Contemplation

My maternal grandmother passed away in India last night after a long and active life of 90 years. Given her age and that at last news her health was deteriorating, it didn't come as a complete surprise but the event does certainly stir the emotions. When Muslims hear of a death, we say inna lillahi wa inna ilaihi rajioon - To God we belong and to Him we return. It's light on the tongue but a heavy and beautiful reminder that our lives are not ours to fritter away but to make the most of it with goodly action as we are all going to go on that path, or as Game of Thrones would have it - valar morghulis.

Living as we did, several thousand miles apart, most of what I remember about her was from my childhood when we'd make frequent family trips to India but even then, I don't immediately remember a great deal from those trips - as a child my major concern was that we'd always go in the summer holidays which corresponded to monsoon season in India which meant we were mostly indoors.

Upon hearing of her death, I pondered - trying to remember what I could about her. I remember an old photo where she was robustly holding my toddler self while my older cousins posed and I remember the last time I saw her. I last visited India ten years ago and my Urdu is quite awful so when I was around her I couldn't communicate all that effectively but I remember her waving from the window when we were making our goodbyes and I remember thinking how small and fragile she looked, and in my youthful arrogance, wondering if I'd see her again. Not my greatest moment but I do also remember praying for her and myself as a result.

In all honesty, it saddens me to admit that I didn't know much about her beyond a general overview of her life. My memories of her are clearly very limited and 90 years is a long time and those who were geographically closer like my cousins will no doubt tell me numerous stories about her as the days go by. I could be very wrong (and I'm sure my cousins will correct me if so!) but hers was not a life of grand and momentous activity but a relatively simple life much like countless anonymous others. Growing up in a village before ending up in Mumbai with my grandfather, she did her duty and fulfilled her religious and social role: believer, daughter, wife, mother, grandmother, great-grandmother.

That's not to say her life was unimportant - every life is. She was loved by those she knew and to those whose lives she was directly or indirectly involved in she made a huge difference and had huge impact. The values she instilled in her children live on in the generations that came after and our very existence was naturally dependent on her. Her descendants have ended up all over the globe making what further impact they can in their own social circles and much like ripples on the sea, it's impossible to track what far-reaching effect these are having.

It's more than a passing curiosity that, even in our modern and progressive world, when people hear of a death they grow solemn and supportive and still acknowledge that the ending of a life is a significant thing. My various WhatsApp groups have been hugely supportive with prayers for her forgiveness and granting of Paradise to her and it's genuinely moving and appreciated. People make time to visit close relatives of the deceased and even brand new work colleagues are understanding of the need for flexibility.

When we hear of the death of strangers on the news its relatively easy to dissociate oneself from it but when it's someone you know who's been affected it's all that much closer to home and that little phrase becomes a stark reminder of our own mortality and the productiveness of our own existence.

To God we belong and to Him we return.

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Hello from the other side

I had my first day at my new job today. After the utter shock and insensibility of the latter half of last week with Trump becoming President-Elect of the USA, my previous state of general calm had been somewhat destabilised and I was a little excited and nervous for my own new beginning at Virgin Media. In preparation for the new job I had temporarily moved over to a friend's flat in West London to make my commute a lot more manageable so along with my new job I also had a new location to add to the general feeling of change. Something to discuss in another post maybe.

I woke up early today but was a bit complacent as a result and took my time to get ready and ended up leaving a couple minutes after my planned departure time. In turn, this meant that I spent the half an hour to the office more concerned about arriving on time than about any apprehensions I might have otherwise had. This has actually happened previously and is quite an effective way of calming oneself - being more worried about punctuality so that when you do actually arrive, you're so relieved you forget to be nervous! Very useful for interviews where you can comfortably deflect any blame for lateness on to traffic/transport.

People say that first impressions are lasting impressions and I'd say I mostly agree. The first impression someone makes on you goes a long way to building trust and confidence in them and while a bad first impression can be turned around, it's definitely much easier to start off on the right foot. I'd spent the run-up to today keeping a low social profile and talking almost exclusively only to those I love and I could be totally relaxed with in an effort to save and build up my social energy for today.

The rest of the day went past quite quickly. I got to know my new team who are a very pleasant and helpful bunch of people, sorted out my various accesses and technologies, explored my new premises and was pleased to find that the contemplation/prayer room was immediately behind where my desk is. I was also very excited to discover that the cafe across the road from the office served halal food! In short, a very successful first day alhamdulillah (praise be to God) and not much to complain about beyond the poor weather. The various anxieties that came and went in the lead up to today pretty much all turned out to be non-existent and unjustified!


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Oh dear

What just happened?! I woke up this morning thinking the worst thing that could happen today was that my car might be snowed in (I'm currently in Scotland). Instead, as I checked the news expecting to read of Americans coming to their senses and of an electoral rout by Hillary, I found that Donald Trump is pretty much going to be the next President of the United States of America.

I'm about as shocked as I was for Brexit, possibly more so as I'm not in the US so not so personally aware of the issues that drive people to make such a ridiculous voting choice. 

It's all a bit too raw and too soon for me so while the result is made certain and the dust settles and the ramifications of this event become clear, I'm just going to praying super-hard.

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Clinton or Trump?

Obviously Hillary. How is this still even a question?! It is absolutely ridiculous and mind-boggling that in the latest polls Clinton and Trump are still running close.

Over the years as I've grown a little bit more aware of politics and government I've developed a healthy scepticism of politicians and world leaders. At the very basic minimum, I've realised that leaders have to make difficult choices and decisions and no one is ever going to agree with everything any of them do and they'll receive criticism from someone regardless of what they do. And that getting things done in a large organisation (or the wider world) takes diplomacy, compromise and and ability to generate consensus.

In the upcoming presidential election, the US voter has a choice. Option one is Hillary Clinton, who's been involved with government for the past 30 years and has huge amounts of experience in getting things done and keep the wheels of government rolling. There's been controversy over her use of a private email server while secretary of state which the FBI have just cleared her again of criminality.

In that 30 years, she's had to make difficult decisions with regards to government decisions, be involved with wars and is responsible for the consequences of those actions, lots of which are pretty negative (loss of life is never a good thing). But in that same time frame she's also been involved with and responsible for a number of good things. Having been part of government for that long means it's guaranteed that she'll have changed her views since the beginning of her career and also have made numerous backroom and unsavoury deals in order to get things done. There's skeletons in everyone's closet.

And the other choice is Donald Trump. A candidate with just the most outrageous public views on a whole range of minority racial and religious groups, no practical experience of government, a number of ridiculous policies, who has alienated the party he's managed to get nominated by, denied holding views thats he's documented and filmed to have held, proven himself to have a notoriously thin skin for personal attacks whilst attacking everyone else, is a businessman who lost a billion dollars in a single year and as a result hasn't paid taxes for the last 18 years whilst attacking others for allegedly not paying taxes, also hasn't published his tax returns which convention says should be done by presidential candidates and has been filmed casually discussing his preferred method of sexually assaulting women.

I repeat, how is this still a question? The choice is between these two for, in essence, the most powerful person in the world, a leader who will be taking responsibility for how the world runs for the next four years and who will have to make supremely difficult decisions. We simply cannot have a person as volatile as Trump in that hot seat. People will disagree with policies and personal positions on both sides and that will colour their opinions but even if they were both horrible people, at the very least Hillary can pretend to be a decent human being and knows what the decent and non-offensive things to say in public are. Trump's public views are incredibly divisive, offensive and dangerous.

America, please stop this ridiculousness and show the world that offence and division are not the way forward.

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