Alhamdulillah, aku masih bernafas di tahun 2013

thank you ALLAH, my lord

i still find myself  breathing in the dawn of 2013, so that i could carry on to be your obedient and taqwa follower.

hey! camna sambutan new year? a friend call out to me! tengok bunga api? and so i went aghast almost to the brim of dumbfounded. this is the same peer that struggle through thick and thin, some people simply have no ability to change - old habits die hard!

years ago i would have arrogantly replied " are you crazy? didn't you see me in Merdeka Square? it seems like the only cool things to do to embrace the new year. " you must be out of your mind not to be there at the - happening of the year event! not to mention the crazy heat and sweat, suffocating environment right into the ocean of unruly revellers and unbearable ear-piercing rowdy music that came from the concert on stage, until you get to the countdown part and then fireworks!

alhamdulillah now i am reduce to....simply carrying on my routine of hajat prayers ( asking god for a much more fruitful year ahead) after the magrib and listening to new year sermon or tazkirah after the isyak prayers. and mind you i am not ashamed of myself for doing what seems to be so uncool to some of you.

at the putrajaya mosque, new year was done with a touch of style. after isyak prayers, what was called TAZCERT started at the foyer. it is a combi of words tazkirah and concert. there were two speakers that delivers the tazkirah on how muslims should embrace the new year the islamic way, intertwine with coral speaking, and nasyid presentations from students of the Islamic University College. food and drinks were distributed to the listeners. the gestures has managed to pull a bit of the crowd from the life concert that was held at the boulevard near the MOF building.

there were Muslim tourists from the Middle-eastern countries that were present and one of them said they did not have anything like this in their country and so immediately my respond was "is it good or bad do you think?"

a few of them were saying that this is a good approach, listening to the sermon braided with songs that praises the mighty lord. "the mosque prepared food and drinks so that we could listen and eat leisurely, this is a beautiful mosque!" especially so the mee, meehon and ketiew goreng were real sedap!

and oh! back the tazcert! they all agreed, by saying "I like..." so congrats to masjid putrajaya! if only the tourists knew this is the first year we embarked on something new like this! well, something is better than nothing, at the very least, there was an attempt of the mindset change.

on the way out of the dataran we got smacked right into the terrible jam of these youngsters making a beeline to the precint 10 bridge that passes through precint 8 and eventually to the Wawasan bridge that faced the MOF building to witness the fireworks!

just to make sure! checking the back of the car through the looking mirror, thank god, Alhamdulillah! my three teenage sons were with me and wanita comel all along and our next important agenda was to get some sleep. the Qia-mulail starts at 4 am in the morning.

as i lay in bed, almost half-asleep, i can't thank Allah enough for blessing  me with substantial rezqi as well as yielding me with marvelous and subservient spouse and sons.

And.... there goes the sound of fireworks at the distance. ZZZZzzzzzz.......