..man's proposal, God's disposal..

..Jabal Rahmah..

...he stood out like a sore thumb from among the golden, way past expiry date jemaah like pakmat and company...fair of skin, youngishly handsome, clean-shaven and hair cropped short..... .with a Colgate's smile, to boot...ahh...to be young and handsome...and in his case, to be young, handsome and on the plains of Arafat, doing the haj....its all that pakmat could do to supress his envy...

..waiting for pakmat's turn at the loo..

..I hardly noticed him earlier at Misfalah, being seldom at the hotel, but here we shared the same tent...and he was here as a mahram, family, to his grandmother..hmm...grandma's pet...and he smiled when I said that...but his smile was not that of a happy man....

... I mentioned him later to the wife as we were strolling around the tents whilst waiting asar...bakpo nyo....why, they were from Bachok...the grandmother was in the late fifties or early sixties...hale, healthy and smartly dressed when we left Kuala Trengganu Sultan Mahmood Airport, with dark shades, even...but her health took a turn after three or four days in the Holy City...

..Jabat Rahmah..

...she pee'd on the carpet as she walked pass, causing discomfort to the other jemaah's...slowly she started losing control over her body...and it was causing great discomfort to the grandson, unable to be with her as segregation among the sexes was enforced for the benefit of all...

..boiling hot water on tap...

..her daughters volunteered, but she refused, preferring her grandson....my wife added, reading the query in my eyes...she did not bargained on being sick....and I nodded in agreement...

...later I was to learn that she never recovered...her illness aggravated to the extent that she was certified by the medical authorities as 'lost all control over her bodily functions'...somehow they managed to complete the haj rituals, albeit wheel-chaired and left for home immediately after, missing out Medinah...I remembered her grandson's forlorn look as he wheel-chaired her for their trip back home...

..the title..

...we were called 'Hajji' the moment after we stepped down from the plane in Jeddah...as we trailed into the waiting foyer, Bangladeshi pedlars called out to us with their Mobily and Zain simcards...henceforth the cry 'Hajji..Hajji..' was an often heard cry...most times followed by 'Toreek..Toreek..' when in the Holy City...inevitably it was someone being wheel-chaired, asking for the right of way....but  pakmat got used to it soon enough...and it was easier calling fellow pilgrims Hajji or Hajjah, having no talent memorising names...

..pakmat knew the responsiblities it bring, being called a hajji.....not so much because he is a hajji, for titular means nothing to him...but more because he has set his feet in the Holy Land,  tawaf the house of God, wukuf in Arafat, stayed a moment at Muzdalifah, stoned the satans in him and outside of him, and sheared his hair....

..more because of the tears that he shed just a few meters away from His House...imploring the Lord to forgive him of his sins...imploring the Lord to accept his repentance...imploring Him for His Blessings....His Bounty....beseeching His Clemency....not just for him...but also for his late mother and father...his children and his grandchildren....his family and friends....the people of his village...muslimin and muslimat....

...'Lord, You are the Most Compassionate and Most Loving....there is no God but You, Allah...and Mohammad is Your Prophet....I stand now before Thee...bringing doa's from my children, brethren and friends..from the people in my village...they seek your forgiveness, Lord...as they seek Your bounty...their lists are long as Your Compassion is endless....please, Lord, grant them their wishes...if You find them fair and of benefit to them....for truly, Lord, I know not what You know'...

..for pakmat, the haj is the divide...that separates him from the old and the new...but inasmuch as he knew his weaknesses, he knew his strength...

...and his journey starts not from the day he left  for Makkah....but from the day he returned...

..the orbs of Muzdalifah..

..Pic 1..Haram..taken by Nik Faris with his budget digital camera..

....I really do not know what they were...the first time I was shown them was by a young 'tahfiz,' Nik Faris,  who was there with his mother...he had taken some shots around Makkah and Muzdalifah with his budget digital camera...thinking that there was some defects in his camera...he had shown it to his mother.. and later, to me as we get to know each other better....but by then, we were well on our way to Madinah...

Pic 2....Muzdalifah...taken with the same camera..

..I thought they were caused by dust particles..it was very dusty around the holy city of Makkah..but as I searched the web for reports of similar orbs when back in Malaysia, it became evident that such orbs caught on digital camera was a common occurrence... I came across a Dr  Klaus Heinemann...and article on him can be read here...

..Pic 3...Nabawi Mosque, Medinah....taken with Sony Ericsson 

Xperia  with flash..

...in Madinah, we tried again taking night shots around Nabawi Mosque, this time with a Sony Ericsson Xperia smartphone...with flash on manual  we took pic 3 and pic 4...we marveled at the orbs..not able to explain it but not totally dismissing them either...

Pic 4...pic taken a few seconds later by pakmat...

..pakmat even took a shot of a roommate, Haji Rasit, as he was reading the Quran in our hotel room, and got this picture of him with  a small orb seemingly floating next to him...Pic 5..

Pic 5...shot taken by pakmat in our hotel room,

Al-Haram, Medina..

..Pic 6...the sky over Nabawi..pic taken by Pakmat..

..intrigue, pakmat searched the web for other images...and found the following pictures...all with orbs in them...there were no mention of it by the owners...perhaps they dismissed them as just a quirky display of light...

..Pic 7...pakmat searched the web and found this picture..

..MasjidilHaram..

..Pic 8...and this...

...Pic 9..and this of Nabawi..

..Pic 10..and this...

..Pic 11 .pic taken by wife with pakmat's handphone, HTC Aria..

..no flash...no orbs..

