Moments in Murcia

In memory of Mak

burdahblue — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 14:26:19 +0000

Yesterday, the people @ Dahlia gave M a packet of sukun (a local fruit, when sliced and fried, it has a tangy banana taste but with a hint of potato). I haven’t ate that since Mak passed away. (Mak was my maternal grandmother, my friend and my beloved, growing up.) I almost cried eating the sukun. The last time I ate that was probably more than 10 years ago. I told M, she used to fry it at least twice a week, and we’d eat them with sugar and talk abt how the day passes, and how she’s tired sewing her sister’s dresses. They’re all hand-sewn. I love her.

Recently, I added 2 new batik retailers, which brings me oh so many memories of Mak again. She loves batik! She would teach me how to smell batik to differentiate between a hand-drawn one or a printed one. Many people of my age don’t know such things.

Batik is a cloth that traditionally uses a manual wax-resistant dyeing technique. Due to modern advances in the textile industry, the term has been extended to include fabrics that incorporate traditional batik patterns even if they are not produced using the wax-resistant dyeing techniques. Silk batik is especially popular.

Javanese traditional batik, especially from Yogyakarta and Surakarta, has special meanings rooted to the Javanese conceptualization of the universe. Traditional colours include indigo, dark brown, and white, which represent the three major Hindu Gods(Brahmā, Visnu, and Śiva). This is related to the fact that natural dyes are only available in indigo and brown. Certain patterns can only be worn by nobility; traditionally, wider stripes or wavy lines of greater width indicated higher rank. Consequently, during Javanese ceremonies, one could determine the royal lineage of a person by the cloth he or she was wearing.

Dream Fable from Rabia

burdahblue — Wed, 09 Jun 2010 15:13:23 +0000

I saw myself in a wide green garden, more beautiful than I could begin to understand. In this garden was a young girl. I said to her, “How wonderful this place is!”

“Would you like to see a place even more wonderful than this?” she asked.

“Oh yes,” I answered. Then taking me by the hand, she led me on until we came to a magnificent palace, like nothing that was ever seen by human eyes. The young girl knocked on the door, and someone opened it. Immediately both of us were flooded with light.

Only Allah knows the inner meaning of the maidens we saw living there. Each one carried in her hand a serving-tray filled with light. The young girl asked the maidens where they were going, and they answered her, “We are looking for someone who was drowned in the sea, and so became a martyr. She never slept at night, not one wink! We are going to rub funeral spices on her body.”

“Then rub some on my friend here,” the young girl said.

“Once upon a time,” said the maidens, “part of this spice and the fragrance of it clung to her body — but then she shied away.”

Quickly the young girl let go of my hand, turned, and said to me:

“Your prayers are your light;
Your devotion is your strength;
Sleep is the enemy of both.
Your life is the only opportunity that life can give you.
If you ignore it, if you waste it,
You will only turn to dust.”

Then the young girl disappeared.

Rabia al Basri

Turmoil in the heart

burdahblue — Fri, 28 May 2010 05:00:05 +0000

Were it not for
the excess of your talking
and the turmoil in your hearts,
you would see what I see
and hear what I hear!

- Ibn Arabi

We’re all guilty of this, I believe. Especially so, for myself. If Allah is great, why again am I so arrogant? Ya muqqallabal qulub. Thabit qalbi ala deenik. O Controller of Hearts. Keep my heart steadfast on Your deen.

New Challenge

burdahblue — Thu, 27 May 2010 07:49:42 +0000

Salams! So the challenge I have put to myself is to make a 15-day menu. That way, I can repeat it twice in a month! No more thinking woes. ‘What to cook tomorrow?’ questions make me have headaches till 3! So Day 1 : Foul Medammes and Seviyan (or semiya)

These are just notes to myself because I barely remember recipes.

1. Foul Medammes

1 can of foul beans – drain to dry, then mash

Heat up 1 tbsp of ghee in a non-stick pot and add spice in no apparent order : cinnamon, fenugreek, cumin, clove, black pepper, star anise, cardamon seeds. Roast the spices, let them be soaked by the oil. The longer the better. Then add the mashed up foul beans. Add salt. Some milk. Some garam masala. And some curry powder, to taste. Add some water. Leave to simmer. Serve with warm bread and sunny side up egg, drizzle some olive oil on the foul. Add some condiments such as cucumber (if you wish), green chillis and diced onions.

2. Seviyan

Heat up some ghee in a pot, fry some of the angel hair sphagetti. Add some garam masala and some rose water. I think MIL adds some cardamon, of which I forgot. Add some milk and water, i don’t like it too rich. Wait till boil and angel hair is cooked. Then top off with some pistachios, or in this case, ground nuts. Funny how I found another recipe asking me to top it off with chocolate rice. oOO fUNKY.

peace out.

Foul Medammes (kacang phool)

Seviyan/Semiya or Payesem.

Sisters Magazine – Spring 2009 and Spring 2010

burdahblue — Sat, 22 May 2010 17:56:19 +0000

I heard about Sisters from friends in the UK. I secretly wished someone would stock them here. A Muslimah-friendly magazine written by Muslimahs. Finally got hold of 2 copies! Spring 2009 and 2010. A year apart, funny eh?

