THE VEIL – my strange dreams at the end of Ramadan

(Don’t stop reading…)

THE DREAM: scene 1

I was in a massive building with maze-like hallways. I was lost; I exited through a gate that led to a forest. The trail in the forest seems to be leading to nowhere until I run into a half-naked man (my spirit guide) bending along the path. I asked if it was the right path, but he ignored me, so I turned back. My spirit guide was behind me as I took another route. We (I mean my spirit guide and I) were clawing our way to a slope in the forest amidst a meshwork of overgrown tree roots (imagine a giant mangrove tree with all the roots above ground). I heard my spirit guide say ‘snake’ at my left foot, so instinctively, I snapped with my right foot whatever was there at my left foot. I woke up. With a sigh of relief, I said – Thanks, it’s only a dream, but then, trees didn’t pop into my windows and plants didn’t grow from my lights, so I thought, This is not my room, and I woke up again, meaning I woke up twice from two-layered dreams.

(A few days back, I watched the movie Inception on Netflix for the third time. Only then did I understand what the movie was all about. They tried to create a three-layered dream—a dream in a dream in a dream.)

From the nearby mosque, the morning call to prayer was blaring from the sound system. I got to my feet, did ablution, and performed my dawn (Fajr) prayer.

I must have fallen asleep as soon as I returned to bed because I was immediately back in my dream world.

THE DREAM: scene 2

I was in an unfamiliar place with unremarkable houses. I flagged down a jeep (…to my surprise, the driver was a Maranao, and with him were two female relatives as passengers). I asked if he was going to Pasig (I have no idea why Pasig), and he said, "No, but I can drop you where you can get a ride to where you are going."

THE DREAM: scene 3

He dropped me in front of a house and pointed down the street where I could get another ride.

There was a small store in the house (travel back in time – our garage house), and in front of it was a rectangular table in the open, where 3-4 men were sitting, sipping soft drinks. I joined them, although I knew neither of the men. A man came out of a door on the extreme side, and one of the men asked what had happened, and he said, 'We talked about marriage.'

THE DREAM: scene 4 – a journey back in time

I walked down the street to find the bus terminal. (Travel back in time – I used to do this when I was young, selling PX chewing gums, peanuts, and cigarettes)

The buses resembled rectangular coaches, with long seats arranged in a traditional manner (travel back in time). If you are over 50 years of age, you probably rode in one of these buses.

Inside the bus was my aunt (deceased) and a female cousin. There were other passengers. My aunt handed me money to pay for our fare. I felt embarrassed that I had already paid for my fare, but I didn’t have enough to pay for the three of us. She was telling me that her son (also deceased) had not changed his ways.  

THE DREAM: scene 5 – questions of faith. (If this dream had not come to me at the end of Ramadan, a holy of holies in Islam, I would not have blogged about it. I don’t want to influence what people believe in.)

I felt that I was still inside the bus with my spirit guide sitting beside me (and by the way, spirit guides are often shadow-like; often, you just feel their presence). Young passengers were asking me questions.

Question 1: Is it absolutely necessary for women to wear the Nikab or veil? (Strange, this is a topic I have not discussed with anyone for a very long time)

Answer: I will tell you the story of how the veil came to be. I started. The prophet’s wives were not initially wearing the veil, but as Islam expanded, multitudes came to the prophet’s house. There were tribes in the Arabian Peninsula that traditionally wore the veil. Those tribes asked the prophet if he could ask his wives to wear veils when they visited. The prophet’s initial response was to put curtains to isolate his wives from view, but this was not enough for the tribes. The prophet was in a dilemma until the angel Gabriel came with a message from God (refer to the relevant Qur’an verse). It is alright to let his wives wear the veil but (this is an important “but”) – they should remove their veil when they are in the vicinity of the sacred house (Kaaba) (God unbounded by space and time knew that time will come when millions will be performing the hajj. It will be extremely uncomfortable and dangerous for women to be wearing the veil.)

