Monday, November 24, 2014

what courage is..

we had the whole clan sending my cousin sister to her college.
it was mixed feelings.
my extended family is really extended. and we are very close. we argued, we yelled, we screamed and we laughed at each other - the bonding we cherished..
...
when i was on my long summer holidays, i remembered having her sleeping on my chest, so that I could take a nap too.. it was  soothing to have that small warm tiny baby on your chest that was so fragile!

that was eighteen years ago. and this baby made us proud for being offered a place (finally) in uitm jengka to pursuit her (or maybe ours) ambition.

well, it's a normally sob stories of a girl coming from a poor family and made it through (insyaallah).
but, i felt like writing about it, just as a reminder to myself, herself or anyone who might have forgotten how blessed life is..allahuakbar
...
she's the little daughter of my aunt. her dad, who has three wives and dozens of abandoned children, was barely there in their life.

my aunt, the only one who never received any formal education out of eleven (twelve?) siblings, was so in love with this guy and got married without the parent's approval and became the second wife. i'd still say she got conned by this man, but, once a while, when she talked about him, despite all the mean words and hatred that came out from her mouth, deep inside, i could still figure out the love never dies, partly.

my aunt raised both of her daughters by herself, with the altruism from the family members. nope. not a single cash came in from that irresponsible father of my cousins. maybe there were, but if there were, i knew it was never suffice. in fact, i remember hearing him asking money  from my aunt. i never knew this guy. i just hate his gut that i never was interested to know his issues! they said, he was actually a nice person.. but any man who left his family behind, ignoring them and pretended as if they never exists never deserved to even be called a person!

my aunt took care tens and tens of stranger kids and babies (some have been all grown up and still came and paid her visits), cooked food  (nice food) to sell every morning before the sun even rise. just so to feed herself and her daughters and survive in this while as much as possible. she barely bought things for herself. she took care of us, too. when we were small, when our parents were away for work, she babysit us, provided us food, bathed us, and washed our laundries. and now, she still did her routines for our kids. it was cheap hard labour, but the least she can do. as much as she might think she was lucky to have us, i wanted her to know we were the lucky one to have her throughout our lives.. she has not only two daughters, she raised so many of us, the cousins and our babies too (that would be for my case)!

i remembered when i was in my primary and the mailman came to deliver a courier. she never knew how to write, and she was supposed to sign the received consignment. she wrote a crooked 'z' representing her name, zaiton.. at that time, i found it cute.. but thinking back, i sympathized! i knew she was struggling, in front of her growing niece and that mailman.. she could hardly hold a pen!

i remembered when i was a teenager and saw her hand-washed my dirty underpants. it was nothing back then, 'ala, mamiton memang basuh baju semua orang'.. and thinking back, allahuakbar, what have i done! i knew she wouldn't mind, but what was i thinking? what was everybody thinking?

i remembered when i wanted to further up my studies oversea, and all she did day and nights were cleaning the anchovies for the sambal she would cooked for me to bring it to the UK,,, she could have just asked my mom to bought the cleaned anchovies to make her life easier, but she said "tak sedap sambal bilis pakai ikan bilis yang dah siap kopek'. as she was the expert in food, we never complained, after all, we never helped! .. and thinking back, how could i do what i did, ignoring small things and noticing how much she cared.

i remembered when i just called her "miton, boleh jaga aidan aimar tak, ain nak gi tengok wayang ngan acap?" and her respond will never fails me..up until today.

i remembered how excited she has been to learn the quran from my boy just because she never knew how to read.

my aunt, seems like non-existing insignificant no-body type of a person, but she's everything.
she is (still) my mom's and my babysitter
she  is the best "washing machine" (never broke unless she was attacked by fever) we could have, and she made the white shirt whiter than you first bought.
she is definitely the best chief we ever had..when others' were telling how much they missed their mum's cook when we were in boarding school, i missed mamiton's food (sorry mama, you still cooked the best nasik tomato, though)
she is our mom.. and she just do hard labour for us..
my aunt, she's everything..

and as we sent her daughter away, as much as we were so proud of her for making it to the university, all the credit must go to my aunt. she has no knowledge how school was, she has no idea how reading was, she learned her basic english words 'jump, run, no, yes' from my children, she has no educational achievement that her daughter can be proud of.. but all of us knew, she will do what it takes to make sure her daughters get what she never get!! if courage is a person, courage is her!
...

nana, ni akak nak pesan.
orang tengok korang orang susah, orang tak bijak pandai..
orang tau tengok je
orang tak rasa susah mak, dah takkan paham susah mak.
alhamdullillah, ada rezeki sepupu2, kite semua tolong sesama kite.
mak berjasa bukan kat nana and tasha jer.. mak banyak jasa kat kitorang.
nana, mak mungkin ada buat silap dalam buat keputusan hidup die dulu.
tapi, akak tau, die bersyukur dapat nana tasha sebagai anak dia.
nana, kite semua tau, takde orang yang boleh tolong kite, selain diri kite sendiri.,
walau mak tak lafaz dekat nana setulusnya, akak tau, dia nak nak belajar betul2, score habis2an..die nak goreng sambal bilis bekalkan nana pergi belajar oversea nanti, insyallah.
nana, belajar betul2.
belajar supaya nasib terbela.
belajar sampai berjaya.
biarlah kawan2 kolej boleh pakai iphone6, kete myvi pergi kuliah, handbag coach latest design, baju sutera yang cantik2, nana belajar je lah. belanja sekadar mampu, tapi pulun habis2an kat university tu.
ari tu 3 kerete hantar nana, though ramai lagi yang nak ikut...nanti, satu bas kita sewa bile nana grad with deans' list, insyaallah.. berkat doa kitorang semua.. berkat doa harapan mak!
insyaallah

akak nak kasik ingat
1. jangan tinggal sembahyang
2. jangan lupa usaha, belajar molek2
3. jangan putus berdoa
4. jangan lara, leka dengan benda2 yang melalaikan
5. set your target high, aim for it and work for it..

insyaallah
belajar tu, part of fisabillillah..
jihad untuk diri, mak, agama, bangsa.

good luck dik
nice shot of miton, nana & tasha
..gosh - u people so young and this was only five years ago!

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