..end of year blues..

...I have slowed down on blogging lately....I could feel the lethargy seeping in, much against myself....there is something niggling at the back of mind which I just could not put my finger to...calls from my ex does not help much..or calls to my children..maybe it is this time of the year..and a receding year has a way of putting you into doldrums..for you tend  to measure yourself against the year before..and the years before...and realised that as the years piled up, there isn't much that you have achieved..intellectually speaking, that is....about the most positive thing that I have done was when I quit smoking 6 years ago..other than that I could see that my horizon has not widened much..

..maybe it is the weather..they say negative ions after rain should give you a lift..maybe I need to lift my face..but, no..I have come to terms with aging....

..I think it was watching Paul Anka singing with his daughter, Anthea, that did it..I used to Youtubed him for the nostalgia...remembering the pangs of unrequited puppy loves with the likes of 'Put Your Head on My Shoulder' and 'Lonely Boy'..but watching him sing 'Yo Te Amo' Do I Love You stirred strange and unfathomable emotions in this old coot....

.,.with a brand new year looming, I am missing my past..




..happy year end holidays everyone..perchance we are there together as the new year comes in, as surely it will...here's an early Happy New Year wish from me..life goes on unabated..as surely it must..take this time to  kiss that flower..plant a tree..hug your love ones..forgive a wrong..do something crazy..and tell that  someone..'I love you...'

..collateral damage..

..war, as in divorce, has its casualties..most times the casualties are the innocents..the Americans, seeking refuge under euphemism, called it collateral damage..a nice, impersonal term for lives lost..lives that are not factored when those precision missiles somehow killed innocents..

..but there are no precision in a divorce..and like wars, divorces sometime happened..whether acrimonious or otherwise, collateral damage in a divorce are always the children..and a society quick to condemn which does not help any one bit..every little thing that the children does after the big D is magnified, with an accusing finger pointed at the father..if their grades fall, its the father..if they took to smoking, its the father..even if they had a mishap with their bicycle on the way back from school, its knowing looks and mutterings ..their father just divorced their mother..

..homes that broke down results in broken down children..it is what we come to expect from such children..society  expects them to..it is as if all social ills are because fathers such as me, divorced their wives..we are quick at generalizing..all those mat rempits came from broken down homes.,.sheesh..

..but I know that fathers can still play a role after a divorce..it is a matter of minimising the damage..it is a matter of giving him a chance  to control..and damage control is through being near..being around..and an acceptance of the situation, especially by their mother..for children reacts to their mother's reactions..restricting access to their father is not the way..neither is the blame-game..yes, I am guilty as charge..but where does  it leaves things?..

....a time to sacrifice..a time to remember the departed..

..during festivals we remember the dead..as usual, after the solat aidil-adha, the jumaah, the congregation will make a bee-line for the graveyard adjacent to the mosque..as my children gathered with their mother around their grandfather's plot, I sat back a little, taking in the scene...

.."we bid thee  peace..oh, ye of the grave..God willing we will follow thee...soon"...

..I sat there on the wakaf as I try to remember those near and afar who have departed before me..

..images of the dead  flashes through my mind..except for my father, Hamid bin Daud, who died a few months after I was conceived in early 1945...he died during an unsettling time, when the country was occupied by the Japanese..and there were no pictures of him...

..but images of others who were once dear to me were clear and true..my grandfather, Sulong bin Lassim, who died more than 40 years ago..he was about the only grandfather that I ever knew..I remember his fondness for ikan haruan and other such fishes found in abundance in padi fields around the house in Kubang Kerian..

..my mother Che Minah bt Sulong, who died 14 years ago in 1996..my son, Amnan Fahim, 20 years ago, 40 days after he was born..my uncle, Zakaria bin Sulong, more than 30 years  ago, of a heart attack at the airport, after stopping by my house in Jalan Pengkalan Chepa..he was the uncle who took me in, treated me like his own son, and threw a shoe at me for too much playing around instead of concentrating on my studies..another uncle Zainal Abidin bin Sulong, a few months ago..

..and friends..friends who once shared their last kopek with me..who helped me in time of need..and gave ungrudgingly..friends who shared the dingy, concrete floor of a room in Kuala Lumpur..who died before me..

..images of them came back to me as I sat there on the wakaf on the morning of Aidil Adha...may the Lord shower His Blessings upon them...may the Lord forgive all of their sins...may they be taken in and placed among those who were with iman..in Your Syurga Firdaus..Your Garden of Edin..

..amin.....

..men hunt..

..I gave in to that primordial urge found in every men yesterday..the urge to hunt..it was more instinct that anything else, this need to stalk with a gun in hand..and trying to outwit your prey..I supposed, in a way, I have always been a hunter..using skills learned as a kid with a catapult..but a gun in hand gave you power..and a sense of control..nothing settles a man more than when he is hunting..maybe I am linking back to the Pleistocene era..when men are hunters..and hunt in order to mate..

