Enki Becomes A God!
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Benson C Saili
THIS EARTH, MY BROTHER
In a stunning feat of genetic engineering, the Anunnaki’s greatest scientist of all time creates the first viable Earthling known as Adam
Having heard Enki’s pitch, Enlil demanded that he inspects the being he was talking about. So to East Africa the five leaders flew and the Bit Shiimti, Enki’s R&D facility, they toured. Enki had, in addition to Ape-Man proper, kept the freak creatures he and his son had biologically engineered in the cages. Recognising Enki, the creatures began to bang their fists on the cage bars as if demanding something, most likely food.
Enki told the entourage that he and Ningishzidda had already tested Ape-Man’s DNA and like the Anunnaki’s it was “entwined, like two serpents”. But Enlil, like the puritan he was, was not impressed. He was in fact outraged. Are you playing God Enki? he asked his step brother. We came here on Earth to mine gold, he was saying, not to concern ourselves with fashioning new life forms. Besides, the idea of creating a slave race was an abomination: slavery on Nibiru was abolished ages ago. “Tools are the slaves, not other beings,” Enlil emphasised.
Enki replied that it was not a slave he wanted to fashion; it was a helper. Enki’s position was supported by Ninmah and of course Ningishzidda. Ninmah said: “With wisdom and understanding has the Father of All Beginnings us endowed. To what purpose have we so been perfected if we cannot make utmost use of this capacity?” Ninurta, on the other hand, insisted that “let us with wisdom new tools fashion, not new beings create”.
It was a deadlock. Enlil decided the matter should be referred to King Anu on Nibiru. Receiving the message, King Anu was in one hell of a dilemma. Enki’s proposal that a new worker race be created via scientific means went against the grain: any attempts at artificially fashioning new sophisticated life forms Anu himself had forbidden both on Nibiru and future Anunnaki colonies. It was not up to creatures to play the Creator. When the Creator of All created life forms, surely it was not his intention that they too should assume his role at some stage. There had to be order in the universe: the laws of nature had to be upheld and adhered to through thick and thin.
Following days of introspection, Anu decided to consult with his council of advisors. The Anunnaki, who too believed in the existence of a Supreme Being they called “The Creator of All” or “The Father of All Beginnings”, distinguished between Destiny and Fate. Both were part of God’s plan, they recognised, but whereas Fate was subject to change, Destiny wasn’t. So the question the council fundamentally addressed itself to was whether Enki’s idea was in line with God’s perfect and therefore unalterable will (Destiny) or fell under his permissive and therefore flexible will (Fate). “Long and bitter the discussions were, of Life and Death, Fate and Destiny,” records Enki in his memoirs.
“Is it (the proposed fashioning of new life) from the Beginning ordained, or by us for choosing?” Following days of back-and-forth deliberation, the consensus was that “Survival (on Nibiru) is in danger! If gold must be obtained, let the Being be fashioned! Let Anu forsake the rules of planetary journeys, let Nibiru be saved!” Enki was ecstatic but Enlil was indignant as usual. Reluctantly, Enlil got Ennugi, the mining superintendent, to relay Anu’s decision to his charges. The miners were not that disappointed: though the creation of a worker race could take hundreds of years in Earth time, it would not take more than a year in Nibiru time, which was their work timetable. They could therefore afford to bide their time given Enki’s “blessed assurance”.
ANUNNAKI CROWN LAYS DOWN CONDITIONS FOR ENKI
The triumvirate of Enki, his genius son Ningishzidda, and his step-sister Ninmah, along with some rank-and-file Anunnaki assistants, cloistered themselves in the Bit Shiimti and there set to work. They were to practically work round the clock till they had produced the object of their labours – a “helper” as per Enki’s take. Now, in fashioning the Lulu Amelu, Enki was not going to have his way. He had been given strict terms by which to inviolably adhere by both King Anu, his step father, and Queen Antu, his biological mother, the former Queen of Orion.
