In Which There Is a Storm

It's raining very heavily as I type, and not just raining either - frequent lightning and thunder, and the knowledge acquired from a children's encyclopaedia tells me that the lightning is indeed very close to our little HDB estate.

The rain has become so heavy that I can barely see the HDB block opposite mine.

The storm inspired me to begin (finally!) my archive of tales which I acquired during my pilgrimage to the holy city of Mekah, or Mecca, and Madinah, or Medina. (There're a million ways to romanize these names.) For it reminded me that we were the selected few, out of billions of pilgrims, to be able to experience RAIN in the desert land.

It rains about once a year, maybe even less, in Mecca, unlike Singapore in which it rains almost every day sometimes, at least once a week to say the least. Everyone tells us that it won't ever rain. No pilgrims bring umbrellas to pilgrimage, unless for the purpose of sheltering oneself from the heat (which is just NOT in fashion there, believe me) or unless they're extremely kiasu/kan cheong/overprepared.

So when it poured, everybody was amazed.

And even more so when the rainwater surged and flooded the pilgrims' tents in Mina, a town in Mecca where most of the pilgrims were at that time for the throwing of the three Jamrahs.

Ever the instinctive photographer (ever since I newly obtained my beloved Konica Minolta barely a month before) I realised what a photographic opportunity it was, one not to be missed. And even on dying batteries, I dashed out before the downpour began to the communal toilet, and snapped this:

That was what the sky looked like just before the storm began, in a city that never rains. Well, barely.

We were lucky to be where we were. Some tents were located atop mountains, where a huge amount of rainwater gathered somewhere and just surged through, breaking past rocks and sweeping tents with a significant flood, significant enough to be reported on local news (especially Singapore because there were Singaporean tents there, and many Singaporean pilgrims). Some were separated from their husband/wife, captured by the ever-so-empathetic news cameras, or so our relatives told us.

But our tent suffered just violent rain which entered our tents and drenched some mattresses and belongings. Which is really...not much.

We huddled our belongings together, and we got together to pray, to hope that no great calamity would fall us as a test.

Meanwhile, the Americans/Europeans/Turkeyians, god knows, but it was labelled as the Americans' tents made contact with us.

Quickly, our ustazah, the religious teacher of our female group, got someone who could speak English to interpret.

My sister and mother and my mattresses happened to be at the wall at which the other side was the American tent. But we didn't hear much of the conversation, not until the chosen interpreter relayed to us what they said.

"They want us to clear our belongings. They say that in case there is a flood, they want a clear escape route (via our tent)."

Our ustazah did not like this. She ignored them, and commented that they did not believe in Allah, that Allah would save us.

I, in turn, did not like her comment.

While you should believe in Allah, that He can save us, you should never be unprepared. There is no Islamic doctrine that tells you to sit on your butt and believe in Allah, and do nothing else. In fact, there IS a doctrine that says "do all you can, and THEN when you can do no more, you leave it in His hands." I thought that it was rather un-nice of the ustazah to say that they did not believe in Allah, because who can judge one's relationship with Allah except that person, and Allah himself?

However, not one to pick a fight especially in such circumstances, I kept my thoughts to myself. I learnt never to judge one's relationship with Allah, and to take care of my own relationship with Him before making sweeping assumptions of others.

But at the same time, He is the only one from whom we ask for Guidance and Help. So we prayed, and the rain did abate, somewhat.

In the meantime, a woman that my sister and I had grown close to, only to be known as Mrs R, gave us the scoop. It was during the Maghrib prayers, where the 3 of us were not praying since were having our periods.

"It's a bad flood," she says. "You should see the scene outside, everything's swept away by the water."

"Are there any Singaporean tents affected?" we ask.

"Yeah, some of them are moving in with us." And she tells us some of the agencies which have beeen affected.

Me and my sister huddle together. "Do you realise our aunt could be affected?" one of us asks the other.

