Not a complaint

To get to Glenmarie from my house in Saujana Puchong, I usually take the Sunway LDP route rather than USJ. And now at LDP Sunway toll, they have the banner above. Emm, I thought it's a little weird to have the phrase 'minumlah air' and 'selamat menyambut Ramadhan al-Mubarak' in the same banner. But we all have our own things, let's leave it at that instead of complaining about things.

One time in life, mid 20's I supposed, I learned the word 'utopia' and being rash and foolish like any youth, I'm fixated about it. I like that word 'rash'. Dostoyevsky use it as ... where others flinch, rash and foolish youth will dare. Together with 'carpe diem', those were my favorites catch phrase at one time. Until I thought, well, this business of trying to find utopia is not that easy. The fact was, I have not tried or expand my resources on anything but just thinking about it was like hard labor to me. And so, I bought a first-generation Nintendo and choose to expand my energy and together with it, my waist line, in playing Mario Brothers.

Hence, it came to mind at the time that, why is that my religion which I was born into, instead of searching and paying for it, can't create this utopia on earth during my lifetime. It was not a good thought process to be in at the time. Especially since I was also reading a bit into other religions and in Christianity, you will find this huge concept about 'Love'. More so about unconditional love such as Jesus so loved the world that he redeemed it with his life.

Plus, we can't deny that our Islam is manifested by many kinds of groups. One group will emphasis a certain aspect much more than others. At the time, the kind of Islamic literature that I read does not have much of these 'love' and other soft concepts. And I felt, in a way, a wee bit down.

This is not about Christianity vs. Islam thing. If anything, our Christian brothers are very close to us; more so since we both believe that Sayyidina Isa a.s. will come back towards the end of time and through him, all the righteous will unite.

And now, reading some of Shaykh Nazim sohbets and other venerable wise guide, I'm happy to note that I'm much more reconciled now. Instead of the word love, we have other words like 'mercy'. And it is such a huge thing that even our beloved Rasul is called as 'mercy to the worlds'. And I'm such a jahil to talk more about this.

In Christianity there’s this thing Jesus as the logos made flesh. And I’ve find in life that, it is much beneficial to us if we could find somebody that actually manifest in everyday life the beauty of Islam.

Truth is, though there are many kind of jewels out there, some are really precious. And if we seek, so shall we find. Knock, and the door will be open. Happy Eid.

Mengidam

Somehow la, satu dua hari ni, saya dok mengidam dengar lagu lagu rock zaman 70's or 80's gitu. I find listening to these songs is like having a good jeruk manga, you know, those yang tak masam sangat, tak masin, and the manga is not tua, or too young, just crispy gitu.

So these songs are playing frequently on my laptop at work:
Queen : Bohemian Rhapsody
Pink Floyd : Learning to Fly
Skid Row : 18 and Life, Wasted Time
Warrant : Heaven
Santana : Black Magic Woman
Moody Blues : Dust in the Wind, Night in White Satin
Harry Chapin : Cats in the Cradle (if u never listen to this, go find it)

After this phase, I think it will be lagu raya, though I don't think I like those as much. Coz I feel that I don't deserve to raya since I don't take advantage of those blessings that came down during Ramadan so much.

Shaykh Hisham once said (roughly la kan), if we are involved in business, we will do more if the market is on the upward swing. It will be crazy for traders not to sell or invest more during good times. The same with Allah, the months of Rajab, Sha'ban, & Ramadan are like the best months to do business with Him.

Emmm, kena pi terawih la kot malam ni. Semalam dah miss.

A Dress

I was listening to Syakh Hamza's 'Marriage & Responsibilities' the other day and was struck by his explanation on one Hadith about women who are dressed but naked.

He said that, and I'm writing this from memory so hopefully the gist of it is correct, the Tradition was not clear to some scholars of old and they interpreted it metaphysically as women who dressed in this world and naked in the next world.

It's not my intention to take a jab at our esteemed scholars or women but more about the miracle of our Prophet (saw) that his saying became clear after hundreds of years later. I mean up until our modern times, people can't imagine how a person can be naked while dressed.

Wow, and to think of it, Hijaz was like a backward place at the time. The centers of civilization were Persia or Byzantine but here comes a man from out of nowhere and telling people of things to come.

And we are grateful that even though we are thousands of miles from that blessed valley, we are counted as his ummah (hopefully).


Note 1:
I later found a reference to that Hadith in a book 'The signs before the day of Judgement' by Ibn Kathir, published by Dar Al Taqwa, London. The Hadith:

Abu Hurayrah said, "The Prophet (saw) said, 'There are two types among the people of Hell whom I have not yet seen. The first are people who have whips like the tails of oxen, with which the beat people, and the second are women who are naked in spite of being dressed; they will be led astray and will lead others astray, and their heads will look like camels' humps. These women will not enter Paradise; they will not even experience the faintest scent of it, even though the fragrance of Paradise can be perceived from such a great distance.' " (Muslim).

Note 2:
Sadly, I'm not that good yet. I still support Women’s Movement; especially from behind. And more so if the way they dress, one could guess the size of their well endowed upper parts. And my gosh, when I was still going to school, those parts are not developed until they have a few kids. But now ... emmm ... puasa puasa!

Hai Kersani Mengalirlah Dikau II ...

To update, I went to Kulim again last week and asked the guy who bought some RM100.00 stuff from Pak Kob if it works and he said, "tak banyak peluang la, asyik lampu merahhh je". Emmm, if only it's like tap water where you can turn it off at will :)

Anyway, to answer Nazrah's, it's nothing lika a spa. Because, with respect to people there, the place is near a place where Tunku met Chin Peng. And as far as Chin Peng is concerned, the area can't be like those Hindustani movies. It is deep inside the kampung where instead of fresh earth smell, it's more like cow manure. The urut itself is done on a used up foam mattress with regular plywoods as walls. But we don't complain.

As far as the urut goes, I think it needs to be done on regular basis to show some results. We went there once just for the experience of it.