[TRUE STORY]: Last Saturday's Evening Incident

Last Saturday’s evening, I decided to meet my friend who lives in the next neighbourhood to cycle and play badminton together. Usually I’d call her in advance if I want to see her but that day, she couldn’t be contacted. I decided to just cycle to her house but on the way to my friend’s house, suddenly I remembered that I promised my grandma to see her for a while. My grandma lives in the apartment residence in the same neighbourhood as mine. It was already past 6.15 pm when I arrived at her house. Apparently, she wasn’t in her house so I just went to my friend’s house.

I called her to tell that I was already in front of her house but it went to voicemail after no one answered my salam. In frustration, I cycled to a spot where I could see the beautiful sunset. Suddenly, my phone rang and it was from my friend, she told me that she was in Cameron Highland and she was on her way back home.

It was too late already, almost the time for maghrib prayer. I cycled back using a shortcut to my house, through apartment residence, I saw a very cute puppy, aged probably 1-2 months. I approached it to… take a picture of it of course! It was running around, I thought it was lost or someone had just thrown it away. As I approached the puppy, it ran to the bushes near to the road. Then I saw its owner. He was an Indian man, probably at his early fifty. He walked towards me and then the puppy followed him.

“Is it a male or female, uncle?” “Male” “He’s so adorable, you bought it, uncle?” “Yeah, yeah.” “How much was it?” “140 Ringgit”.

I asked him these questions like I was interested to have a puppy, which I think yes, a puppy would be a great companion but of course, to think until that extent is a bit overrated.

When we were talking, my eyes caught something in his right hand. It was tasbeeh, made of ninety-nine wooden or plastic beads, for zikir, remembrance to the Almighty Allah. His tasbeeh was made of plastic beads. I also saw a few other trinkets and necklaces around his wrinkled neck.

“You’re a Muslim, uncle?” Truth be told, I haven’t hold tasbeeh, or zikir for a very long time. I have been so liberal these days. What a slap on my face.

“Yes, yes I am. You don’t believe me?”

I kept silent, half smiled but he knew that I didn’t believe the fact that he is a Muslim so he took out his wallet from his trousers’ pocket and showed me his identity card and also a revert Muslim verification card, which I am sure is not fake. I saw the date he reverted to Islam, it was in May 2010, but I couldn’t catch the day.

“Oh, awesome.” I told him.

“I feel so isolated by the Muslims here. When I go to the mosque, ask the people there to teach me about Islam, teach me to pray, they say just follow them. Some people also don’t like me to be in the mosque. They say I am a keling paria. They say I want sympathy, just because I look like one. I feel so hurt.”

“Oh that shouldn’t happen, uncle. That’s not nice of them. I wouldn’t do that to new sisters or brothers in Islam.”

“So I just practice Islam alone,” he said while calling his puppy named Jackie to him. It was surprising that I didn’t judge him about him petting a dog. If I were to be here, two years back, I would probably have cursed him. I’m so glad and thankful that I can accept a lot of things now. I am more open-minded.

“Is your wife a Muslim too?” I asked.

“No, but she likes Islam too. But… it’s complicated.” He answered while lighting up a cigarette.

“I see… but uncle, those people really shouldn’t treat you like that. Believe me uncle, not all Muslims are like that. It’s okay uncle, I will pray for you that Allah will help you.”

“Ya, ya. Hopefully. But I ask you what, if I were to rape one Malay(Muslim) girl in this neighbourhood, will the people accept me? Teach me and guide me to Islam?”

Jackie.

I was very shocked with his question. I was started to feel a bit afraid and uncomfortable. I stepped back, went further from him, nearer to my bicycle. He was petting Jackie.

“No, uncle, no. If you do that, people will even hate you more and your life will be damned.”

“Ya ah?”

I nodded. I was already on my bicycle, ready to go.

“Uncle, I go first. It’s almost azan.”

“Okay, okay.”

I cycled as fast as I could to home. In my mind, things like this shouldn’t happen at all. I really hope that all Muslims are nice to everyone… especially those who are interested in Islam.

