The moon shines in you

921204 Kim Seokjin

I asked the man in the moon
How does he keep it aglow
He says the moon only has to look at you
And reflect all the beauty you own

To infinity and beyond

Today is my second last day of leave. The day after tomorrow, I'll finally be starting my final posting of housemanship.

Am I relieved? I guess so. Mostly because, at least, now, there's a progress in my life.

Am I happy? No.

Honestly, I haven't known happiness for a long time now. 

Didn't realise the numbing feeling was so significant until earlier last week.

And suddenly, I was so overwhelmed with a hatred of existing that my heart swelled with the pain.

I do not hate my existence. I love who I am, the I who is 

the person my parents brought up,

the sister who set up the bar for her younger siblings

that one introvert friend

Nor did I wished for death.

Life is God-given. He decides and orchestrates the time, venue, mechanism

I just couldn't bear...."existing"

The reality in which I exist in, I cannot change.

In sleep I find solace.

For, in sleep, there is no consciousness of existence.

Life feels so long,

yet so empty.

What am I looking for?

I have yet found the answer.

But a spark found me.

A simple occasion.

I went to a market yesterday. 

Variety of food I like.

Comics.

Fruits.

After a long time, I felt a spark of joy.

It reminded me of going to the market with my mom while I was growing up, all in the excitement for the food and comics of course, none for the knowledge of types of fish and whatnot.

It made me realise I can find joy in these occasions which occur as a daily or weekly norm to other people; which used to occur as a weekly norm for me too.

Alas, my reality has set its own tempo.

And that joy is temporary.

To a friend

I wrote this during my flight from Kuching to KK, heading home to rest for a few days before starting work anew.

🙈🙉🙊🙈🙉🙊🙈🙉🙊🙈🙉🙊🙈🙉🙊

Friend,
I'm writing this because these are the words I couldn't say to you.

I appreciate that you can open up to me, and try to make me understand your pain and how painful the world is being to you. I know that hesitation to share and open up to people, because not everyone can empathize, not everyone can understand, not everyone can accept it other than a mere weakness and vulnerability exposed.
I get that, because I'm an independent woman. And being the independent woman that I am, I show no weakness nor vulnerability. To be more accurate, I don't think anyone can understand and empathize with my weakness, my inner conflict.
The fact that you chose to open up to me, I truly appreciate it.

Friend,
There were a lot of things I thought of saying to you these past 2 days but couldn't bring myself to.

Friend,
When you spoke to me about the loneliness, emptiness, numbness you felt inside, it reminded me of myself from once upon a time ago.
It reminded me of a desperate me;
The "me" inside who was empty and cold
That "me" kept looking for something to fill the void
I kept looking for things to excite me. Something that could spark a flicker of life inside me.

But friend,
What gave me life at that time was God, Him the Almighty. He took my hand and guided me when I was lost. He shone light on my path - what felt like light at the end of the tunnel after an eternity of darkness.
My heart was beating since I was in my mother's womb, but that was the first time I felt alive. I felt like living a life doing something I believe worth dying for.
Benarlah hidayah itu milik Allah. He gives it to whomever He wants, and takes it away from whoever he wants.

Now, most of the time, I just work; I do not think nor do I feel.

I am a loner. I am also a deep-thinker with a sensitive personality. If I allow myself to think and feel so freely as much as my heart and mind will, and not have anyone to share that burden, it would kill me. So I just don't.
Once in a while, it creeps up. That feeling of being dead inside. Not that being dead is a specific feeling by itself. Dead people don't notice that they're dead...or do they?
Anyways, that feeling of emptiness, cold loneliness, numbness...I look around me and I see happy people, people living for something or for someone (as it appears superficially, who knows, maybe they're dead inside as well), going somewhere in life, and I'm just here - not fully sure what I'm living for, why I'm living the way I am.
Once in a while, some bits of life and human left inside me shout, scratch and rebel, and I would be able to cry my heart out, die in doing so and then try to live again.
Other times, I felt as if I have lost the capacity and strength to bring myself to tears. So I end up staring into space, at nothing, at no one, being engulfed by a paralyzing fear that everything in my life will sum up to nothing.

