Eid 2020 Away from Family: Like the Good Ol' Aussie Days #RememberEid2006

This year, just as for many over the world, Eid al-Fitr will mark a major departure from previous year's norms: away from the family.

For me, personally though, this was how it was throughout my Chemical engineering undergraduate studies in Sydney. QaddarAllah, somehow Eid would always happen at the most "inconvenient" of times - final exams and end of semester. 

During my second year in 2004 (when I had the most number of exam papers spread out across a 2-week period), Hari Raya Eidul-Fitr fell smack dab on the weekend in between 😂. And since I stayed at Malaysia Hall at the time, all of us were obliged to collaborate and help prepare the venue for other fellow Malaysians coming over to celebrate Raya. Tak study la jawab dia.

In hindsight, it's a wonder I survived that semester at all 😅.

But none of those years were as brutal as Eid of 2006, where I spent the  entire night of Eid in the computer lab of Chemical Engineering Department, University of Sydney, with almost zero sleep.

And no, it had nothing to do with qiamullayl 😂

The situation goes as follows: 

October 2006 - It was a state of turmoil and fear. Our final year Design project, was due on the same week of the 1st of Shawwal. This would be the most challenging, time-consuming, collaboration-intensive assignment of our entire engineering degree studies. Since the Aussie education system put a 40% weightage score on fourth (final) year subjects, this subject could make or break the outcome of our degree. And for under-performers such as myself, not scoring well for Design could potentially result in graduating WITHOUT the Honours title in our degree. 

Or worse yet, not graduate at all. And burn my government study loan, to the embarrassment and shame of my parents who sent me out all the way here.

Needless to say, the stakes were high. I wasn't driven by a passion to pass with decorative flying colors. I was on a desperate mission of survival: driven by a palpable sense of fear and anxiety. No sir, failure is not an option.

Considering the workload of the other ongoing courses at the time, the only way we could survive was to burn the midnight oil - including the final night's of Ramadhan, though ironically nothing to do with Qiyamullayl or Qur'an, rather instead a Qiyam to perform HYSYS & Matlab simulations, excel calculations, and final reports.

Fortunately, I wasn't alone. For several nights in a row, the computer lab was almost full with my fellow final year engineering classmates, half of the class pretty much camped there. Fellow comrades. Survivors struggling to cling on to dear life by the skin of our teeth.

I was the only Muslim in my class doing overnights at the lab, so for better or worse, there was no one else to share my plight with for losing out on the final nights of Ramadhan, and being completely sleep deprived on the night of Eid.

When you are in desperate situations, a fellow band of desperate survivors is exactly what we need. What may have began in a competitive rat race slowly but surely evolved into spirit of selfless collaboration to help each other survive.

And its times of difficulties that you truly recognize your classmates. 

I will never forget my fellow Malaysian classmate, Aldrich: this guy was on panic mode 24-7. Always on "OMG am gonna die, am gonna die" kan-cheong mode, and voicing out "I can't believe its so stressful just to STUDY! This is worse than work life man. At least work you get paid. This is too much!". Not the kind of guy you'd want when handling a crisis, but exactly the kind of guy you need to "push" you to jolt you into action in desperate survival situations.

I remember Gaz (Garrath), this big sized Aussie white boy, who wasn't exactly the definition of "hardworking", but was always kept calm and cool in the face of extreme panic, pretending everything was alright when he was always 2 steps behind. But somehow, his coolness also gave a false sense of security, which was useful escapism when you were about to hit breaking point.

During those darkest hours, I would constantly doubt and question myself and my incapabilities, convinced that engineering isn't the career for me. 

"I'm just not made for this. Just push through this final stretch of the sprint, get your degree and pursue something else in life."

By the morning of Eid, I went back home, got a shower, go to Malaysia Hall for Eid prayer.

And then later on, celebrate Eid of course. By heading back to the computer lab 🎉.

But in spite of the insurmountable odds (as Aldrich would effortlessly remind us), we made it through. And Alhamdulillah, much to my shocking pleasant surprise, I managed to graduate with the "Honours" intact in my degree.

Flash forward now - 13 years later - I feel a profound sense of humility and gratitude as I look back in hindsight, in retrospect of where I am now from where I was back in 2006.

Who would have thought, that that desperate kid, who was forecasted by his chemistry teacher in high school to get a "B" in chemistry for SPM,  struggling to stay awake on Eid night to complete his Design assignment, would eventually graduate B.Eng (Chemical, Hons) and go on to work as a Chartered Chemical Engineer (CEng) in a Fortune 500 company in Oil & Gas?

Who would have thought that oh, by the way, that girl, Umm Muawiyah studying  Mechanical Engineering, will eventually get married to you and become your best friend?

Who would have thought that 13 years later, I would reminisce celebrating Eid away from my parents once again.. But this time, not entirely alone: instead, with my own little happy family and very own Little Man, Muawiyah, looking into the sunset of Lutong beach in Miri?

Certainly not me. 

When we look back at our own lives, we can always look back and "connect the dots" on the events that shaped who we become.

As Steve Jobs once said, "You cannot connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future".

All we have to do is to strive to do our best, in the present moment, and put our trust, our tawakkal in Allah, remain optimistic and hope for the best of greater things to come. In the same way that in our circumstances right here today, we may not be able to "see" the greater wisdom in the grand scheme of things. 

Perhaps years down the road when this coronavirus pandemic has died down completely, we can look back at these difficult times and recall the valuable life skills and lessons that have made us better persons.

So, Eid in 2020 away from the family?
Alhamdulillah ala kulli hal, We've had worse #RememberEid2006

In fact, where we are right now, staring with my little Muawiyah into the sunset within these final few minutes of Ramadhan this year, I think to myself: Alhamdulillah,  this is still way better than 2006 by a long shot. And more than anything else, we have far more reasons to be grateful. And to be healthy and happy in the company of loved ones is a great blessing which we simply don't thank Allah enough.

الحمد لله الذي بنعمته تتم الصالحات

We hope that, even if we are separated from the rest of our family at this point of time, that this will be a means of strengthening our relationship, as absence makes our hearts go fonder.

And even better yet, may all of us be united in Paradise - jannatul firdaus - together with Rasulullah ﷺ, the prophets, siddiqun, syuhada and Salihin.

Wishing everyone a "new normal" Selamat Hari Raya and Eid Mubarak: تقبل الله منا ومنكم 🤗

Your brother, 

Faisal Abdul Latif @ Abu Muawiyah
Miri, Sarawak

23 May 2020
1 Shawwal 1441 AH