It has been really hard for me to settle in Malaysia despite it being my country of origin, despite me being born here and growing up here for the first 17 years of my life...I travelled to UK when I was 17 years old and whilst I was in UK, I found something amazing...I actually found Islam.
Even though I was born in Malaysia, a supposedly Muslim country but I never really knew Islam. I never truly recognised Allah, my Lord, my Creator...but when I was in UK I started to meet, discuss and interacted with the Muslims in Britain, they opened my heart, my mind to this beautiful Deen. I studied at Kings College London and I was the only Malay student in the Medical faculty. I didn't have a choice but to mix with others...at first, I used to hang around with the people at my halls of residence. I had a friend called Imran Khan (not the cricket player) who was a Dentist and he was very funny and smart. We used to study together and he taught me all about anatomy of the head and neck. I was living like everyone else...a secular life but I always felt that something was missing. I had all the freedom in the world, no parents, no uztaz, no government to tell me what to do...I was free and yet, I felt trapped within my own skin. Trapped by the conditions imposed upon me by society. I wasn't free at all and so one day, I went to the prayer room at the University for the first time and I was greeted by this beautiful petite girl wearing himaar and jilbab. She started talking to me, asking me about myself. I was weary at first because I thought people would judge me, I wanted to be discreet and not speak to anyone but she spoke to me and she was nice to me and she didn't care that I was not wearing the hijaab (at that time).
From that day, I kept going to the prayer room and from time to time chatted with some of the Muslims there. Then, one day I was on my way to the prayer room and the sisters invited me to join them for a talk. I went with them and what was said just opened my mind. I felt like a light was switched on and I was no longer groping in the dark. Her topic was simple...purpose of life...but all this while, I never realised that my purpose in life was to worship Allah. That was the reason that God created me.
From that day, I never looked back. The Muslim sisters became my real sisters because my family were in Malaysia. We spent time together, they helped me, supported me, spent Ramadhan and Eid together, even got me married. For the first time in my life, I experienced true sisterhood and true brotherhood. I truly felt that we were one ummah, the ummah of Muhammad (saw).
I started to learn more about Islam, about my Deen, about my Lord. I started to learn about the Qur'an and what it means to make the Qur'an alive, to relate everything that Allah says to what is happening in reality. To understand the relationship between Truth and Falsehood, to understand the plots and plans and political scenario of the world....my mind was truly liberated. I understood what was before life, what is after life and what is this life. Before life was nothing but Allah, after life is the Hereafter, the Akhirah and this life was a real test...to see whether we will believe and obey Allah or disbelieve and disobey Him.
So, after all that...how can I possibly go back to not knowing? How can I accept some of the things that are being said? How can I close my eyes to what is happening around the world? How can I ignore the cries and suffering of my brothers and sisters...who have helped me and protected me when I was weak and alone? How is it possible for me to go from believing, understanding of 1Ummah, the Ummah of Muhammad (saw) to being 1ummah of God knows who? I don't want to be the ummah of someone else...I don't want to follow anyone else...
I am finding it so hard right now...so hard to explain all these feelings that I have. To a certain extend, I am disappointed, frustrated and sometimes I just feel down and low....looking at the state we are in...the state of mind. There is so much potential in this Ummah, I mean...the Ummah of Muhammad (saw) but we are shackled and chained by those who wish to see the Ummah in a state of decline. The Ummah can do great things if they truly have confidence in Islam, confidence in themselves as Muslims, stop worrying about what the non-Muslims would say or think, stop worrying about rocking the boat. Don't they realise that under the rule of Islam, the Khilafah...it wasn't just the Muslims that excelled but non-Muslims as well? Just read on one topic...the history of Islamic medicine and you will find the names of great scholars and inventors of Jews, Christian and Muslim origins. We can be a great nation but unfortunately, we put restrictions on ourselves and that is our tragedy.
Tuesday 22 February 2011
Tuesday 1 February 2011
What went through my mind as I left for Stansted Airport
I said my goodbyes to my aunt and uncle and drove to Stansted in my wonderful little silver VW Polo, getting slightly lost initially. My auntie told me if ever I get lost, I should park up and read al Fatihah and inshaAllah, I will find my way so, I stopped at Tesco carpark and looked at the map and then I read al Fatihah and Alhamdulillah i found my way back on the M11 and reached Stansted, fuelled up and found my way to the car rental returns. Alhamdulillah. My short visit here had been a fruitful one achieving all the things I needed to achieve.