First, the Lulu Amelu was to be made substantially beneath the Anunnaki intellectually. Enki was told it was not an equal he had been sanctioned to create: it was simply a slightly improved version of the primitive Ape Man. The Lulu Amelu should simply be capable of obeying orders and carrying out instructions and not to reason the way the Anunnaki did and possibly entertain insurrectionist ideas.
Secondly, the Lulu Amelu was to be much smaller in stature than Ape Man and much smaller than the Anunnaki themselves. Enki wasn’t to create a creature that would pose a physical threat to the Anunnaki in any way, shape or form.
Third, the Lulu Amelu shouldn’t be capable of reproducing itself. It should be mass produced in the laboratory using artificial means and not innately carry the capacity to perpetuate itself through the process of heterosexual fertilisation. In other words, the sexual urge should be dampened considerably.
Fourth, up to 99 percent of the Lulu Amelu’s DNA should be erased so that it was not capable of feats and leaps of ability both at the physical and metaphysical level matching those of the Anunnaki. Fifthly, Queen Antu insisted that the brain stem of the Lulu Amelu should be Arian, that is, of predominantly Orion DNA, which was significant as we shall explicate at a later stage.
Finally, King Anu insisted that the brain of the Lulu Amelu should be rigged with certain organic structures that would render it vulnerable to corrective manipulation. Enki was not exactly amenable to the conditions imposed upon him yet he had no choice but to simply play ball. Enki called the undertaking Project Adama. Adama can also be rendered as Atamo or Mo-ata in that in olden languages, terms could be reversed without changing the meaning. It has two interconnected meanings basically. The first is “He of Earth”, or simply Earthling. The second is “Progenitor” or “Multiplier”, that is, he who will give rise to countless others of his kind.
PROJECT ADAMA’S LITANY OF FAILURES
Would Project Adama succeed?
The chances were it could. Enki and Ningishzidda had on their own come so close yet so far. They had, after mixing genes of various animal species, come up with all sorts of creatures such as centaurs (part human, part horse), griffins (body of lion but with head and wings of an eagle), and minotaurs (head of a bull, body of a man). This time around, Enki wanted to try something revolutionary, which would be wholly focused on Ape-Man, or Homo Erectus, the creature that within a few million years' time was to evolve, so Enki reckoned, into Homo Sapiens like the Anunnaki were.
Enki had decided that for the sake of the toiling Anunnaki, this evolutionary process be fast-tracked, so that Earthly Homo Sapiens emerges now rather than in the unforeseeable future. In other words, Enki had decided to intervene in the natural evolutionary process.
The first thing Enki and his team attempted to do was to artificially inseminate Ape-Woman in a bid to get her to conceive.
They implanted a Test Tube-fertilised egg (a mixture of Anunnaki sperm and Homo Erectus ovum) into the creature’s womb. In so doing, Enki made sure (at the insistence of Enlil) that the Anunnaki gene was substantially tweaked – in a process we today call gene splicing – so that the Anunnaki component in the ensuing hybrid creature was minimal though sufficient for the purpose.
The Anunnaki as pointed out above did not intend to create an equal: they wanted a reasonable but considerably inferior being. After several attempts at gene modifications, along with a series of miscarriages, Ape-Woman finally started conceiving. However, all pregnancies went indefinitely beyond term, forcing chief midwife Ninmah to perform caesarian sections. Moreover, all offspring were males and all were, if not stillborn, badly deformed from the womb – deaf, dumb, blind, crippled, and worse. At long last, there was what seemed to be a breakthrough when an apparently able-bodied offspring was delivered, it too by caesarian section.
“In desperation, Ninmah a cutting made, that which was conceived with tongs she drew out,” recalls Enki. “A living Being it was!… Shaggy with hair all over was the newborn, his foreparts like of the Earth creatures were. His hindparts to those of the Anunnaki more akin they were…” But disappointment soon set in. “Taller the Earth child grew, in the image of the Anunnaki he was not. His hands for tools were not suited, his speech only grunting sounds was! We must try once small, Ninmah was saying. The admixture needs adjusting.”
