Student of Knowledge

Assalamualaikum.

How is it going guys? Had a good weekend? Alhamdulilah I myself had a pretty good one. Let's start with last Thursday. My wife and I went for a talk in IIUM. It was given by Sheikh Navaid Aziz where we first heard him on our very first Twins of Faith. Prior to the talk, I remember he was hands full of stories that are both inspiring and full of lessons. And he was, again that night. The talk was on You Only Live Once, or YOLO to be short. This philosophy is what our youth nowadays live by. At least by majority of youths all around the social media. From what I can understand, YOLO means that you can do whatever you want because you only got to live once, especially when you do the crazy ones! From embarrassing yourself to indulge in sins, nauzubillah. But still, there are positivity behind this idea. Sheikh Navaid said that since you only live once, you got to seize the day and make the most of it. This dunya we live in is short for a reason; it is the place for us to sow the seeds, to do what Allah instructs and leave what He forbids as we will reap the rewards later in the Hereafter.

The next day, I was looking forward to hear Mufti Menk friday khutbah in Masjid Tun Abdul Aziz PJ. That morning I was actually kind of busy but alhamdulillah I got to the masjid in time. Suprisingly the masjid was not really full house when I first arrived. I reckon it was partially because most people didn't really know that he would be delivering the khutbah since I myself knew on Facebook. This is my actually my first time hearing Mufti Menk live. I got to listen to him a couple of times but most of them were on Youtube. Anyway, back to the real story here, Mufti Menk talked on Allah test gives on us. He asked the jamaah to wonder why did Allah create this dunya to be temporary and not forever? Because if it's forever there would not be tests and difficulties. Allah made it temporary so we would strive the very best that we can for us to book a ticket in His Paradise, insha Allah. He also talked about how the greater the difficulty the greater the reward we'll get if we only really understand how it would benefits us. One would not be crying in his prayers if one never got to face any kind of tests whatsoever in one's life. One would not be learning life's greatest lessons if life's on the right track all the time. Because the greatest life lessons were learnt when we were at our lowest.

May Allah make easy for us and may Allah make us to be always grateful for all the blessings He bestows upon us. Ameen.

Umrah Part 2

Assalamualaikum.

We were in Makkah for 5 days if I remember correctly. It was 5 days that I'd rewind it back if I could. The first day we're like still finding our ways around Makkah. But after a while, it has been el nature for the two of us. Alhamdulillah in this first trip to Makkah, we got to do a couple of umrah, 3 to be precise. If you intended to your umrah slow and steady, you ought to do them during dhuha time. Around an hour or so after subuh right after zuhur. Because for me that's when it's the least people around the Masjidil Haram. Once I got to do tawaf for like 20 minutes or so during dhuha time. That's quite impossible to achieve in the peak hours, I'll say it's from Zuhur to Isya'. Even after Isya' hundreds  of people were still all over the Masjid.

Our umrah package includes meals throughout our days both in Madinah and Makkah. So that way we could focus on optimizing our time for seeking Allah's pleasure. Anyway I don't know about anyone else in our Rayhar package, but  ohh boy did the food on Madinah or Makkah was amazing or what haha. It's a rare thing for me to eat only once during any meal time. One time tambah is the way to go for me hehe. I eat so much back then that one of Rayhar officials reckon I didn't miss Malaysia at all. L to the O to the L.

Wordless Wednesday

Mirrors

Bismillah.

Looking back at our marriage back when we were 22 years old, so many things have changed. Ohh I remember back then when I was so lack of common sense that the common theme of our arguments would be for the lack of my common sense. And I'd say till this day, but maybe down a tad bit, yes? Hehe. I would go further telling you what has changed for me but I would save that for other people to tell. Now what I want to tell you is how my partner has changed, far more interesting, yes?

First off, at the beginning of our marriage, my wife was kind of scared with my big family as most of them were.. socially active I would say. I for one completely understand as it can be intimidating for her to interact people like my family since she's can be a little bit shy being with people whom she's not familiar with. But now she can click quite a bit with other members of the family. And that make me happy. We family meet quite a lot so it's great for her to be comfortable.

Umrah Part 1

Bismillah

It almost been a week. Alhamdulillah last week my wife and I went to Makkah and Madinah to perform our Umrah. We went there for 12 days with travel package from Rayhar. Well.. technically it was 10 days because our flights were delayed. But at the end of the day we got there, and did get back home safely alhamdulillah, so what more can we ask right?

You know how people always imagine what their ideal or best day would be like. Well for me, my days visiting these two Holy places would by far are the best days in my lifetime ever. Felt like serenity is always in the air. Humility is constantly embracing me. And whenever I did whatever to please Allah, I felt religiously satisfied. Not that I didn't feel any before, but this time it was a whole new level.

Before this, I always hear people say they would definitely come to Haram again and again. Or for the people who are already retired, it's the only place left they would want to go in this world. Now experiencing it for myself, I understand what's the hype is all about :')

In Makkah, particularly Masjidil Haram there were ocean of people. Clearly, it's the most holy place in this world. But you know what? Never did I felt overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people in the Haram. In fact, I felt closer to them thinking we're all there for the same reason, finding Allah's pleasure. And I can see people's mouth were uttering praises to Him all day along. The pilgrims, the contractor, the labors, the cleaner of the Masjid. All of them. It was a beautiful sight to see.

Anyway we were at Madinah for 3 days and the remaining days were filled in Makkah. The weather in Madinah is breezily cold. I reckon it was 17-20 degrees. When we're arrived at our hotel, we go on and pray our first prayer in Masjid Nabawi. I felt awe with the size of the Masjid and with its non stop visitors. The next day we're guided by our Mutawif to visit Baqi cemetery and Raudhah. Goosebumps were all over me when Ustaz Hadi guided us in saying salam to Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h) We continued with visiting Raudhah. It was full of people because they were fully utilizing their opportunity to pray and make dua in Raudhah as it was one of the place where Allah will accept our dua.

