...approaching 70, I am still working on trying to be a good muslim...and I think it is laughable that at my age I am still at the attempting stage...should not someone of 67 be smug and snug that he is a good muslim?...
...I am trying to be a good muslim in between Ramadans...I was a better muslim in the fasting month...not really good, but better...in that I tried to be more forgiving of people...speak less and not to give in to mindless and uncontrollable laughter...I also tried to keep my eyes down...tried no to see what they willingly revealed...and, of course, I tried to be kind and charitable..to children, especially...to the cats and animals...to the plants and trees...
...I am also trying to be a better father to my children...but most have grown and have families of their own...so I tried to be a better grandfather...the only grandfather that I remembered was my mother's father, tokayah...but he never put me on his lap or hugged or kissed me....as I often did to mine...and I hope that one day, when they all have up and grown, they will remember wistfully this cranky grandfather of theirs...and the kittens that I placed into their little fingers...and the kisses that I smudged upon their faces..
...and I am also trying to be a better husband...and that, being the polygamist that I was, is nigh impossible...but now that I back on a monogamous path again, I am trying to be a better ex-husband to my ex-wives...its not easy, of course..much has flowed under the bridge...I am trying to be more cordial...open and communicable...
..I have a couple more years before touching 70... I might just reach it and go a little bit beyond...until then, I am on this path of trying to improve myself and be a better person by 70...the Lord willing..
Sunday, 26 August 2012
Thursday, 16 August 2012
..youthful ways..
...as with the ways of youth, friendships tend to be fleeting and short..no matter how intense they may be once...when pakmat came back to Kota Bharu in late 1969, I was pushing 23 and a stranger...but Kota Bharu was too swinging a town and pakmat too gregarious for him not to be accepted by the in-crowd of boys...boys responsible for making things happened then...Kota Bharu was like a ripened fruit, waiting just for the moment when it would fall to the ground...Britz Park has closed down...but there were a number of night clubs operating through the nights that helped maintained the beat...but they were fighting against an ebbing tide....
...bands, three guitars and a drumset, maybe a keyboard, was the in-thing..kugiran were formed at a drop of hat...but two rose above the miasma..boys with talent a cut above the others...with names like Suara Kilat and The Streaks..pakmat was part of the scene...yes, pakmat remembers them...Wan Salman, singer and keyboardist, Yusof, lead guitarist, Asran, bassist, and Opa on drums...throughout the year that we were together we were like brothers...moving around in a pack......and a love for music the bond...
..but all too soon we went our separate ways...life has a way of starting anew with marriage and children...with pakmat it was several marriages...those days of carefree bachelor days were forgotten...when you faced the tempest of polygamy, there is not much time to reminisce your youth...
..but sometimes in the first week of Ramadhan, Haji Wan Salman called...Opa had died...solat jenazah at Masjid Telipot after Zohor...as I hang up, a mist cleared...and I saw a gangly youth a few years younger than me...pleasant and easy with his grin and laughter...Opa was a maestro on drums...though we never met as an adult, I remember you, Opa...and I remember you well...May the Lord includes you among those He blessed..May the Lord forgives you your sins...and mine...and places you in His Jannah...
...
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| .Haji Wan Salaman...a pic from his youthful days.. pic borrowed from blog Ayu The Sun.. |
..but all too soon we went our separate ways...life has a way of starting anew with marriage and children...with pakmat it was several marriages...those days of carefree bachelor days were forgotten...when you faced the tempest of polygamy, there is not much time to reminisce your youth...
..but sometimes in the first week of Ramadhan, Haji Wan Salman called...Opa had died...solat jenazah at Masjid Telipot after Zohor...as I hang up, a mist cleared...and I saw a gangly youth a few years younger than me...pleasant and easy with his grin and laughter...Opa was a maestro on drums...though we never met as an adult, I remember you, Opa...and I remember you well...May the Lord includes you among those He blessed..May the Lord forgives you your sins...and mine...and places you in His Jannah...
...
Wednesday, 8 August 2012
...my late mother, abit on father..and brethrens..
...I never get to know my late father...there never was any images or pictures of him that I can relate to...he must have died in 1944, during the Japanese occupation....those 'makan ubi kayu cicah dengan budu' days...I remember my late mother telling that she was carrying me for two months or thereabout when he died....and she was at the height of her morning sickness, puking everywhere with endless bouts of dizziness... a few years short of thirty, her other two sons would be about 4 and 2 years old...
...she must have suffered as any young mother would...widowed with three children with one an infant, she must thought that life had given her a bad deal....I have no idea how I was born, or exactly where...but it was agreed that it was in Lemal, Pasir Mas, Kelantan...my late father must have a house there, being a Ranger with the Forest Department that he was...
.. when the Japanese left in August, 1945, she must have picked up whatever pieces of her life that was left, her children scattered, and with herself suited she tried a round of marriages....which failed a couple of times until she met the late Ismail, a tailor, who gave her a daughter and some stability into her life until he died sometimes in the mid-sixties...
..by then, she had handed me over to her younger brother, the late Zakaria, a government officer who served most of his years as an Assistant District Officer in various districts of Perak...and so it was that I grew up in Kuala Kangsar, Parit and Ipoh....away from my mother and my two brothers and halfsister...
..the house that I came back to in late 1969 is now in ruins...the soul of the house is no longer there...like my brother, Johan, it is wobbly at the knees, standing uncertainly upon the earth that awaits to reclaim it...even though the laughters and tears of the past still ring in my ears, it is receding...
..today, I found myself again at Jalan Gajah Mati..as I often did upon paying visits to my destitute brother...but something made me took that extra steps to the house...and for a brief moment as I stood there, I could almost hear my mother calling out to me...exhorting me not to be out late...
..in Your Hand is the kingdom, Lord... and Your Power is over all things..You who created life and death that You may try us...unto you I seek forgiveness...forgive them all, Lord...
...she must have suffered as any young mother would...widowed with three children with one an infant, she must thought that life had given her a bad deal....I have no idea how I was born, or exactly where...but it was agreed that it was in Lemal, Pasir Mas, Kelantan...my late father must have a house there, being a Ranger with the Forest Department that he was...
.. when the Japanese left in August, 1945, she must have picked up whatever pieces of her life that was left, her children scattered, and with herself suited she tried a round of marriages....which failed a couple of times until she met the late Ismail, a tailor, who gave her a daughter and some stability into her life until he died sometimes in the mid-sixties...
..by then, she had handed me over to her younger brother, the late Zakaria, a government officer who served most of his years as an Assistant District Officer in various districts of Perak...and so it was that I grew up in Kuala Kangsar, Parit and Ipoh....away from my mother and my two brothers and halfsister...
..the house that I came back to in late 1969 is now in ruins...the soul of the house is no longer there...like my brother, Johan, it is wobbly at the knees, standing uncertainly upon the earth that awaits to reclaim it...even though the laughters and tears of the past still ring in my ears, it is receding...
..today, I found myself again at Jalan Gajah Mati..as I often did upon paying visits to my destitute brother...but something made me took that extra steps to the house...and for a brief moment as I stood there, I could almost hear my mother calling out to me...exhorting me not to be out late...
..in Your Hand is the kingdom, Lord... and Your Power is over all things..You who created life and death that You may try us...unto you I seek forgiveness...forgive them all, Lord...
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