Enki agreed and once again Ninmah proceeded with the gene tinkering under the supervision of Enki. “One bit she took from one (the Anunnaki gene), one bit she took from another (the Home Erectus gene).” The results were no better: in one case, the offspring “his senses they tested, they found them deficient. The Earth child could not hear, his eyesight was faltered.” In other cases, “his semen was dripping … One had hands too short to reach the mouth, one had lungs for breathing unsuited.”
Enki was saddened by this concatenation of failures year upon year. Meanwhile, the labouring Anunnaki were relentless in their badgering of Enki. “How far are you Lord Professor?” was the one, monotonous question Enki kept fielding day in, day out.
NINMAH OFFERS HERSELF AS AN INCUBATOR
Now desperate but still resolved, Project Adama Leader Enki opined that maybe the reason Ape-Woman’s offspring were failing was because the container – the Test Tube – in which the zygote was grown before being inserted into her womb was not made of appropriate and compatible material. The Test Tube was made of “Nibiru crystals”. So Enki suggested that a new “purifying bath” be made out of Earthly clay rich in copper and gold. Ninmah accordingly moulded such a vessel.
The improvement was significant but the results were not dramatically different; the offspring still fell far short of a fully-functional Being. Then an idea struck Enki. Thus far, they had been using Ape-Woman as a surrogate mother. Why not try an Anunnaki surrogate? In other words, why not let an Anunnaki female carry the pregnancy instead of Ape-Woman?
Enki’s suggestion was hotly debated by the Bit Shiimti team. As Ninmah put it, the odds that a normal being or a monster would result were fifty-fifty. Just who would be the Anunnaki woman to take such a risk? The selfless Enki, since he did not want to endanger anybody else’s life, offered his wife Ninki. But Ninmah, having thought the matter over, volunteered herself instead. “The admixtures by me were made,” she said. “Reward and endangerment should be mine! I shall be the one the Anunnaki womb to provide, for good or evil fate to face.” Enki impassionedly embraced his step-sister as a tribute to her sacrificial gesture.
The die was now cast. Enki now addressed the Bit Shiimti team officially and for the record thus: “We have with us Ninmah, who we will now call BELET-ILI, a birth-giving goddess. Let her fashion a LULU. Let an AMELU bear the toil of the gods! Let her create a LULU AMELU. Let him bear the yoke!” Put differently, Enki was formally lending his blessings to the creation of a Lulu – a mixed one, or hybrid – for utilising as an Amelu – a workman – to take over the Anunnaki’s gold-mining toil, using Ninmah as the surrogate mother. If anything went amiss, such as Ninmah dying, for instance, he was prepared to face the wrath of both Anu and Enlil, who were kept in the dark about this turn of events.
“MY HANDS HAVE MADE IT!”
Let us at this juncture turn to the Bible. Why did “God” decide to create mankind? The answer is found in GENESIS 2:5 – there was no man to work the ground. It is crystal-clear: “God” created mankind primarily as a worker. Obviously, this selfish “God” could not have been the God Jesus introduced to us in the 1st century. It turns out this “God” was actually Enki! The term “God” in Genesis is used sometimes as a plural (ELOHIM in the original Hebrew) and sometimes as a singular. As a plural, it refers to the Anunnaki leadership; as a singular, it generally refers to Enlil though it at times refers, as in the present case, to Enki and other leading Anunnaki figures.
As we keep reiterating, Genesis was written in the 6th century BC by the Levites whilst they were in captivity in Babylon. It was in Babylon that they came across accounts of Earth’s beginnings inscribed on thousands of clay tablets that were at least 2500 years old. The inscriptions were done by the Sumerians, the world’s best known civilisation of old.
