My Father Just Died

070611 1020hrs – EX C.R.E.S.C.E.N.D.O.

The pages of Norwegian Wood was slightly damp due to the rain it endured. Yet its pages still enthralled me with Haruki Murakami's story that I would briefly summarise as about sex and suicide. It wasn't much but it provided much needed amusement for me and the bunch of testosterone-overloaded and deprived men that I narrated to. Once again I lay on the sponge mattress after more than a week to fully enjoy the novel. That morning was the end of a long exercise that marked the end of blazing 40 degrees sun and midnight marches. I had my reservations about the performance of my trainees for the last mission, but I shrugged it off to allow them a moment of peace. The chapter started with the suicide of its protagonist's love interest.

Then I got the call.

It was from a blocked number, so I had no idea where it originated. Initially all I could hear was static. Then there was loud sobbing in the background before the caller hung up. That was it. I was left puzzled by the call. I got a sudden chill as the snippet of noise eerily conjured a horrid image of a mourning crowd in my mind. I quickly brushed away the image to get back to my protagonist's sorrows.

Again, the phone rang. The reception from 6472 kilometres away was poor, but I could faintly discern that the sobbing was from my mother, among others. Through her cries, I made out one clear statement - “Farhan, ayah baru meninggal.” She carried on with disjointed accounts of how it led up to the incident. Frustrated with the distorted speech, I asked her to pass the phone to my sister. All I got from her was a verification of the incident. Without much thought, I let them hang up.

There was nothing but the silence of resting bodies and the air of satisfaction over the exercise's completion around me. My hand trembled, my heart raced, but my mind remained clear. Nothing at all. I checked the time on my watch. It would be around 6.30am where she called me from. I let the thought of a cool dawn breeze wash over me. Nothing happened, only a short call in the middle of a perfectly quiet morning.

Then it hit me.

- retrieve last call - establish point of contact - take down details - inform superiors - make travel arrangements - check flight timings - calculate transfer costs - pack all luggage - sort hand carry - check local relatives - recall insurance coverage - contact travel agency - laundry being washed - assessment sheet unfilled - call credit balance -

A torrent of thoughts drowning me like a tsunami. My own mind, the tool that allows me to work with ruthless, organised efficiency is playing itself out. Mental notes were being taken, calculations were processed and thoughts were reorganised. I let my mind do what it does best, but my conscience lay in wait. Where was the sadness, the sorrow, the breaking down as realisation sinks in? Was I still stuck in the first stage of grief? I'm not even in the country and my father just died overseas for God's sake! But none of that came. All that I could think of were these mundane thoughts making their own way through my mind. On the way to the canteen, I tweeted - 'What are you supposed to think about when someone close dies?'. Before, I ever wondered how I would be like when someone close dies. Would my cold, ruthless self remain or would a shred of humanity make an appearance. Now I know.

Facing my colleagues was a slight challenge. It became tiring to keep up the jumpy, bitchy facade. Remaining composed was the most I could put up without dropping to the coldness underneath. One of them followed me on my way to pack my things. He praised my strength and offered me a prayer. The moment he touched me I felt my walls crumble and the hard exterior cracked. I hate those pure of heart and clear conscience, they strip me and leave me nothing but human. I quickly tried to disengage him, but not before my eyes watered and I caught a glimpse of the hollowness within me.

070611 1800hrs – Bangkok City, Thailand

From a distance, the Bangkok Mega Bridge was a sight to behold. Its supporting columns look like sky-reaching solitary towers, making your awe disregard its purpose and massiveness. Only when we approached the structure did I realise that it was in fact a bridge. Passing through this manmade beauty, I suddenly whimpered and my vision blurred. As soon as it came it was gone. This was one of several brief outbursts that occurred throughout the journey to the airport. Initially, the duty clerk accompanying me was visibly disturbed, but he knew better than to ask.

The first and only song that came to mind was this:

Do you feel cold and lost in desperation?
You build up hope, but failure’s all you’ve known.
Remember all the sadness and frustration.
And let it go. Let it go.

Perhaps I was still in denial, but I never conveyed the news directly to any friends or relatives back home. Whoever knew probably picked up that fact from my usual ambiguous rant on Twitter or from the condolences on my Facebook page. Strangely, it was cheaper and more convenient to use the internet than to call overseas, hence social networking became the natural choice. Besides, I needed to burn off the prepaid credits. The mocha I was sipping at the airport Starbucks seemed to have lost its flavour.  Only then did I realise that I skipped lunch due to the hussle back in camp. I waved to the barista to heat up a chocolate muffin. Flashing a smile in return, she brought it over since there was no other customer to attend to. Before heading for the boarding gate, I went to perform the evening prayer. As the unnaturally cold water flowed over my hands, my body moved by itself to perform ablution. After the salam at the end of the prayer, my vision blurred. With a deep breath, I turned to face the other people praying and my eyes became clear again.

