Ngaji Days

I was inspecting a house just now when I smell something very familiar. It's somehow like a powder with flowery smell. Very hard to describe it. One thing I know was that it's unique. I spent a couple of minutes wondering where in my past memory that smell came from. Soon after, I realised it was my Nenek ngaji's house.

Gosh. A sudden rush of memories soon followed.

Still remember the time when i got whacked with rotan on the palms 10x just because I just couldn't get the tajweed idgham bila ghunnah right!

Still remember the time when there's this guy by the name of Muhd Nur Azam bin Zainal. He's a cool guy, fun to be with. The thing is his name is the exact similar to my closest cuz. The only difference between them both is their skin colour. So I named them Azam white and Azam black. Hahahaha! Since young already my tongue was as sharp as a sword. Haha

Still remember the time when I had a massive crush on a girl in my ngaji class. She lived right across the road from nenek ngaji's block. So, I posted post-it notes on walls on the linkway from her blk to nenek ngaji's blk. The main intention was to keep her reminded of me while she made her way to ngaji class. Hahahaha! I was so cute back then! Haha. She moved when we were about 11 years old I think and I no longer 'pursue' her as she stayed quite far (at that point of time). Actually, she just moved to another part of Bedok only. HAHA!! Too funny.

Another story was when she managed to hafal Surah ad-dhuha first. And I haven't even completed half the Surah. I was in another room with all the boys together with the fierce and tormenting datuk ngaji. She was in another room with all the girls and very gentle nenek ngaji. As she was tested, I could hear her voice reciting the Surah and completed it. So here I was, alone, bursting into tears after hearing that and till now everyone thought that I lost my lidi(pointer for quran). Padehal padehal... Got a good scolding from datuk ngaji aka the tiger

There was a time when I called my fellow ngaji brethrens mat names. "Eh. Kau mat arid kau mat lazim kau mat jaiz kau mat farii kau mat thabii. Aku mat Salleh!" Hahahaha!
This was actually not for fun or to degrade my fellow brethrens. I used it for easy recollection. I was such a genius back then. However, no one accepted my point of view. They regard it as demeanour. Hah! Now in uni, I learnt that this association is good for memory recall. Best thing about this is that I learnt that myself at that age. No one taught me such things before. Therefore, I declare myself a genius back then. Did I mention it twice? Yes I did. EL OH EL

Speaking of genius, I just realised that i was quite like a tiny Einstein during those years. My achievements are quite remarkable actually. (Ok this is a bragging paragraph.) So here it goes...

1) Was consequently the top 3 student in madrasah for my whole pri and sec school years. (Guess who's the other 2 persons? Yep. One of them is my crush. HAHA)

2) I khatam-ed the Quran before primary school. 

3) Completed learning tajweed before primary 3. 

4) Hafal all Surah from al-ghaashiyah till an-nas WITH translation by 15 years old.

5) Spent most of my past time reading story books about our prophets (and playing football)

These were and are such major achievements for me! I didn't realise how smart and knowledgeable I was until a few minutes ago while writing this. Hahaha. Also, not mentioning my religious education was really up there.

What happened to me now? Shit happens I guess. Now everything with regards to that aspect has remained stagnant except for a few. Hmm... How I wish nenek ngaji is strong enough to teach again. I think she's over 100 years old already now. Still living and quite strong. Datuk ngaji also. Still visit them every hari raya. Alhamdulillah.

Ok. I'll end the post by saying a prayer for our datuk and nenek ngaji, our ustaz and ustazahs, our cikgus, our teachers, our lecturers, our gurus, our mentors, our educators. They are the one who made us who we are. They played a major role in moulding us and we are forever indebted to them.

Let's pray for their health. Let's pray they can still touch lives as long as they live. Let's pray that their rezeki will come in many folds. Let's pray that whatever they had done, they will receive barakah. Let's pray that they will be housed in the highest of highs in heaven. InsyaAllah amin.