The process by which Enki set about fashioning mankind proceeded thus: the TE’EMA, that is, genetic DNA, was obtained from the blood of a volunteer “young” Anunnaki male. This Te’ema was injected into the TI-IT, that is the ovum, of Ape-Woman and the mixture was retained in a Test Tube made of clay rich in copper and gold before finally being implanted into Ninmah’s womb – a procedure we today call cloning! Although there was clay involved in this mixture, the Bible throws up the notion that man was actually made from clay, or “the dust of the ground”. Once again, the Genesis authors got it wrong. They employed the Akkadian word TIT, Akkadian being the father of the Hebrew language. TIT of course means clay, but the original Sumerian records used the term TI-IT, which means “That Which Is With Life,” or simply reproductive cell!
Ninmah’s pregnancy lasted nine Earth months, not nine Nibiru months (a Nibiru month lasts 360 Earth years). In other words, the gestation period ran according to Earth’s natural cycles, not Nibiru’s. Ninmah was naturally delivered and the offspring was a baby boy! There were clear-cut signs that the newborn was viable. Says The Lost Book of Enki: “Enki the boy child held in his hands; the image of perfection he was. He slapped the newborn on his hindparts; the newborn uttered proper sounds (cried)! He handed the newborn to Ninmah; she held him up in her hands. My hands have made it! victoriously she shouted!”
Project Adama had borne results: Adam, Earth’s first viable Test Tube Baby, was born. Enki had become a God! GENESIS 2:7 says, “The Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being”. The misconception of “dust” we have already unravelled above. As for the “breath of life”, this was simply a mix-up with the place Adam was created in. He was created in the Bit Shiimti, which means “Place Where The Wind of Life is Blown In”, or simply “A Man-Making Factory”. As we have seen, this was Enki’s organic Research & Development facility in East Africa.
The evolutionists have been right all along: Africa is the cradle of mankind.
NEXT WEEK: ANOTHER “LULU” COMES INTO BEING
Columns
GONE FISHING
In recent years, using personal devices in working environments has become so commonplace it now has its own acronym, BOYD (Bring Your Own Device). But as employees skip between corporate tools and personal applications on their own devices, their actions introduce a number of possible risks that should be managed and mitigated with careful consideration. Consider these examples:
Si-lwli, a small family-run business in Wales, is arguably as niche a company as you could find, producing talking toys used to promote the Welsh language. Their potential market is small, with only some 300,000 Welsh language speakers in the world and in reality the business is really more of a hobby for the husband-and-wife team, who both still have day jobs. Yet, despite still managing to be successful in terms of sales, the business is now fighting for survival after recently falling prey to cybercriminals. Emails between Si-Iwli and their Chinese suppliers were intercepted by hackers who altered the banking details in the correspondence, causing Si-Iwli to hand over £18,000 (around P ¼ m) to the thieves. That might not sound much to a large enterprise, but to a small or medium business it can be devastating.
Another recent SMB hacking story which appeared in the Wall Street Journal concerned Innovative Higher Ed Consulting (IHED) Inc, a small New York start-up with a handful of employees. IHED didn’t even have a website, but fraudsters were able to run stolen credit card numbers through the company’s payment system and reverse the charges to the tune of $27,000, around the same loss faced by Si-Iwli. As the WSJ put it, the hackers completely destroyed the company, forcing its owners to fold.
And in May 2019, the city of Baltimore’s computer system was hit by a ransomware attack, with hackers using a variant called RobinHood. The hack, which has lasted more than a month, paralysed the computer system for city employees, with the hackers demanding a payment in Bitcoin to give access back to the city.
Of course, hackers target governments or business giants but small and medium businesses are certainly not immune. In fact, 67% of SMBs reported that they had experienced a cyber attack across a period of 12 months, according to a 2018 survey carried out by security research firm Ponemon Institute. Additionally, Verizon issued a report in May 2019 that small businesses accounted for 43% of its reported data breaches. Once seen as less vulnerable than PCs, smartphone attacks are on the rise, with movements like the Dark Caracal spyware campaign underlining the allure of mobile devices to hackers. Last year, the US Federal Trade Commission released a statement calling for greater education on mobile security, coming at a time when around 42% of all Android devices are believed to not carry the latest security updates.
