On the 22nd October 2011, NYPMSN committee together with its alumni, organized an exclusive brothers' ONLY event at Masjid Muhajirin. Exciting and meaningful activities were planned especially for our participants.
One of the activities was to build the highest tower using only the papers avoided. The brothers was really creative and innovative in their paper building.
Let's see what the brothers have to say about this Camp :)
"Bismillah.
The camp began with a ta'aaruf session, where we had some interesting games including personality shape game that lets you know what type of a person or ‘shape’ you are when working with others. Another highlight was lunch, which was over-satisfying. Then after that was briefing for our trip to DAIRY farm. The alumnis aka organizers told us that we had to buy our own dinner and breakfast for the next day with only $2 per person. Good thing I ate numerous servings of lunch before the briefing! After that was a presentation from bro Remy. An important point that was brought up was that you don't have to ask or fight for a leadership role just to gain that authorization, it happens naturally when people appoint you to lead something.
Not long after, we set off to some shops and bought some snacks after combining our money with the allocated budget. I realised it's easier to survive when you pool resources and work together instead of handling things on your own. After dropping off from brothers Remy's, Syaheer’s, and Azmi’s shiny red cars, we started our trail into dairy farm with bro Hilwan and bro Azhar. Yes you saw it right," DAIRY". So our first stop, we had a sharing session. We talked about how Wudhu' and Solaah can be conducted at pressing situations such as during school hours, when solaah time clashes with lessons or NS and also the working life. Alhamdulillah, the sharing was useful and beneficial, and is easily applicable to my daily life. The session emphasised that there's always time to do your solaah.
Then we prayed asr together, and after that we played some leadership and team-building games, which were really FUN. One of the learning points from here was the importance of communication among committees. When passing information, it has to be from the right person in a clear manner. We did our maghrib prayers together at American Pie, a cave that made us prostrate 45 degrees. It was yet another new experience. It amazed me when maghrib came, all the creatures in the surrounding nature started to make their sounds. At this point, the feeling of appreciating Allah's creations really had a great impact to my heart. Subhanallah!
After descending down from the cave, we had our dinner in the dark on the field. The torchlights and lightsticks helped to compensate for the lone firefly flying around us. During dinner, we talked about Humility. A leader is said to be incomplete without this value. We human beings make up a small part of this universe. It reminded us that we are helpless and it would be inappropriate boast about our own abilities. Then, after we did isya', we headed into the dark forest where we learnt about trust. We got out of the forest safely by trusting the person in front of us (we had to walk in a single file). To trust one another is another key when working in an organization or commitee, another lesson.
Soon after that we got a ride back to our base at Muhajirin Mosque (thanks to the alumnis and their cars). When we got back, we met an ustaz who gave us sound advice regarding meeting the objectives of the camp, just like how Rasulullah (pbuh) spread da’wah to his people. I am glad I was part of it. Soon after, we had a reflection followed by bedtime (even though there was no bed to sleep onJ)
Next morning after fajr prayer, we had a light snack followed by a tadarrus session. We had final session of sharing this time. I learnt that being in a committee is to be committed (no pun intended, merely an emphasis). The alumni showed us some videos from the past events that were organized from the previous batches of NYPMS. We commented and described the necessary planning required for an event to be successful. It also gave me an idea of how NYPMSN has been operating. It was like a history lesson of NYPMS, it was refreshing to get to know the big picture of the current NYPMSN. We went on talking about future plans of NYPMSN.
Alhamdulillah, through this camp, I got to know everyone involved much better, be it the alumni or the current members. Meeting the alumni during camp Amir was very interesting because they had a lot of experience to share with us. And I really mean A LOT. I'm pretty sure all of us were inspired to make NYPMSN strong and successful from their sharing. Well, I definitely was. The only thing that was really disappointing about the event was that it ended too early."
-Zubair Siregar, an inspired participant of Camp Amir.
The brothers head out to Dairy Farm for their next activity. From their testimonials, alhamdulillah, we can see that the brothers had really enjoyed themselves and benefited from it.
"Camp Amir. In other words, Leadership Camp. I was looking forward to this as it was going to be my first camp with my NYPMSN brothers. The event was held at the house of God, somehow this made me more mindful of Allah during the camp. Of course, that doesn’t mean that one cannot have Ihsan when he is not at the mosque or in solah. Even if we can’t see Him, I know that He sees us J
The camp started with an activity which described our personality. We had to choose one out five shapes, and I picked circle. We were tasked to build the tallest tower just using papers. All the groups had their own creative ways to build and make their tower stand. I realised from this activity that having a good foundation to lead is important. It doesn’t matter how long it might take to build, as the following steps will be smooth and easy to build upon. Otherwise, your tower, akin to your leadership, will be unstable and may even collapse. At the end of the game, we were told that the participants who chose circle were the sociable ones. It reminded me that we ought to give salaam and smile when we came across with our brothers outside. Courtesy is for free. Courtesy is for you and me!
We played Country Tycoon next. We had to be smart in managing a country, and work around how much input and output we can manage for our resources, in order to survive or even make profits. For lunch, we ate nasi goreng. It was very nice!
We headed to Dairy Farm. After a short trek into the forested area, we arrived at a huge field, surrounded by the hill. Brother Hilwan shared his experience in NS and working life. We were told that it will get more and more difficult to find time for solah as we grow older. However, we should not make our work, tiredness, or anything we are busy with as excuses to miss our responsibility in doing ibadah. We shared how we can shorten the time for solah and taking wudhu’. One of the ways to shorten the time for wudhu’ is to just take those that are wajib, and do it once instead of thrice. It is even possible to take wudhu’ with less than half a cup of water! Also, finding the kiblah is not that difficult. Just use a compass, if you have. If you don’t, look at the stars. Spot 3 stars in a straight line and that’s there you have it, the kiblah. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Hence you can roughly gauge where the sun and kiblah is at. After we prayed solatul ‘Asr, we hiked into the forested area and rested in a really small cave named, American Pie. Soon, it was maghrib. It was a new experience for many of us who have never prayed on a slope full of small rocks and a place with little headroom. After we did our prayers, we could hear all the creatures making really loud sounds in the darkness. Actually, they were all doing tasbih. And they continued on and will continue doing tasbih throughout the night. We continued on the programme with dinner and Isya’ prayers, before making our way back to Muhajirin mosque.
Through this event, I learnt that as a leader, we have to do our best in what we do, and also guide others along. Offer help if anyone is having any difficulties. Communicate with one another and ensure all information is clearly passed to other members. In a team, every single member is important. Lastly, learn to humble ourselves. No matter how successful or how high our rank is, we are all equal in the eyes of our Creator. What makes us different is our heart. I hope this camp continues on in years to come so that we have more brothers to join us in this beautiful experience insyaAllaah."
- Brother Zaki
NYPMSN would like to express our gratitude to our alumni for sacrificing their energy, time and money to organize this wonderful camp for the brothers. We would also like to thank our wonderful participants for joining us in this camp. InsyaAllah, we'll see one another again in next year's brothers event, perhaps? :)
Head over to our NYPMSN Facebook for more photos of Camp Amir!
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