Fast forward and Makkah were our next destination. First thing we did in Makkah was our Umrah. I was actually nervous prior to our arrival, as I didn't know what to expect at the time, since it was my first doing it. We started our Umrah around 2 o'clock in the morning and finished it for like an hour and a half. Alhamdulillah our first Umrah went well. May Allah accept it, Ameen.

There are still so much things to be shared in this journey but I'd continue them in future post as it is now late and sleepy eyes is now very sleepy hehe. In the next post, I'd share my journey on the remaining days on Makkah and what are my thoughts on this trip as a whole. Till the next post, Assalamualaikum.

Moving

Assalamualaikum.

I'm having many tabs too open in my brain right now. Haha like literally. One hand I was having conversations with a prospect wanted to lose weight with Herbalife, and on the other hand I was thinking & writing this post at the same time. Ohh did I tell you that my wife is in front of me right now sharing what's inside her head while me writing this blog and talk to her back and forth? Talk about men can't do multitasking hehehe. So bear with me if this post is like haywire because that's the current state of my mind.

So earlier this month we were getting notice from owner of this house. Our rental contract will end next month and he didn't intend to renew the contract. I quite understand his decision because I myself didn't want to extend my stay here haha. It's not like this house isn't good or anything, but it's just that I wanted to have new experience in new place. It's always in my blood, you know, to have the urge to experience new things. And I believe such interests were developed from my life experience. See, since I was a kid, my family were moving to new place within 4 to 5 years. One time we were in metropolitan city KL, next thing you know we were going to stay in Labuan. It was truly a great experience albeit troublesome at times, with all the moving things and finding place to say. And with that experience, it also develops my interest to always try new things to eat hehe. I consider myself as a food lover, but not as in having personal favorites and just stick with them. Or having few favorites place and always go whenever I can. I'm the ones who always wanted to try new menu or new places. This can be developed into a blog right? Trying new things and share them on the web. I've had that in mind for a while but as of now, what I have is just a url. My wife must be rolling her eyes right now hahaha. One day, okay? *bile la tu*

Now back to the story of us having to move out from this house. Having like two month notice (thanks owner!) giving us plenty of time to find new house to stay. Since we're our own boss, we can stay wherever we like. At times, we were having discussions where we would settle for life but until now, without no clear answer. Maybe Allah wanted us to try many different places until we got that 'this is is' moment *haha poyo je kan aku ni*. Anyhow we both agreed to stay in vicinity of Ulu Kelang or Gombak area for now. So I was searching houses to rent in the Internet. Lots of amazing houses but comes with even more amazing price hehe. After filtering all things considered like rental price, location and such, we end up with few houses that met our criteria. Fast forward a bit, we fell in love with this particular house. Okay we're not falling in love with the house (that's tomorrow where we'll meet the owner) but with the concept of the condominium. It has that homey neighborhood vibe since there are couple of townhouses near the condo. The property is also relatively new, launched in 2012. So when you talk about new property, what I love is its current state would be decent, so that's a plus. Here's just hoping that the house we wanted to rent would be great, insha Allah. I would definitely update on the progress. Till then, later.

The Side Project

Assalamualaikum.

Well this week has been quite interesting. For start, I finally got to see Gravity. The movie that everybody seems to talk about. And now that I finally got to see it, I can say that I understand what the hype is all about. For me it's one of the better movies of the year, but most importantly what made it's amazing is that it has an exceptional cinematic experience. Gravity made me immersed with its world with its score, cinematography and of course, excellent performance from the lead roles. And I love how the film alternates the spooky yet soothing sound of vacuum space with its epic score throughout the film. I thought that really elevate the experience. And I would definitely like George Clooney to have more screen time, he nailed that cool astronaut persona for me. However, the film is not without its flaws. The story's predictable at times and its direct storytelling didn't help much either. But I guess it kind of fits with the theme of story.

While we were waiting for Gravity to start, we stumbled upon Food Challenge organized by Sunway Pyramid. There were five challenges that day, each from different vendors of Sunway Pyramid. At that time, it was a durian puffs food challenge. I'm actually tempted to try out the challenge but since I just ate my lunch, I decided to just give moral support to the contestants lol. In that challenge, contestants have to finish 4 packs of durian puffs in 5 minutes time, each packs consist of 5 puffs. So that makes it a total of 20 puffs. Looks like a small number right? I figured this will be easy as pie. Well I was wrong. The size of puffs were quite big and combine that with the pungent smell of the durian, it was really challenging. At least, from my point of view. But there were folks who were eating them like a boss. Finishing per pack like a minute or so. Eventually, no one did finish all 5 packs and I got to see one who finished 3 packs, I reckon that lad won. Anyway it was a good experience and certainly something I would try to cater the foodie in me lol.

Now onto the next exciting stuff happens this week. I found a new circle of friends. Yay! This might not sound that much exciting but it really is to me. Lots of reasons of course, first thing being I kind of always with the same circles, so it's refreshing to start get to know new people. Perhaps I'd find new perspective or just new things to learn. After all, it's always a plus to have more friends right? But what's more important is I start to have a Side Project, as my wife would call it. Before this, life would always be work and play and something routine in between. As uninteresting as it seems, that's the reality of my life. So to have something to be preoccupied with is a good thing for me. Plus, this side project would not only benefit me, but other people around me, insha Allah. So what's the Side Project? Well that's story for the next post to tell hehe. I would certainly keep you posted on this Side Project of mine.