Disobedience

To steal another's property is an act of disobedience to the natural order of things.

Each person has been given a certain amount of material and immaterial belongings. Rizq. What you have, you're mean to have. What you don't have, you can't have. That's the natural order.

What happens if you want something that you don't have? You make the effort to get it through lawful means - you buy it, or ask permission for it, or pursue other dignified, humanely-accepted way of getting that thing.

What happens if you really want something, but upon careful or careless deliberation come to the conclusion that you will never get it through the lawful means? You can accept that you're not meant to have it. Or - you can perform an act of disobedience to the natural order of things and take it without asking anyone.

The person whose property is stolen will view the act of the thief as a malicious one, one that indicates a total disregard of the owner. If only the thief had asked for the property, the owner could have exercised the option to either give the property for free (thus making the thief escape the burden of committing a wrong) or sell it at a reasonable price.

I'm saying all this philosophical-sounding things for a reason. My bicycle was stolen yesterday afternoon, right outside my front door when my wife and kid were at home, when the door was closed. The thief had cut the chain I had used to secure the bicycle to a large pipe outside our front door. The bicycle used to be my late dad's. I hadn't ridden on it the last few weeks because the tires were out of air.

I made a police report last night, and they took the cut chain as evidence.

Stealing my bicycle right outside my front door worries me. And to think that the door is open for long periods of time, because Zayed likes to look out and talk to the kids playing outside...

The thief had a heck of an audacity to do it - my floor has five families, of which four have kids below the age of 15. At any one point in time, somebody could have walked to the lift lobby when the theif was doing his job. Risking getting caught, he still proceeded to steal it and whisk it away. I hope he learns his lesson.

Fine Piece

Every once in a while, a Tamil movie will come by that will say that "yes, Tamil filmdom is not going doing to the twisted cesspool of idiotism, jingoism and flesh paradism".

Jayam Kondaan was released quite a while back, in Aug 2008 and only last week I got to watch it on Vasantham. Directed by Mani Ratnam's former assistant, R. Kannan, the movie showed that there was still hope left for intelligent, realistic movie-making.

Viney (of "Unnale Unnale" fame) plays a young exec who's been slogging in the UK for the last seven years. He quits his job and comes to India when his father passes away, as his UK bosses refuse to let him go on leave to see his late father. He then decides to start a new business venture using the money he had been remitting to his dad for the last years and settle in India.

But he finds that all the money he'd given his dad is missing. The quest to find the money to realise his dreams takes him on a journey where he comes face to face with a sister he never knew, meets a girl whom he'd long forgotten about, realises the value of friends, and faces the greatest threat to his life and new family.

The beauty of the movie lies in the fact that it actually bothers to tell a story - one event leads to another and the protagonist and audience travel together in the journey. It's not a "first-half comedy track with some teasers and second-half "aapu" romp" kind of movie that Vijay kept doing several times in the past. The story unfolds logically - people react how you would expect people to react and not react in an over-the-top manner. Like some bad guys who gets so pissed off he starts yelling at the hero with "Ey!" countless times.

The other wonderful part of the movie is the solid character development and attention to human relations. The relationships are lovingly and slowly built up by the director, with the hurdles and knots placed here and there. By the time the movie ends, the story untangles all the knots, clears up all loose ends and everything makes sense. Truly, the director "jayam kondaan" ([He] attained victory).

The songs are melodius, but slow the pace of the movie. Acting is first rate by all the major characters, especially the baddie. Viney can hold the movie on his broad shoulders, although he can't dance to save the living daylights. (Luckily he was fired from Dhaam Dhoom which needed a lot of dancing.) I thought Bhavana was quite endearing as his lady love.

Overall, a good picture worth discussing, dissecting and analysing with like minds.

Awwal Meal

Let me recount to you the first meal I had in 1430.

Toasted wholemeal bread, mushroom soup, mushroom + tomato omelette. When you dip the toasted bread into the soup, the end result is pure joy.

The company I had was my wife who prepared the feast, and my trusty 10-month-old sidekick/crony who laughs at all my jokes now. Excellent.

Wishing everyone a blessed awwal muharram.

The Day It Wasn't Supposed To Be

Our son is very active kid - he doesn't want to sleep! He likes to crawl, pull things, push things down, play with his toys, beat our faces up, watch selected ads on TV, swivel the TV around, touch the electrical points, want one of us to be always within sight, put most things he finds on the floor in his mouth, and laugh to his heart's content.

