Friday, April 06, 2012

Missing you


For my wife - I miss her.

posted by NunBun @ 5:28 PM 0 comments

Reflection



Lately I've been feeling somewhat down. My new job isn't what I thought it would be (at least, not yet). Lots of uncertainty about my career prospects, whether I'd get recognised and promoted. Then there are the thoughts about going off to the US or UK to do my Masters. But there is uncertainty over exactly what I want to study, why and when - Zayed's schooling is another thing to think about.

Key words popping to mind are uncertainty, vagueness, unsettled and the phrase "there's something out there".

I've been given some time to think about these things - wife is on a short trip abroad and boys are at my mother-in-law's place. I am thankful for that.

A part of me tells me to take things day by day. Enjoy today, live it properly and don't worry too much about tomorrow. But I need to know, at least vaguely, where tomorrow leads to before I can enjoy today.

Then my inner voice tells me that all these are early distractions and that I should really only be thinking about serving Him, and that the answers will come by themselves. Makes sense - the power of the Divine is something I have full faith in, and I fully believe that if you relinquish the World, it will come running to you, but if you run after the world, it will never be enough.

I hope to get more more insight at Friday prayers later, Insha Allah.

posted by NunBun @ 11:01 AM 0 comments

Monday, April 02, 2012

Tamilan




Tamil.

One of my most intimate friends, now very far away. This is very obvious from the language this post is written in, and the thoughts from which these words are derived from.

Our parents brought us up speaking Tamil – the only person I began to speak very early on in English was my elder brother. I even always spoke to my sister in Tamil (who now rightly has found her destiny as a Tamil teacher). My 
thoughts were in Tamil, my inner voice spoke Tamil, and my most intimate conversations with Allah were in Tamil.

I did very well in school for Tamil. I took Higher Tamil, mind you. Scored straight As and was dubbed “Tamizh Pulavar” by my mom.

Then in JC, I was exempted from Tamil due to the Higher Tamil thing. I guess that’s when the de-Tamilisation of me started.

I still spoke in Tamil at home – but the demands of General Paper in JC, the need for more “sophistication in thinking” in University lead me to increasingly think in English, grapple with complex concepts for which I could not find any meaning in Tamil. This was more due to my limited knowledge of the language than anything else.

Then I began to actually sense my brain translating my English thoughts to Tamil whenever I spoke to my parents or folks who spoke to me in Tamil.

I knew something was wrong, and I always wanted to correct it by picking up that Tamil novella and reading it end to end. But it was a time when I had trouble focusing on English language books, so the idea was dropped.

I attended the 2012 Tamil Language Festival launch event last Sunday, where many personalities spoke about the marvel of the Tamil language, the beauty and wonder of the Thirukkural and many other aspects. I felt so far away from it, but deep inside, I know that it’s only a matter of will, and time, that I can reconnect to my mothertongue.

posted by NunBun @ 11:54 PM 0 comments

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Friendly reminder from The Creator

Chapter on Aala Imran, part of verse 185:

"Kullu nafsin dhaa-e-kathul mawt..."

"Every soul will taste death..."

A simple yet hard-hitting reminder to get our act right and not mess it up in this world.

posted by NunBun @ 10:33 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Work Out

It's been about 3 months since I started going to the gym regularly. It all began during a staycation some weeks back, the realisation that I was putting on weight. Then came the gym membership and the fitness instructor. Then a lot of things changed...

I lost some weight. I got (some) muscle. But best of all, I feel good more often... the endorphins are doing good things to me.

More gym sessions...

posted by NunBun @ 3:48 PM 0 comments

Scare

Yesterday was a scary moment for the whole family. It just takes one second for something really, really bad to happen.

But everything was okay in the end, alhamdulillah. Allah's mercy, quick thinking and quick action saved the day and saved us from a terrible, terrible ending.


posted by NunBun @ 3:02 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Energised

We were able to kick off one event and one idea recently, both that were in our minds for a few months. now.

