Last Saturday, i went to a friend's new home for a mini housewarming ,get-together kinda thing. Only few good friends and their families were invited. Food was great and so was the company.We has so much to catch up with each other and there's lots of laughter and sharing amongst the ladies...i bet the same for the men and the kids too.

While some of us were talking , eating and laughing....came bro M , his wife and kids. They were warmly welcomed and all of us were so happy to meet them after a long time.

But i believed most of us there, we "shocked" to see sister F (bro M's wife) without her hijab. She has been wearing hijab for as long as i could remember...maybe abt 10 years ago, ever since i 1st met her . She has been wearing hijab, ever since her marriage with bro M (who by the way is a convert).

I have always envy her strength n courage of wearing her hijab, even in the presence of all her in-laws ,who are mostly..... Christians. I ,myself , find this is one great challenge for me ..(my in laws and the clans are all staunch Hindus)

So, now , sis F has these long flowy hair with some highlights . Seriously, she is pleasant looking lady, but i would very much prefer to see her in hijab ..

I am not sure, if this is the reason for her taking out her hijab....

Months back, my hubby told me , that he bumped into bro M and sister F at a Mall in JB. Hubby thot , bro M was with another lady, but to his surprised , she is sister F w/o hijab. Then another good friend, ever mentioned to me, she also bumped with bro M and sister F (with some of their friends ) in KL, during school holiday, last year...They coincidentally stayed in the same hotel. This time again, sister F was not wearing hijab but neck plugging blouse instead.

It really didnt occured to me that she would really showed up w/o hijab on last week's housewarming party , cos, the last bbq we had months back, she was covering her head..

I told my friend, i have believe that sister F changes , may be due to her back-to-work again lifestyle. Sister F has been a stay at home mom for years ,till she decided to step out to workforce again, to help her hubby (bro M) financially. She then had no time to attend classes and religious activites like she used to and slowly get drifted away . When she started to work, they (bro M and sister F), managed to get a car and hired a domestic helper. Financially, probably they are quite stable now...im not sure abt the spiritual part.

Anyway, who am i to judge her.

We are merely human who normally forget (or lalai ).. so, let's remind each other .

May Allah guide us all to the truth and lead us to the right path. ameen.

Holiday's over !

All kids are back to school today.

No extended school closure , for a week as "rumoured".

All of them have to bring their thermometer and travel declaration forms ,due to H1N1 pandemic scare...to make sure they did not travel to those affected countries.



World,

Everyone is talking abt the passing of the King of PoP , Michael Jackson.

Im saddened of his death, cos, i grew up listening to most of his songs.

I attended his concert once, many years back when he came to Singapore.

He is indeed an icon in an entertainment industries.

The saying goes ..... "it's not the beginning of your life that matters, it's the ending "......

Did he died as Muslim , as some people claimed...... ?

RIP, to MJ.

Month of Rejab is here .



Im proud of myself, i managed to complete the Surah Mariam after my Maghrib prayer last nite...and continue with 2 pages of surah Taha.

If i mentally set my gear right, i shld be able to fast once the school holidays are over , next week. Insya allah.














On another note, my hubby has this "crazy" ideas...at least to me it sounded "crazy" .

He wanted to climb mountain...Mount Kinabalu that is . He even spoke to his cousin, Ranesh , who apparently just climbed the same mountain abt 2 months back . Ranesh gave him so much infos , as the adventure was still fresh in his head.
Now, the hubby is in the "very-keen-to climb" mode . *roll eyes*



Anyhow, he cant do it this year due to some logistic matters and stuff . He asked me if im game for this so-called adventure trip ........... hmmmmm , am I ??

"A'sallamuallaikum Nor, hope u are fine. With Allah guidance, Alhamdullillah i managed to khatam Al-Quran tis evening. I just want to share my kesyukuran wif u. Wishing you a blessed month of Rejab and Allah showers HIS blessing and rahmah to u in this blessed month. Ameen "

Those are text message i received from a good friend last nite. Alhamdulillah ! what a wonderful news , i replied her .

I wished she and her hubby would be able to perfrom Hajj this year , with much ease. I know they are waiting anxiously for the reply from Muis.

Ive not been reading my Quran consistently (especially during this school hols period).

I need to get back on track. Im just at the beginning of Surah Mariam., and ive got longggg way to reach the end. But , it's better late then never ...im hoping to khatam by end of Ramadan,insyallah. That's my goal .

The other day, i was talking to sis N , she mentioned , try to minimise listening to songs and stuff ...listen more to the recitation of the Quran.

When you at home, while cooking or doing housework...simply just ON the cd . There's an inner calmness that she couldnt describe..........i believe so , cos, i felt it whenever i read the Quran.

IT just healed the inner side of you ......truly hard to explain .