It's not that I didn't try. I tried finding my way back. I tried doing things that once brought me there.
Tapi benar hidayah itu milik Allah. Kemanisan beribadah itu kurniaan Allah. Perasaan itu milik Allah.
Sama seperti apabila kita makan, "kenyang" itu kurniaan Allah.
Sama seperti apabila kita tidur, "rehat" itu hakikatnya hadiah dari Allah.
Sama seperti apabila kita makan ubat, "kesihatan" itu Allah yang bagi.
I am still trying.

But it's a wonder by itself that I'm writing once again, no?
You were spot on when you guessed that I was a naqibah.
I feel like I can tell you this because..
The feeling of realizing your purpose to live, and living with an aim of martyrdom, and longing for that sweet feeling of what we felt at that time to be rekindled...
After I heard your story, I feel like you can understand mine?

When I was a naqibah, I was told that I had a gift of speech. Aku dapat menyentuh manusia. On and off I would write too.
But what I spoke and wrote came from a soul which was living with a longing to die in the name of God -
"Teringat ku teringat,
pada janjiMu ku terikat,
Hanya sekejap ku berdiri,
ku lakukan sepenuh hati
Peduli ku peduli,
siang dan malam yang berganti,
pedihku ini tak ada erti
Jika Kau lah sandaran hati
Kau lah sandaran hati" -
Pain in life was inevitable, but I longed to
to finally be rested in His gardens, a soul which at that time, had sight on where its going.

I don't know when exactly it happened, but my soul became like the dry dessert under the hot scorching sun, with an excruciating thirst for the sweet taste of raindrops..and it lost its sights...and once again I find myself in the darkness.

Since then, I couln't speak nor write.
But having spent some time with you, it felt like a crack appeared on the hardened shell enclosing my heart, allowing a glimpse of my soul to peep through...
And here you go! I'm writing again.
And for that I am grateful to you, friend.

Friend,
This is not the end of our journey yet.
Every breath and heartbeatis Allah's way of saying "Keep going. Don't give up"
Apa-apa pun usaha kita sekarang untuk kembali, sebesar mana sekecil mana, He is still allowing it.

God Almighty will not leave us. He never leaves us. That, at least, I believe is something we can hold on to.

I'm 26

It's 2am on April 27th 2016.
I'm 26.
And I'm moving to Kuching.

The last time I wrote was prior to starting housemanship.
It was so long ago.
I've seen and experienced a lot of things, and will continue doing so.
A lot of times I felt like writing again.
But I never had the time. Or the will.

I'm 26. And I just bought myself a car.
I'm moving to Kuching for my paeds posting and I'm renting myself an apartment.
Still single as ever. Yep, that's me.

So much I wanted to write about, especially about my experience in paeds so far.
Klinik Kesihatan Kaingaran.
Thalassemia.
Being a paeds houseman in general.
Being a houseman in general.
Being me but not who I was.
But as always, words fail me when I need them the most.
Honestly, my English is so disappointing nowadays.

I'll share one day.
When it's not 2 am in the morning :)

Marriage & Death

No one seems to be visiting my blog. It's kind of a good thing, I guess. I can pour out the stuff in my head without worrying how are people gonna accept the dark side of my mind.

Having travelled for 2 weeks with my parents and 2 couples of their friends really made reality look clear- relationship-wise that is. Things that I've thought before but was buried because of change of environment resurfaced.
I've lost faith in the marriage institution, or to be more accurate, in long-lasting love. I accept marriage, I do not reject it, as it has been ordained by God. And I accept love, I accept its existence, I accept how people can fall in love. But seeing what I have seen, living where I live, I highly doubt love can last life-long...unless you die early.

I'm sick of seeing men, walking ahead and leaving their women far behind. I'm sick of seeing men handing stuff for women to carry, or leaving their heavy luggages for women to heave. I'm sick of men, fed and rested, ordering women, hungry, tired, to do heavy work even after the women pleaded for a rest. I'm sick of women, being laughed at by their friends for "trembling" at holding a 500 dollar dress because they know their husbands easily buy a 1300 dollar suit. I'm sick of women having to travel without being allowed to even know when their flight is, or where are they gonna live. I'm sick of women having to stand and wait because their husbands "went somewhere" and didn't tell them where to go. I'm sick of women being forced to agree to something just so their husbands can pride themselves in their power. I'm sick of men taking their so-called "love of their life" for granted.

I find the word "sayang" so hypocritical when everyone can see she has to beg for extra money, and that you think everything you say is right, and everything she says is dumb.

