Da'wah Trip to Texas Through a Professional Academic Path

By: Syaefudin Ali Akhmad

Thank God, with Allah's permission and help, we were able to visit the city of San Antonio, the state of Texas, about 3 hours from the cities of Houston and Dallas. Our visit was at the invitation of ASBMB or the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, a professional organization of chemists, biochemists and molecular biology whose members from all states of the United States are members of the Experimental Biology (EB) forum. Next year 2020 the Experimental Biology meeting will be held in San Diego with the attendance of up to 14.000 people from various medical professions in the fields of Anatomy, Physiology, Pharmacology, Biochemistry and Physical Chemistry (please open googling eb2020). We were present as members of the ASBMB and also participants in the ASBMB conference with the theme Transforming education of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology in Life Science which was held at the University of Incarnate Word (UIW) San Antonio Texas starting from July 25-28 2019. We presented a poster presentation with the title of lesson learned from Biochemistry Online Learning of Harvard Medical School to share experiences while we attended the 2-month online course at Harvard Medical School starting from the requirements, costs, learning models, materials, assessments, and evaluation of the program with all its advantages and disadvantages through the cerego application with an Adaptive Learning approach.

The event was attended by more than 100 participants from all universities in all states of the United States who are members of ASBMB. This meeting itself is the organization's annual routine meeting and every month there are also regular meetings according to their respective interests or research interest groups which are divided into lipid research interests, research on the discovery of new biomolecules and research on instrumentation for the development of quantitative measuring instruments to maintain the quality of biochemical examination results. In August this year a meeting will be held on LC/MS applications for the discovery of new biomolecules. The positive benefits that we feel after being able to join as ASBMB members are being able to update knowledge and share experiences and share the latest evidence in biochemistry education and being able to keep abreast of the latest developments, especially in the world of biochemical and molecular biology research. Another benefit is being able to join in multicenter research collaborations and networking to improve Biochemistry Education within the CURE network or course based undergraduate research experience. CURE was formed to standardize the biochemistry and molecular biology curriculum for the undergraduate level which involves student chapters from various leading universities in the United States so that students are skilled in molecular biology research. FK UII is interested in adopting the CURE curriculum but is hampered by the PBL model which is very short in learning in a block system, making it less possible to run the CURE program for 1 semester. In addition, there is also a Genomic Education Partnership (GEP) collaboration to provide opportunities for undergraduate students in genomic research by utilizing bioinformatics tools such as the free UCSC genome browser to determine phylogenetic, evolution, and gene annotation based on selected cases. Another advantage of joining ASBMB is being able to access free journals consisting of the journal of lipid research, the Journal of Biological Chemistry, and the Journal of Molecular and Cellular Proteomic for one year or as long as ASBMB membership is still active.

The material that was quite interesting from the ASBMB meeting was the need for conformity of models and ways of teaching biochemistry with existing learning theories or learning theory. Of the 5 types of existing learning theory, namely behaviorism theory, cognitive theory, constructivism theory, social learning theory and social constructivism theory, each learning model must optimize each student's learning style in order to achieve competence and proficiency and mastery that can enter long-term memory (in count of years).

On the sidelines of the ASBMB meeting, our FK UII delegation was able to carry out da'wah by sorting halal food at each meal by ordering a Moslem Meal (MOML). And alhamdulillah, during the trip from Indonesia by using the ANA or All Nippon Airways aircraft owned by Japan and United Airlines (UA) owned by America, we got special service by being served first with the MOML code on our seats. During the trip and while living in America, you can freely wear the robes and turban style of Prince Diponegoro and many people ask for photos together and want to get acquainted. Because the ASBMB event was held at the University of Incarnate Word which is the largest Catholic university and world missionary base, we were able to meet missionary leaders and sisters who were attending world meetings at the same place for evangelical missions in Mexico and Columbia. We also met many Muslim brothers during Friday prayers at the Islamic center in the city of San Antonio. They are mostly refugees from Burma or Myanmar, Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia and Ethiopia. What touched us was meeting Yasir, a Rohingya refugee who had to struggle to live and run away from his country. Yasir and his family initially fled to Makassar with 40 other refugees but were detained in Makassar and fled to Bogor, then fled to Australia and lived on Christmas Island for 5 years. Because there was no clarity about their fate on Christmas Island, they finally sought asylum in the United States and finally got a green card to live in the United States for just one year. Alhamdulillan can work and can live in an apartment with a monthly rent of $ 1500.

During the event, you go for a walk to the location of the river walk, the most famous tourist destination in downtown San Antonio. The history of the birth of the city of San Antonio began in the small town of Alamo, which was colonized by Spain and then fell to the rulers of Mexico. Then there was a major war in 1834 at the Alamo between American immigrants and Mexican soldiers.

On weekends this tourist city is always full of tourists, both from Chinese, Mexican, Spanish, British and German descent, and South Asian derivatives such as India and Pakistan. At the restaurant, we were able to preach to Iraqi refugees who work at the Casa Rio restaurant where we took a photo together (picture attached). Just mention his name Ahmad, who no longer prays and no longer wants to practice Islam and tends to be atheist because he is hurt by ISIS. We discussed it for a long time and we asked him to return to kalaimatun sawa, namely the sentence of monotheism, and thank God, finally he was silent, wanting to protect the password for heaven, namely the sentence thoyyibah Laa ilaaha illallah. We talked about our habit of practicing David's fast, so even at the restaurant we didn't have dinner because we were fasting. That's what amazed ahmad and wanted to listen to our next story. Finally, our da'wah reached Ahmad's friend named Ilya from Bulgaria who is non-Muslim and we were offered the password for the heaven/paradise with sufficient explanation so that he could finally say "illallah". During the maghrib prayer time at 20.40:3 p.m. Texas time, when all the ASBMB participants were walking around and looking for their favorite food, namely the best ice cream, we made time for the maghrib prayer near the red light intersection in downtown Alamo. Thank God, after praying, I can preach again to gatherings or hanging out with young people who are on weekly nights there. Dressed in traditional clothes in the style of Prince Diponegoro, we walked around or walked around offering the kalimah thoyyibah and thank God 22.30 people were able to say the sentence. Until XNUMX we finally returned to our lodging at the UIW campus dormitory.

We still have one more night to stay in Texas after the conference is over and we use it for prayer service at the prayer room and madrasah which is being started by Maulana Ilyas from India who is a Koran teacher and also the owner of a madrasah in Chicago. We can travel or go around from apartment to apartment to the Muslim community who speak Malay and the Muslim community from South Asia to maintain religious charity and revive mosque charity amidst the temptations of materialism that are so strong. All of our acquaintances while in Texas we saved their contact numbers on our cellphones but it turned out that we had no luck to make silarurohim more intensive because we left our cellphones in the dormitory and remembered when we wanted to board the plane.

This is the short story of our missionary journey in accordance with the mandate of RKAT FK UII that official travel to America is limited to a maximum of Rp. 40.000.000,00 for registration fees, airplane tickets, accommodation, pocket money and visas. Alhamdulillah, with Allah's permission, everything is blessed and sufficient and may it become a guidance asbab.