There are a few things that I will truly miss about Britain when I return to Malaysia; for one the 24 hour news BBC and al Jazeera. I know that these channels are available on satellite but it is not easily accessible to everyone and you have choose for the news package to get access to it. How many people in Malaysia would choose News package over movies or entertainment? Emm...let me not offend anyone. For too long, I feel that the masses of the Malaysian society have lived in the dark, excited only by the news reported in Metro. It is unhealthy. So, these are some of the changes that I would like to see in Malaysia.
1. More responsible driving – maybe people should realise that they need to be responsible drivers. Put some order into things and not just turn into a wild beast as soon as they get into a car.
2. More 24 hour news – I know you can get it from Astro but not everyone has Astro and I would like to see news more available to ordinary people. For example with the new Unifi TM, you can subscribe for Cbeebies but not BBC News 24. Why?
3. More political analysis – I would like to see the news reporters actually discussing the news rather than just regurgitating the news that they have received from newsagents such as Reuters or Bernama. Is that a bit lazy reporting? There should be more analysis and more discussion and more critical thinking although I respect our journalists who risked their lives onboard the Marv Marmara to bring us the story from Palestine.
4. More people reading – definitely reading should be encouraged and I'm not talking about reading romantic novels but rather intelligent reading. Newspapers should stop reporting gossips and trash but there should be evidence based reporting, process of verifying news before it goes to print.. If the people demand for better quality news, I'm sure the news agencies will have to succumb.
5. People who simply gossip and say things like 'I heard from such and such and such and such that person x did this' should really be told to shut up and get a life. There should be no room for hear say and chinese whispers rather, any form of corruption should be discussed with evidence and political awareness.
6. Quality control - there should be a tight control over the quality of things that are sold especially when it is presented as a luxury item. Sometimes the price certainly does not reflect the quality of the thing. There are so many Western owned supermarkets in Malaysia but the items sold are not as good as the ones sold in the same stores in Western countries and that includes even something as simple as nappies. You start to wonder if the conspiracy theory of rejected items in the west are being sold in developing world for profit is actually true. Cetainly cars are over priced. I have seen 2nd hand BMWs being sold for less than RM50,000 in London and the car I was driving in UK was indeed one of the most precisely immaculate engineering. Yet, some cars around here are like cardboard on wheels.
I'm sure there are other things I can think of but I will not bore you and I don't want to make people feel defensive. I shall refrain from my complaints but there are many things about Malaysia that are wonderful, like the sunny weather, even the rain and thunderstorm just reminds me of the greatness of Allah, the sound of Adhan, the places to pray all over the place, the facillities to make istinjak, the pasar tani, pasar malam, kedai mamak, the people are friendly and they are often grateful to Allah, gratefulness also equals happiness and tranquility. So, I love it here really but improvement is never a bad thing.
There are a few things that I will truly miss about Britain when I return to Malaysia; for one the 24 hour news BBC and al Jazeera. I know that these channels are available on satellite but it is not easily accessible to everyone and you have choose for the news package to get access to it. How many people in Malaysia would choose News package over movies or entertainment? Emm...let me not offend anyone. For too long, I feel that the masses of the Malaysian society have lived in the dark, excited only by the news reported in Metro. It is unhealthy. So, these are some of the changes that I would like to see in Malaysia.
1. More responsible driving – maybe people should realise that they need to be responsible drivers. Put some order into things and not just turn into a wild beast as soon as they get into a car.
2. More 24 hour news – I know you can get it from Astro but not everyone has Astro and I would like to see news more available to ordinary people. For example with the new Unifi TM, you can subscribe for Cbeebies but not BBC News 24. Why?
3. More political analysis – I would like to see the news reporters actually discussing the news rather than just regurgitating the news that they have received from newsagents such as Reuters or Bernama. Is that a bit lazy reporting? There should be more analysis and more discussion and more critical thinking although I respect our journalists who risked their lives onboard the Marv Marmara to bring us the story from Palestine.
4. More people reading – definitely reading should be encouraged and I'm not talking about reading romantic novels but rather intelligent reading. Newspapers should stop reporting gossips and trash but there should be evidence based reporting, process of verifying news before it goes to print.. If the people demand for better quality news, I'm sure the news agencies will have to succumb.
5. People who simply gossip and say things like 'I heard from such and such and such and such that person x did this' should really be told to shut up and get a life. There should be no room for hear say and chinese whispers rather, any form of corruption should be discussed with evidence and political awareness.