We wanted to spend Christmas Day at home, lazy and relaxed, but we've been on our toes since morning, making sure he didn't get electrocuted or poisoned by the things he touched and tasted.

But his smile is all that it takes for us to melt to our knees and smother him with hugs and kisses. Good job, my son! As charming as the dad.

Walimatul Urus

The other day I went for a Malay wedding feast (walimah) at the void-deck. I’ve always sensed people giving me the stink-eye or rolling-eye whenever I say that “so and so is having her wedding feast at the void-deck”. At this stage, I'd like to also clarify that the invites you get for under-the-block events is NOT the wedding (nikkah) - it is the walimah, the FEAST only. The bride and bridegroom will come and show face for a while only. They would have been married somewhere else nice and jazzy earlier.

Anyway, back to void-decks - I tended to agree with these naysayers most of the time. The void-deck is not the best place to hold the most important feast in your life. But after attending many wedding feasts, I can see why the void-deck is probably a very practical option.

Malay (or Muslim for that matter) wedding feasts are not restricted to invited guests – all are and should be welcome. In the true kampong spirit, everybody in the community is welcome to attend the feast. The food is served for a long period, not just from 12pm – 2pm or whatever. No one is turned away and everyone is invited to join in the food, no matter who you are.

So when you do this, there are some trade-offs. Most of the cost will be the food – there will be a large quantity of food required for a long period. So the other cost centres have to be reduced – location is a prime target. The void-deck is perfect as it’s affordable and accessible to the cook, with his massive barang-barang like pots and pans. Further, you are not likely to get lost if the location is at the void-deck – it’s a HDB estate and not some ulu place (like say, Fort Canning?).

So the void-deck is a practical venue in terms of cost considerations. But it is not to say the persons involved cannot afford more than a void-deck – that’s a supremely wrong perception. People who have weddings at void-decks spend good money on the wedding décor and the food, mind you. It’s just that resources are limited – the average dudette/dude doesn’t have a Madoffian bottomless wedding budget. With limited resources, you need to put in the moolah where there’s most bang for buck.

The downside of the the void-deck is that there may have been funerals held at the same location. This one I leave it to the individual to decide – some are bothered, most aren’t.

But the void-deck is a good location for a wedding feast. The wedding or nikkah can be somewhere posh of course, because that’s where the real action is.

I had my nikkah at the Masjid Bencoolen function room, and the wedding feast at Leng Kee CC. Perhaps if I was prepared to accept the void-deck as the location, I could’ve invited everyone I knew to the void-deck for the feast. Alas, I couldn’t think practically – I wanted a very classy nikkah and wedding feast. The ballroom was out of the question, too atas. So we decided on a CC and made the whole set-up look grand. Higher cost than void-deck, so the number of guests had to be “controlled” – we had to make difficult choices in coming up with the guest list. So there's always a trade-off somewhere

But the one thing that stayed with me during the wedding I attended the other day was the food – such exquisite briyani! Truly awesome. I used my hand to eat, savouring its full flavour. The other reason was that the utensils weren’t properly washed!

And... curtains

A historic place of learning will be closing its doors when 2008 ends.

No, I'm not talking about some Nalanda University. Its the Indian Muslim madrasah at Masjid Al Amin, which taught tens of students the rudimentary basics of Islam.

In a mixture of English and Tamil, the religion was made simple to understand for people aged 9 to 23. Although there was no standard methodology or structure/curriculum, the wholly-volunteer run class taught confidence ("reciting in front of class after given a notice time of 20 seconds"), memory skills ("regurgitate the doa's learnt last week in front of the class") and character-building ("You're going to get it for not memorising this doa/you're going to get public shaming for playing in the musollah during asr prayers") for a lot of kids and adolescents.

My younger sister had been learning there since 2000 (I think), since she was in Pri. 4. I was very interested to learn how to recite but due my advanced age of 21 prevented me from joining the class, which consisted mostly of 9 - 17 year olds then. But I put my pride aside for the sake of my learning and started my journey with and link to Masjid Al Amin and the important people whom I've gotten to know through it.