One day, it will change. InshaAllah. 

Suraya

I was kicked out from university for the second time in my life. I was twenty-three years old, I only had a year before I graduated and I threw myself to this problem. Well done Suraya, well done.

Most of the girls my age were getting married or at least were planning to tie the knot after we were supposed to graduate. I failed. I failed my final examination and I did extremely bad for assignments and when I was asked to redo, I didn’t. I also did terribly in the reseat exam, everyone passed except me. I felt like I just wanted to give up. I felt so useless.

My life’s so fucked up.

            I finished packing and saw mom with my two little brothers goofing around from my room’s window. I took a deep, long breath. I hadn’t said any word since she arrived to see me after I told her on the phone about this news yesterday. She only asked, “Again?” and told me she would come today, but I could tell she had foreseen this would happen. I slapped my own face, regretting what I had done.

            “Sue? You okay?” my roommate, Aida, asked and to tell the truth, I actually completely forgot for a moment that she was in the room. I answered that I was okay, just a bit stupid. She laughed and she stood and gave me a hug. It was a sincere and earnest hug.Aida said to me to just be careful and be safe… nothing about “good luck” or try again in academic, she knew me too well.

            Aida helped me with my bags to my car and when she saw my mom, she kissed her hand. She had been my good friend since our second year.

I bid farewell to her and promised her I would keep in touch with her.

            Mom drove her own car and I drove mine. My little brother, just after me, Shahril was nine years old, and the last one, Shazlan wanted to take a ride with me. My parents didn’t expect any more children because I was fourteen and sixteen when Shahril and Shazlan were born.

            When we both arrived home, mom told me that she was going to prepare for dinner and asked me to settle my stuff and clean myself. She seemed so cool about the whole thing but I knew she was frustrated inside…

            Dad came home late that night and I was smoking cigarette in my room when I heard his car coming in to the garage. I took the last puff and put it off in the ashtray. I had started this bad habit of mine since I was in high school, I tried to quit for several times but it didn’t work, so I guessed that’s why I failed terribly in life. I was such a bullshit.

            I remembered mom’s advice not to smoke whenever my brothers were around because she was afraid that Shahril and Shazlan would follow my step. I once argued with mom about this thing, like smoking was a big fat sin. One day, she discovered that I drank alcohol because Akmal, my ex boyfriend tagged a few pictures of me drinking booze and having fun in a nightclub on Facebook. I didn’t really use my Facebook account so I didn’t know how to handle it. At the end, I deactivated my account and felt safer since then.

            When I was in university, I spent eighty percent of my money on cigarettes and food but very rarely for academic purpose. I studied accounting and I intended to be an auditor when I graduate, but as year went by, the course killed my spirit slowly. It was damn hard to even pass.

            The first time I was kicked out when I was in my first year and it was because the university was so nosy about my social life, they kicked me out. Unbelievably unfair.

            My dad suggested me to apply private university and lucky me that my parents were filthy rich to pay for the fees. The shame he had to endure was heavy. People talked about me, about my dad who raised a bitch who didn’t act like how a decent Eastern Muslim girl supposed to. What a poor dad, he was blessed such a mischievous daughter like me. I wonder if he was as bad as me when he was younger because I heard people always say that if you do sin to your parents, your children would eventually do the same to you when you become a parent.

            “Suraya?” my dad popped his head out into my half closed door and asked if he could come in. I answered yes and he came in. I could see that his nose was sniffing, he knew that I was smoking. He didn’t bother asking the stupid question.

            He came nearer to me and asked about my day and if I had eaten my dinner. After a short conversation with my dad, he finally left the room. I was so touched that he didn’t get raged, nevertheless, it wasn’t his nature to get angry. I smiled, in a horrible shameful way.

I lit up another cigarette that night before I went to bed.

            The next day I woke up after I heard my brothers’ voice downstairs, it was two o’clock in the afternoon. They were already home from school.

