Selfie

These days we are happier

to smile at a camera

than to each other

#thebestselfieismuhasabah

Xgi Masjid

"Beriman kepada qadha' dan qadar":

rukun iman ke-6.

Kenapa aku x gi masjid?

Dan kalau pergi pon,

lambat?

(Dapat tangkap rakaat terakhir je?)

Sebab ak busy study la bro..

Study tu penting jugak..amanah kot..!

Sebab ak penat la bro..

Klau x cukup tido..x sihat la..!

Sebab ak nak jumpa kawan la bro..

Hubungan baik dgn kawan2 penting..baru boleh dakwah..!

Sedangkan kita percaya

(kononnya)

bahawa results exam,

kerehatan,

dan persahabatan

semuanya ketetapan Allah?

Na'udzubillah min zalik

Mungkin aku xpegi masjid

atau lambat gi masjid..

Na'udzubillah min zalik 

..sebab ada sekelumit perasaan dlm hati

xpercaya rukun iman ke-6.

Na'udzubillah min zalik

(Maaf klau berat.

First and foremost,

peringatan kepada diri sendiri)

😔

#jomgimasjid

Complain

I've got a feeling that
the act of complaining
is very much
human nature.

After all,
do we not do that from an early age
to our parents?
"Mama..Adik has a better toy than me..!" [said with eyes tearing up]

To everybody on Facebook via our status updates?
"I love her so much..why can't she love me back..??" [typed with eyes tearing up]

Heck we have departments in most of our institutions dedicated to handling complaints
"Why did I not get any chips with my cheeseburger? Where is your manager?? I AM GOING TO SUE THIS PLACE TO THE GROUND!!!" [no teary eyes..just lotsa expletives]

There is something comforting about just being listened to;
whether the person you complain to
can help or not..is not the point, really.

[Credit]                   

Hence the context of why I find the following to be such a sweet ayat:

"He [Zachariah] said, "My Lord, indeed my bones have weakened, and my head has filled with white, and never have I been in my supplication to You, my Lord, unhappy.""
[Surah Maryam, 19:4]


Through the act of his servant Zachariah, God gives us a tip on how to call to him (du'a):

Complain.
Plain and simple.

But do it sincerely..from the bottom of your heart.
Of course God knows what you are going through. Duh. He is God kot.
But complain anyways..
and yes, let your eyes tear up ;')

I guarantee it will feel much better than complaining to
mere mortals, or
to Facebook, or
to a (probably hugely ineffective) complaints department.

True peace will come
when you complaint to the One
who can actually do something about it.
He does not tire in listening to you.

So what are you waiting for?
Start now. Complain.
But this time..
do it to the right department ;)

Wallahu'alam

[Credit]

Disease of the Heart

"Yesterday she came back to life..after having literally died for 10 minutes.

It was the scariest thing I've seen in my life!", 

said the staff nurse with a morbid sort of excitement, almost gleefully.

"Anyways, both of you can take her blood glucose reading", she said. 

It was music to the ears of my clinical partner and I - two typically UPSA-obsessed medical students.

"She is very poorly..she won't get better again. We are waiting for her son to fly in from America tomorrow morning to see her", she continued. 

("...for the last time", she could have added.)

So my clinical partner and I, armed with the blood glucose and ketone monitoring kit thingy, approached the bed of the lady who came back from the dead yesterday.

Around her machines beeped and sighed; as if lamenting the situation, as if grudgingly acknowledging the futility of the task they have been set up to do - to keep her in an artificial state of life.

Then again, was she really alive? 

I mean,

her brain is present..but her thoughts were most likely not.

Her lungs exchanging gases..but only with the persuasion of those sighing machines.

Her anatomy complete..but yet, very much like a piece of meat which though has not yet decomposed, is already past its date of expiry.

She lies down there asleep, never to wake up again; a living corpse.

She still exists, but I dare not say she is still alive.