With very attractively designed covers, it’s no wonder the Sisters Magazines caught my attention. Personally, they remind me of how quaint and sweet life can be with picturesque windows with a dash of roses on the window sill, or a plate of cranberries taken up close. Very inviting, dont you think?

My immediate reaction was to flip to the ‘glamorous’ side of Sisters – fashion, beauty and cosmetics. Looking presentable should always be a girl’s top priority; inside out preferably.

I was surprised and delighted at the same time the fashion consultant for Sisters is the designer for the infamous Shukronline.com Yes, that classy, simple range of clothes, nothing too over the top but always clean and traditionally modern. (Don’t mind the oxymoron, I love linen abayas that let you skip-to-the-lou whilst pushing the pram, haha. I better stop.) She even advices you who to go shopping with to fit your budget, and your wardrobe essentials must-haves. (Move over Tim!) She explains what’s trendy, what’s too flamboyant and the fact that a lady must dress appropriate for the occasion. It doesn’t hurt to have a full bling-ed on scarf, but please don’t use that to the supermarket. (We’ve all seen that before, don’t deny this.)

Then there’s this quirky section called ‘The Kitchen Beautician.” Hah, it’s ayurvedic medicine meets The Body Shop. It’s not my personal favourite but the columnist collates all those age-old remedies just waiting to be tried by ladies trying to be experimental.

What attracts me most from these 2 issues, were the heartfelt stories of sisters from around the world (there were entries from Sudan, Nigeria, South Africa) about how they survived through their individual struggles. Be it about raising a child with non-Muslim grandparents, dealing with paralysis, challenges of a mother homeschooling her children, hijrah of the heart or welcoming the newborn. I can’t relate to all of these issues, but they’re fully relevant. There’s just something about a lady voicing out her woes; somehow you really CAN feel it.

I just wished Sisters included faces, but probably they’re keeping in line with modesty.

Be like a bee

burdahblue — Sat, 22 May 2010 17:21:05 +0000

“Be like a bee, anything he eats is clean, anything he drops is sweet, and any branch he sits on does not break.” – Imam Ali kw.

Mind-blowing.

Secret of Secrets Class

burdahblue — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:16:18 +0000

Allah bless, love and protect Khwaja. I miss him.

1. Nothing is present except Allah. No other intention except for Allah. Nothing exists except Allah.

2. The first intelligence is also the first creation i.e. Rasul s.a.w.

3. If you love Allah follow Rasul s.a.w. through his essence.

4. Your vision cannot encompass Him.

5. Adam is not God. But Adam cannot be separated from God. – Maulana Rumi.

6. Rasulullah acquires the names of Allah in the station of servanthood.

7. The credit of all our deeds goes to Allah. The worshipper and The Worshipped become One in worship.

8. We cannot praise You as You praise Yourself.

9. Allah is jealous of our love towards Him.

10. We must try and be dust, then Allah will pick us up. If we try to be gold, He will discard us.

11. We bore witness there is no Divinity except for Allah. We forget this primary oath of allegiance as the inner heart forgets to see with His Light. T

12. The world is an adornment, an ornament which is destructible.

13. The highest station is to be a servant.

14. Audit yourselves before you are audited.

15. He hides from you, but He is Manifest. Only He exists.

16. Opposites cannot unite unless with Divine Power.

on Fana’/Ecstasy. On my yellow post it, it’s divided into a mind map with 2 columns. On the right is the column labeled spiritual ecstasy and the left labeled physical ecstasy. Again, these are the words from the Khawaja.

Spiritual ecstasy is/are
1. the product of the overflow of the spiritual energy.
2. where physical resistance is obliterated.
3. where the mind cannot choose and cannot decide
4. purely spiritual and beneficial.

Physical ecstasy is/are
1. the product of the ego
2. influenced by the senses
3. purposeful hence hypocritical
4. where one thinks he can still choose.

Allah knows best. rom Sheykh Abd Qadir Al Jilani, interpreted by Shaykh Tosun Beyrak al-Jerrahi Halveti.

1. The traveller on the path must have intelligence, understanding and insight. These are his prerequisites.

2. Hadrat Hasan Al-Basri q.s. used the say the ones close to Allah succeed through their fear of Allah. In them, fear well exceeds hope because they know the danger of being fooled by the human nature.

He ends:
3. O seeker! Fall on your knees in front of your Lord! Strip yourself of your material being! Confess and repent for your past errors and wait at the gate of mercy without anything, in complete want! If you do this, you certainly receive His grace, His blessings, His enlightenment, His love and compassion; and all your sins and impurities will melt away from you. For He is the Beneficient, the Most Compassionate and Generous, the Eternal Lord, the All-Powerful. We beg for peace and blessings upon our Master the Prophet and his progeny; companions and followers. All grace and thanks belong to Allah; we leave all in His hands.

Amin.