            I came downstairs and saw my maid was serving lunch for Shahril and Shazlan. Shazlan shouted my name and asked me to join them. I pinched Shazlan’s chubby cheek and sat beside him.

“Kak, you just woke up?”

“Or was it a short nap?” Both of them laughed and later I joined.

            That afternoon, I got to know that Shahril had joined karate, had a crush on a girl in her class and went to Quran recitation class every weekend with Shazlan. While Shazlan, he liked Katy Perry, started to collect egg toys he saw in Toy’r’Us he went on basis with mom and he ate nasi lemak every Wednesday at school. I knew so much about my brothers that lunch. All these years, I never cared, but Shahril and Shazlan were nice to me.

            I came to my room and initially I wanted to smoke. I stared at the cigarette box, it’s written “Smoking Kills” in Malay and there was a picture of a damaged liver. I learnt that the sign was as useless as forcing a dodo bird (it extinct already if you didn’t know) to fly. It never worked. My intention to smoke suddenly disappeared and I took a long shower instead.

            It was already 4.30 pm by the time I finished showering. I was still wrapped in towel when I heard azan, the call to prayer for asr prayer. I was startled for a few seconds, it’s not that I hadn’t heard azan in ages, in fact, I always heard it because being a Malaysian living in a majority Muslim country, azan is a usual thing, it can be heard anywhere. But, I just started to think that I hadn’t prayed for a long time… I hadn’t sujud, prostrated, lowered my head to the ground since… I couldn’t even remember. I guess I didn’t know the importance of believing in the God.

***

            Two years passed, I am now in Stockholm, Sweden, working with my friend’s mom who was so nice offering me a job (as an awful accountant) in her mom’s Malaysian food restaurant. Probably she had sympathy towards me.

***

            A year after I was kicked out from university, my dad’s company went bankrupt and he had to sell almost all of his properties. It was lucky that dad bought an apartment under mom’s name so we stayed there. Shahril and Shazlan were so confused with the situation, some times, they asked where bibik, our maid was. We never had an answer for that. A few months after that, dad passed away.

            All the friends I knew seemed gone after dad’s funeral. Aida came and stayed with me for two days, but I ignored her presence. I felt that I was faceless. My dignity was ripped up. It was me who tried to stay away from Aida and them.

            Mom couldn’t handle, it was too much of misfortune for her. Mom had a mental breakdown. She cried, shouted and shrieked every single day. My little brothers were scared. Never I saw they were so sad in the year I spent with them.

            I wept so much at one of the nights mom was ‘possessed’, I came out from my room and scolded her, scolded her to shut the fuck up. I couldn’t bear anymore.

            “You, you… are a rebellious daughter, you damned my life, look, look what you have done to me! You are such a bastard! I didn’t know keeping and raising you up could ruin my life! I should have agreed to abort you!” 

            My heart broke into pieces when I heard those words. I argued with mom some times, but this time, it was too much, it was unacceptable. I wasn’t sure if I was really a bastard, but to think that my behavior all my life was so corrupted, it could be. Then I saw my mom went out from the house but I just let her go.

            I smoked to ease my feeling. This time, I didn’t care if Shahril and Shazlan saw me smoking.

            I was shocked when a kid aged around seven came to my house and shouted from outside. “Kak Sue, Kak Sue, your mom jumped off the building and she’s dead!” “Your mom’s dead, Kak!”

            I could feel that my blood was boiling inside of my body. My eyes were red. My hands were stiff. It was too sudden.

            “Your mom’s dead, Kak!” was playing in my head as I was rushing to the scene. I saw mom lying on the ground. I saw blood everywhere. Her head was twisted. She’s gone.

***

            I don’t want to rewind the bitter memories of my life. I had enough. I am here to turn a new leaf. I promised to my little brothers that I would collect a lot of money and bring them out from the orphanage three years from now. It’s hard for me to say this to them, in fact, it killed me.

            Looking at Shahril and Shazlan would remind me of my parents. I am cruel for leaving them behind, but I hope they understand. They will understand my pain I had. They will.