The first very important person is my Ustaz, the very first person who properly taught me how to recite and to recite well. In his own wacky way, he taught me Islam - what it means to be a good Muslim, and what it means to be a good human. Coming from a secular background, he fully appreciated moderation and always told me to balance my life between the religious and the secular, but never to compromise on religion. After I "graduated" from the class, he became and and still is my extremely close friend and mentor.

Then there are the friends whom I made in the class - Raascal and Ali (who doesn't have a blog name and who's in Texas at the moment with a clean-shaven look). On the first day of class which I attended, Raascal was wearing a sarong, making me think he was some really cool dude from India. But alas - he was merely testing out the sarong to see how airy the classroom really was. Both Raascal and Ali were one of my first Indian Muslim friends (can you believe that?) who had similar wavelengths as mine (don't count the bizarre and weird bits).

Then there is the mosque - I became closely associated with the events organised by the madrasah and helped out wherever I can for the masjid. I became a regular face at the mosque.

The latest development is that the administration of the mosque has decided to change the format of teaching at the madrasah into a more holistic one, namely under the A.L.I.V.E. series formulated by MUIS. This a good move, as it has a more interactive and engaging teaching methodology for younger kids. The class will also include non-Indian Muslims, and the medium of instruction will be in English.

However, many parents, themselves from the old school rote-learning method, disapprove of this shift and have decided to perhaps bring their children to other Indian Muslim madrasahs nearby. Whatever the case, there could be less students in the new format, which Insha Allah will start next year.

Which means that the old format which my friends and I are so familiar with will exist no longer at the masjid we live so close to - the madrasah as we know it will become something else. The timings will change, the students will change (and the fees will change). Although this sort of change is probably for the better, I cannot but help have a sense of nostalgia that the madrasah will no longer operate.

My doa's for the smooth operation of the new class next year.

Quite Amusing

Datuk Shah Rukh Khan announced that he'll be acting in a movie which condemns the notion that Islam promotes violence.

Anyway, I wrote this post to just see how it sounds like to write "Datuk Shah Rukh Khan". It's, like what Rhino the hamster says, "Awesome!"

Retreat

The whole family had a nice time at Batam last week. Ok lah, by "whole family" I mean the three of us. It was Zayed's first trip out of Singapore. Man, he was thrilled. He knew we weren't in Kim Tian, at the very least. He was like a man on fire in the resort suite - crawling up and down and spewing out all his "ahh"s and "oohs" and screams of joy.

The highlight was the trip to the swimming pool on the second day. He was totally into the whole waddling-in-water thing. He was moving his arms and legs all over the place. After about 30 or 40 minutes, we ended the session and he slept on and on... he basically tired himself out!

We tried to entertain ourselves by walking around the hotel area to get cheap food, and taking a cab to the nearest city centre. We had some smashing ayam penyet, unexpectedly spicy like hell and some A&W root beer float to douse the spice.

Batam's largely undeveloped - it's rustic and calm. There's nothing much to do there, so it's perfect for a short retreat.

Khamoshi

I found out the other day just how "noisy" my mind is. I tried to do an experiment - the aim was to concentrate on a particular sound only, and blank out everything else. It was tough. The random thoughts, the complaints, the worries, the song tunes, the comments for the song tunes all just kept popping up, refusing to shut up.

I guess it needs practice. What's the final aim of this exercise? They say the heart speaks much clearer when all the competing sounds and voices are removed from it.

Sickos

The recent Mumbai terror attack which claimed a Singaporean life made me sick. I feel like one of my relatives passed away. My heart goes out to the family of Ms Lo Hwei Yen. It must be so surreal for them. I cannot imagine the pain that her husband went through in Mumbai and now in Singapore. I know how a sudden death in the family feels like, but I cannot begin to even think about a demise such as this.

The people who did this all got wiped out by the very capable Indian commandos. A undignified death for what purpose? No one knows what their goal is. It is to liberate Kashmir, it is to fight America, it is to take revenge on behalf of the Palestinians, it's everything. It's everything but nothing. I don't think even they know why they're doing this.

Terrorists fight for their own selfish needs, and die for their own selfish needs. They don't die in the name of God or any religion. If they really know the essence of God's message to man, it is to live and serve others for the sake of God and religion and not cause death, mayhem and mischief to self and others. Their actions are condemnable and surely, they will answer to Him.

My prayers for all people in the world to be spared such terrorism, violence and confusion.