Our aunt, while also going on pilgrimage, had not followed the agency we had chosen. She had, instead, chosen to stay with another agency with which we had at first wanted to try. Her tent was located in the area near the hills.

We were worried, but we concluded that we wouldn't tell our mother. For you see, our mother was Ill, and suffering from terrible appetite dysfunctions, so we decided to refrain from worrying her more. (Because my mother's quite the worrier. ) So as we worried about our aunt, we kept our worries to ourselves, and merely prayed for her safety.

At the same time, there were fresher problems coming up. We had to go out to throw the Jamrahs, but could we in that storm? I was more worried about the fact that my mother would suffer greatly with her intolerance of the cold, and the lack of fat she has. (She was positively skeletal.) And so I made a promise, or nazak, that if the rain would abate, just for that evening so that we all could go and throw the Jamrah safely, I would fast some days in Medina.

He answered my prayers.

I remembered that I almost could have cried.

We went out that night, and the rain wasn't really there - just a very, very slight drizzle. But went we went out to the street, the mayhem was apparent. Everything was swept up, and it was only praise to God that we had tents to stay in. For some pilgrims who couldn't afford tents had to live on the streets, and you can only imagine what it was like then.

We had to step through much clutter, and in the mess of crowds, I remember we nearly getting separated - I believe it was the same night of the rain. I was sticking with the crowd, entrusting my mother to my sister and father, somewhere at the back of our large group. when I noticed a small group of women from our agency, probably about 3 of them, straying far.

Instinctively I made towards them, but immediately someone grabbed my arm and told me to stay close.

"There're people who're cut off from us!" I told them. Shocked, some tried to call out to them, but it was apparent that in that kind of chaos there was no way for them to be heard.

I ran away from our group and caught up to the women before they strayed any further, and clutched their sleeves and told them that we were all over there. And luckily we managed to get them back, for who knows what could have happened in THAT mess?

It was also that night, I remember, when I yelled, for the first time, in Arabic, to another man.

We were all done, safely, thank goodness, and were trying to get out of the place.

Arm-in-arm with me was an old woman, who had either chosen me to bring her along, or I had gotten hold of her first. ( Because you see, the majority of pilgrims are old women. People my age are very few and far in between, and there're only so many female officers who can help them along.)

In front of me was the ustazah, who had two women with her arm in arm.

A man shouts something at us, with luggage atop his shoulder, probably because we were moving too slowly and were too close together for him to slip through.

"Be patient!" Says my ustazah in Arabic. "For a Haj that is accepted by Allah!"

(If you understand Arabic: "Sabr! Lil haji mabrur!")

The man retorts something which I do not understand, and was trying to push through me and my charge.

"SABR!" I yell, which means "Be patient!".

And he stops pushing, grumbling, and I inwardly am proud of myself. For when you want to communicate something to the Arab, you musn't let yourself get pushed around. As an Arab, I know this perfectly well, and I am perfectly used to yelling around. (Something which my purely Malay relatives don't like.)

I was very happy and related this incident to my sister when we met up later. And feeling quite happy, our spirits lifted by something undescribable, we sing our praises and zikir to Allah spiritedly, so spiritedly that some of our fellow pilgrims were rather amused.

And we woke up to a beautiful morning - a moment which I managed to capture, but only a little.

Again, on dying batteries, Alhamdulillah.

The next time we were on Mina again, I managed to capture happier, sunnier, dryer pictures. When I say tents, these are what I mean:


There are many more tents like these all over Mina.



And if you were wondering what Jamrahs are, this is where they are located:


And this is what a Jamrah looks like - I believe Jamrah Wusta.


I left Mina with an unforgettable experience, and many lessons.

And hence, ends my first tale, and in Singapore, the rain slows to a drizzle.

Thanks to Blogger for hosting the pictures, taken with Konica Minolta Dimage F500. It's a tad too small - I'll upload larger pictures next time. All pictures are at least 600X800 pixels.