The Pilgrimage of all Pilgrimages.

So I haven't blogged for a long while. It was because I had nothing to blog about, and for the past week I have been on a road trip to Mecca for Umrah and some ziarah-ing.

I would upload pictures later. ;)

So my family went with another three Malaysian families, including Fatin's and Fatihah's, and another two Pakistani families. We all even had papers with the Malaysian flag on it to stick on the inside of the car window so we wouldn't lose each other. The drive was around 18hrs, excluding the night we stayed at Taif before going for Ihram, for those who don't know what that is, I shall explain later.

We started driving at 2 a.m. We prayed and excrete our waste along the way at rest stops. There were some really clean ones and there were some really... yucky ones. But I've been to worse and was grateful that I went to Cahaya's camps and all.
It made me tough!Hahahaha. When we arrived at Taif, it was already night time,me and Fatin went to get pizza, in our abayas and hijab! I'm pretty sure they'll spit or throw something at you if you don't cover yourself.I just realized that Taif is the place where the Jewish kids threw stones at Nabi Muhammad when he tried to preach to them, and Zayd tried to protect him.

Near our hotel, Pizza Hut is somewhere there.

Syawal and Hakimi wearing their Ihram in the majlis.

Anyways! The hotel room was huge! It had a 'majlis', a place where Arab men sits around discussing stuff. So Harzan and Syawal slept there. Because there wasn't enough bedrooms. Me and Marsya slept in one and Mama and Abah slept in anotherr. There was a kitchen and all, but we didn't use it. xD.

The next morning after Subuh, the boys and the daddy-os got into their Ihram. That is two pieces of white cloths for those who don't know.It shows how all humans are equal no matter how rich or poor they are. They still have to wear the same thing. Then all six families left the nice hotel and went to Miqat to niat umrah there. So we prayed there and there was just the cutest cat in the masjid!

Then we arrive in Mecca a while later. It was really crowded and there were so many buildings and pigeons! I really didn't expect to see so many pigeons. But you're not supposed to scare them or hurt them. Which is what I do here all the time because it's nice to see all of them flying up at once. Hehehe.

So the city didn't make any impression on me at first. But then we had to walk 600 meters from the hotel to the Masjid Al-Haram.And OMG, the mosque is soooo amazingly beautiful! It's huge. Well it has to be, since it has the Kaaba inside. And it's is made out of marble from head to toe, inside there were red carpets, there were marble fans, air conditioning coming out of the marble pillars,gold(I dnt know if it was real gold) bookcases with loads of Quran on them. There was also tanks of zam zam water everywhere! And they refill them all the time. The mosque was so crowded, especially during prayer time.

Near our hotel in Mecca. See the pigeons!

Lots of buildiiiings.

After we prayed Zuhur, we went to tawaf around the Kaaba. When I first saw the Kaaba, I didn't cry like my parents did when they first saw it. It was breathtaking, because it was really beautiful, but I didn't cry and that made me pretty sad. And the Kaaba is way smaller than I thought!During my tawaf, there were these two workers moping the floor around the Kaaba and I saw this man shaking their hands as a thank you gesture. That made me feel happy, it's not like here where the people look down on the workers and cleaners. And although the sun was hot and I was barefoot walking on the marble, my feet weren't on fire like they were outside the mosque because according to my dad there's air conditioning coming out of the floor. My tawaf went well, no obstacles or whatsoever (except for the occasional pushing) and it only took like 20 minutes I think. After tawaf we went to Mount Safa for saei. Took us a while to find it. The saei went well but I couldn't really concentrate because I didn't eat a thing that day except for two mini Mars bars and two mini muffins and it was evening by then. But for some reason I wasn't hungry at all during tawaf. After seven times going back and forth, and drinking zam zam water in between, my dad cut a bit of my fringe (even though I got my hair at the back ready) and we were off to find food. Well we had to find slippers first because I lost mine since I was dumb enough not to bring a bag to keep them in with me.