This is an era when employees increasingly use their smartphones for work-related purposes so is your business doing enough to protect against data breaches on their employees’ phones? The SME Cyber Crime Survey 2018 carried out for risk management specialists AON showed that more than 80% of small businesses did not view this as a threat yet if as shown, 67% of SMBs were said to have been victims of hacking, either the stats are wrong or business owners are underestimating their vulnerability. A 2019 report by PricewaterhouseCoopers suggests the latter, stating that the majority of global businesses are unprepared for cyber attacks.
Consider that a workstation no longer means a desk in an office: It can be a phone in the back of a taxi or Uber; a laptop in a coffee shop, or a tablet in an airport lounge. Wherever the device is used, employees can potentially install applications that could be harmful to your business, even from something as seemingly insignificant as clicking on an accidental download or opening a link on a phishing email. Out of the physical workplace, your employees’ activities might not have the same protections as they would on a company-monitored PC.
Yet many businesses not only encourage their employees to work remotely, but assume working from coffee shops, bookstores, and airports can boost employees’ productivity. Unfortunately, many remote hot spots do not provide secure Wi-Fi so if your employee is accessing their work account on unsecured public Wi-Fi, sensitive business data could be at risk. Furthermore, even if your employee uses a company smartphone or has access to company data through a personal mobile device, there is always a chance data could be in jeopardy with a lost or stolen device, even information as basic as clients’ addresses and phone numbers.
BOYDs are also at risk from malware designed to harm and infect the host system, transmittable to smartphones when downloading malicious third-party apps. Then there is ransomware, a type of malware used by hackers to specifically take control of a system’s data, blocking access or threatening to release sensitive information unless a ransom is paid such as the one which affected Baltimore. Ransomware attacks are on the increase, predicted to occur every 14 seconds, potentially costing billions of dollars per year.
Lastly there is phishing – the cyber equivalent of the metaphorical fishing exercise – whereby cybercriminals attempt to obtain sensitive data –usernames, passwords, credit card details –usually through a phoney email designed to look legitimate which directs the user to a fraudulent website or requests the data be emailed back directly. Most of us like to think we could recognize a phishing email when we see it, but these emails have become more sophisticated and can come through other forms of communication such as messaging apps.
Bottom line is to be aware of the potential problems with BOYDs and if in doubt, consult your IT security consultants. You can’t put the own-device genie back in the bottle but you can make data protection one of your three wishes!
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“I Propose to Diana Tonight”
About five days before Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed landed in Paris, General Atiku, a certain Edward Williams was taking a walk in a woods in the Welsh town of Mountain Ash. Williams, then 73, was a psychic of some renown. He had in the past foretold assassination attempts on US President Ronald Reagan, which occurred on March 30, 1981, and Pope John Paul II, which came to pass on May 13, 1981.
As he trudged the woods, Williams had a sudden premonition that pointed to Diana’s imminent fate as per Christopher Andersen’s book The Day Diana Died. “When the vision struck me, it was as if everything around me was obscured and replaced by shadowy figures,” Williams was later to reminisce. “In the middle was the face of Princess Diana. Her expression was sad and full of pathos. She was wearing what looked like a floral dress with a short dark cardigan. But it was vague. I went cold with fear and knew it was a sign that she was in danger.”
Williams hastily beat a retreat to his home, which he shared with his wife Mary, and related to her his presentiment, trembling like an aspen leaf as he did so. “I have never seen him so upset,” Mary recounted. “He felt he was given a sign and when he came back from his walk he was deeply shaken.”
The following day, Williams frantically sauntered into a police station to inform the police of his premonition. The officer who attended to him would have dismissed him as no more than a crackpot but he treated him seriously in view of the accuracy of his past predictions. He took a statement and immediately passed it on to the Special Branch Investigative Unit.
