What would life be like without little helpers?

The other day Aisha (white hijab) came home from school saying, “One of my friends at school came up to me and said, “Ordinatory people are looosers!”…”

Everywhere I go, almost everyone I know greets me with “I saw your video!” It’s amazing how far these videos have gotten. Ever since the release of the lead up videos for the Message Mastery program people have consistently told me how they love my little sisters and how cute they are. I just have one request from you all…

…say “MashaAllah“

It means the world to me. May Allah-swt preserve my little sisters, enable them to effectively represent and stand up for the deen of Islam, and bestow His mercy upon them. Ameen.

You know what this is exacly what i’ve been dreaming about, how to make cool videos for dawah purposes and i’m so exited! – Alima

The past couple weeks have been BUSY! I’m literally been spending three days out of the week tirelessly not sleeping…working on this program and making it the best possible experience that it can be…all while juggling work, school, family, and life together!

Ever since people started posting and emailing me their feedback and what not regarding the program, the motivation to make it even better is ever increasing.

Thank you so much for this! Truly inspiring stuff for a 16 year old filmmaker like me. If someone like you who knew nothing when you were my age can do so much, it really is encouraging! - Kashif

Also, I never realized that posting videos online could get me so much du’aa. For all those who have made du’aa for me, may Allah-swt grant you that and much more!

There are probably less than a handful of people in the Muslim world that can single-handedly match the quality of videos that Belal produces. For any Muslim who is multimedia inclined… this MessageMastery is looking to surpass anything he has done before! — May Allah grant us success!

-Safi (http://www.fitnessformuslims.com)

Today I released the conference call video recording that I had with “Baba Ali” from Ummah Films.

In this conference call you’ll hear Ali talk about how Ummah Films began and where he is today. He also tells the stories of how he was approached to do a reality TV Show, interviewed with newspapers like the New York Times, USA Today and other major papers. Ali then talks about the movie he is about to produce. Also, be sure to stay tuned for the question and answer session at the end. One of the questions threw us a little back, you’ll see what I mean

This is just what i have been waiting for.

- Mehboob

To listen in on the recorded conference call video titled “Baba Without a Crew” click the link below:
http://messagemastery.com/long-awaited-release-of-baba-without-a-crew-surprise-deal-11.htm

This was printed in The Daily Reveille, LSU’s daily newspaper.Who this Shirien Elmasraya girl is…no one knows.

Hurricane relief workers experience prejudice

By: Shirien Elmasraya

Posted: 3/28/08

Imagine trying to save someone on the verge of death, but they refuse. No, they are not insane or suffering from depression – they are prejudiced.

The room was dim. Dark, wooden walls surrounded him as he was being filmed on camera. He leaned forward in his chair, slowly telling the chilling stories he encountered after the hit of Hurricane Katrina. The darkness of the room coincided with the darkness that surrounded his narrative.

“It was like a ghost town. It was like a horror movie,” said Islamic Relief worker Ruben Vaughan. “You saw helicopters, humvees and you saw dogs, some were dead. And then you’d see cats and some were dead. And you wouldn’t really see anybody else.”

As he explained the situation, those who were interviewing him looked on as if they were frozen in time – as if they were in complete disbelief.

“We [Muslims] are a small group here, but we were able to help people in mass scale,” Vaughan said. “The best thing we’ve been able to do is to deal with people individually, let them know we’re Muslim, and even though you aren’t Muslim, we can still help you. We can still get along, we can have a friendship and learn from each other.”

Vaughan was being interviewed for a documentary produced by Leechon Films, a Muslim owned and operated film company, to debut at LSU in August.

The film is called “Tufaan,” which is Arabic for “Great Storm.” It is about the stories of the Muslim victims and relief workers of Katrina.

“If people who aren’t Muslim just realize that Islam has been around since the first man Adam, that we aren’t aliens, that we aren’t foreign and that Islam comprises of every race and background out there, then they can realize that they don’t have to fear Islam,” Vaughan said.

During the first week after the hurricane, Vaughan said he saw two very different reactions from non-Muslims who saw Muslim volunteers driving supplies.

“I remember there were a group of brothers bringing supplies to the affected areas,” said Vaughan. “On their trip they were asked by different people what they were doing. One group of people would say, ‘We don’t need your help. You can just take it back.’ And the other group of people would load up their cars and help them on their [the brothers'] way.”

Vaughan, former firefighter and former squad boss for FEMA back when the Columbia Space Shuttle blew up over Texas, sought out relief organizations to join after Katrina. He wanted to make sure he got to the affected areas to help in any way he could.

He contacted Islamic Relief, and because of his background in relief work, he was allowed to go to New Orleans at a time when only select individuals could go into disaster-ridden areas.

He explained how some of the male volunteers have beards and the women volunteers wear hijab, a head cover. Unfortunately, some of these volunteers faced difficulties from the very same victims they were helping who were prejudice against Muslims.

“I want the non-Muslims out there to know that they don’t have to fear people who are trying to help even though they see a hijab,” Vaughan said. “And they don’t know what to do or say because they are caught off guard because of all the negative things they see in the media.”

Vaughan still remains in Baton Rouge and is continuing with the hurricane recovery effort.

Prejudice is real. And while human beings see race and religion, disasters know no prejudice. It affects everyone.

I encourage everyone to attend the debut of the documentary when it’s released in August.

Leechon Films plans to donate a percentage of the money made by selling DVDs of the documentary to the hurricane recovery effort.

** To see the original column click HERE , and you can see the comments students have made below, warning they’ll mostly be hate comments lol ***

This past Wednesday I finished developing an project I’ve started called Message Mastery, where the goal is to equip 200 Muslim brothers and sisters on producing effective and profitable dawah videos. Not only produce them, but also equip them with the tools necessary to develop, write, produce, edit, market and distribute their the call to Islam.

With any sincere initiative, Allah-swt sends down tests…

Saturday, the day we decided to produce the introduction video we had thunderstorm that knocked down plenty of branches and powerlines in the neighborhood. No power, no internet, no light, no heat. Where to go to meet my Sunday night deadline? – The house of Allah-swt!

I went to the masjid for Isha, and spent the whole night finishing up development and begin editing on a client project while I pondered on how to make these videos for message mastery. I prayed fajr, ate breakfast, and went home to get some rest. I woke around duhr time, to find that dad bought a generator to get the basic functions of the house going. — Our basement began flooding since the pump was off due to lack of water.

Shooting Time!

Only having a couple hours to shoot, I borrowed my little brother’s room, put up the lights, camera, mic…and action!

That night in the process of capturing, the generator went out. I resorted to using my car’s engine power and ciggarette power converter to power my laptop, hard drive, and camera as I captured the video. When I had 30 mins remaining in capturing the footage, I decided to drive to my university where I can have power and internet access.

I arrived around mid-night, prayed isha, and burned the midnight oil. Once Fajr came in, I just had some touch ups to make. I went to work, and made the final changes and set it to render. Below is the result. Watch the video

Now that you’ve watched video…take action! Do the following:

• Go to messagemastery.com and tell me 1….2….or..3 things you want to be able to learn from this program (you can post it here if you like as well), by posting it in the comment.
• Sign up for the early bird notification list by going to: http://www.messagemastery.com/earlybird