..but yesterday it was a good excuse to get out of the house..to take in the fresh air..work out a sweat and bond with the villagers..it was harvesting time..padi planted from scattering of seeds and harvested with a machine that munched through ripe padi-stalks and shoo-ed the birds away..

..but there was nothing to shoot yesterday..and I went home without firing a single shot..

..but life is like that...you stalked around, gun at ready...and there's nothing to shoot..the next day you are without your gun, they came and wiggle their tails...

..the monsoon and the cup in Bachok..

..almost on cue, the rain stopped this Friday morning..the clouds cleared, making way for the sun.....as housewives took out their washings to dry, pakmat gave his thanks to the Lord..yes, its gonna be a beautiful day..a glorious day for the Cup to make its first ever appearance in Bachok..and what better place if not at Dataran Perahu, Pantai Irama, Bachok?..

..the Cup arrived and history was made..

  

..pakmat with the big man himself..he was amused..whilst attention
was focussed on the players and the cup, this old coot singled
him out, shook his hands and have daughter Auji took this pic..

  

..auji and her mother..getting a ringside view..

..Rizal Hashim of Loose Canon was right...among reasons he chose Kelantan to win:

1. Sebagai hadiah buat majoriti penyokong Kelantan yang ghairah tapi sopan dan tertib.

2. Sebagai hadiah buat Tan Sri Annuar Musa yang membawa transformasi luar dan dalam padang.

3. Alah, NS dah menang tahun lepas, bagi chance la kat Kelantan.

4. Sebagai hadiah buat B. Sathianathan, atau ejaan sebenarnya B. Satiananthan...kerana selepas ini dia akan digantung enam bulan!

5. Sebagai hadiah buat Akmal Rizal Ahmad Rakhli yang tak pernah menang gelaran besar sepanjang kerjaya

6. Kesan ekonomi buat negeri Cik Siti Wan Kembang serta menghidupkan pembangunan bola sepak di akar umbi.

..right on, LC..I was not there at the Stadium..but I was there this morning at Pantai Irama..the crowd was by far small, compared to that in Bukit Jalil the night Kelantan won..but this morning, I could feel the passion..for in the words of KAFA.s president..through sports, no matter the divide, we are united..and Kelantan has proven that their supporters make their team into...the red warriors.....

..age and weights..

..I have gained some weight lately..5 kilos..not since my polygamous days have I put on so much...polygamy kept me trim and slim..and lithe...all those running around burnt those calories..my girth has increased, too,  by an inch..from a constant 29 inches to 30..the missus likes it..got some extra flesh to hold and hug, she says..

..retirement, monogamy and blogging must have agreed with me..my 60 kilos against her 70..pushing past 50, she needs to go on a diet..but there was a time when she was rake-thin..that was when she discovered that I had taken on another wife in the city of KL, a girl of 26 whom I had married at 50..my final fling, and last attempt, at keeping growing old at bay..

..it does not work, of course..but the wife revolted  when she found out..having married a married man herself, she could say much then..as she did not say much now..but she lost weight through self-suppression of her inner revolt..there were no flying pans and pots..no shrieks and screams..no shamans and no bomohs..just tears that flowed silently as she prayed her five times a day solat...tears that fell in the silent of the night as she prayed a few hours before dawn..I used to watch her through the half-light of a waning moon that caressed and enveloped her..a figure in white, almost ghostly as the moon streamed its light through the translucent window...

..but the next morning, I would just packed by travelling bag with a few clothes and left for KL..invariably, she would be in the kitchen..at the kitchen door, watching me go...

..gi dulu, cik....the driver would say..she would try to muster a smile..not quite looking at him, as we drove past..

..the monsoon and the cup..

..for the first time ever, Kelantan won the Malaysia Cup..we never won it during those heady days when Singapore was a participant, when Kelantan and Terengganu were arch rivals, or when Malaysia ruled the turf with the likes of Mokhtar Dahari and Soh Chin Aun..we never won it  when I was that carefree youth shouting myself hoarse as Dali Omar took to the field with aplomb, and my butt burnt from the hot concrete seat of Stadium Sultan Mohamed the IV drenched hot by the afternoon sun as the game started at 4.30 pm..

...we won it when this old geezer had given up of Kelantan ever winning the cup..we won it when I have become an old horse left to roam free in the meadows..with no more spring in his trot, and with just a memory of the fire that burns in every staunch and fervent a supporter's heart  that he still is..

.the next day, it rained..the skys darkened with black clouds hiding the sun..the rain came along with howling wind and cold..it is like as if the final that Saturday night was the turning point for the monsoon to start..

,,the view in front of pakmat's home..

..for mekbu, it is time to nestle her litter of 4..

...Trengganu may have the Monsoon Cup..but we have the monsoon and the cup..cheers to the red warriors..