————————–————————–——————-

Allah is jealous of our love towards Him… Very Jealous.

who do you love?

burdahblue — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:14:20 +0000

For the past few years, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting many wonderful people who try to keep one thing alive in their hearts i.e. love. Allah bless their sincerity. I’d like to share something I read in a book called ‘On Love In The Muslim Tradition’ by a Bosnian thinker, Rusmir Mahmutcehajic. A little more about him is in parentheses below.

It may be a little lengthy (even to me) but how wonderful would any country to have THIS kind of vice president.

From the book,
————————– ————————–——————-

“I want to be blind, to see what’s behind what I see,
To be deaf, to catch that undertone of peace,
To be fingerless, to feel untouch touch me.

And once I’ve passed beyond that wall-less wall
Where even my burden of selfhood feels like release,
Time, only time is flowing, and time is all. ” – Skender Kulenovic, “Beyond the Wall-Less Wall”

And it seems that nothing bears witness to this human orientation toward the ‘wall-less wall’ so much as love. It is the experience of every being. Although it is present in the world of forms, not of them encompasses it. Although it is the experience of every being, not one can represent it in an image that would include the ways in which it is revealed to others. It is itself, therefore, fullness. It is present in every detail, but not one of them exhausts it. Everything in existence reveals itself with it, and through it everything returns to it as fullness. Wherever it seems clearest, its endurance is briefest. It is therefore in the infinity of the instant and of all time, in the greatest height and deepest depth of corporality.

Love is in the spirit and with it. Whenever love reveals itself, it is the descent of the spirit. But the spirit is hidden, even from the Lord’s commandment. Although it is possible in everything and toward everything, love is always oriented away from the fullness of the human self and toward it. That is why unity is its only aim, but its existence is always also separateness. What love reveals is the longing for unity but existence in separation. Love is the path toward unity, the path along which everything speaks of that unity that flows in all things.

Love is what stimulates fullness to reveal itself in divergence. Not thereby betraying oneness,it reveals the hidden in creation and division. In that way, existence, with all its details and changes, is the manifestation of fullness as a consequence of existence’s love for fullness.

But, love cannot be replaced by knowledge. Love is within knowledge and constantly transforms it into a connection with oneness and return to it. As the moon’s year enters into the sun’s and emerges from it, as everything in existence comes and goes, so too love enters into knowledge and emerges from it, thereby creating constant ebbs and flows of belief in the human self, from hopelessness to existence in the full sense. And nothing in that may be firmly fixed. The mystery of man is nothing other than impossibility.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

[Rusmir Mahmutcehajic was born in 1948 in Stolac (Bosnia and Herzegovina). He is professor of applied physics at the University of Sarajevo, where he also lectures on the phenomenology of the sacred. He was a dissident during the Communist years, and in 1991 he was elected Vice President of the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina. He also served as Minister of Energy, Mining, and Industry. In late 1993 he resigned from all governmental posts because of his opposition to the country' s ethnic partition.]

i love you wardah

burdahblue — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:13:53 +0000

Last Saturday, I brought Abdullah to Wardah to iftar with his bapak only to know I was to be surprised.

Set on the centre shelves was a display of collectibles and memorable pictures. I shan’t tell you what they exactly were so there’s still an element of surprise. But one of my favourite items was a rare vinyl record. I mean, WOW. I’ve never seen anything of that likes, and I really loved it. Then there’s this haunting picture of a local mosque here which really captures my heart. Call it simple, since it’s black and white, but hey I like it as one can really see the contrast of light in this palette. There are others worth tempting a passer by (let’s not forget ameera’s poems in the poem book) like old (really old like 1950s maybe) local Islamic publications which are out of print! I’ve heard you can only see copies of them in some German university, Allah knows.

Then the pictures! Of these ulama, that scholars, friends and what not. I mean, Wardah has really grown over the years. MashaaAllah!

On a more personal note, I’ve seen Wardah bring people together in remembering Him even if it is for a mere moment. Customers being friends, even besties. LOL. Oh yes, we do get our spiritual scoldings and advices from the books but what’s better than sharing and chatting over the world (and the Hereafter) with our dear friends.

I hope Wardah (meaning rose) blossoms everyday. If you know Wardah then you’d know what I mean. Thank you Mr Ib and Mar.

the silent scream

burdahblue — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 04:12:27 +0000

In response to Ameera’s note with the painting encapsulated,

The Scream is the title of expressionist paintings and prints in a series by Norwegian artist Edvard Munch, depicting an agonized figure against a blood red sky.

One theory advanced to account for the reddish sky in the background is that Munch had observed a powerful volcanic eruption of Krakatoa in 1883: the ash that was ejected from the volcano left the sky tinted red in much of eastern United States and most of Europe and Asia from the end of November 1883 to mid February 1884.

The person in the foreground may be the artist himself, not screaming but protecting himself or itself from the scream of Nature. Thus, the position in which he portrays himself could be considered a reflex reaction typical of anyone struggling to keep out distressing noise, whether actual or imagined.

Sometimes, out of our nafs, we scream like that. The Silent Scream.