One was to organise a talk describing the doa's and practices a Muslim usually undertakes during pregnancy and after birth of a newborn. When Zayed was born, we were quite blur on the necessary prayers to recite for a smooth delivery and for good children, amongst many other things. We invited our Al-Qur'an Ustaz, Zulkiflee Bachik, to do the talk as he was very knowledgeable of the Qur'an. It's happening on 30 June, so if you're interested, come to www.shajr.sg and register.

The other idea stemmed from my interest in teaching Zayed (and eventually Talha) Arabic and some basic knowledge of the tenets of Islam. I asked Yasmin if she could draw up a nice curriculum for him, using her pre-school/child development skills and expertise. We thought about it some more as asked ourselves why not we make it a bigger class of about 8 kids and have a small Muslim playgroup? Seemed like a fine idea and initial checks revealed a lot of interest in such a group. Looking forward to making the idea a reality...

posted by NunBun @ 7:04 PM 0 comments

rethink

We recently took a 3-day trip to Batam to unwind. There was no agenda - well, the agenda was to have no agenda. We got ourselves a nice 2-bedroom suite at the Holiday Inn. I had some learning points:

1. I really need to relax. Like chill. Less uptight, less quick to blow my top and whack the kids or scold someone. This uptight thing has been going on for at least 2 decades, I'm sure, but I've been feeling it's consequences on my life more than ever.

2. I need to convert a lot more local currency when I leave Singapore. This time at Batam, we were all blindsided with the amount we needed to pay for a fuss-free holiday. For example: The hotel's cab contact was safer, but a major rip-off, and we almost didn't have cash to pay for that.

3. Prayer timings. Research prayer timings in a foreign place well in advance instead of scrambling and worrying about it the whole day (see 1).

posted by NunBun @ 7:02 PM 0 comments

Sunday, May 29, 2011

The Little Man

Muhammed Talha is the name of my second son. With a crewcut that has patches of hairlessness, and six fully-formed milk teeth (4 on top, 2 below), and no more than 1.4 metres tall, he's an adorable fellow. With his newly-found walking ability, he steadily walks, or now runs, to us in moments of extreme emotion ("I'm happy", or "I just shat"). He just hugs and kisses us with his adult-like twinkle in the eye.

He laughs at my funny faces, and at the delivery of my stupid jokes. He always wants me to carry him when I come home from work, even if for just for a few seconds. My little man.

I put him to sleep every night. I tap his back gently, as he grasps my neck and rests his chin on my left shoulder. At the point of floating off into la-la land, he will start blabbering in his low-pitched voice. It is supremely adorable.

Goodnight Talhababy, I love you.

posted by NunBun @ 11:40 PM 0 comments

Weekend

Therapy today - cleaned up the kitchen and much neater now, especially that the toaster oven is back in its original place at the cubicle-like cupboard.

Had a so-so day with the kids and wife at the baking session earlier. I think those who did the shaping of the dough and baking must have enjoyed it. I was hanging with Talha who was sleepinh half the time, so not much work for me.

Wanted to do some work tonite - finish some slides, but decided to sit back and enjoy some Clint Eastwood fare with he wifey. Hereafter was an awesome show. Spoke very eloquently and poetically about death and the hereafter. Fascinating if you are into life-after-death issues.

posted by NunBun @ 2:30 AM 0 comments

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Realisation on multiple levels

Lost another one today, I think. Not sure why, but it's a loss. I feel it. Hopefully things will be okay. But I doubt it. These things are remarkably fragile.

Third consecutive day without my work laptop at home. Amazing feeling. I need to do this to pace myself, if not it's going to be a total burnout.

A shocking realisation during the staycation last weekend - I had put on weight. Lots of it. A sinking feeling came upon me, that the fabled "by about age 30 your metabolic rate will slow down and you'll put on weight" prophecy had come true. This is indeed my "sputnik" moment - I have to do something about my weight gain...

posted by NunBun @ 11:55 PM 2 comments