Friday, September 11, 2009

one minute news..

After catching bits of the news on TV last night with mum and dad..

Me: Why is all the news about Muslim countries?
Mum: Because its Ramadhan, dear.
(pause)
Dad: Because nothing is happening anywhere else.

xxw

Wednesday, September 09, 2009

Cloak or Kebaya

Its been three days since K and I touched down on home soil. Ten days since I arrived in Heathrow from Tehran. Two months since graduating from my diploma in London.

Given the time I've had to re-adjust to life as a post part II, a fresh out the box post graduate you'd think that a move home would be fairly easy. However glad I am to be back in the family house with no fretting about the next gas bill or our boiler going on the blink, something has already begun tugging at those twenty five year old worry lines.

Perhaps it is because it is fasting month here in Brunei. Perhaps it is because I have just spent an intense seven days in Iran that have irreversably altered my views of the world (how cliche, right?). Then again, perhaps it is the onset of a delayed teenage rebellion inching its way out from beneath the solid gold goodness of my sheltered upbringing. But as I get ready for a family get together to break fast tonight I find myself concerned that my mother and sister have opted to don the Arab abaya cloaking their bodies in swathes of black fabric exposing just their faces. I don't blame them.. its comfy and in the way I might put a smock dress on to hide the extra bulge I have been nursing since final hand-in - the black abaya hides all. In some ways, some might say it was fashionable. After all, the best ones are from Saudi. And you've got to foot the hefty air fare to get your gloved hands on those sliky sequinned babies. Still, I worry as our pretty traditional white prayer clothes are inked black.

Its a petty worry, I realise. After all, you might say they were just clothes. Still, as I banish my hand-me-down abayas to the depths of my wardrobe I feel just a bit better. I hope there they shall stay. Its a small act of defiance in anyones eyes, but I'm taking it one step at a time. Besides, my teenage rebellion has only just arrived ten years too late.

Progress reports to come.

Sincerely,
W.