So that's how my Umrah went. And everyday for three days it was like that, we would go in and out of our hotel to walk under the hot sun to pray at the mosque. I really didn't mind it though, the sun, I've had worse. I'm just gonna make list of things:

- The mosque, is beautiful, if only I don't need to excrete waste, I would definitely stay and sleep there.I've actually slept there before for a few minutes and it was very comfy.
- There are so many Malaysians and Indonesian there so a lot of people including the Arabs can speak Malay.
- Its useless to know how to speak English there, hardly anybody knows it.
- The people there were really friendly, they would give salam and sedekah stuff.Fatin got like a mini sejadah and a t-shirt.
- You will see a lot of old couples. And it's sweet because some can hardly walk that long to the mosque, and yet they did, holding hands and stuff.
- There's a nice ice - cream shop near the mosque.
- I always read the Quran there at the masjid every day before prayers.
- There will almost always be someone who died during prayer times, so we can solat jenazah.
- On the way to the hotel once, the illegal merchants were running away from the undercover cops. I saw two of them got caught, it was pretty scary. My dad said some of them might not even be muslims so maybe that's how slippers get stolen all the time.
- There were a lot of beggars on the street but my dad couldn't give money to all of them because we need it for the trip, but he did when he could and felt it necessary.
- We went to the hill where Nabi Adam and Hawa met at Arafah and it was scary because there were a lot of beggars with one arms. Most probably because they had stolen before.
- I saw the mountain where Nabi Muhammad and Abu Bakar hid and boy is it friggin tall! And the edges are so sharp too and there were a lot of cacti, I don't know how they climbed all the way up there!My dad said they had better shoes or something.
- Shawarma King is so good.
- I also witnessed this small old man (wearing Ihram) who got caught stealing a wallet from this Turkish lady. The cop took him away quietly and he didn't resist. It was pretty sad.
- I was told that a pigeon got hit by a car and its leg was bleeding so a man carried it away from the street so that it won't get hit again.
- There were so many people around the world there! There were Malays, Indons, Arabs, Turkish, Germans, Iranians, Indians, Pakistanis, British and who knows what else.
- I'm glad I know a little bit of Arab.
- I like passing cups of zam zam water to old people, it made me happy when they say something in another language to me which I assumed to be a 'thank you'. Well it sounded like it was. xD.
- I prayed for a lot of people. And I prayed for a lot of things. InshaAllah they'll come true. Well so far two of them has.
- There's a nice Indonesian restaurant in the new mall right across the mosque.
- You're not allowed to take pictures unless one of your family or friends is in it. My dad was caught taking pictures of the mosque by the guard so he ran away xD.
- The Kaaba is so much more beautiful at night. It made me a little teary.
- We saw the library that used to be Nabi Muhammad's house. It was huge!
- We also saw the cave where the big scorpian-look-a-like will come out on the Day of Judgement. That made me really scared.Insaaaf.
- There are surprisingly a lot of good looking guys there! I'm not kidding, even my mom said so! And I seriously think I saw a Justin Timberlake twin.

I think I left out quite a few things that I can't remember right now. But anyway, on the last day of our stay at Mecca, I cried. Well during Subuh prayer I was thinking of how Fatihah and Hidayah cried on their first day there because they realized they only had two days and how I envy their sensitivity!But after prayer, my mom and dad were discussing about the time we were leaving and he mentioned tawaf wida and something like 'we can't just leave like that' and that's when, I'm not even being dramatic here, my heart broke. No, seriously, I felt it there, I nearly gasped. I have never felt so sad in my life before. I actually felt it there in my heart, it felt like it was... shrinking...contracting? I can't explain it.Okay let's just say that I was really really really sad. I was holding back the tears but when my mom asked me what was wrong I started crying a lot. And after that whenever they mentioned leaving I felt like crying again. And now whenever I talk about Mecca to anyone I feel like crying. Even right now I feel like crying.