The report read as follows:
“On 27 August, at 14:12 hrs, a man by the name of Edward Williams came to Mountain Ash police station. He said he was a psychic and predicted that Princess Diana was going to die. In previous years, he has predicted that the Pope and Ronald Reagan were going to be the victims of assassination attempts. On both occasions he was proved to be correct. Mr Williams appeared to be quite normal.”
Williams, General, was spot-on as usual: four days later, the princess was no more.
Meanwhile, General, even as Dodi and Diana were making their way to the Fayed-owned Ritz Hotel in central Paris, British newspapers were awash with headlines that suggested Diana was kind of deranged. Writes Andrew Morton in Diana in Pursuit of Love: “In The Independent Diana was described as ‘a woman with fundamentally nothing to say about anything’. She was ‘suffering from a form of arrested development’. ‘Isn’t it time she started using her head?’ asked The Mail on Sunday. The Sunday Mirror printed a special supplement entitled ‘A Story of Love’; The News of the World claimed that William had demanded that Diana should split from Dodi: ‘William can’t help it, he just doesn’t like the man.’ William was reportedly ‘horrified’ and ‘doesn’t think Mr Fayed is good for his mother’ – or was that just the press projecting their own prejudices? The upmarket Sunday Times newspaper, which had first serialised my biography of the princess, now put her in the psychiatrist’s chair for daring to be wooed by a Muslim. The pop-psychologist Oliver James put Diana ‘On the Couch’, asking why she was so ‘depressed’ and desperate for love. Other tabloids piled in with dire prognostications – about Prince Philip’s hostility to the relationship, Diana’s prospect of exile, and the social ostracism she would face if she married Dodi.”
DIANA AND DODI AT THE RITZ
Before Diana and Dodi departed the Villa Windsor sometime after 16 hrs, General, one of Dodi’s bodyguards Trevor Rees-Jones furtively asked Diana as to what the programme for the evening was. This Trevor did out of sheer desperation as Dodi had ceased and desisted from telling members of his security detail, let alone anyone else for that matter, what his onward destination was for fear that that piece of information would be passed on to the paparazzi. Diana kindly obliged Trevor though her response was terse and scarcely revealing. “Well, eventually we will be going out to a restaurant”, that was all Diana said. Without advance knowledge of exactly what restaurant that was, Trevor and his colleagues’ hands were tied: they could not do a recce on it as was standard practice for the security team of a VIP principal. Dodi certainly, General, was being recklessly by throwing such caution to the winds.
At about 16:30, Diana and Dodi drew up at the Ritz Hotel, where they were received by acting hotel manager Claude Roulet. The front entrance of the hotel was already crawling with paparazzi, as a result of which the couple took the precaution of using the rear entrance, where hopefully they would make their entry unperturbed and unmolested. The first thing they did when they were ensconced in the now $10,000 a night Imperial Suite was to spend some time on their mobiles and set about touching base with friends, relations, and associates. Diana called at least two people, her clairvoyant friend Rita Rogers and her favourite journalist Richard Kay of The Daily Mail.
Rita, General, was alarmed that Diana had proceeded to venture to Paris notwithstanding the warning she had given Dodi and herself in relation to what she had seen of him in the crystal ball when the couple had consulted her. When quizzed as to what the hell she indeed was doing in Paris at that juncture, Diana replied that she and Dodi had simply come to do some shopping, which though partially true was not the material reason they were there. “But Diana, remember what I told Dodi,” Rita said somewhat reprovingly. Diana a bit apprehensively replied, “Yes I remember. I will be careful. I promise.” Well, she did not live up to her promise as we shall soon unpack General.
As for Richard Kay, Diana made known to him that, “I have decided I am going to radically change my life. I am going to complete my obligations to charities and to the anti-personnel land mines cause, but in November I want to completely withdraw from formal public life.”
Once she was done with her round of calls, Diana went down to the hair saloon by the hotel swimming pool to have her hair washed and blow-dried ahead of the scheduled evening dinner.