Black Eye Pea latest song is in my mind now...boom..boom..boom.

IM soooooo slacken. !

Some random pictures of my vacation........... ;)




Ulek Beach Resort (nice and clean..just a year old)






The kids......


Sharmila & Vahesh ....... all the 4 kiddos ............Akesh & Vikesh




juz arrived at Redang Islang ,being invited by crystal clear water ............



Selvi, my sis-inlaw & family .. akesh & sharmila snorkeling (below picture)




Will post some more pictures if i have the time...

Im back from my vacation on late Wednesday nite.



There's 10 of us in this trip.....my family which consist of (hubby,me and my two kids), my elder sis-in law, her hubby (i call him BiL ) and her two kids + my mom-in law and my younger sis in law.



I prefer it tis way...just us families (no extended families pleasse) driving up to the east coast of Malaysia in 2 cars...(thanks to our MPV , where all the 4 kids bunked in ,talking, laffing and watched vcds along the journey) .



It was a indeed looooooooong ride..we stopped at Mersing to have our breakfast of roti canai and then continued our journey to Trengganu...we had toilet break in btwn before we finally reached our very first stay for the day , Ulek Beach Resort.



After checking in and settled down , my BiL and I made phone calls to check on Redang Island, for our next destination on the next day. Bookings made .... we had to leave in the wee hour of the next morning in order to catch the ferry ride at 9.30am.



The ferry terminal is somewhere in Merang abt 2hrs ride fm Ulek resort and we are yet to find out where exactly it is. We left around 6am the next morning and reached the terminal at 8.30am , where we had breakfast at the jetty "cafe" while waiting for Mr Bahar whom we are supposed to meet at 9am , to pass the pymt for our Redang stay.



The ferry ride to Redang was another one hour before we finally reached the clear water resorts. A little dissappoinment when we checked in, as the place , Redang Lagoon Resort , that we were staying was much of a run down state.



After lunch , we had our short rest before we headed for snorkelling ... (will update pictures). In the evening we decided to skip dinner at our resort but hopped over for a good western food of steak at Coral Redang Resort instead. Im satisfied *burrrps*



After dinner, we walked and sat at the beach, laughing and talking to each other (family bonding like dat :P ) and just watching the stars that filled the entire dark sky . My niece Vahesh, said she saw a shooting star .

The next morning..after breakfast, we checked out and took a speedy boat back to the mainland, where we continue our journey to Kelantan..............The route that we took toward Kelantan was winding but awesomely scenic.


After Kelantan.....we head back to Perak and stayed for a nite, then drove down to KL the next day , just for chendol n rojak (and goreng pisang) before we ended our journey back to Singapore.

To summarise, the trip was fun and enjoyable one...even the kids said so. We did things that we never did as a family .


Will post pictures later ..................




PS: now i have heaps of laundry to fold !! No fun... !

VACATION IN PROGRESS ....................

The day ive been waiting for............... yesterday evening, immediately after i did my maghrib prayer, i took a cab down to The Singapore Expo Conference Hall for a special Talk by Shaykh Hisham Kabbani.

By 8pm, the hall was already filled with at least 500 people, masya allah. When the Shaykh walked into the hall, everyone stood up.........what a lovely sight to see all muslims and muslimah (donning hijab and beautifully dressed) , taking a little of their time to attend such event.

Here are some clickin' moment to share.


I got to sit on a very good spot in the front row. This is the stage.



Opening the event...with a beautiful Quran recitation.

The Nashq Band (Nashqabandi) as they called themselves........singing some nasheeds.

The Shyakh Hisham Kabbani.

Dearest Shaykh, delivering his Talk..

he did not prepared any notes with him,bcos according to him if you prepared something, it may "sound from your ego..but if you did not, it comes from your heart"

(tis is may not be his exact words).

I was indeed moved by his words. My body and soul being very much

enlightened after the Talk.

My body needs food and so is my soul...............

I longed for something like this, again.

I really had a wonderful time with some good friends yesterday. Ive not met them for ages due to time clashes and distances of our homes, nonetheless we do keep in touch thru sms and blogging.

As promised, here are some clickin' moments :)


Me and Yati... you are blessed my fren. Have a save and smooth journey for your Umrah .



Rina (the host of the day) ,ME and Yati....
To, Rina........... whatever comes take it as a personal test and challenges from HIM. I know, It's easier said than to face it in reality, but hope it will make you a stronger person.((HUGS))




The Kecohrable gang...especially Ms Mumble aka Petom ( the one in black hijab)


Chitty..chitty bang..bang pose :)

Lastly, we allllll need to eat right........so these are some of the foodies.

Im so glad i came yesterday........... :)

Yayyy ! I can start click...clickin' again, cos i got myself a new camera yesterday.

Im meeting some goood friends tomorrow, will do some clickin'....and share some pictures here.