..Pic 12...taken by pakmat with HTC Aria...no flash..no orbs..

..that I have created jinns and men that they may served Me...surah Az Zariyat

..Mina..

..by the time we reached Mina after Muzdalifah, it was almost dawn...we found our tent soon enough, H 14...and it became apparent when most of our tent members showed up, that there was just not enough room for all of us...it was too tight a squeeze...for a moment,  nerves frayed...a momentary furore amid all the suggestions, and pakmat was promptly elected penghulu...when you are slight of built but big of voice, you will be easily noticed.....in our disagreement, we agreed to push the canvas walls and lined them with our baggages...and slept like sardines - criss-crossed...a really closed-knit group, I thought..

...its easier to interact with the forced proximity...and I soon learnt that on the day my roommate died, a lady pilgrim died a day earlier..and her husband was that quiet man who would sometimes sat alone outside the tent, pullling upon a cigarette...and I commented in my heart for his smoking ways...I did not know he was suffering his wife's loss...but later, when I got to know him better, also named Pak Mat, I extended my hand and asked for his and His forgiveness...please forgive my erring thoughts...

..Pak Mat, pulling upon a cigarette..

...one night we had a tahlil for the late Tokwan and Pak Mat's late wife...halfway I could see tears welling in his eyes, as he tried to follow the tahlil...couldn't....walked to outside the tent...and sat alone by himself as we continued...there is no God but Allah...there is no God but Allah..there is no God but Allah..there is no God but Allah..

..there was also not enough toilets...they were built on the septic-tanks and you walked up five steps to get to the door, that is after you queued up for anything from ten to fifteen minutes...but the ladies were worse-off...their queues were longer, along with their time waiting...which sometimes resulted in some cutting in into the men's queue...and some males protested, with the husband coming to the defence of the wife with a show of fists...which led to brief fisticuffs..

..for some there was little of that virtue called patience...they just could not wait or made adjustments...so it was into these bottles...and pakmat took in the sight and the stench one morning, marvelling at the various shades of yellow  and the bottles lining the walls...

..waiting for the bus back to Makkah..

..an open letter to thirteen..

..reading lc's blog must have got to me...lc is fond of writing open letters in his blog, which you can access here...but his concerns will always be about sports, being the conscientious sports critic that he is... and I just have to response to anonymous', thirteen,  comment, being the conscientious blogger that I am...so here goes..

..salam thirteen...I think, to get a single person who is without sin to throw the first stone is nigh impossible...for we  are all sinners, one way or the other..and God, in His Greatness, knows all the weaknesses of Man, His creation, in that we will sinned.....and He created Purgatory, to my mind, not for sinners...but for those who committed sins knowingly or unknowingly but do not repent...

..pakmat looked at the Haj as an opportunity for us who sinned, to repent and be close to Him...so, thirteen, make the trip...regret, they say, is the first step towards repentance...dwell upon your regrets...wake up the last quarter of the night and do the night solats...think well of Him...insyaAllah...for He is the Most Compassionate and the Most Loving...

..the stoning..

..Mina was from where we trekked to the Jamrah for the stoning ritual, through the Muasim Tunnel, which is 2.6 kilometers long...from our tent, it was about 800 meters to the entrance...from the exit, it was another kilometer to the Jamrah.... and so, in all we walked 10 kilometers each day to the Jamrah...

..but it was not as daunting as it sounds...the crowd, and the singleminded of purpose made light the trek...

..the plains of Arafat have prepared us for Mina...but to my mind, it was our prayer upon touchdown in Jeddah when we first arrived....that we came as Your guests, Lord...and we did not expect for much...eat whatever is served and rest at whatever places shown to us...

...as for pakmat, for my resilience and patience, I was rewarded with a sitting bowl on the last day...and I thought that all toilets were the squatting type..which was a bit difficult for this old coot, lacking balancing skills somewhat in his old age...on the last day, I entered the last toilet on the right..and there it sat...a beauty of a sitting bowl...gleaming white...ahh...thank you, Lord, for Your little Mercies...

..back to Makkah..

..we came back from Mina much relieved and with a measure of freedom...no more bounded to wearing ihram, we were back to robes and kopiah....but we have not yet cleared the final hurdle of the haj, the tawaf and the saai....

.it was a much cleaner Makkah that we came back to...the authorities used our absence to clean up the city off the rubbish and litters left by us...water tank were replenished...over flowing septic tanks were flushed of scum and sludge....the squares were washed and swept clean...even the air smelt clean...

..pakmat felt invigorated...the time in Arafat and Mina recharged him...he could see that the missus felt the same way, too...the next day, after the tawaf and the saai, and thereon the final tahallul,  he kissed her on the forehead..congratulations, makhajji...may the Lord accepts our haj...insyaAllah....

..water tanks being replenished..

....signs of overflowing septic tanks..

..now for the umrah....which we both did with gusto...woke up before dawn, a quick bath and the donning of the ihram...out of the hotel onto the main road...haggled with the cabdrivers...anything from 10 to 15 rial per head and off to Tanaim Mosque, the choice miqat of the day...2 rakaat solat..the niat and off to Haram for dawn prayers...most times led by Imam Sheik Abdul Rahman Al Sudais, the man with golden voice...later the tawaf and the saai..a brief cutting of hair...and a leisurely 2km walk back to the maktab for breakfast of roti and hot coffee served by Ahmad....

..

Ahmad from India manning his eatery..

                                   

..miqat at Tanaim Mosque..

but for some, it was time for packing and heading for home...but for us of KT49, it was awaiting the day when we would be heading for Medina...and the Prophet...