THE “TELL ME YES” RING IS DELIVERED
Since the main object of their Paris trip was to pick up the “Tell Me Yes” engagement ring Dodi had ordered in Monte Carlo a week earlier, Dodi decided to check on Repossi Jewellery, which was right within the Ritz prencincts, known as the Place Vendome. It could have taken less than a minute for Dodi to get to the store on foot but he decided to use a car to outsmart the paparazzi invasion. He was driven there by Trevor Rees-Jones, with Alexander Kez Wingfield and Claude Roulet following on foot, though he entered the shop alone.
The Repossi store had closed for the holiday season but Alberto Repossi, accompanied by his wife and brother-in-law, had decided to travel all the way from his home in Monaco and momentarily open it for the sake of the potentially highly lucrative Dodi transaction. Alberto, however, disappointed Dodi as the ring he had chosen was not the one he produced. The one he showed Dodi was pricier and perhaps more exquisite but Dodi was adamant that he wanted the exact one he had ordered as that was what Diana herself had picked. It was a ploy on the part of Repossi to make a real killing on the sale, his excuse to that effect being that Diana deserved a ring tha was well worthy of her social pedigree. With Dodi having expressed disaffection, Repossi rendered his apologies and assured Dodi he would make the right ring available shortly, whereupon Dodi repaired back to the hotel to await its delivery. But Dodi did insist nonetheless that the pricier ring be delivered too in case it appealed to Diana anyway.
Repossi delivered the two rings an hour later. They were collected by Roulet. On inspecting them, Dodi chose the very one he had seen in Monte Carlo, apparently at the insistence of Diana. There is a possibility that Diana, who was very much aware of her public image and was not comfortable with ostentatious displays of wealth, may have deliberately shown an interest in a less expensive engagement ring. It may have been a purely romantic as opposed to a prestigious choice for her.
The value of the ring, which was found on a wardrobe shelf in Dodi’s apartment after the crash, has been estimated to be between $20,000 and $250,000 as Repossi has always refused to be drawn into revealing how much Dodi paid for it. The sum, which enjoyed a 25 percent discount, was in truth paid for not by Dodi himself but by his father as was the usual practice.
Dodi was also shown Repossi’s sketches for a bracelet, a watch, and earrings which he proposed to create if Diana approved of them.
DIANA AND DODI GUSH OVER IMMINENT NUPTIALS
At about 7 pm, Dodi and Diana left the Ritz and headed for Dodi’s apartment at a place known as the Arc de Trompe. They went there to properly tog themselves out for the scheduled evening dinner. They spent two hours at the luxurious apartment. As usual, the ubiquitous paparazzi were patiently waiting for them there.
As they lingered in the apartment, Dodi beckoned over to his butler Rene Delorm and showed him the engagement ring. “Dodi came into my kitchen,” Delorm relates. “He looked into the hallway to check that Diana couldn’t hear and reached into his pocket and pulled out the box … He said, ‘Rene, I’m going to propose to the princess tonight. Make sure that we have champagne on ice when we come back from dinner’.” Rene described the ring as “a spectacular diamond encrusted ring, a massive emerald surrounded by a cluster of diamonds, set on a yellow and white gold band sitting in a small light-grey velvet box”.
Just before 9 pm, Dodi called the brother of his step-father, Hassan Yassen, who also was staying at the Ritz that night, and told him that he hoped to get married to Diana by the end of the year.
Later that same evening, both Dodi and Diana would talk to Mohamed Al Fayed, Dodi’s dad, and make known to him their pre-nuptial intentions. “They called me and said we’re coming back (to London) on Sunday (August 31) and on Monday (September 1) they are
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RAMADAN – The Blessed Month of Fasting
Ramadan is the fasting month for Muslims, where over one billion Muslims throughout the world fast from dawn to sunset, and pray additional prayers at night. It is a time for inner reflection, devotion to Allah, and self-control. It is the ninth month in the Islamic calendar. As you read this Muslims the world over have already begun fasting as the month of Ramadan has commenced (depending on the sighting of the new moon).