Ze Masjid Al-Haram. That's only like 1/3 of it. x)

This is when it's not crowded.

At niiight. That's why it looks yellow. Lol

At the Indonesian restaurant.

We were in between the masjid and the 'Pavilion' of Mecca. See the pigeon!

Ze Kaabah. My dad takes nice pictures.

This is how crowded it is at night. All those white things, those are people.

Harzano inside the mosque.

This is at the Saei place.

I love this picture. It's so pretty.

At the left, there are more zam zam water.

This is on the way to Mount Zur.

Mnt. Zur is somewhere on the left at the tallest mountain. Where Rauslullah and Abu Bakar hid.

The sharp cactus.

We're such posers. x)

Zomg, the camel ppl were so scary. They were like begging me to ride their camels so I didn't. Because I was scared of them!

This is at Arafah by the way, up there is where Adam and Hawa met.

The tents they provided for Haj.

I like this picture. So many pigeons.

Omg, this is when it's crowded . Look at it, it's so beautiful!

More zam zam water on the right, the red stuff are the carpets to pray sunat on.

This is inside the masjid, the guy's side of course on the second floor.

It looks pretty much the same to the ladies' side only less crowded.

That's the Quran's book shelf up there.

This is like after Tawaf Wida. No wonder they took so long, my dad was taking pictures.

This pic. is pretty toooo.

After we left Mecca, we went to Madinah and the Masjid Nabawi was beautiful too. But it's not as great as Masjid Al-Haram of course.And so the girls (that includes me!!) went to visit the Raudah because they have certain time for men or women to go in. They divided us into groups according to where we're from. So the Malays and Indons were in the same group and the Arab women guards were like "Sini ibu, duduk sini", "Kiri bu, kiri!" and "Sila tunggu giliran anda" and even "SEBENTAR BU!" when they were really pissed because nobody listens.

And while I was reading Quran waiting for our turn, my mom was like "Dianah! Look behind you!" I did and came face to face with a lady that looked so familiar. But I couldn't place a name on her and I kept staring at her to remember and she stared at me back. Then I was like "OH!" It was Irsyad's mom. Hahahahaha. Then my mom and her were like hugging and salaming. Then I continued my reading. Before I went into the Raudah place, I was seriously scared, because I heard that it's aggressive, especially with the Turkey people, and sometimes your head will get stepped on while you prayed. But Alhamdulillah my prayer went well. Nobody pushed me much and I managed to pray wiithout any interruptions. And I also gave my salam to makam Rasulullah and his friends.

We also did some ziarahing. The Mount Uhud looked really small and I drank camel's milk! We went to a camel farm, I'm not sure why. But the milk tasted good. It was fresh from the camel and it tasted a little like coconut. Ooh, and we bought kurmas too!

The street across our hotel in Madinah.

That is teh bus for the Turks, how do we know. Well we almost went on it thinking it was our bus xD

I forgot what this mosque was called but it was the first mosque built in Madinah. Rasul's camel chose the spot for it to be built.

Inside the mosque. You have to have your wudhu from home before you go there.

This is the mosque near the Uhud place.

That small hill is where Rasulullah and the troops shoot arrows at the enemy during the Uhud war. And he told them to not go down no matter what but they did when they thought they had won. But then they got attacked again.

Um, not sure what that is.

The camel farm!

It was really sunny.

That's the sign in front of the place where Rasul's uncle Hamzah and his friends died during the war.

At the kurma orchard.

This one is my favourite! It taste like honey. :P

Check out my cool hippy sunglasses. I forgot to bring mine, so I had to use my sister's.

Masjid Nabawi. It's actually bigger than that.

My bros in front of the masjid.

So that kinda sums it up. I do feel like a part of me has changed. I'll never miss a prayer now, InshaAllah. And I'm starting to wear tudung but (for now) only when I go out with my parents.

And I seriously miss Mecca now.:(