But that is not the true story of the veil…I continued. In ancient times, and I believe this is not unique to the Arabs, clans and tribes were endlessly engaged in wars. Clans and tribes veiled their women to conceal their identity when shepherding in the valleys, hills, and mountains. That was the sole purpose of the veil — to hide the women’s identity from rival/enemy clans and tribes, until it became a tradition with the real meaning lost in the annals of time.

Question 2: How about women’s circumcision in Islam? (This is another strange question I have not talked about for how long – I cannot remember)

…I said; Don’t do it (followed by laughter). It is a tradition of some African tribes that has no connection to Islam. Africa just happened to be a Muslim continent, and it is now considered mutilation by Western nations, meaning that if you are living in the West, female circumcision is unlawful, and you can be in jail. (The explosion of laughter woke me up.)

(I spent another half hour awake, turning in bed, deciding whether to blog or not to blog. There was another element in the dream where I traveled so far back in time, I’d rather keep it to myself. There is a meaning to every aspect of the dream; I will eventually figure it out – In-sha Allah.)

https://www.amazon.com/Nosca-Khalid/e/B01NA7APYQ

BBC Documentary: THE RISE AND FALL AND RISE OF ISLAM IN GREAT BRITAIN

Ignorant me! I have always thought of Marmaduke Pickthal; translator of the first Qur’an I read in English when I was in college as a gentleman from the Indian subcontinent. I didn’t know he was an English gentleman who converted to Islam. This BBC documentary is so awe-inspiring; I just have to embed it to my blog. 

BELIEVE IT OR NOT; your name becomes you!

I chuckled. It’s good, I just gulped the last stream from the bottom of my cup of coffee; otherwise, I would have choked.

I heard from Karen Davila on Head Start, what I thought I would never hear on national television. “You will now think about naming children. Your name is Brilliantes (Ma’Rosa just won the Cannes Best Actress award). You are brilliant. They say; YOUR NAME BECOMES YOU.” I thought I was the original of that…twink!!! If others and I noticed it, there must be some truth. Martina Hingis was one of the few players to become world No. 1 on the WTA tour at a remarkably young age. Her mother named her after Martina Navratilova.

I told my grown-up children to give their children meaningful names because…YOUR NAME BECOMES YOU. 

      

When I came to Manila from the south to pursue my studies, my professors would always inquire about my nationality on the first day of school because of my name: NOSCA. If it doesn’t sound strange to you, you must be strange.

My name, my children’s name – it must be true.

I gave my firstborn a meaningless name. I just heard it, and I liked its sound. I love poetry, but, huh! She is still on a journey searching for meaning…

My second child’s name is Hope. She is very successful in her chosen field, but we still hope her family life will be…fine.

But my third daughter’s name is Wow! It means shining, and yes, I didn’t know that her name is Nigeria’s currency, or money. 

Movie stars were among her guests at her wedding last December. In fact, except for the family members, most of the guests were from the entertainment industry. She perfectly blended, and yes, she shone among the stars. Among my children, she is the one who has no difficulty finding work, as if money follows her around without her even trying hard. Smile, her husband is nicknamed...Rich! 

I was on my way to the nursery. The nurses were asking me to come and fill out my son’s birth certificate. “Give me a name that begins with the letter ‘N,’” I asked a friend from Sudan whom I met on the way. He is a close friend to this day. “Your only son,” he smiled. The birth of my son was the talk of the hospital. “He is rare…Nader means rare.” If you know my son, you know he is a rare breed, LOL!

My youngest daughter’s name is “Little Flower,” and yes…she is a little flower to us all. In June, she will be in the 7th grade at Senator Cayetano Memorial Science and Technology High School in Taguig City.

Before I forget: my name!

My mother adopted my name from a well-known Muslim Scholar at my birth. I am not a Muslim scholar…or am I?

…and for prospective fathers!

Don’t name your children after prophets like Jesus or Muhammad. Jesus will be righteous but will not strive enough to provide for his family. Muhammad will be virtuous, but he may have more than one family he cannot provide for. I know many.

