Sunday, September 27, 2009
Peace One Day: Jeremy Gilley
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Copenhagen 2009: Help Seal The Deal
http://www.sealthedeal2009.org/
Sign the petition and help Seal the Deal.
Watch Ban Ki Moon's Message to the World: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kI0g5p9pCVQ
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Baroness Kishwer Falkner
Yasser: Arab James Bond?
And I guess it just reinforces one thing: that humans have an astounding tendency to defy labels. It's only once you share and accept people as they are that those masks of survival fall away, and you realize that under the difference of clothes, lies as fresh as ever, the human spirit. Under that skin, lies another human, with the same fears, same worries, same hopes. That's what the Mosaic Summer School accomplished for 83 delegates and many others from the Muslim world this year.
To defy labels a little further: Yasser, dressed in traditional garb of bisht and keffiyeh, happens to fly gaming champions around the world for a living.
More about the Mosaic International School: http://www.mosaicnetwork.co.uk/international/international_summer_school/
Monday, September 14, 2009
On the train home
Saturday, September 12, 2009
Crossing the Divide: Allegra Mostyn-Owen
I did not set out to teach at a mosque because it was a religious environment but because it was the most direct channel to a closed community...It was my friend Riaz who set me on this path. He was a refugee from Kabul. I might not have felt sympathetic except that Riaz is an impressive man and I was ashamed of Britain's war policy. In time, Riaz suggested I offer free classes in the Pakistani community. "I'm British, I'm not Pathan now and all those women and children need modernising", he said. "They need to come out of the darkness to appreciate the life here, they need to break the barrier where they're living. It's not Islam: it's all culture and people's emotions."
Quoted from: Crossing the Divide by Allegra Mostyn-Owen, Reader's Digest June 2009.
"She is not a Muslim, but has been an important part of our attempts to deradicalise our young people. Allegra provides a positive message that something is being done for our community."
-- Minhaj-Ul-Quran Mosque President Istiyaq Ahmed.
Friday, September 11, 2009
Unlocking Potential
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Mosaic Pakistan Action Plan
Greetings from Abbott Pakistan,
My excuses are not very different from other Pakistani delegates. Pending work load and resuming my MBA (after about 1 year gap), did not let me to work more than sending my feedback report back to Mosaic office. To be very honest i was also waiting for the meeting outcomes from Unjela et al. so that i could see what else i could add. But realizing the fact that we all need to be proactive and self starter, here are some initial thoughts from my side:
1. Am strongly in favor to support CSR standing committee of FPCCI for the projects that are already on board instead of starting a new one especially since we have not yet developed a firm working platform of Mosaic Pakistan. This CSR committee is working in collaboration of following social sector Standing Committees:
1. Education, Literacy & NFE
2. Science, Technology & Technical Education
3. Tertiary Education
4. Religion, Culture & Sports
5. Human Development & Poverty Alleviation
6. IT & ICT
7. Special Education & Women Development
8. Health Care
9. Environment
10. Research & Development
There are a large no. of projects in progress under this umbrella, each requiring our personal contribution.They are all voluntary services targeting a sustainable community set up.
2. Since all of us are already involved in some community services (at our work place or University), we may continue serving them utilizing the energy and lesson learned during summer school and involve other Pakistani delegates who are interested in it.
3. Though we have so many blogs and channels of correspondence with mosaicians across world, i still agree for having a separate one for Pakistani delegates or at least improve our existing communication with maximum participation. The google group developed by FPCCI earlier seems nonfunctional now.
4. We need to communicate the message and vision of Mosaic at all levels of our contacts. I personally have done the same with my maximum contacts and specially in my Organization where i shared my experience with Middle and Senior Management.
5. As i understand, unlike other countries, Pakistani delegates are having a polar distribution, a major bunch at Karachi, a second bunch at Islamabad and a few scattered. Formal and informal reunions would definitely help in working as a team.
Hope to meet you in Oct
Regards
Imran Khan (Abbott)
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
How can we contribute...
Some of us are university students so we can work quite extensively on creating awareness for Mosaic, and encouraging new recruits. We also have more time in general, as compared with the ones with full time jobs (and families).
Our links in media can also help spread the message about this project very easily, so let's just think about what can we bring to the table as individuals.
We can't create a perfect world in a day, but at least we can get started on making it a better one.
On the Agenda
According to Arif's report, these were some points that we could work on:
The development and implementation of Mosaic in Pakistan can include:-
• Awareness of Mosaic International Summer School
• Support for Mosaic International Summer School and creating a long term funding mechanism for Mosaic activities in Pakistan
• Programme development
• Future selection and screening of Mosaic International Summer School applicants
• Guiding individuals and companies to channel, facilitate and enhance their positive impact on society by:-
Encouraging volunteering
building third sector capacity
transferring successful programmes
measuring impact on society
providing inspiration and positive role models
supporting accountability & transparency
• Placing each participant on return to Pakistan with a program within the FPCCI in their respective knowledge/ interest area for a period of 6 months with a Mentor. During that time, they should be able to evolve a comprehensive action plan including international linkages and pilot projects.
• Create a Mosaic network within Pakistan with a "tile" at each university, where fellows will interact with other students to work on the above outlined projects.
• Applicants for future Mosaic summer school programs may come from these as well.
Mosaic Pakistan
Everyone can post their ideas, updates, pictures, videos, thoughts easily in this place, and we can also keep track of our progress hopefully.
You can also share interesting bits from your work lives which you might think twice before emailing everyone lest they be considered as flooding mailboxes.
Hope this place gets good posts, and I hope Unjela would be the one to start with the ideas on the way forward.
This blog can be deleted in a microsecond in btw, :) so if it's does not serve it's purpose then out it goes. :)