Ramadhan 2010

So here i am after spending my first Ramadhan overseas, and my first Aidilftri overseas. The first one without my family around me. The first one outside of Terengganu actually since both my parents are from the same state. And i missed my first solat raya overseas : (  Insyaallah next year i'll try my hardest to stay awake and go to the local masjid. Luckily enough my first aidilfitri celebration overseas went without a hitch or any problems whatsoever. We had plenty of traditional foods to choose from lemang, laksa, soto, rendang, kuih raya but no ketupat. Or maybe there is but i missed it. We the bujangs did a performance of dikir barat and it was so hilarious and fun. We did practiced twice but overall i think it was okay considering we had to submit two assignments prior (the day before to be exact) to the celebration.

students of deakin university

But it's not the Syawal i wanted to write about. It's about the Ramadhan that had just past.


I had to admit it was different from the typical Ramadhan i ever had. There was no atmosphere of fasting around us. Same day as any other day, except everyone else is eating and you're not. There was no bazar ramadhan to visit. None here in Geelong but there are some mini bazars around Melbourne. What we want to eat, we cook ourselves. There was no big congregation of people going to the masjid every night, the typical huge volume of people trying to get to the mosque before tarawih each night that causes massive traffic jams along the road. We had only ourselves. Our little community of Muslim comprised of families and friends and the local Muslims. But it was enough. I feel blessed. Even in the land where Islam is not a major religion, i'm humbled.


True we had almost non-existance Ramadhan atmosphere around us but we had plenty when we were around ourselves. I realized how true the saying out of the comfort zone is now. We became much more conscious of ourselves, our actions and of others. We had tarawih every single night which is not always the case back in Malaysia for me. The first week was at the local masjid where we had our share of experiencing Turkish way of ramadhan. A bit fast, okay maybe more than a bit but still it's the niat that matters. The following weeks were done in the comfort of our house yet nonetheless enriching and humbling. We took turns by being the imam and hilmi being the wiseguy of our house nicknamed the routine 'akademi calon suami' (or something like that, i can't really recall). haha. drop me an email for your suitable future husband :)



Another aspect that improved vastly was the skill of our cooking. We made the challenge of creating 30 different dishes in 30 days of ramadhan. It was succesful....almost. Because during the last days we somehow lost track of the dishes made.haha. But still it was fun and challenging to complete the feat. I for one successfully made the tom yam chiang mai for 20 person during our house iftar. it was a great event and bonding session between us students. and we had a near-faint tragedy because the tom yam was too spicy for naz to handle and also shazwan whom i didn't know is allergic to mushrooms. im truly, deeply sorry to both of you :P

deqnot & tas checking out our tomyam chiang mai (mira is already on it.haha)

iftar at our house and bonding session

But most of all, i believe i improved even if it's not much but to a certain understanding. In the sense of spirituality and believing. We had a nightly discussion where we discussed and shared stories and experiences and give advices to each other which i truly valued. Not to forget the plentiful infos and tazkirahs available on the web to help shed the light towards the right path. This kind of activity is really benefiting to all of us. Sometimes it's the words of our close friends are the most effective and easy to comprehend. I learned a lot and i hoped my friends too. There is a hadis that says "Belajar satu bab daripada ilmu lebih baik dari sembahyang (sunat) seratus rakaat” riwayat Ibn Abdul Barr and Ibn Majah. These little discussions might open the way towards jannah. insyallah.


And that's all for this article. i originally wrote the drafts for this article a few days into syawal but lost the enthusiasm and ideas to write. eventually, syawal had passed me by and i just finished my study for this semester so i got some time to ponder and write. i shall remember this past ramadhan as one of my best and enriching month. let's pray for the next ramadhan to be better and we live to meet it again, insyallah.


wasalam.

Knowing thyself

I always believe that life is a journey of learning about yourself. When we were born into the world we learn how to breathe instinctively. Then gradually we learn the physical aspects of ourself from walking, jumping, running, swimming, smiling, eating, and to hold our pee when the toilets're full or too dirty.

However, it's not the physical actions of ourself i'm focusing on but more towards our spiritual side. Our personality, the character, how we handle ourselves etc. 

According to dictionary.com personality by definition is the quality of being a person;  existence as a self-conscious human being;  a personal identity.

As Paolo Coelho aptly said;

Man improves himself as he follows his path; if he stands still, waiting to improve before he makes a decision, he'll never move. 

When we made 'the' decision and move forward, we inevitably learn about ourself. Why did we made the decision, what did we consider when we made the decision? How will the decision affect us? Wether the decision we took is one we happy with or did we just made a mistake is not as important as the journey we go through when we made our decision. 

Life is about learning ourself and improve and make mistakes and continue improving.

Along my short journey so far in this world I've learnt many things about myself. I learnt that i'll cry when i see/be among others cry or when i see a touchy movie or drama. I learnt that i'm most emotionally vulnerable when i'm sleepy or when i just woke up. I learnt that i forgive but don't forget. I learnt how to appear happy and satisfied when actually i'm sad and disappointed. I learnt to be content. I learnt that i keep my secrets quite well that nobody (even my close friends) actually know my full story and history other than the normal trivial matters like where you were born, lived, studied etc. (as if anybody is interested).

Further up on learning about ourself is how we learn to react to others in a certain situation, how we control ourself when we are faced with something we truly despise or cherished, what path do we usually take when are given option to choose. To be safe or to take some risk. Will we take the scenic road or the bland one? Learning when we are the most effective, is it in the early morning? or late at night? will it be a long-focused several hours of concentration or we need to take some pause between the hours to stay sharp.

I learnt that to accept others and to not judge them by appearances is extremely hard. To accept them as they are in the belief that nobody is perfect and we ourself are never a saint to start with. How often do we ridicule someone out without even trying to know them by just looking at their Facebook profile picture or when we heard from a friend of your best friend's friend that his friend said something bad about him that when we actually met the person we already have bad thoughts about him?

Maybe we learn about ourself differently. Either by experience, stories, observing, reading and many countless ways. But ultimately to learn and accept being ourself is a journey in itself. I might write this post today after mulling about the subject for more than a month. Which i learnt that i'm not one to write something without preparation or knowledge with fear that it might be misleading or cause unnecessary problems :)

Have we learnt something about ourself today?

Sometimes in your life you will go on a journey. It will be the longest journey you have ever taken. It is the journey to find yourself. - Katherine Sharp