Guys! C’mon, don’t take my word for it! 

https://www.amazon.com/Nosca-Khalid/e/B01NA7APYQ

OMG! DUTERTE ABOLISHES CONGRESS

35% of the vote does not give you the mandate of the people. The 65% will be watching your every move, and if you declare Dictatorship/martial law or abolish the congress, they will storm Malacanang. Then you will see if the 35% you mesmerized with your vulgarity can withstand the tempest of the people. 

...BUT THE 65% WHO DID NOT VOTE FOR YOU WILL BE WILLING TO GIVE THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT IF AND WHEN YOU BECOME PRESIDENT.

ADDED VIDEO FILE MAY 1, 2016

https://www.amazon.com/Nosca-Khalid/e/B01NA7APYQ

DUTERTE "CAPTAIN BARBEL"

IT IS NOT IN THE NATURE OF THE FILIPINOS TO SEE THE BIGGER PICTURE - THE REASON WHY THEY ARE A HAPPY PEOPLE. THEY ARE HAPPY WITH WHAT LITTLE THINGS THEY HAVE. THEY HAVE NO TIME TO WORRY IF THE SKY IS FALLING.

ROXAS –the low rating phenomenon

When P-Noy crossed swords with the country’s TOP POLITICAL DYNASTIES with immense political bases - GMA, Enrile, Jinggoy Estrada, Bong Revilla, the Binays, and the Marcoses, ROXAS lost a bulk of the people’s support.

In its eagerness to raise money, the BIR started taxing OFWs' balikbayan boxes and charging terminal fees to departing OFWs, which had been free in the last 19 years. Roxas again took a beating for the popular vote. P-Noy should have let go of the BIR chief.

…and then came the traffic and MRT’s daily breakdowns, the “TANIM BALA” at the airport, not to mention “Yolanda” and the “El Niño.”

P-Noy focused on bigger things, such as infrastructure and the economy, but paid little attention to the more minor issues, so the smaller things matter most to people. Not even Superman can solve this country’s problems, but Filipinos love their superhero, and they see it in the person of DUTERTE—the Captain Barbel of our time.

Like Duterte, P-Noy was a populist president, but he seemed to have lost his ‘connection’ with the people somewhere along the line. He projected himself as more of a doer than a talker, but talkers get more votes in politics than doers. You cannot talk about GDP and the STOCK MARKET as a measure of your presidency when 99% of the people do not understand what you are talking about. They could better understand “P_tang’_na” (son of a bitch) and “Papatayin ko sila” (I will kill them). 

In P-Noy's eagerness to do the right and more significant things, ROXAS became his single and biggest casualty. Roxas, by all measures, is the most qualified among the candidates, but in a country where 90% of the people have to live in crime-infested terrain, do not know how to wear neckties, and do not drive around in fancy cars, they would instead go for Dolphy’s version of Captain Barbel just for the laugh and Du30 it is. Can Captain Barbel deliver on his promises…? The answer is a big no. In Davao, he was above the law, so he killed with impunity. In Malacanang – he is not above the law. He made so many powerful enemies that he would be impeached if he made even the slightest mistake. In Davao, where he is the king, there is no Congress and no Supreme Court to clip his wings. If he is a man of his word, he could leave office earlier than expected. Better be a king of Davao than an emperor of the 7,100-island archipelago.

https://www.amazon.com/Nosca-Khalid/e/B01NA7APYQ

IMAGINE: you are able to talk to yourself anywhere in time

I was Googling images of time travel when I found my book among the results. I remembered having posted the photo in my blog, so that’s it. Among the many images were lookalikes of famous people from long ago. 

When I was young and grazing the beasts under my care (cows and water buffalo), I wondered how Maya birds recognized each other’s relatives whenever a flock flew over the rice field. They all looked alike, and then, with an amusing thought, the Maya birds could likewise be wondering how we humans recognize each other. We all have hair, eyes, ears, noses, and mouths.