            I continued working that day in the restaurant’s office and I suddenly miss the sound of azan, the call to prayer. In Sweden, I cannot hear it because the Muslim population here is very little, so the mosques here don’t get the permission to sound the call to prayer. They say it’s disturbing. I don’t know but to me, it’s very calming and it soothes my soul.

            I have started to perform my salah, pray, the five times daily back. I realised that God ignored me because I ignored Him. I deserve the punishments. I do. I am now trying to correct myself. My life was a hell and I made it. It was all me to be blamed. It’s not because I am a bastard, if I were one, but me. It’s all me. My parents’ sin should not affect me in any way, it’s just a shitty excuse the society give to make illegitimate children all over the world feel useless and guilty of their existence.

            But I promised to myself. I promised to Shahril and Shazlan. Malaysia was a mean place for me. I found so much peace in Sweden. I’ll come back to my homeland when I am done correcting myself and the wounds are healed, but it’s a long way to go.

Brothers, I love you. Wait for me.

Unsolved

It was the year that Mat and I were warned not to commit any more mischief behaviour because early that year, we were suspended from hostel and because both of our houses were quite far away from our school, we had to skip school for the period. Mat somehow didn’t mind and in fact, he enjoyed the two-week ‘holiday’ but I was kind of traumatised.

            I remembered that Mat told me he had super fun days where he went to Pulau Batam in Singapore with his grown-up friends I never had contact with. I had no clear reason why and how he managed to go there but I didn’t give a damn because I really had had enough with him and his shenanigans. Mat and I were labelled as “juvenile delinquents” by teachers and wardens and maybe some of students’ parents here.

            I was studying for our Chemistry test that coming next week late that night in my dorm’s study corner. It was only me who was wide-awake. It was raining so heavily and at times, storm and thunder could be heard. I had my mp3 player that I sneakily brought from home so it could accompany at nights because what I wanted now, to stay away from Mat if he were to make any monkey business.

            My bowel movement decided to screw me up but being known as an over-brave boy, I was never afraid to go out at this kind of time. Once, Mat and I sneaked out from hostel at 2 o’clock in the morning to smoke cigarettes and had some porn-materials hunting and managed to get back before everyone woke up. We visited the cyber café or the magazine booth in the nearest neighbourhood to our school two or three times every week. All the times we sneaked out, we succeeded to be safe, but one night that changed our lives and it was the transition of my life. It was the night we were caught by a guard when we were drinking beers and smoking cigarettes with some porn magazines with us behind science laboratory in a school block, which was pretty far from our hostel. My dad was extremely outraged and my mom was unusually sad and shocked to know the news and that meant they were highly disappointed with me and to be honest, I had never felt so guilty in my life when I saw my parent’s reactions, especially mom whom I loved more than I loved my dad. At that point (where we were suspended for two weeks from staying in hostel), I really, really told myself that I had to stop. Stop from being villainy.

            My dorm was around 1km far from the nearest toilet, okay, I exaggerated, but to say, it was far, if I wanted to poop in the morning, I had to wake up as early as 5 or not, the students whom their dorms were near to the toilet would dominate. To add, I knew Mat and always had conversations with in the toilet before we got really close and dared to do juvenile sins together.

            So, I ran to toilet and settled my business. As I washed my hands, I heard some people, maybe three or four people were kind of muttering outside the toilet. I didn’t understand the whole conversation because some people were talking in Chinese, sometimes mixed with Malay. I just kept silent. Who the hell are outside chatting at this fucking time? I went out and was shocked to see Mat and some of seniors were having a discussion and what made me shudder was when I saw a dead body on the ground in the middle of Mat and his senior friends. I almost fainted because I had never crossed something like this, it was so out of the blue for me to know that Mat was that violent and evil… and so inhuman. I couldn’t see whom they had killed but blood was all over his head.

