He is my only brother, the only son of eight siblings. Emak, my mother, told us that Bapak, my father, was hoping for a son after six daughters. Finally Allah answered his prayer and a son was born. He is the pride of my family and he went to a boarding school early. He was only maybe aged 13 or 14 at that time. It was a military college and of course he grew up groomed to be an officer in the Army. Emak was very proud of him and I could still remember how she told her friends and our neighbors about his career in the army.
Being in the army was good and he had the trappings of a "gentleman". But this drew him away from the family because life in the kampung where he and the rest of us was born was not in consonance with a "gentleman's life". The Western way of life had overwhelmed him and after a while I learned from my sisters later that they felt a little left out. The city and military life at that time commanded his mind set and we could not identify fully with him.
I am the youngest in the family but because he went to a boarding school so early, I became less close but always think very highly of him especially when he displayed his photo album showing how glorious life was in the city and in the Army. I envied him a little because I stayed in the kampung school until I was eighteen and my mind set was conservative and could never match his "love" for a free life.
For many, many years he live almost apart from Emak and family. We let things go with the flow although my mother, Emak, had wished that he would be around us more often. But life is not a bed of roses and life is made differently for different people. God, Allah, allows us to be different although personally I was wishing that we could find a converging point where we could share a lot more things in life, especially with Emak and Bapak.
After more than fifty years and after a lot of "soul searching" to understand why we are what we are, I came to terms with the present situations. It is not totally his fault that we are not close in physical terms. But I know deep in our hearts we love him all the same, and I am quite sure he love us too. But the environment in which we grew up were so different that we almost do have the same values in life except that we hold dearly to the fact that we are true Muslims although we may have erred in many aspects. No body is perfect and my sisters and I agreed that we will not let this imperfections tear us apart.
So last night, in the spirit of EidulfitriI we visited him after a very long break. Alhamdulilah, Allah made us feel like we have been close all this while. We tell stories to catch up with lost time and my husband was very pleased. We forgive each other and my Allah protect us and bestow wisdom upon us to live the future in togetherness.
Being in the army was good and he had the trappings of a "gentleman". But this drew him away from the family because life in the kampung where he and the rest of us was born was not in consonance with a "gentleman's life". The Western way of life had overwhelmed him and after a while I learned from my sisters later that they felt a little left out. The city and military life at that time commanded his mind set and we could not identify fully with him.
I am the youngest in the family but because he went to a boarding school so early, I became less close but always think very highly of him especially when he displayed his photo album showing how glorious life was in the city and in the Army. I envied him a little because I stayed in the kampung school until I was eighteen and my mind set was conservative and could never match his "love" for a free life.
For many, many years he live almost apart from Emak and family. We let things go with the flow although my mother, Emak, had wished that he would be around us more often. But life is not a bed of roses and life is made differently for different people. God, Allah, allows us to be different although personally I was wishing that we could find a converging point where we could share a lot more things in life, especially with Emak and Bapak.
After more than fifty years and after a lot of "soul searching" to understand why we are what we are, I came to terms with the present situations. It is not totally his fault that we are not close in physical terms. But I know deep in our hearts we love him all the same, and I am quite sure he love us too. But the environment in which we grew up were so different that we almost do have the same values in life except that we hold dearly to the fact that we are true Muslims although we may have erred in many aspects. No body is perfect and my sisters and I agreed that we will not let this imperfections tear us apart.
So last night, in the spirit of EidulfitriI we visited him after a very long break. Alhamdulilah, Allah made us feel like we have been close all this while. We tell stories to catch up with lost time and my husband was very pleased. We forgive each other and my Allah protect us and bestow wisdom upon us to live the future in togetherness.
MY BROTHER
HIS WIFE
FAMEZ, HIS SON
May Allah bless us all, Amin.
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