My daughters said, I look like Jackie Chan – ha ha ha! With 7 billion denizens of planet Earth alone, you can reshuffle our DNA only so much and end up with some who look alike with only a few differences. Although in a lottery, only one or a few can win, hundreds differ from the winner by only one number, and thousands more by two digits. This means that, with 7 billion people on Earth, some will end up looking like me, or I will look like them. Imagine a multiverse universe where the stakes infinitely increase…not one, but many will look exactly like me – a parallel universe.

One of the most intriguing physical proofs that time travel could be possible is that an old woman was accidentally caught talking into what appeared to be a cell phone in a Charlie Chaplin movie. The puzzle, though, that not many people come to talk about is…to whom was she talking to?

With the theoretical possibility of the existence of exotic sub-sub-subatomic (dark matter) particles so miniscule it is beyond our observation by any available machine at present (Large Hadron Collider) – we may in the future develop the technology to communicate with someone somewhere in time, meaning I can communicate with myself in another place in time, but wow…it’s mindboggling scary. Just think about it…it’s insanely crazy. Suppose the speed of light is the only barrier between now and anywhere else in time. In that case, we may be able to communicate with ourselves from any point in time and anywhere in the past, at a specific moment when the technology becomes available, no matter how fantastical it may seem. We may even talk to ourselves beyond the grave. (Don’t search the internet. This is my own theoretical fantasy.) 

These are objects that may have been sucked into a wormhole (time tunnel) and transported over long distances in time. Many scientists believe that wormholes were a consequence of the Big Bang, which occurred in varying sizes.

Oftentimes, I wonder why the Kaaba in Mecca is clad in black, and the ritual of ‘Taw’waf’ (circumambulation) is counterclockwise, the same direction all galaxies rotate, and planets in our solar system orbit around the sun. Did God give us a timeless message? If you are not a Muslim reading this, the Kaaba is the first house of worship dedicated to God, built by Prophet Abraham (a.s.) and his son Ishmael (a.s.). They originated the ritual of counterclockwise circumambulation by the command of the Almighty.

If you had told me 30 years ago, when I had to drive 173 km and pay 8 riyals per minute to call my family in Manila, that one day in the not-so-distant future, you, my friend, would carry in your pocket a small gadget that would let you call anyone anywhere on the planet and send a telegraphic (TXT) message of 160 characters at a negligible price of one peso, I would have called you insane—absolutely insane. 

If you were to tell me now that, in the not-so-distant future, I will be able to talk to the same me with my cellular phone from another time and place, I believe you.

El Niño Freak Weather and Saudi Arabia

I have always thought of the massive rain in this town (Zahran Al Janoub) in 1982-83 as a global consequence of the El Niño weather phenomenon, but I wanted to be sure, so I did a few clicks in search of info…and voila, I found this.

El Niño

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It is thought that there have been at least 30 El Niño events since 1900, with the 1982-83, 1997–98 and 2014–16 events among the strongest on record.[35][36] Since 2000, El Niño events have been observed in 2002–03, 2004–05, 2006–07, 2009–10, and 2015–16.[35]

(Take note in the above that the dates 1982-83 and 2014-16 are the strongest)

The freakish weather in 1982-83 virtually dissolved the government hospital where I worked. After the rain, workers patched the leaks on the roof deck. The following year, the freak storms and weeks of rain returned, causing the hospital's roof deck to collapse and forcing the government to order the staff to evacuate.

More than 40 bridges (according to an engineer friend) between the highland city of Abha and Jizzan along the Red Sea coast were washed away by rampaging flood waters.

In 15 years, the government had moved the hospital twice, renting buildings in town to house the hospital, offices, and the nurses’ hostel. In 2001, a new hospital (which had been in construction for more than 10 years) finally opened to the public. A new 200-bed hospital is presently under construction in another part of the town.

A WITNESS TO FREAK OF NATURE

The Day After

The Day After