The longest twenty five years

As I sit here in my living room in front of the amber flamed fire, I find myself sharing this note that I randomly came across, a one-off journal/diary/rant note. I wrote this note back in September, 2010 or 07/09/2010 at 16:00 to be precise. Definitely a day of dark clouds and depressing thoughts.

18 years of getting an education. I am 25 years old. Almost 4/5th of my life and more than two thirds of my life has been spent in schools, colleges and universities. I have a decent enough CV, so i think, that would lead me to my chosen profession, or vocation as i would like to believe.

Yet, despite all of this so called learning, i still wait anxiously to greet some good news. MintfreshMuslim, you’re just what we’re looking for, with all the right qualities we require for our school. We feel you have the potential to make progress for yourself and more importantly for the children here who will come to see you as a positive role model. Please start as soon as possible, yes the job is full time and yes, it is yours to keep for good.

If only.

Ever since i left my first and last full time post, i have been hopeful that i will find something suitable. A school that needs me more than it needs me. In reality, things rarely work out how you want, the way you have it sketched out in our mind, or how you dream them up in your subconscious.

My parents had their hopes and expectations of education paying off for the hard work we put in during our growing up years. Don’t give people reason to disgrace us my mum would say. Why it is that this particular command remains constant in my mind and how did i become the one who would ultimately feel humiliated for not being employed.

It hits at you. Picks at you. The get up and go spirit has vanished and is replaced with a demoralising sense of failure. The failure on my part to be able to make something of myself. Despite all the years of sweat and tears to enable me to potentially do something useful with my life.
I pray and pray and pray. and i wait. Trying to wait patiently.

But it is testing. Very testing. My day is full of hopelessness and grey clouds.





And here I am, at the other end of the field, the lighter and brighter side. Well actually, there are still dark clouds, but only the ones in the sky outside my bay windows. Difference is, I now have the inner strength to see the bright blue sky hiding before the clouds, reminding me that nothing stays the same, saying "watch, just watch and find out". Life can change in moments and the thunder you once feared tests you to use the strength in your bones to see the fear through. It can empower you to be more determined in not giving up and to always hold on to the faith passed on through your parents. The faith to have faith in Allah subhanawatallah.

I am still 25 years old, though I don't feel it. I feel somewhat older, after everything that has been going on in my life recently (I feel I am at least 26 years old!). This year has steadied on as a progressive one mashaAllah, where no two months have ever been the same (not that they ever are, huh). And I truly have been blessed to have the support and love of my best friend and confidante, my darling hubby who has helped me get through what felt like some of the darkest months of my life. And of course my dearest and loving family, especially my mother and sisters who have been the backbone of my strength in the past ten months.

For now, I am deeply grateful to Allah for opening the right doors and windows in the events of my life this far and pray that He continues to be in my heart. My life is still happening and I need Him more than ever. I hope that I can continue in my attempt to stick to my New Year's resolution of finding happiness in whatever Allah puts me through, because like everything else preceding it, it too will pass. InshaAllah.

*25 moments in a year of being aged 25 to be noted soon.

Be Efficient and Effective

Source: http://theislamicworkplace.com/2011/05/01/follow-muhammads-s-sunnah-take-a-power-nap-to-increase-alertness-and-productivity/

New beginnings - 21.05.11

Light rushing in through the bay windows, surrounding us with warmth and happiness – yes, we have moved into our new home. Alhamdulilah.

After ten months of living in a brand new city, alien to us both, the hubs and I have finally found the house of our dreams. And we feel humble and ever so grateful to the Almighty for blessing us with this piece of land, this house and home which is now ours. Such a strange feeling. It almost feels unreal and yet here we are, in the midst of settling in, with packing, unpacking and rearranging taking over our minds. It is real.

