Calligraphy is an art that takes years of practice to master and Quranic calligraphy is much harder because it has to be error-free. And now, thanks to a computer software, calligraphers of the Holy Quran need not spend so much time and effort on their work.
Hasan Rasheed, the owner of a publishing house in Lahore, has developed a software, Qur’an Publishing Software (QPS), which is the world’s first ligature-based Quranic software. QPS not only provides an efficient solution for printing the Quranic test with translation and interpretation, but also without error because the software is completely non-editable, allowing only chunks of the Quranic text to be copied.
The system also allows users to read the original text and have a translation in any language side-by-side with the original text. The software also allows an ‘Arabic to Arabic’ translation, that is from the classic to the modern, to adapt to contemporary needs.
The software uses Inpage engine as its basis and offers industrial standard digital and advance printing facilities as opposed to the conventional methods. There are also numerous visual customization options available for page layout and design. Hasan Rasheed has plans to develop more fonts and improve the existing software by adding on the existing features of QPS.
Vegetable protein and BP
The link between environmental factors and rise of blood pressure with age has been under discussion for decades, states a recent issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. By the 1990s, there was sufficient evidence to justify four recommendations for treating hypertension. These included, controlling body weight, reducing dietary salt, increasing physical activity and limiting alcohol use. Research continued on other dietary determinants of blood pressure as magnesium, calcium, fibre, fats and proteins.
Two large studies have analyzed the type of dietary protein effective in lowering blood pressure. The results confirmed that more dietary vegetable protein and not animal protein was associated with lower blood pressure.
Another study was done in China on 302 Chinese adults, 35 to 64 years age, with pre-hypertension or first stage of hypertension. The subjects were divided in two groups. One received 40g soy protein and the other complex carbohydrate in the form of cookies. Follow up was done at 6 and 12 weeks, adherence was good as proved by the cookie count. The soy bean protein group consumed 27g more total protein than the placebo group.
The mechanism by which soy protein reduces blood pressure could be by increasing insulin sensitivity and dietary arginine which increases nitric oxide levels. The side effects of soy protein are still not fully determined. Till such time, it would be safer to recommend mixed vegetable protein. — Dr Fatema Jawad
Losing all to save trees
Former real-estate mogul Xing Yiqian is well-known on the Chinese island of Hainan for his dedicated conservation of the area’s dense rainforest. Called the “Tree god” by locals, Xing spent his fortune — once valued at $24 million — paying individual landowners not to cut down their trees, financing expensive transplants for unwanted trees, and creating China’s first private nature reserve for thousands of birds and thousands of acres of tropical rain forest.
Xing restored a paradise that existed only in his childhood memories. Today, Xing is surrounded by trees, but he’s broke. He has run out of money trying to save the forest he loves and is learning the hard way what it means to be an environmentalist in a country where the quest for prosperity makes preservation a lonely pursuit.
Xing’s love of nature traces back to his childhood, when he herded water buffalo through the dense jungles, climbing giant litchi trees in his backyard and watching cranes and swans frolic in the lakes. In 1979, he left home for Hong Kong, where his farmer parents had gone in search of a better life. After years of struggle, he returned and made it big in Hainan real estate.
He tried to win the villagers’ trust so they would come to him before selling trees for timber or shooting birds for dinner. He bought gas stoves so they wouldn’t need firewood. He built water towers so they could have running water. He paved roads and put up streetlights. He handed out truckloads of clothing.
“What he bought with his money is time. What took hundreds of years to grow takes only minutes to destroy,” said Zhan Zunhong, 56, an accountant who has worked for Xing for a decade. He hasn’t been paid in four years.
Xing’s idea was to let the villagers stay and learn to live in harmony with nature. He owns part of the land and rents the rest. In return, farmers within the 22-village reserve promise to check with him before destroying anything.
Unfortunately, saving trees was so rewarding that Xing forgot about the business of making money. So he was caught unprepared when the local real estate market began to collapse in 1994, wiping out everything he owned. But Xing’s rags-to-riches-and-back-to-rags-again story is far from over; he has big plans to turn some of his land into a lakeside resort. “If I don’t come up with the money soon, someone else will. They will turn it into furniture. When the trees are gone, the birds won’t have a place to rest,” said Xing. — Samina Iqbal