6. Quality control - there should be a tight control over the quality of things that are sold especially when it is presented as a luxury item. Sometimes the price certainly does not reflect the quality of the thing. There are so many Western owned supermarkets in Malaysia but the items sold are not as good as the ones sold in the same stores in Western countries and that includes even something as simple as nappies. You start to wonder if the conspiracy theory of rejected items in the west are being sold in developing world for profit is actually true. Cetainly cars are over priced. I have seen 2nd hand BMWs being sold for less than RM50,000 in London and the car I was driving in UK was indeed one of the most precisely immaculate engineering. Yet, some cars around here are like cardboard on wheels.
I'm sure there are other things I can think of but I will not bore you and I don't want to make people feel defensive. I shall refrain from my complaints but there are many things about Malaysia that are wonderful, like the sunny weather, even the rain and thunderstorm just reminds me of the greatness of Allah, the sound of Adhan, the places to pray all over the place, the facillities to make istinjak, the pasar tani, pasar malam, kedai mamak, the people are friendly and they are often grateful to Allah, gratefulness also equals happiness and tranquility. So, I love it here really but improvement is never a bad thing.
Driving in UK is systematic. Driving in Malaysia is 'tunggang-terbalik'
One thing I love and will surely miss about Britain is driving. Driving in the UK is a wonderful experience Alhamdulillah.
People flash their lights at you to give way, they stop when you step on the zebra crossing, they let you go pass when you signal, they give you way in a tight space. It is completely different from driving in Malaysia.
I was driving on the M2 motorway to Deal, Kent. It was a 2 hour journey from South London to visit my in-laws and it was a beautiful experience. Slow vehicles on the left lane, fast overtaking vehicles on the right. People give signal when they want to overtake. It was pleasant. The scenery too was beautiful. I used to take the countryside for granted but Allah has made the whole world beautiful. It was winter and the trees were either bare or covered with brown leaves. either side of the highway were fields of meadows.] It was freezing cold and some parts of the way were foggy but it was nice.
Even though cars were driving fast but they behaved themselves. I wonder to myself, why do drivers in Malaysia have to be so reckless? What is there to be proud of driving like a lunatic. People drive with their egos, they leave their brains behind and they're proud about it? Is it a good thing to be proud of something that kills others, that takes the lives of children, parents, husbands and wives? How can pride be more important than the live of another person.
That's when the scary thing hit me...I don't think people think at all. They enter a car, a machine and they shut their minds. Are we really ready for modern progress when our mentality is still stuck in the times of horse carts and 'kereta lembu'? It is an attitude problem and that needs to change if any improvement was going to happen on the roads.
It just feels like in Britain, the traffic was civilized. I really felt that I was driving in a civilized environment but what does that makes us in the so called 'developing' world, uncivilized? I think people can see that very clearly and they don't tell us but they form an opinion about us...and because we have no value for our own lives then, others do not value us. Our life becomes cheap and they don't even care when millions of people in the developing world die of something or another...accidents, earth quakes, bombs etc...etc...
Our attitude has to change and it should change because we are Muslims and Allah has made life sacred. We have to value life as sacred, a gift from God. Then, we need to develop our Islamic personality which means developing responsibility and accountability. We are responsible for entering a car, turning on the engine and driving it on the road. We are responsible to drive safely and carefully and not to endanger the lives of others and ourselves. Why? because we are accountable to Allah and we will face Allah on the day of Judgement and we will be asked about every single thing we do including how we drive a car.
We need to develop mercy, tolerance and generosity on the roads because a Muslim has mercy, has tolerance towards others and that tolerance is towards the mubah behaviour of others NOT the haraam. We should not tolerate haraam but we should tolerate mubah so, give people right of way, let the pedestrians cross the roads, and pedestrians try to cross the roads quickly instead of 'terlenggang-lenggok' like you're carrying a turtle shell on your back. Be generous on the road. it will not kill you to give way but it might kill you to drive recklessly.
We should truly feel ashamed by the jungle, survival of the fittest mentality on our roads.
What upsets me....
I am so grateful to Allah that He has made my heart love two different places. I lived in UK for 17 years and memories is what makes us who we are. I felt at home there, familiar and as soon as I landed in Malaysia I felt familiar too. I have been able to experience two very different places in the world in terms of its weather, the people, the food and the culture.
I can't explain the feeling I had when I met up with the sisters again. It was surreal. I have yet to meet anyone like my sisters in Britain. They are warm, they are generous, they are fun and we can have good conversations about the world politics.
