We completed Hajj!

Meet the new Haji and Hajah

Mecca 6:37 am Kuala Lumpur 11:37 am Monday Nov 14th, 2011

We completed our tawaf ifada and saei haji. Alhamdulillah. Allah fulfilled his calling and my 20 years of yearning.

We are now Haji and Hajah.

We still have few more days in Mekah to do whatever we need to do. The primary purpose of performing the Haj have been fulfilled.

Since last week, I have been missing Malaysia. It is strange. All my life, I've lived and travel abroad many times. Never have I missed Malaysia like this.

I love Mekah and Medinah. But perhaps, God has a mission for me back home.

I missed my family, my comrades, my friends, and Malaysians back home.

Mekah and Medinah are the holiest place in the world. Today I realised Malaysia is still the best place in the world to live.

The exchange rate maybe in our favour. But food, transport, medicine, etc are very expensive.

Oh yes ... I missed Malaysian food. Nothing really wrong with the food. I just can't consume and even smell the Maktab cafeteria food anymore. I've been taking only bread, dates and fruits.

I'm yearning for asam pedas, masak lemak, watery kacang panjang masak asam, ulam and sambal belacan, my mother's world greatest sambal ikan bilis, my mother-in-law's rendang Minang, nasi lemak Tanglin, Mee Curry at Uptown PJ, Cantonese Mee in Batu Caves, Loaves in Bangsar, .... and the list goes on.

Even nasi Arab in Hadramaut, Jalan Raja Laut and Safa, Jalan Jelatek taste better than any of the modified Arab food near Masjidil Haram or Masjid Nabawi.

What happened to the Arabs? Why are they taking lots of chicken? Where are their kambing dishes?

This must be another Arab conspiracy to deny the likes of me good food. It is a conspiracy against those with gout.

I missed peaceful, laid back, and orderly Malaysia. Unlike in Malaysia, embarrassing to say of Muslims, people here don't queue and are very impatient.

If they queue, they think product and services will be denied of them. So they have to rush and berebut.

They probably think that if they do not get it first, the Hajar Aswad, Hijar Ismail and Rawdah would disappear at their very eyes.

They say, some Malaysians, especially Malaysian Chinese mums, are kiasu. No ... they are hardly compared to the Asian sub-continentals.

After a month of heat, I missed the rain. The rain clears dust in the air and keep the atmosphere fresh and filled with negative ions. When I return, I wanna walk in the rain and sing Singing in the Rain.

For the rest of my stay in Mekah, I hope to do more umrah and tawaf. I hope I am up to it. The dhoby service can't handle the huge number of Ihram sent for cleaning.

I have about 10 juzu to go. Rather slow, but I hope to khatam here in Mekah and in Masjidil Haram.

Before leaving back, I need to visit the Saudi side of my extensive Malay-Javanese family. Insya Allah, I'll write about my grandmother's adik whose a Saudi citizen.