Aaaarrrgghhh!

Every once in awhile, I say something in class that I immediately regret. Several years ago, I had a student who rarely did any homework and, after I assigned the class a little homework, I said to the student, "Will you do the homework this time?"

The response was the typical, "Inshallah." This sort of means "God willing," but not really. For most people in the UAE, it's just a natural response to just about anything.

I said, "Are you really putting the responsibility for your homework on Allah? If you don't do it, will it be Allah's fault?" Well, I was lucky I didn't get kicked out of the country. It took a long, long time for the students to get over that.

Today, one of the students asked what 'myth' meant, and I foolishly said that they are stories we tell to explain mysteries but that they are real - like the 'jinn' in the Middle East. And, I kind of mocked jinn and ghosts. In my defense, Wikipedia says,

Genie is the mythical English translation of the Arabic term jinn.

Well, one student said that jinn were real because the Quran mentions them. Most of the other students agreed. It took them an hour to stop sulking.

From Wikipedia - Jinns: Similar to humanity, jinns have free will allowing them to follow any religion they choose to, such as Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, etc. The only difference is that they are made of smokeless fire and therefore are not visible to humans. There are more jinns than humans, in terms of population. Jinns have the power to fly and fit in to any space so they live in remote areas, mountains, seas, trees, and in the air, in their own communities. Similar to the humans, Jinns will also be judged on The Day of Judgement and will be sent to Jannat (heaven) or Nar (hell) according to the life they lead.

Every person is assigned a special jinn to them, also called a qareen, the jinns that whisper into your soul and tell you to give into your evil desires. The Prophet Muhammad's jinn turned into a Muslim jinn, on the recitation of the Qur'an, as the jinn found it most beautiful.

I know I should be more careful, but I just wish everyone would lighten up.