I find the word "sayang" so hypocritical when you throw hot soup in her face and throws her out of the house when you're angry.

But I don't know, like I said, lifelong-lasting love doesn't seem to exist....where I live. The men in the West seem to appreciate the women they love more. They may not respect women, in the way the Easterns do, but they make up for it in gentleman mannerism and when they fall in love, you can really see it even when they're all grey-haired and wrinkled.

Do I sound like a feminist? Or a Western-ist? I don't count myself as any one of those, though. Maybe it's because I have pride in myself as a woman. I'm used to make decisions for myself. And my decisions aren't whims. Why does the world treat women as liabilities? They became liabilities because you treated them as liabilities and  severed their potentials and nobilities. The world treats women as if they're lacking. But what women are lacking are actually the due respect that they rightfully deserve. The respect that God has ordained for them to receive.

I have my own head. I'm used to be given responsibilities and being pushed to my limits without being considered the difference in energy I have as a woman. I have my opinions. I have my thoughts. Why should I let another human being make me into such an unvalued being?

People fall in love. And that love that they've fallen into is beautiful. But when I see couples in love, I can't help myself imagining what will they be like in another 20 years. Will their "great love" survive? The kind of love which exists till death and beyond do exists, I'm sure. But, I think it's very rare. So rare that it'd be like a miracle to even witness one.

It's kind of a wake up call seeing these things again. I've been living among youths, and used to seeing young love, young married couples. It even came to a point that I took a step, kinda dipped my toe, into marriage, with these ideas and hopes that my life could be different, and pushed my fear of having my spouse be fed up with me after a few years of marriage and that I'd be taken granted for for the rest of my mortal existence.

Falling in love would be the end of me. I know myself. I can pretty much let myself go when I fall in love. I can't help myself when I'm in love...which makes me more convinced that it will be the end of me.

I don't wanna ever be in that state, of having a man take control of me and be the death of my soul. But, mom would be so sad. She's really hoping that I would marry as soon as possible. And she says I'll look so pitiful when I'm older and I don't have my children to take care of me, or if I don't have a child's home to go to during festive seasons. I don't wanna ever face that shame either.

It made me kinda of understand people who take their own lives. It's kind of... for once, being able to take control of your life, despite all the things and fears of things you can't control. It's a feeling of orchestrating the end of your mortal life.
I know. It's God's right. It is.
I'm just saying, I kinda understand why people would think it.
If I could live my youth strong, please my parents, and die early before I can shame my family for not marrying, and face the extra shame of having my organism to rot in the limbo of what people will call me "unattractive loneliness"
But, I cannot orchestrate my own end.
It is against God's will.
And I may sometimes be attracted to the things He forbids, but I do not go against His will.

And besides, I'm not confident of attaining paradise, but I don't wanna end up in the other one.
And, who's gonna take care of my parents when they're older?

Again, I say to myself: Sometimes, life is so hard, so painful...and there's no way out of life...

Darkness

It's dark where I am right now.
I'm currently hiding out.
I'm hiding out from reality, and responsibilities that I have to bear if I face it.
I bundle myself up in a world of my imagination, where darkness is my freedom.
A world so impossible, I paralyse myself in between these two worlds.

I open my eyes and see the person who is right now where I was before.
That person will not understand that I, at this moment, before her eyes, am being engulfed by a daze, a confusion of who I am, a hatred towards the world I am living. She will say this and that, but there is no solution without understanding the problem.
And she will not be able to understand me.
I have been there, where all I see despite blood and sweat is hope and light.
But I have fallen into nowhere, where all I see despite smiles and laughter is doom and darkness.

I close my eyes to avoid the realization that I am falling.
I don't want to see that I am falling.
I am falling and I will be broken into pieces again.
I don't want others to see that I am falling, I don't want to accept the fact that I am falling.
But, I know I am.

Now, darkness feels more like home.

I have always cared,
I have always bore weight on my shoulders,
I have always felt guilt for others' oblivion and ignorance,
how does it feel to not care?
To go about without feeling propelled to do something.
Do as you wish, and I will do as I wish!
Darkness is pulling me into this sweetness of throwing everything into the air and go
"Screw everything!"
And I will be screwed along with it.

