happy birthday mak

mak at 20 years old
a police sargeant then

it was mak's birthday yesterday.  my beloved mom turned 77 yesterday at precisely 5am.  born on february 20, 1934, in Alor Setar, Kedah, Alhamdulillah she has lived a good life with the blessings of Allah.  with a loving husband on her side, she has been blessed with eight children, one of whom passed on at the age of 5 months in early 1960.  she told me that when my sister NorAishah returned to God, part of her went too. she had a hard time during the first few months of my sister's death, refusing to go into the house when she had the choice.  she would prefer to sit at the door, feeding my older sister and my two older brothers, playing with them... anything to avoid staying in the house. it was sometime until she let go of NorAishah's clothes, to which she used to hold on to, looking for the familiar scent of her baby which soon faded with time.  today, she tells me of how she rejoices at the thought of having her daughter wait for her in heaven and hopes to be someday reunited with her there. and how thankful she is for her children and grandchildren whom Allah has blessed her with.



oh yes, mak enjoys having 27 of her grandchildren around her and she is now also a proud great grandmother of three. just the opposite of my dad who cannot bear the noise, my mom welcomes the chatters, yelps, loud laughs brought about by her children who can amazingly speak in a criss-cross way to each other. so you virtually have everyone talking at about the same time on a few different things, and actually jumping into another's conversation with ease.  top that all off with the grandchildren running around, honestly it is such fun...

bak and mak
a few months after they got married

an opposite of my dad too when it comes to traveling, my mom's stiff knees will astonishingly get better when one of her children ask if she wants to go somewhere. my dad loves to tease her about it.  bak on the other hand will miraculously gets a headache when invited to travel somewhere and even more so when mak is about to leave for a vacation of sorts.  we tease both of them about it. for bak, house is his heaven - rumahku, syurgaku... and for mak, she wants to go anywhere and everywhere if she can. she teased my dad about wanting to take that long almost 24 hours flight to New York if i move over and my dad teasing her in return of how she will not survive it, will laugh so hard, his face turns all red. i love those moments, when they tease each other and laugh like what seems like forever...

flowers for her birthday

anyway, mak loves flowers. the trick to her heart is through flowers and i make it a point to get her flowers or plants on her birthday and other special days.  i believe i am like her in that sense, flowers wow me just like it does her.

oh did i say mak is amazing and really good at sewing and cooking? she is. she used to sew all our clothes including my dresses. she would design a costume and have me wear it for competitions when i was in kindy, and hey i actually won. she cooks so good, and she bakes. i used to sit next to her everytime she bakes when i was a little girl. waited for her to finish beating the sugar and margarine (yes, those days it was margarine and not butter and it tasted good no less), and once she has scooped them out, she would let me scrape the leftovers with my fingers so that i can lick them all up. and i would help her with cutting the dough and the rolling and the filling. i used to love watching her and she was such a natural when it comes to that. unfortunately for her, my sister and i are pretty much useless when it comes to sewing. my sister cooks for the sake of it these days and i enjoy cooking which i do not excel at unlike her but i sure love baking.

mak and thoriq
sharing a light moment

i love mak to bits. no words can ever describe what i feel for her. yes, we have had many moments when we disagreed with each other, and had tiffs over a number of things but i have never loved her any less.  i know too that i have hurt her many times which for whatever reasons that seemed justified at that time and even felt was no fault of mine, are regrettable. i wish i could take back every hurt i had inflicted on her, every harsh words spoken, every raised tone that should not have been. i love her deeply and as i get older, i know for whatever judgement she has made concerning me, despite sometimes being out of this world, or not making any sense or totally disagreeable to me, i understand where she is coming from, that it was made out of her love and concern for me. 

to my dearest mak:

As mothers and daughters, we are connected with one another. My mother is the bones of my spine, keeping me straight and true. She is my blood, making sure it runs rich and strong. She is the beating of my heart. I cannot now imagine a life without her... 

happy 77th birthday mak

with love always and for eternity