Still, I have seen some other things in Britain that has made me very angry and sad. I have seen how people can be so arrogant and how even some Muslims have been affected by a mentality of 'I deserve such and such'. People believe that they deserve a perfect life, they deserve the house, the car, the job, the husband, the wife, the children, the health and as soon as something goes a bit wrong...like if they suffer from something not very serious such as having a cold or diarrhoea which are self-limiting or if they have some chronic benign illness like dysfunctional bowel then, they think that they have been robbed of their 'perfect life'. I have heard Muslims wearing himar and jilbab saying things like."I can't go on like this for the rest of my life" saying it with such arrogance that I wonder whether they truly have eman. There is no humility, no acceptance of the Qadr of Allah, no saying 'I know this is from Allah'. Rather, it is I came to see the doctor and you're telling me I haven't got anything serious but I am not having perfect health like other people and you have to fix me no matter what...' and as if God does not exist. I have heard people who have been suffering for years from arthritis due to old age, have complaint about every single treatment that they have received under the NHS, have had every single investigations in the world, refuse to accept any advice and still say after so many years to the doctor, "So what are you going to do for me?" In other words "doctor, sort out my miserable life".
No amount of medical knowledge or psychiatry or psychology is going to sort out misery. If a person is miserable, if a person has negative thinking, if a person believes that they deserve better than what Allah has already given him, if a person is ungrateful then, there is no remedy for him except...to reflect, to realise and to repent to Allah swt.
There is a difference between demanding for our rights given to us from Allah swt e.g. as what the people in Egypt are doing today, demanding for a just and fair system, demanding for the implementation of Islamic rule. It is okay for a husband to demand his rights from his wife or that a wife to demand for her rights. Allah has given us certain rights as an ummah, as citizens, as mothers, fathers and children. That is different from demanding from Allah the kind of life that we think we deserve. It is Allah that decides our Rizk, our Ajal, our health, our future, our past.It is Allah who decides how many children we have or if we have any at all, it is Allah who decides if our children are intelligent or have an impairment. For these things we cannot demand, we can only be grateful for the things that we have and make dua to Allah to alleviate us from any suffering or to increase us in goodness.
I can't explain the feeling I had when I met up with the sisters again. It was surreal. I have yet to meet anyone like my sisters in Britain. They are warm, they are generous, they are fun and we can have good conversations about the world politics.
Still, I have seen some other things in Britain that has made me very angry and sad. I have seen how people can be so arrogant and how even some Muslims have been affected by a mentality of 'I deserve such and such'. People believe that they deserve a perfect life, they deserve the house, the car, the job, the husband, the wife, the children, the health and as soon as something goes a bit wrong...like if they suffer from something not very serious such as having a cold or diarrhoea which are self-limiting or if they have some chronic benign illness like dysfunctional bowel then, they think that they have been robbed of their 'perfect life'. I have heard Muslims wearing himar and jilbab saying things like."I can't go on like this for the rest of my life" saying it with such arrogance that I wonder whether they truly have eman. There is no humility, no acceptance of the Qadr of Allah, no saying 'I know this is from Allah'. Rather, it is I came to see the doctor and you're telling me I haven't got anything serious but I am not having perfect health like other people and you have to fix me no matter what...' and as if God does not exist. I have heard people who have been suffering for years from arthritis due to old age, have complaint about every single treatment that they have received under the NHS, have had every single investigations in the world, refuse to accept any advice and still say after so many years to the doctor, "So what are you going to do for me?" In other words "doctor, sort out my miserable life".
No amount of medical knowledge or psychiatry or psychology is going to sort out misery. If a person is miserable, if a person has negative thinking, if a person believes that they deserve better than what Allah has already given him, if a person is ungrateful then, there is no remedy for him except...to reflect, to realise and to repent to Allah swt.
There is a difference between demanding for our rights given to us from Allah swt e.g. as what the people in Egypt are doing today, demanding for a just and fair system, demanding for the implementation of Islamic rule. It is okay for a husband to demand his rights from his wife or that a wife to demand for her rights. Allah has given us certain rights as an ummah, as citizens, as mothers, fathers and children. That is different from demanding from Allah the kind of life that we think we deserve. It is Allah that decides our Rizk, our Ajal, our health, our future, our past.It is Allah who decides how many children we have or if we have any at all, it is Allah who decides if our children are intelligent or have an impairment. For these things we cannot demand, we can only be grateful for the things that we have and make dua to Allah to alleviate us from any suffering or to increase us in goodness.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)