070611 1543hrs – Mecca, Saudi Arabia

The town went still. The call to prayer from the Grand Mosque echoed into the horizon signalling the afternoon prayer. Everything would halt as the city would pray in unison, regardless of where they were and what they were doing. This was the scene from my memory of the holy city of Mecca twelve years ago, and it would probably be the same now. At the Ka’bah, at the centre of the Grand Mosque where all Muslims pray towards, a more solemn occasion would begin after the daily prayer. It was not an uncommon sight, but today from 7268 kilometres away I was there in spirit. Upon the Ka’bah, at the center of the religion of Islam, by the footprints of the Prophet, lay the body of my father.

080611 0025hrs – Changi Airport, Singapore

There were some close friends waiting for me at the airport. I couldn’t be bothered to start a domestic drama by calling a relative. They probably didn’t know I was back in Singapore. Talking to my friends, everything seemed normal again. We went for supper and everything was perfectly fine. It was like that for the next week, going out with friends and going about my everyday life. There was no crying mother or a hoard of relatives at home. I kept the house in my preferred clinical sanitary condition and looked through the insurance papers with a morbid curiousity. Other than the occasional calls chasing for the death certificate, it would have been nothing more than a quiet week all by myself.

090611 1945hrs – Tahlil, aunt’s home

Every Thursday night, it was religiously customary to recite the Ya Sin, the 36^th chapter of the Qur’an. That evening, the paternal relatives had a small gathering for a remembrance ceremony. There was an awkward moment as they greeted me, as if they were expecting a dramatic breakdown or profound sorrow in my eyes. The whole scene looked like a set up, with soft casual conversations and the aroma of food. I was half expecting hidden cameras and somebody to pop out to declare that it was all a big prank. I returned their greetings with the traditional handshake and a curt nod. They gifted the Ya Sin, Al-Fateha and a prayer and as all Malay gatherings go, proceeded with a hearty meal.

I was never much of a believer, prefering the agnostic view, contrary to my religious upbringing. When the ceremony started however, I felt a stirring from within. The Arabic words rolled off my tongue and I used the book only as a reminder. It was akin to how the Prophet received the first word of the Qur’an. “Iqra, speak!”, said Gabriel, and the Prophet spoke the first verse of the Qur’an. Perhaps this was what it meant to be as a disbeliever yet an instrument of God. Always having the curiousity to doubt, without the wisdom to clear them. But entrenched deep within is the knowledge and muscle memory of the religion. I recited the Ya Sin smoothly, as if it was only yesterday that I last read it. So this was what the religious scholars meant when they refer to the true form of the Qur’an. Not in print, nor in the words spoken, but in its very definition – the Recital, with meaning coming from within the very essence of your soul.

If I was asked to deliver a eulogy that night, I would have been dumbfounded. What would I say about a man I hardly knew. I have nothing against my family, especially my father, just that we were never close and he was a particularly quiet man. I make it a point in life not to live with regrets, always looking forward. But I know that in the corner of my mind was the desire to know the person who brought me up. In a fantasy that I recall, I was resting my head by my father’s side on his deathbed, and he would tell me about life growing up at the kampong, what he was like when he was a teenager and how he got to know my mother. As I sat in front of the lake writing this, I half-wished that the scene would play out in the reflection of the water. But I know this would never be, and my tears would only dry up, leaving the whole bittersweet scene as nothing but a figment of my imagination.

So here I am in Singapore, sitting by the lake with the moon reflecting off the water, after having rushed a week ago from Thailand, and the rest of my family still in Saudi Arabia. In a tale of three cities, I offer to end with what some might call a prayer, but others a plea.

In the name of God, most gracious, most merciful.

Dear God, accept me for my sins. It is by your will that I came to be and to you I will return. I may turn away from you but you are regardless a living presence in the core of my being. I will always be an instrument of your will, the hand of God. I do not expect fairness from this world but taking my father back is still cruel. If you declare that it is his time, I can do nothing but accept. As how we welcome new birth, we must accept death. It is with thanks that you take him back in the most perfect of conditions. Thank you for inviting him to your holy city three times. Thank you for allowing him to share in the footsteps of the Prophet. Thank you for giving him a resting place among the holy. He is yours to take back, but I ask that you keep him with you among respectable company, at the highest of thrones. I ask that you wash him free from sins and let him watch over me. Until it is my time to return and await your judgement.

Amin.