To make sure I wasn’t misleading you (and myself), I’ve asked others about the term madrasah and its meaning. All agreed with me, except for a girl from Pakistan, who said that in her country it means a school where religion, and specifically Islam, is the main order of the day. She added, however, that it did not necessarily mean they were extremist.

And while the general consensus on the net again seems to agree with my original post, I did find this useful bit of information: “The word Madrassa in ARABIC means school but in Pakistan when a person says they attend a Madrassa, they mean a religious school. So the western media is using the urdu meaning of madrasa not the original arabic meaning of it.”

I’m not usually a stickler for semantics, but I wouldn’t like to be the American around Arabic parents arguing about who’s going to pick up the kids from school.

(Personally, I’d use the word ‘markez / murkez’ to describe the extremist schools).

Good presentation. Apologies for the confusion.

Omar

Thank you for this clarification. I wasn’t aware of this! “Madrassa” is — in America, at least — used to refer to schools that focus on militant Islamist teachings. This is also the term used in Three Cups of Tea, a book about building schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan. What would you call these extremist schools in proper Arabic?

All the best,

Tim

I’m about half way through watching the first video above, when you mention an alternative to ‘extremist madrasah schools’. I feel that I need to pause the video here and take time to point out that ‘madrasah’ literally translates to ’school’ and has absolutely no implied connection to extremism whatsoever, and has only acquired this negative and ultimately false connotation since the whole Obama kerfuffle . As far as Arabs are concerned, you also went to a madrasah, albeit an American one.

Other than that, keep up the good work!

Omar

I have now been reading a lot of your posts after having read your book. I think what interests me most is the very interesting things you do. The fact that one has to travel all over the world to do them is a bit of an issue though. I mean I live in South Africa and I dont even travel around in my own country. For the very first time I decided to start in my own back yard and went to the Kruger National Park which is massive to say the least and is really interesting. It is actually quite wierd how much stuff there is to do in our world. Anyway I started by looking at the tourist offices and seeing how South Africa is being promoted within our own borders. What opportunities are we selling to the tourist and it is truly amazing what you can get to see in your own backyard.

Ofcourse it is never as satisfying I guess as going to Alaska and doing something wierd and wonderful there. I am guessing there is never anything to top the desire to go out and see the world.

I have certainly had my fair share of time off. I have been unemployed probably more time since I left school than what I have been employed. It has had its fair share of anguish but I can truly tell agree with you when you say the mini-retirement is the best thing their is in life.

So for a while now I am working again. Nose to the grind stone but I have taken a job that allows me certain freedoms which others would not. So although I get paid less I enjoy a better quality of life due to the fact that I dont have the stress and am free to pursue other interests as long as I am ready and able when crunch time comes at my offices. This allows me a lot of freedom which is great. Still working on the autopilot stuff now and as soon as that is in place i will be able to travel as well.

I have lived in the Netherlands for 5 years and had some good fun but on the whole what you find out is that living in 1 place can be generally speaking as boring as the next unless you are willing to leave your comfort zones and actually travel around a bit.

I have quite a bit of valuable information regarding the Dutch and their ways in my book. [John, please put your book URL in the appropriate field per the comment rules! Thank you.]