Music in Parisian Metro

No one really visits my blog. Because no one really knows about it. The only ones who's been on my blog are my former murabbi, her mom ( I think), one of my usrahmates, my adik-adik usrah, one of my housemates, and some other random people who visited my blog once when I posted the link to it on my fb. Once.

I'm not so enthusiastic about people, random people or strangers, reading my blog either. Well, it's always a dilemma of getting my thoughts out there, and my conflicting nature of hating people who don't really know me, don't experience living with me and stuff- get to know stuff about me, my character, my personality, stuffs I like, stuffs I think about, which, to me, are personal.

***

In January, I went on a winter trip to France, England (London), Scotland (Edinburgh) and Ireland (Belfast). It was the longest winter trip I've ever went on. 2 weeks and 3 day. The last 2-3 days or so of the trip, I was totally "pancit". Didn't wanna go nowhere. Just wann'ed to sleep.

I achieved a lot, I think, from my winter trip. Learnt a lot about myself. Experienced the culture. Understood the world better than before I went on that trip. Survived the ups and downs of travelling with other people. Lots of things happened, lots of stuff. But I'm not blessed with the ability to beautifully transform everything I see into writing. Most of the stuff I see, taste, hear, experience, they're kept in the heart-they help me to feel more; in the lens of my eyes-they help me see the world in a constantly renewed perspective; and in my head- they help me understand human, the uniqueness of them, the culture, their association with nature and development, a whole lot better.

Oh, yeah. And I hung out with ma brathahh (my bro) in London. Hoyeahh!

One thing I do feel like sharing -though you may not experience the feeling of enlightenment and thoughtfulness that I experienced when this following realization had hit me, but whatever- a scene I saw in an underground Paris metro.

I was riding the metro one Parisian morning to go see Eiffel (or was it Pierre Herme?) with my 2 hommies (no, they're not my hommies) when suddenly  a song came playing. At first I thought, "What is this, they have the radio on in the metro or something?" But then, when I looked around, there was this old couple, around 40-50 years old I'd say.
The man was playing the accordion, while the lady, presumably his wife, sang to the music. They played and sang beautifully. But everyone in the metro was ignoring them, avoided eye contact with them, some even frowned upon them. She was still singing when we got off. I understood later, when I embarked on another metro and saw another senior lady singing a few rounds and then asking for money, that the couple must've had done the same thing.

"What's so enlighteni-"

I'll tell you what's so enlightening.
I, for one, just hate seeing senior citizens or anyone whose age isn't far apart from my parents', working hard, being ignored, having to ask crowds for money. I just hate it.
And the senior couple, oh my God, kept smiling throughout their gig.
The man was playing the accordion, moving to the beat of the music he's making, smiling non-stop while looking into people's face. His partner-the same, only she was singing. But people were ignoring them, people didn't look at them. The ones who did look them had 'annoyed' plastered all over their faces for having their peace in the metro disturbed.

Making music in the metro for some money

I wondered how the man could look into their faces and still keep his smile so bright and keep doing what he was doing, an act I highly suspect I am unable of ever carrying out.

Looking at this couple, while maintaining a polite smile -stretched enough so that they can see I was smiling and not just rudely staring at them, but not bright enough that they might ask me for money- on my face, made me think:

How they are able to carry on this marvellous feat, the reason must be one out of these two:

1) Either they're really really desperate, that frowning faces are just minor unpleasantness they have to bear compared to the mountains of problems hanging on their shoulders,

2)Or they really really love what they do.

In the context of being a daie, I continued thinking then, it's both.
It's a sunnatullah (something that Allah has made it fixed so) that being a daie, someone who's calling towards good and God, is uber hard, and there's always gonna be resistance, there's always gonna hatred thrown at your face, and as you are striving for 'al-haqq' (righteousness) to thrive, there's always gonna be others who does the same work for 'al-batil' (falsehood).

Nabi s.a.w faced the worst kinds of "unpleasantness". The ignorants of his time called him a liar, a wizard, they tortured whoever followed the message he conveyed, they plotted against him, they tried to kill him. One of those people was his uncle.
And yet, he persisted.

When he stood up on Bukit Safa', he called his people in a desperation and urgency to save them from the torture that is Hellfire.
When he stood in front of the Almighty in the deep darkness of night, he called upon Him in braids of unrequited love.

We may face a lot of pain, but we go on because we're desperate, and because of love. We are desperately in love...with Him.