WELCOME TO MADANI PESANTREN

Hello, friends. Welcome to my space.

This time, I wrote a review for Indonesian book, entitled The Land of Five Towers or Negeri 5 Menara by Ahmad Fuadi.

The Land of Five Towers by Ahmad Fuadi

English version (left) and Indonesian version (right)

Alif had never set foot outside of West Sumatra. He passed his childhood days searching for fallen durian fruit in the jungle, playing soccer on rice paddies, and swimming in the blue waters of Lake Maninjau. His mother wants him to attend an Islamic boarding school, a pesantren, while he dreams of public high school. Halfheartedly, he follows his mother’s wishes. He finds himself on a grueling three-day bus ride from Sumatra to Madani Pesantren (MP) in a remote village on Java.

On his first day at MP, Alif is captivated by the powerful phrase man jadda wajada. He who gives his all will surely succeed. United by punishment, he quickly becomes friends with five boys from across the archipelago, and together they become known as the Fellowship of the Manara. Beneath the mosque’s minaret, the boys gaze at the clouds on the horizon, seeing in them their individual dreams of far-away lands, like America and Europe. Where would these dreams take them? They didn’t know. What they did know was: never underestimate dreams, no matter how high they may be. God truly is The Listener.

Inspired by his own life story, Ahmad Fuadi wrote a story about Alif. This clever boy has a big dream. He is planning to get into the best high school in Bukittinggi, and after that attends to Institute of Technology Bandung, hopefully one day he will become like Habibie. But his mother refuses the idea. She wants Alif to go to an Islamic school and becomes an excellent Muslim leader. There is some belief in Indonesia that Islamic schools are just for "unqualified" students, therefore, make the quality of these schools low. That is one of the reasons Alif refuses to go there. Until one day he gets a letter from his uncle that says there is an Islamic Boarding School in Java—Madani Pesantren—that has very good education quality. They teach their student English and Arabic, and other subjects, besides Islamic subjects. Alif agrees, and the story begins....

This book is more focus on the character development so the plot is not so great. Nothing much happened. It basically tells the readers about Alif's daily life which, almost, has zero problem. But, the nuance of this book...I liked it. It gave me peace. It was a comfort book for me. 

When I read this, I felt like I was there with the characters, like I was one of the students there. I took classes, got some lessons, and got other experiences as a student of Madani Pesantren. It felt nice.

The main theme of this book is Islam. You can learn so many things about Islam from this book. If you are interested about Islam, or you are a Muslim who wants to read a good Islamic book, pick this up. You won't regret it. HAPPY READING.