We picked up the keys from the seller on Wednesday and walked the short distance from her friend’s house to ours. Err, umm, is this actually happening, we both thought with probably an unexplained screwed up and perplex look on our faces. We stepped in, breathing in Allah’s name and carried a copy of our Qur’an in hand. A quiet trio we were, with strength and happiness, the Almighty, the hubs and I. And a trio we shall remain until the day we finally have a family of our own, little mints filling the house with noise and busy-ness!
Best comes to those who wait though, and so I shall because patience really is a virtue that cannot and should not be dismissed. Everything happens in sequence and takes its own path, I look forward to that day.



**
I wrote this post a while back just a few days after we had moved in. Sadly, our net connection is still in process at the moment (BT have a funny way of welcoming new customers) and I am posting this from our beloved flat. Strange feeling having my possessions all over the place! I am supposed to be doing some school work and packing but the blogosphere has sucked me in!

Dear Bloggie

Dear Bloggie

Even writing this one sentence seems to be an unusual feeling at the moment, it really has been forever since I was last here. I even forgot my password the first two attempts I tried logging in just now - thank God I finally cracked it, yes, you'd be correct in thinking that I felt something of a hacker logging into my own personal blog account, silly but there you go.

So what brings me here you may ask. Or perhaps equally as intriguing, why was I ever away for this long in the first place? Hmm.

Hmm.

I have, contray to what you may think dear Bloggie, been a frequent visitor on these shores. From checking through other fellow bloggers updates, to pondering over my own blog, I have been here, just not seen nor heard.

And to be perfectly honset I didn't mind that, not one bit. Plodding along with life has suited me just fine. But a written record of my life's account is something worth coming back here for. This place also suited me just fine when I was experiencing some of life's highs and lows so why should I not carry on with it?

So without going into the ins and outs of my life for the past year, I just want to say hey/hola/warup and check in before I make myself comfortable. It may not be immediate or even tomorrow when I sign in and wave my hand again, but just know that I am here with the intention to share my life with you, just a bit more ;-)

Fatty

Jib jab ouch

Does the thought of sticking needles into ones body NOT scare any body? Clearly the nurse who stabbed the TWO big fat needles into my arms has become immune to them herself! "It's nothing!" she grinned. NOTHING is not mega painful m'dear :-S

/rant over.

I have had a heck of a day, seriously. But who wouldn't think that after being on the receiving end of three injection needles???

After three weeks of thinking I would be relatively pain free following a temporary emergency tooth filling, I accepted pain would be back in full force after I accidentally swallowed my filling. Yes folks, swallowed it, gulped, not chewed mind, whilst munching on some grub last week. I had been avoiding sorting the sensitive tooth issue out for several reasons, all which I baaadly regretted today when the tooth pain struck again. Hot, raging and intolerable was the pain and agony I was in. All whilst in school after enjoying eating a packet of crisps :-(

I called the emergency dentist people who thankfully fitted me in for an afternoon appointment. I had to leave school, hoping the office staff would be kind enough to arrange cover for my lessons, which thank fully they did. Twenty minutes after much cleaning, drilling, treating, filling and polishing, not to mention the injection to numb the area, I was fit and ready to go. Alhamdulilah, I am now relatively tooth pain free, at least for now anyway :-)

Couple hours later, I then hopped along to my doctors surgery for my travel immunisation jabs. On getting there, I was informed my childhood jabs had expired and I was now in need of four jabs in total, including the one, the only one that I was expecting! Part of me actually felt cheated, I honestly believed my childhood jabs would protect me forever more. But apparently not :-(



Three injections later, and two more to follow in a weeks time, all is not doom and gloom. The weather in this patch of my world, is glorious. Sunny bright and HOT! And if that wasn't good enough, the English World Cup football team have brought back some pride, we won! England 1 : 0 Slovenia.

Yaahey!

After weeks of hunting, comes the foul and then the granted pray(er)

The hubs and I have been spending the last year mulling over the prospect of relocating. We have spent the past month or two eyeing up suitable accomadation, weighing the ups and downs of complex A vs complex B, will the apartment be too small, too noisy, too happening? Just some of the questions we've been debating over.

