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Yesterday I spent all day translating an article I found quite stupid and immature in both its premise and explication, and finished at a reasonable time in the evening, a day before deadline! That is a rare thing to happen to moi. So, very complacent with myself and the translation, flush with the relief of having finished the job, what should happen next but the obvious? I clicked on the wrong key.

Gone was the translation.

Not a trace to be found.

It was another one of those days when the little Murphies keep persecuting you, in spite of your determination to keep a cool head and be doubly attentive to what you are doing. There is no gainsaying the Murphies. They must be allowed to have the run of your life once in while. Hopefully, their field day will have exhausted their bucket of mischief for another year, at least.

All of which is by way of explaining why I am in no mood for writing or saying anything for myself today. (Since I had to re-do the whole thing again, this morning. One interesting statistics emerged; it took me less that half the time to translate the piece a second time. Apparently, my memory could recover the text, while my computer failed to do so, in spite of working all night on a deleted-file recovery programme. This means something, though exactly what I have no idea.)

Instead I'm going to link to a few posts from my favourite blogs.

Here is Mick Hartley on the delicate etiquette of wife beating:

"Beating in the face is forbidden, even when it comes to animals. When a person is beating an animal... Even if you want your camel or donkey to start walking, you are not allowed to beat it in the face. If this is true for animals, it is all the more true when it comes to humans. So beatings should be light and not in the face. [...]

If he beats her, the beatings must be light and must not make her face ugly. He must beat her where it will not leave marks. He should not beat her on the hand... He should beat her in some places where it will not cause any damage. He should not beat her like he would beat an animal or a child - slapping them right and left."

These instructions make great sense. As attested here, it is necessary to remember that this etiquette parleys the principle that: "These hadiths provide some of the most decisive evidence that Islam protects women and guarantees their rights.

Islam has surrounded the woman with a fence of compassion and mercy. It has shown that the twisted nature of women stems from their very creation. This is how Allah wanted woman to be. Therefore, the husband must adapt himself to her and be patient with her. He should not giver her too many things to do, or things that she is incapable of doing. He should not make her do anything that is contrary to her nature, and to the way she was created by Allah."

Hmm. And here is one commenter's timely contribution.

Here is Selma of Tehran,

trying to counter the allegation made by some who "..strongly believe eastern poetry is far “better” than the western type."

Selma, a gentle admonisher if ever there was one, explains:

Western and eastern poetry despite differences are essentially very similar for the mere fact that WE are all similar.

Every flower has its own distinctive scent and color and yet… they are different aren’t they?
It’s not like ALL “westerners” are sinking in a materialistic, senseless, emotion deprived whirlpool of events and definitely not ALL “easterners” are symbols of mystic thoughts, aesthetic awareness and unlimited wisdom,… and vise versa.

And here is Norm, takes what a Muslim cleric says about abused men and abusive women in Malaysia and turns it into a question about freedom of speech:

"Women who wear figure-hugging clothes are giving Muslim men sleepless nights and distracting them from prayer, a prominent cleric said yesterday.

Attacking the appeal of modern Malaysian women, Nik Abdul Aziz Nik Mat... said that provocative clothes were a form of "emotional abuse".

Here's a question. If you think that freedom to say and think what you like and indeed to do what you like has to be qualified by a concern not to offend other people, what could you say against this cleric's ridiculous claim?