hour period of alternating light and darkness on earth."

Angel: "Oh yeah? What are you going to do now?"

God: "I think I'll call it a day."

Bush's Views on Marriage - Cartoon of the Day

World's Largest Camel Race in Western Sahara - Picture of the Day

Crowds in the stands

Despite strong winds that whipped up a sandstorm,
hundreds of local Saharawis turned out to cheer their favourite camel.

The grandstands echoed to the ululations of female supporters, and a special
enclosure was reserved for local dignitaries.

A race by 468 camels around a 4km-track in Layoune, in Western Sahara, has, say the organisers, broken a world record with some 100 more entrants than previously recorded - although this is still to be ratified.

It was the high point in a week-long festival celebrating the culture of the Saharawi people.

The entrants included 100 one-humped dromedaries, known as Arabian camels, and 200 Bactrian camels, which have two humps.

Cheering crowds

Saharawi women wear long flowing robes known as melhfa.

Women here enjoy a greater status within the family than in Morocco to the north.

The festival's organiser, a woman, said female camels run faster than male ones.

"It's natural, women are better than men," Hajbouha Zoubeir added.

Check out these pictures of "Desert Riders" from BBC's website.

Muslim Barbie

A couple of years back when these dolls were introduced in the Muslim world, they were selling like hot-cakes! :-)

I wonder if Toys R Us or Target sells them? Hmmm....

The very popular Fulla doll is sold in the Middle East wearing either a black abaya or a white head scarf and long coat. Under these modest coverings, the dolls wear fashionable dresses.

Funniest quote from article:

But Jyza Sybai , a lanky, tomboyish Saudi 10-year-old, visiting Syria with her family for a short vacation, disagreed. "All my friends have Fulla now, but I still like Barbie the best," Jyza said. "She has blond hair and cool clothes. Every single girl in Saudi looks like Fulla, with the dark hair and the black scarf.

"What's so special about that?"

Bestseller in Mideast: Barbie With a Prayer Mat

by Katherine Zoepf
Published in the NY Times - September 22, 2005

DAMASCUS, Syria, Sept. 21 - In the last year or so, Barbie dolls have all but disappeared from the shelves of many toy stores in the Middle East. In their place, there is Fulla, a dark-eyed doll with, as her creator puts it, "Muslim values."

Fulla roughly shares Barbie's size and proportions, but steps out of her shiny pink box wearing a black abaya and matching head scarf. She is named after a type of jasmine that grows in the Levant, and although she has an extensive and beautiful wardrobe (sold separately, of course), Fulla is usually displayed wearing her modest "outdoor fashion."

Article continued...

Stand by for the Gay Muslim Suicide Bombers - by Shazia Mirza

Shazia Mirza, a Muslim comedian from the UK writes a really funny article as part of her weekly column called "Shazia's Week."


Stand by for the Gay Muslim suicide bombers - they're the ones with Christian Louboutin briefcases

It is really been a bad day at the office if you're a suicide bomber going home. It is noxious enough that whenever I turn on the TV it's one of "our lot", but now to know that they're actually rubbish at doing rubbish things: that is just devastating.

I understand that wages on the NHS are pretty poor - it's enough to drive anyone to suicide - but not only are you still alive, I don't think the NHS is going to have you back either. I think it's instant dismissal.

My mother always wanted me to carry on the family tradition of either being a doctor or marrying a doctor. She is devastated that medicine is not the sacred profession it once was. Now it has become less selective, she has her eye on the local mechanic.

The recent events have made me wonder - is there no end to the aspirations of the middle classes? We even have middle-class suicide bombers who shop at Waitrose, holiday in Tuscany and prefer a Mercedes to a Nissan Micra. But what worries me is that al-Qaeda's car got towed away. Obviously, because the bomber hadn't put the correct parking ticket on the windscreen. Typical Muslim - always trying to do things on the cheap. The security services really need to erect surveillance cameras at Waitrose on Marylebone High Street - this is where aspiring terrorists hang out, not the foothills of Bradford. That's so 2001.

In the days before suicide bombing became fashionable, I used to think the motives were sexual. Now they seem to be more political. But when the sexual mixes with the political, that's when the real fireworks happen.

With the IRA it used to be basic bombing, but the Muslims thought, "Anything you can do, I can do better," so we threw in suicide and the game was up for the IRA. Now the poor Irish must be thinking: "Bloody hell - those Muslims, coming over here, stealing our jobs."

There are still more male suicide bombers than female, possibly because the incentives for a male suicide bomber seem more lucrative. They apparently get 72 virgins. What do Muslim women get if they blow themselves up? A day off. Not really worth it, is it?

I am worried that, with the middle-class Muslim suicide bombers exposed, things are going to escalate further and we will soon see the rise of the Gay Muslim suicide bomber. They've taken a while to emerge, as they've been hidden away in the closet, posing as horny clerics. The Gay Muslim suicide bombers will carry not rucksacks, but Christian Louboutin briefcases. MI5 needs to get on to this straight away. Gay Muslim suicide bombers will not fail; they are meticulous planners.

I was stopped by the police on a dual carriageway a few days ago – not for being brown, or because my Peugeot 206 was veering dangerously close to Stansted Airport, but because I was on the phone without my hands-free kit on. It had dropped on the floor and I put the phone to my ear just as the police pulled over. As I wound my window down the officer shouted very loudly in my face: “Do you want three points?” “What prizes do I get?” I asked.

He ordered me out of the car. The whole road stopped to watch. I told him I was only joking. "It's not funny," he said. "This is a serious offence." Then he asked for my name and occupation. When I told him I was a comedian he said: "Right, that's enough! I want you to come down to the station with me." "No, I really am a comedian," I said. He asked if I had any proof. "Well, I've got a tight ten-minute routine I could do," I replied.

He looked at me in utter disbelief, and started shouting. "Why are you shouting at me?" I said. "Is it because I'm black?" He said: "Right, you, that's three points." I said: "Can I have your phone number? You're husband material." My mum will be pleased, because he's not a doctor.

Shazia Mirza

Bush's Iraq Exit Strategy - Cartoon of the Day

Islamic Style Women's Fashion

Islamic fashion is the latest craze in the Muslim World! Check it out at Queer Muslim Revolution.

Sen. Byrd's "Barbaric" Rants on Senate Floor

As much as I respect Sen. Byrd and his political views, this video is one of the funniest I have ever seen.

Sen. Byrd comments on the recent indictment of Michael Vick (a football celebrity). Police found a dog fighting ring on one of Vick's estates.

Enjoy! :)