I have a new grand nephew, my third grand nephew. He was born yesterday. My Bang Ngah will be the happiest man because finally he has a grandson he can dote on. To Ita and Najib, congratulation, and to Naemah, now you have a little brother to play with.
Today is also my sister birthday. She is two years younger than me. She is totally opposite of me in terms of character. I’m the quite one whereas she's the talker in the family. She can really talk, and that’s why she’s a good sales manager.
I still remembered when we just moved to Port Dickson. I was ten, and she was eight. On our first day of school in Port Dickson, my dad asked us to take the army truck to go home from school. Yeah! We were an army brat. It was a privilege to go to school on truck. We boarded the right truck, but when the truck turn right instead of left to the army camp, I was worried. The truck was heading away from the house, and when the truck stopped to pick up more students from other school, I dragged my sister down from the truck. Not knowing where we were, we continued to walk.
I thought we were heading back to the camp, but we were actually heading toward the town. At that time, it was almost dark, but Allah was great, my dad saw us when he was on the way back home from PD town. He stopped and took us home. That was one scary experience that I had, and every time I think about it, I shuddered. We might not be here anymore.
My sister also has a good voice. She can sing, and when we were young we always like to imitate the rock band like Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, Led Zepplin and many other bands. She would be the singer and the guitarist, and I would be the drummer. She would be fighting with my brother Zahir for lead singer. I missed those moments.
She was also an athlete like me. Eventhough, she was not as active as me, but she played hockey. She was also a runner. But her favorite past time when she was young was watching TV. She would lie down in front of the TV and would be there until her bed time. She hardly open her book, but yet she scored in her exam.
We both went to US to further our study. I came back alone, but she came back with a hubby and a daughter. Yeah! She married to an American guy, and her daughter is an American citizen. She has another daughter who looks more like her American relatives than us, and both are adorable.
To my sister, Ami, I wish you, a very Happy Birthday. May Allah bless you and grant you all your wishes. I believe in you, and you can make it, and I cherished our childhood memory.
Salam
My dad passed away peacefully on Tuesday at 7.25pm. I was lucky to be with him. All his daughters were with him during his last moments. On Friday, when he lost a lots of blood, doctor gave him until morning but boy, dad was a fighter.
He survived for another four more days. On that Tuesday 14th Dec 2010, I just came out from meeting at 5pm when my oldest sister called me and said doctor has advised mom to take dad back home. When mom heard that, she called my oldest brother who brought an imam with him, to conduct the special prayer. This prayer is just to ease him to move to the next journey in his life.
When I heard the news, I quickly cleared some of my work and left office. As I was parking my car, I saw my brother with the imam leaving the parking. So I quickly walked to the ward. As I put down my backpack, my dad condition changed. I saw Mom was standing at the window and when we saw dad's condition we quickly called mom. As we surrounded him, mom recited the shahadah to dad's ear. We quickly called the nurses who was stationed right in-front of dad's ward and they quickly brought in their equiments to monitor dad's heartbeat.
As we gathered around him, with my eldest sister reading Surah al-Bakarah and the rest reading Surah Yaasin, dad left us. He went off peacefully where he just looked like he was sleeping. We cried but I managed to control my tears. We kissed him goodbye before they took him to mortuary where they did the final preparation before the funeral.
We took dad back to his house in Seremban, which was left empty since September, and get it ready to receive him. He reached the house at midnight and the neighbours came to pay respect to him.
After the subuh prayer, we invited the jemaah surau for tahlil and at 8.30am, he was taken to surau for the prayer. His was laid at Makam Tuan Haji Said and his grave is facing the army camp. Yes, dad was an ex-army. Mom said to him after the funeral, "Tok, goodbye. Rest in peace tok. See you are facing the army camp. Goodbye."
We said our final goodbye to him before we left the cemetery but as we passed by on the way back, we can see his grave from the road. Abah, even though you are no more with us, you will always be in our lives and will alway be remembered by us.
"Abah, Zai doakan roh abah di tempatkan di kalangan orang-orang yang beriman. Amin." Al-fatihah.....
