The Good, the Bad, and my big toe
Where do I begin...I guess the good news is where I should start my story.
By the grace of Allah swt my sister got engaged to a brother from London this passed weekend, and though there really is no such thing as an 'engagement' in Islam, there such thing as a commitment to get married so before you shoot me with your bida gun you betta recognize foo.
The wedding insha Allah will be in the States so my sis's fiance wanted to throw a party with all his homies there. The party was great, my sis looked beautiful on the sisters side (yes he is also a partitioner like us) and we had a grand ol time.
London is an awesome place, especially East London which reminded me very much of Karachi with all the niqaabis, sunnah beards, masajid and ghetto desi strip malls. Even though it was hella expensive there and really crowded, i could actually see myself living there if the need arose.
The muslims there were stronger, they were an intricate part of the culture of the place and not just some doctors and engineers who make their money and live out on a hill like we are here. Their presence was actually in the streets and they were known. This became obvious to me when i would walk around and the people wouldnt stare at me. Here in the US i walk around anywhere and I get the death stare like im automatically Osama's cuzzin cuz i got a beard and my skin is brown, but there I even saw advertisments for things that had hijabis in it. How gangsta is that!
Oh, and I flew business class on the way back alhumdulillah, to be honest I was not that impressed. I mean, of course you get better food, gangsta chairs that recline like all the way back, but then you got people getting free alcohol and they are no afraid to get drunk as a skunk. I even told the girl seated next to me that I wasnt even going to act like ive been here before or fake like this is how im livin. Im here cuz i got a hookup.
So that pretty much sums up the good part of the trip, lets move to the rest of it...
Now i was supposed to leave to go to London on Thursday, but I ended up staying at the airport all day only to find out that all the flights to the connector in Atlanta were overbooked and I wouldnt get a flight. Problem is I checked my bag already so I didnt know where it was, but was assured by the counter lady that I would reunite with it in London.
So Friday morning I go back to the airport and catch a flight early in the AM to Atlanta alhumdulillah and then get the flight I expected all the way to London. But before the flight to London I ate some Panda express at the airport which gave me some serious acid burn to the extent that I actually felt like I had a fever. I still think it was something wrong with the food since my stomach felt some serious cramping but I just figured it was acid. I ended up taking 2 8hour PM tylenols and just being asleep throughout the flight.
When I get to London I go to the baggage counter only to be told that my bad has not arrived and that it is still stuck in Baltimore. Yes, Baltimore as in my hometown. I am now stuck in London with 1 pair of clothes that im wearing, and a backpack full of books, a phone charger, face wash, and some chappals. Ohhhh yeah this trip was not looking good.
I end up buying a punjabi-ish outfit for the party that night which came equipped with a dupatta which i promptly turned into a turban.
Fastforward through the party.
So im sitting at the computer in the living room of the house we were staying in and I call someone over to check out a video that I saw on googlevideo. As I move over (im on my knees btw) and feel some glass like material on my foot which makes me go 'ouchouchouchouch' until I roll over to see that a push pin had gone almost a quarter inch into the top of my big right toe and bent, lodging itself in the bone of my toe. I could not really understand how something like this happened, and everyone was too busy playing karron board to really be paying attention to my foot except the one I called over to the cpu. I then tried to gently pull the pin out of my foot but it would not budge, it was lodged pretty good. I had to give it a good tug until it finally came out, and with it came a lot of blood. Alhumdulillah the needle didnt break, and the bleeding eventually stopped, and I didnt need a tetnus (sp?) shot since I had gotten one a couple years before when I was playin basketball and got a tooth lodged in my head (long story). To make a long story short, my toe swoll up pretty good and I just lost the knot on the location of the penetration today.
Now came the return flight...
We spent an entire day at the airport in London only to find out that we could not get onto a flight back because there were 40+ people on standby and barely 15 seats available all day. After hours there, we went back home, only to find out that the next day would be even less likely to get a flight, with the lady at Delta telling me and my sis's fiance that flights would freeing up in Mid August. MID AUGUST!!!????
We all then decide that we are going to go on a trip 5 hours away to Manchester where it seems more likely that we might actually get on a plane back home. My sis's fiance books tickets on a double decker coach bus with AC to get us to Manchester, and when we get on the bus it looks like we're gonna have a fun road trip.
Wrong.
5 minutes into driving we notice a burning smell, then a smell of fumes coming from the engine, then we notice that the AC doesnt work and that the engine heat was taking over the bus. I sweat straight through my clothes as did errybody else, until we finally arrived at our destination.
Of course we couldnt just end the story on such a happy ending right?
We get to the airport at 12 midnight and our flight that we wanna catch is at close to 2PM, so we had a lot of time to kill. We sleep in waiting area chairs until we find a musallah where me my future bro in law and his friend end up sleeping. Time goes by, and finally comes time for us to catch our plane. We're on stand by, there are like 12 seats with 15 people listed, which means our priority level determines if we get on or not. They call names, people go, until they call my fam and I up. The guy at the counter tells us that there are 3 seats on this plane and that all 4 of us would not be able to board. My dad decides to be gangsta and try and take the next flight (to NY) which my sis my mom and I get on this one to ATL. We get to ATL only to find out that my dad, who alhumdulillah made the flight to NY, got in from Manchester late and missed the connecter flight back to MD, which meant he had to spend the night at the airport and try and catch the flight to MD in the morning. We have to switch our flight from MD to DC since the MD flight is booked, and we get back home at 12AM Thursday morning alhumdulillah.
My dad ends up getting home this afternoon and by the time i got home from the summer camp he was like sleeping unconscious on the couch (poor guy).
I just got back from the airport which had been keeping my luggage since my departure and subhan Allah they had this huuuuuge letter on it to explain to me what happened cuz they knew id be blown.
So what have I learned from this trip.
1) My sis is so happy its rediculous, and she has a right to be because she deserves it. Her fiance is awesome and I am, for the first time, comfortable (not happy) giving my sister away.
2) London is bananas
3) There is a reason traveling is a tazkiyyah and the dua of a traveler is accepted. Because it is hardship that you endure that you have to endure with no choice, and this patience is a patience of purification from Allah swt.
4) I hate flying
5) Praying on a plane stinks.
May Allah make my sister and her fiance a couple joined together for the sake of Allah, and may Allah swt protect her and him from haram, and allow the marriage to be done quickly and with ease...ameen
posted by Iboo LaL @ 9:13 PM
Comments: 8
