h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi, I just moved in. I saw your name on a page and thought, "Hey, there's another Muslim already living here!"

Now that I've visited your page, I'm thinking I was wrong, and that Mustapha's just a nickname. Right? (Muqtadee is my nickname, but I am a Muslim.)

No probs, though ! Your page looks full of interesting things so, if you don't mind, I'll browse around. I can see all sorts of tempting stuff about history...

Salaam to you too, my friend! No, I'm not of the faith, but I do have a passing interest and admiration for Islam, and a few good Muslim friends. I'm also planning to write an Entry about it, to go with the one I've already written on the Prophet.

My nickname is just that, one given to me by art tutors based on appearance and personality. A Muslim friend told me it meant "one to be praised" or something similar, and I gladly accepted Fate's judgement.

Of course, he could've lied to me and it really means "backend of horse", but there you go.

By all means, read the Guide Entries, peruse the Journals, but please keep your feet off the furniture.

I'll check out your entry on the Prophet later.

Sorry to say that your tutor was mistaken; he probably got mixed up with 'Muhammad', which does mean 'one to be praised'.

Mustapha means 'Chosen one'. It is a very beautiful name in Arabic, and one of the names by which Prophet Muhammad was known.

Of course, we can still praise you as much as we like!

Chosen One, eh? Gets better and better!

So, if you don't mind me asking, what made you decide to convert?

Most converts have great tales of meaningful searches, inner struggle, overcoming adversity and final enlightenment...

... whereas I was trying to find something - anything - to do instead of what I should have been doing, i.e. studying. You know how it is: suddenly, ironing seems like fun, and staring at the ceiling becomes moving and absorbing.

So, I started reading a paperback translation of the Qur'an. I finished it within a week, and promptly converted. That was 16 years ago.

Oh yes, and I failed my exams too!

Sounds like a familiar story, "picked up a copy of the Qu'ran, and it just made sense".

If all such moments of divine revelation are so low key, it'll be a big disappointment for agnostics like me who're waiting for fireworks and a big show.

Some people do have great moments of revelation; and not just in spiritual matters. Any unexpected discovery or realisation can be like that.

I remember watching an excellent documentary about Prof Andrew Wiles, who cracked Fermat's Theorem. This cool, calm man was trying to describe the moment he solved the final, really tricky piece in the jigsaw. He just stuttered to a halt, saying that he'll never have another moment like that in his life.

My change did not happen like that. I didn't turn a page and 'realise the truth'. Rather, it happened gradually as I read through the Qur'an.

I guess if I'd been waiting for a 'big moment', I'd still be waiting today!

I remember seeing that one about Fermat's Theorem. Wiles was more like an artist than a mathematician, high and low periods of creativity, making thumbnail sketches on pieces of paper, and occasionally having to take a step back from his masterpiece and go have a cup of coffee.

Have you ever had any 'moments' in your life?

Artistically, yes. During my second year of Fine Arts, myself and two other students collaborated together on a screen-printing project. I wanted to do something involving Shakespeare, one of the others wanted to do something with billboards.

The end result: A quote from The Tempest, "You taught me language, and my profit on't is I know how to curse", with A4 size lettering, stuck across the front of one of the art faculty buildings. I found a portrait of Master Will, and made a copy of it on to a silk screen using photographic emulsion, then printed the letters using cut-out stencils, so that the body of each letter and character would be composed of the Bard's face.

It stayed up there for nine months, a wonderfully metaphorical number of months, into the following year, and was incredibly tatty and weather-worn. Unfortunately my collaborators hadn't passed, so I had the privilege of taking it down myself.

It explored some interesting themes about new clichés and phrases and how they fade and become degraded over time.

A second artistic 'moment' was a solo effort and involved me making 3 metre² (9 feet²) reproductions of various pastoral works by Poussin.

I think these were pretty great personal moments, because they shattered the preconceptions that the tutors had about me. They generally thought that all I was capable of producing was tiny fidgety little pieces and there I was pulling out all stops and making some of the biggest works they'd ever seen.

I've had a few moments myself. The one that springs to mind is, unoriginally, when my first child was born. And what a brat he's turning out to be!

Please excuse my ignorance (and curiosity), but what's the connection between Fine Art and Journalism?

As my first artistic example may have alluded, I worked a lot with text and literature as an art student. The written word/text is a visual medium (unless it's in Braille, then I guess it becomes sculptural). It's the ultimate in abstract art and expression, most, if not all, text evolved from pictorial forms. Condensed, reduced, essentialised (is that a word? Well, it is now). Text is used to evoke pictures. And inversely pictures are used to evoke words.

I learnt to write (not just for artwork, but for essays and things) with the eye of a visual artist - attention to detail, text must flow visually as well as phonetically, there must be an inherent logic, keep it simple - no clutter, etc. These same basic rules apply to journalism. And every journalist must be able to critique his own work, and justify every single word - a walk in the park after 3+ years of *very* subjective criticism from art tutors.

As an artist, you're are constantly producing stories from the point of view of one author - yourself - for a very small like-minded audience. As a journo, you're telling the stories of many different people¹ for, hopefully, a much larger audience.

For a number of people, studying the arts merely opens up new possibilities (which tends to happen when you start looking at the world in a different way).

An inquisitive mind, lateral thinking, an interest in people and an appreciation for the beauty of the written word - does this sound more like an artist or a journalist?


¹ For 3rd Year of Fine Arts, we were required to be involved in 'off-campus' activities and endeavours. I opted to do a varsity paper on Social Anthropology.

Does Arabic calligraphy have a place in there somewhere, or is that something different.?

I was at Turkish mosque yesterday (for a wedding), trying to make out the words in the very ornate calligraphy, set against a background of Islamic patterns. It strikes me as an example of art meets the written word.

Arabic is a perfect example. However, I shied away from borrowing stuff from present-day cultures, cultural appropriation is a very troublesome business - remember the fuss when a fashion-designer unwittingly put excerpts from the Qu'ran on his dresses?

I did find it much easier appropriating stuff from ancient cultures - I once made a series of clay tablets written in Persian cuneiform, it had a beautiful textural look (as well as textual) to it. The real buzz, however, came a few months later when I was looking through someone's book and came across a picture of a real Persian clay tablet, and making out 'DA-RA-YU-SA' or Darius.

So cool.

I tell you what, I'll keep an eye out for the name 'Mustapha' in calligraphy. I don't recall seeing it, but if I do, I'll let you know. Then you'll be part of the art yourself.

Cheers! If you do find a pic of it, I'd be happy to put it up on my user page. (Provided, of course, I wouldn't get into bother for doing so )

I'm slightly embarrassed, as I have not managed to send you your name written in calligraphy.

I emailed a friend (called Mustafa -- only one spelling in Arabic, mind), who was (and still is) on a world backpacking tour. Some time ago he said he'd found the name in Calligraphy. I asked him to keep it with him until he returns to the UK.

A few days ago, he emailed me from New Zealand! He'd just left Auckland, and was heading south to Hamilton.

If I'd known he was going to New Zealand, I would have asked him to try to get it to you.

So, I haven't forgotten -- but I'm afraid you will have to wait a bit longer.