            “Fuck.” I heard it coming out from Mat’s mouth. Then I heard he said fuck over and over again. He seemed so surprised to see my presence since I firmly said to him that he could only talk to me if he had changed like I had. “Fuck, Azli, fuck!” I started to shiver like I was having a bad fever or in a Nordic country in winter without any coat and mittens. In blurriness, I heard his other friends were saying something in Chinese. One of Mat’s friends, which were our seniors I never talked to, quickly grabbed my hands and hit me really hard at my crotch and the next thing I realised that I was in a storeroom in a school block beside the lifeless boy.

            It was Alvin, the boy who initially wanted to join us doing mischief things a few weeks before we were suspended but he was so careless that he almost made us in a big trouble so Mat ditched him. After that, Alvin threatened us that he was going to report to our warden. Mat and I were extremely angry and hit him once. Alvin kept his mouth shut after the incident, so I thought it was done, this case was no more an issue, but was I wrong! I was pretty sure too that Alvin, Mat and the seniors had done something big that I didn’t know. Like in Pulau Batam, Singapore. But I had no clue.

            Realising that I had woken up, Mat walked from his position across mine and Alvin’s, the dead boy, he squatted so he could talk to me and removed the tape on my mouth, and said “I’m sorry Azli, I had to. Because you changed. And I’m still me, I can’t trust you, can I?” with laughter. My brain was starting to malfunction, it hurt so bad, so bad that I couldn’t think of any words to answer him. He taped back my mouth, stood up and spoke to his friends in Chinese. It was that night I knew he could speak Chinese, almost a year I was with him, he never once spoke in Chinese or mentioned to me that he was able to communicate in Chinese. It was unprecedented.

            I felt that I had drank a lot of boozes because I felt so drunk. I heard some noises they made but I wasn’t paying attention but what I knew that Alvin wasn’t beside me anymore. I cried of fear. I was afraid that I was going to die, I was going to be killed. I saw mom’s face on the ceiling when I looked up. I just felt so hopeless. Suddenly, Mat came to me and told me he had hid Alvin in a school’s block and asked me to calm. I couldn’t of course. He and his friends left the room after awhile.

            I was relieved that Mat didn’t kill me. I didn’t know the reason why, but he just let me in the storeroom until I could see some light coming from the door’s crack. I scooted my body a little by little, I was trying so hard to go to the door and when I arrived, I kicked the door with my feet but I guess it was locked from outside. I tried for five minutes but it didn’t work and I was so weak to continue but I still tried to knock at some points. I realised that it was a school day and all students were in school blocks, not in hostel. Tears fall from my eyes and I fall asleep.

            I was pushed because I leaned on the door when someone tried to open the storeroom’s door. My body leaped a bit. It was the cleaner of my hostel block. She was shocked to see me in such condition and half screamed but I moved my body, trying to give her signal to shut up and asked her to untie my hand and open the tape on my mouth. She seemed to understand and did what I wanted her to do. I asked her to keep quite and told her this was just a prank and nothing’s big or to worry about. She laughed and said okay so I ran to my dorm.

            I sat beside my bed and cried again. I didn’t know how I could even tear so much, I had never cried so bad before. I thought about the whole murder thing and what Mat had done. I felt so weak but I decided to shut my mouth and never say a word about this.

            The next day, the school was shaken by the news of Alvin’s death. A boy from junior class found his body in his class locker. Questions played in my head were like “Didn’t anyone in the class even open the locker earlier?” or “Didn’t they smell anything suspicious?” but I really tried to ignore. I really did. Police came and everyone was asked. Our dorm and the others were checked and the funny thing was that it was the day I saw so many porn magazines and cell phones were confiscated.

            When I was asked, I acted normal and tried to answer all the questions. I was aware that Mat was peeping and paying attention among the students when it was my turn, but I ignored and as I finished, I walked away.

            The case remained unsolved. I didn’t know how the hell these police people and investigators couldn’t manage to catch the culprit. The case was pretty simple. I just couldn’t believe it but I refused to tell them the truth. Now it’s almost five months since the case and the year was ending soon, I felt so much relief. One thing I was dying to know what more secrets Mat hold but I couldn’t even see his face. I decided to move out from the school when the new year comes. I was so badly traumatised and I was certain I was never going back here…