‘The month of Ramadan is that in which the Qur’an was revealed as guidance for people, in it are clear signs of guidance and Criterion, therefore whoever of you who witnesses this month, it is obligatory on him to fast it. But whoever is ill or traveling let him fast the same number of other days, God desires ease for you and not hardship, and He desires that you complete the ordained period and glorify God for His guidance to you, that you may be grateful”. Holy Qur’an (2 : 185)
Fasting during Ramadan is one of the five pillars upon which the structure of Islam is built. The other four are: the declaration of one’s belief in Allah’s oneness and in the message of Muhammad (PBUH); regular attendance to prayer; payment of zakaat (obligatory charity); and the pilgrimage to Mecca.
As explained in an earlier article, fasting includes total abstinence from eating, drinking, smoking, refraining from obscenity, avoiding getting into arguments and including abstaining from marital relations, from sunrise to sunset. While fasting may appear to some as difficult Muslims see it as an opportunity to get closer to their Lord, a chance to develop spiritually and at the same time the act of fasting builds character, discipline and self-restraint.
Just as our cars require servicing at regular intervals, so do Muslims consider Ramadan as a month in which the body and spirit undergoes as it were a ‘full service’. This ‘service’ includes heightened spiritual awareness both the mental and physical aspects and also the body undergoing a process of detoxification and some of the organs get to ‘rest’ through fasting.
Because of the intensive devotional activity fasting, Ramadan has a particularly high importance, derived from its very personal nature as an act of worship but there is nothing to stop anyone from privately violating Allah’s commandment of fasting if one chooses to do so by claiming to be fasting yet eating on the sly. This means that although fasting is obligatory, its observance is purely voluntary. If a person claims to be a Muslim, he is expected to fast in Ramadan.
The reward Allah gives for proper fasting is very generous. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) quotes Allah as saying: “All actions done by a human being are his own except fasting, which belongs to Me and I will reward it accordingly.” We are also told by the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) that the reward for proper fasting is admittance into heaven.
Fasting earns great reward when it is done in a ‘proper’ manner. This is because every Muslim is required to make his worship perfect. For example perfection of fasting can be achieved through restraint of one’s feelings and emotions. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said that when fasting, a person should not allow himself to be drawn into a quarrel or a slanging match. He teaches us: “On a day of fasting, let no one of you indulge in any obscenity, or enter into a slanging match. Should someone abuse or fight him, let him respond by saying: ‘I am fasting!’”
This high standard of self-restraint fits in well with fasting, which is considered as an act of self-discipline. Islam requires us to couple patience with voluntary abstention from indulgence in our physical desires. The purpose of fasting helps man to attain a high degree of sublimity, discipline and self-restraint. In other words, this standard CAN BE achieved by every Muslim who knows the purpose of fasting and strives to fulfill it.
Fasting has another special aspect. It makes all people share in the feelings of hunger and thirst. In normal circumstances, people with decent income may go from one year’s end to another without experiencing the pangs of hunger which a poor person may feel every day of his life. Such an experience helps to draw the rich one’s conscience nearer to needs of the poor. A Muslim is encouraged to be more charitable and learns to give generously for a good cause.
Fasting also has a universal or communal aspect to it. As Muslims throughout the world share in this blessed act of worship, their sense of unity is enhanced by the fact that every Muslim individual joins willingly in the fulfillment of this divine commandment. This is a unity of action and purpose, since they all fast in order to be better human beings. As a person restrains himself from the things he desires most, in the hope that he will earn Allah’s pleasure, self-discipline and sacrifice become part of his nature.
The month of Ramadan can aptly be described as a “season of worship.” Fasting is the main aspect of worship in this month, because people are more attentive to their prayers, read the Qur’an more frequently and also strive to improve on their inner and outer character. Thus, their devotion is more complete and they feel much happier in Ramadan because they feel themselves to be closer to their Creator.