Salaam dear young friends. Hope you are all fine by the Grace of Almighty Lord. How is everything going on in these semi-cold days? Temperatures cool down during the fall season, but Autumn has got its own beauties.
One of the most stunning signs of autumn is the turning of the leaves. The shorter days are a sign to trees to begin to prepare for winter. During winter there is not enough light for photosynthesis to occur, so as the days shorten throughout autumn, the trees begin to close down their food production systems and reduce the amount of chlorophyll in their leaves.
Chlorophyll is the chemical which makes tree leaves green and as it declines other chemicals become more prominent in the leaves.
These are responsible for the vibrant ambers, reds and yellows of autumn. The chemicals responsible are types of flavonoids, carotenoids and anthocyanins.
Did you know some of these chemicals are the same ones that give carrots (beta-carotenes) and egg yolks (luteins) their colours?
While walking in the streets of Tehran and other cities, we love the turning leaves when they’re still on the trees, it’s fun to scuffle through them once they’ve fallen to the ground, and it’s a treat to see the little ones take running jumps into the leaves their parents have so carefully raked into piles.
Well, yes, as all our friends are aware, next Monday will be the World Children’s Day. So, we cannot congratulate you in advance as we are witnessing the massacre of children in Gaza as thousands have been slaughtered by the US lethal weapons given to the illegal Zionist entity.
This is surely a genocide going on in Gaza and this is a mockery to the 1959 Declaration of the Rights of the Child. As of 14 November 2022, 196 countries are party to it, including every member of the United Nations except the United States.
Apart from the plight of the children in Gaza, according to a report on November 8 2022 by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), over 27 million children at risk as devastating floods set records across the world.
Number of children affected by flooding in Chad, Gambia, Pakistan and north-east Bangladesh highest in over 30 years.
According to a report, over 600 million children live in poverty, and over 11 million children die each year of largely preventable causes (around 21 each minute of every day). Our society uses over 250 million children as labourers (of which more than 125 million work in life-threatening environments).
It is really shocking. Children are supposed to be flowers of the society, and no human in his/her right mind would think of harming or torturing children, let alone killing them.
So who would commit such atrocities against these hopes of the future?
The answer is obvious: Beasts in human forms. Those who indulge in such brutal behaviour against children cannot be called human beings, even if they resembled humans in appearance.
We pray to God to help us resist the temptations of the devil, and revert to the path of virtue and righteousness – for the sake of children, the hope of the future.
Goodbye and God bless you until we meet again next week.