Alhamdulilah, I am glad to say we have found what seems like the ideal city centre apartment for us, and gosh I AM SO VERY EXCITED! Thrilled would be too much right now, but I'm kinda close to it :-) A little haven, a love nest just for the two of us. Without giving away too much about the exact location details to the whole wide but small world, our little apartment will be ready for us to move in to after we return from Umrah (another big YAY) in July. This is what it looks like from afar:


After viewing close to dozen or so flats, countless looong and late conversation between the hubs and I, we decided to snap this one up before the renting population of B'ham swallowed it up! Super excited.

So that was the hunting, and the granted prayer bit. Part 1.

Part 2 is where the foul takes place.

Ever since the hubs and I got married, we talked a great deal about making the Umrah pilgrimmage when we both would be ready for the next leap in our lives. With the significant changes that took place in our lives, just less than a year ago, we decided to do Umrah Hajj before moving out and flying the marital nest. Living together, just the two of us, in an unknown town does seem quite daunting, especially since we will not have any family, or close friends physically within reach of us. And so we figured we could do with strengthing our imaan and our bond with the Almighty, and ultimately seeking His blessings and love before finally moving out.

March/April was when the official search for Umrah deals began and quite shortly we realised how pricey the deals can be around July time. We came across an agent who claimed to offer some of the cheapest deals on the net, and after some enquiries went ahead with it. Since then, this so called agent has been nothing but a constant pain in the neck. Two months after paying a third of the whole payment, numerous sleepless nights and days of being sick and tired of waiting for him to send some sort of confirmation through, we realised the incompetent agent was nothing more than an unprofessional and unreliable travel agent who was more interested in fobbing us off than sorting anything out for us. Enough became enough and we decided to cancel the deal with him, despite his promises of sorting something out soon.

By that point, I had reached melting point, distraught and confused by what had just happended. I had set my heart on going to Umrah for such a long time so why is this happening right now? Doesn't Allah want me to visit His sacred and holy site?

My prayers were answered the next day, a Friday alhamdulilah, when after much hunting for a reliable and decent priced travel agent, I found one who could offer us a tailor made package on the dates that we required. SubhanAllah.

We are also expecting a refund of the deposit soon iA. *clears throat*

Moral of the story folks.

1. Cheap does not always = cheerful.
2. When booking flights through agents, make sure they are at least ATOL protected.
3. Having one's imaan checked and tested is vital and prerequisite of life, always seek the guidance of Allah.
4. Pray and then hunt for the prey :P

Okay. Long story, cut not so short! lol

Anyhoo, I'm gonna be off to help myself to a cool, sweet and milky white Magnum. For now, check out the cute ickle ducklings the hubs and I came befriended near our soon to move into apartment:


Peace and love!

A year old already!

It's been a while folks but I hope you're all well iA! I just realised right now that it's already been a year since I started this thing called a personal blog. A year!! And what an eventful year it has been. I have realised how nostalgia can both be a blessing as well as a curse, and having a written account of some of the significant and insignificant moments of my life is definitely something new for me. From feelings of embarrassment after reading some of my ishtupit remarks, heeheehee, to feeling better realising that my journey in life is one that is moving along, slowly but surely alhamdulilah. Alhamdulilah. There is no hiding from the fact that I do find it difficult to actually click on any post link about my dad though, I don't think I'm strong enough to be able to read it fully without bursting into tears. I do want to add though, that this blog certainly has done something to let me release my fears as well as expressing the joys I have felt throughout this rather turbulent year. I love my dad dearly and although I rarely mention him in my blog posts these days, I cannot go without thinking/making a reference him almost every hour of the day. Perhaps it's okay to not always blog about something that lives on so deep within your inner being.

So yes, it has been just over a year and to be perfectly honest, I really do love reading through countless number of blogs every(other) day, perhaps even more so than writing my own! Thank you to all of you who have followed my blog, whether openly or otherwise ;-) and to all of you who have kindly remembered me in your prayers :-)

Here's to another year of blogging iA!! Wooot!