If those thoughts were on my mind, I pushed them aside to focus on the task at hand 

as I took her hand, still warm (my hands ironically colder than those of a dying lady),

pricked her finger, and tried to coax a drop of blood out of her.

Bumbling medical student that I was, though, I tried and failed a few times - one time I would drop the sample collecter to the floor, on the next try the blood would stubbornly refuse to come out, etc etc.

The only comfort I could draw from the situation was that my clinical partner was just as clumsy.

As we struggled on incompetently by the patient, I noticed the staff nurse in conversation with another healthcare professional (the pharmacist?).

I no longer remember what they said - but what I recall was the cheerful nature of the chat.

It struck me as disrespectful somewhat: here was a lady who was about to die, at the very latest, in the next 48 hours (if she isn't already classed as dead) - but there you are chatting away like nothing of significance is going on!

This lady, lying prone on the bed, is a person - a human being was once upon a time born into this world, grew up with loved ones, probably went to school somewhere, went to work, fell in love, became a mother herself (maybe even a grandmother?).

God knows the joy and grief she went through in this experience called Life; and how, along that journey, she has touched the lives of those around her - her loved ones, her friends, her acquaintances, or even strangers.

To put it simply, this is a lady who has a life story..and we, in this ward, today, have received the honour of becoming part of the final chapter of that tale. 

It struck me as disrespectful

because of how matter-of-factly the nurse and the pharmacist(?) treated such a profound fact.

But then I took a look at myself

and saw a medical student 

struggling to get blood 

out of a dying lady's finger

just to get an UPSA signed off.

Who was I to talk about disrespect?

*          *          *

Later on a palliative care nurse spoke to my clinical 

partner and I.

What she said, I still remember - and could very well resonate throughout my medical career - 

as she questioned:

"What we are doing now - taking obs, sticking needles into thislady once every hour, blowing her up with IV fluid - is it really for the patient?

"or do we actually do this for our own benefit? For us healthcare professionals to feel like we are still able to do something..?"

*          *          *

In these past few weeks the PBL cases have been about diseases of the heart:

AF, CCF, ACS, MI, and the like.

But I've developed the feeling 

that the most horrifying (and possibly most dangerous)

disease of the heart

is when we - the doctors, nurses, and other healthcare professionals -

become numb to the passing on of our patients from this life to the next.

And my fear at this point of my training?

Is that this disease is taking root in my heart as well.

P.S. I do not deny that healthcare professionals have to 'build a shield around their hearts' in order to protect themselves from the emotional demands of this profession; in order to operate more professionally for the patient's benefit.

I just fear that we will go too far and stop caring; in a field where caring for others is the core of what we do.

P.P.S. We did not get the UPSA signed off that day - instead getting a telling off for taking nearly an hour to get blood glucose and ketone readings from the patient (in our defence, we were distracted by the palliative care nurse!) 

- dedicated to a patient who, at the time this is written, has likely already left this world for the next. 

Though I have inadvertently become only an insignificant part of the final chapter of your life story, 

you have become a significant part of this chapter of my life story: 

the chapter in which I try becoming a good doctor -

Islands

Allah has spread the 5 solat throughout the day

like paradise islands in this ocean called the Dunya -

so that at set times of the day

we can go ashore,

take refuge, take a break

before we continue the difficult swim

through the Dunya.

But instead we can't bear

to stay too long on these God-given islands

(Naudzubillah..maybe we don't even visit them!)

and prefer to stay all day in stormy waters.

Take a long hard look at your daily schedule:

Are the five daily prayers

a sanctuary from worldly concerns,

or merely 

just another appointment

to add to that busy schedule?

Just another event to be rushed through?

Enjoy your solat..

take it slow,

feed your spiritual needs;

you have nothing to lose but the anxiety in your heart.

MH17

To: Muhammad Lam

This was your earlier question, paraphrased:

"So you don't care about those people who died on that plane lah..
even though they're Malaysian, closer to you?
You only care about your 'Muslim brothers and sisters' in Gaza lah..??"

After years having not spoken to you,
I've forgotten that you were, and still are,
the lovable pessimist;
my eternal debate teammate/opponent

And put on the spot very suddenly by your accusation/query,
I answered "Yes" (big mistake)
Followed later by my awkward statement
"Muslim doesn't have to mean Al-Qaeda lah.."

Yup. Obviously not the best answer.
(Kalau debate, confirm I have to answer a lot of POIs at this point)


I know writing this after hours of thinking it over is kinda cheating
(confirm cannot do in an actual debate).
But your question was a very good one;
definitely worthy of a better answer than the one I gave.


So here is my 'scripted', but HONEST answer:

I still remember the morning after MH17 crashed.
Eating sahur with my family I was silent as always,
but on that day not because I was sleepy;
it was because I felt that I've just had a brush with death.

Because the route MH17 flew, over Ukraine,
is most probably the exact same route which I took
when I myself flew to the UK two years ago
(my transit was at Amsterdam).

That morning, in my mind,
I was wondering if any of my friends were on MH17,
and also I was thinking:
"It could have been me on that plane"

So your statement is correct, Lam:
in a sense, those people who died on MH17
ARE closer to me than those in Gaza are.

Credits

But the next part of your statement
is also spot on:
I DO care very much about my brothers and sisters in Gaza.

And yes,
a large part of that care comes from the fact
that they are fellow Muslims.

I am not ashamed to admit that.

But allow me to quote the cliche:
"You don't have to be Muslim
to care about Palestine.
You just have to be human."

(Saja quote a cliche..I know cliches get on your nerves) ;)

Point is, the fact that so many non-Muslims
are so aware of the Gaza crisis
is because it is a HUMANITARIAN crisis.

Credit

Of course I am affected by the loss of Malaysian lives,
and the grief of Malaysian family members.
People who talk and look like me.
Because I am Malaysian.

I am also not ashamed to admit that.

Credit

But as I write this
so many people are living continuously in Gaza
in conditions worst
than those who died instantly on MH17.

Credit

Both incidents tug on my heartstrings.
Because both are tragedies.
Both lives ruined by injustice.

So today I join the rest of my country
in remembering those who were lost on MH17.
But I don't apologise
for also remembering my brothers and sisters in Gaza.


I am Muslim first.
That doesn't make me any less Malaysian.

With love,
The lovable optimist;
your eternal debate teammate/opponent



P.S. see you at dinner tomorrow, insyaAllah. I kinda miss our conversations, believe it or not

I'm Keeping the Beard

So many judgemental people out there
when it comes to non-hijabis

"What's wrong with her??"
"Showing off-lah tu"
"Astaghfirullah...HARAAAMMM!!!"

I wonder how these judgements were made..
what was the basis of their comments?
Do they know these non-hijabis personally?
or at least TRIED to understand them -
their personalities,
their backgrounds,
their knowledge of the Deen?


Funny, too, that many of these Haram Police are men

How can they know what a woman goes through
when she first wears the hijab;

The wordless protests of family and friends,
the discrimination at work,
the hateful looks from strangers,
or at the very least
the disapproval of a culture
which views the hijab as
"conservative"
"fundamentalist"
"Melayu" (if she's not Malay-lah)

The closest to this woman's experience
that a man can go through
(in my humble opinion)
is if he suddenly chooses one day
to grow a beard.

(And no, not those Robert Downey Jr.-type goatees
but a full-fledged beard.
As the Prophet (peace be upon him) said
when it comes to beards:
"Let it flow")

And no I am not justifying the act of not wearing a hijab
(or not wearing a beard ;) )
Because its true..the Quran DOES tell you to wear the hijab (24:31)

But the Quran also tells you to do dakwah with hikmah - wisdom (16:125)


Me?
InsyaAllah
I'm keeping the beard ;)