“Would You Like To Come With Us For Hajj?”

Pt. 1

Listening to: Party of One by Brandi Carlile

Image from islamonline.net

When I wake up every morning, the first thing I see in my room is a row of law books. The Philippine Constitution, Obligations and Contracts, Criminal Law, Philosophy of Law, and Basic Legal Ethics. They no longer give me pain. Before, I’d open my eyes and experience the most excruciating feeling of being punctured by a power drill, both forces starting from my forehead and temple, boring all the way to the center of my brain. Many things disturb my peace in Small Town. The short and quiet times I have to myself may still be threatened by my parents or by many other things. And the prospect of peace being disturbed gives more anxiety than the peace actually disturbed.

Take for instance the heat. April of this year arrived and came with it was a high number of cases of children passing out during class. It was happening all across the country. News about it broke very quickly. The heat in classrooms was so high that elementary and high school students in response would curl on their armchairs as though trying to sleep until they became unconscious. Or they would simply fall down to the floor. The frantic local and national governments carried out their laws and ordinances: classes were to stop. Classroom settings, like it was during the pandemic of 2020, were once again ineffective. This time schools did not resort to online classes. They simply stopped.

Then came the water rations. The local water district office announced that the distribution of water was to be scheduled and strictly monitored. The drought choked our water reserves to a critical low. Our schedule was 2:00 A. M. Until 4:00 A. M. We would wait, facing a half-turned-on faucet. But not a single drop of water came out of it. We soon resorted to ordering from (mineral) water refilling stations. P600.00 would suffice a day of bathing, laundry, washing plates and general cleaning for eight people if we conserved strictly. 

The way we would bathe is to take a dipper of water and, using our hands, spread the water on our bodies. Four to six dippers per person would suffice— must suffice. We spent P600.00 everyday for close to eight weeks. We were one of the “rich ones who could manage.” All around Small Town, trucks passed with tanks full water, precariously juggling about the rocky uneven road, precious water splashing and wetting the town pavements. 

Again, these were the well-to-do families. Just few hundred steps away, in the slums of Small Town, poor families lined by the hundreds, carrying small gallons, pails and buckets. The government, realizing that water ration scheduling would not suffice, covertly changed their plans and opted to deliver a single large water tank per baranggay per day. Large as they were, they were still not enough for thousands of people per district. 

Soon, our families and neighbors took to drilling on our front yards in search for water veins underground. It kind of worked. But even with high-powered filtering systems, the kind of water that emerged was brown, almost murky and turbid. Like creek water. But to most of us it was safe enough for bathing (a few developed rashes). It was too murky for white clothes. So, for weeks we only wore colorful clothes and jeans.

I received a text message from the psychiatrist’s assistant informing me that my next check-up was soon. I went. She asked how I was now that I was taking Lexapro and Quetiapine daily. I replied, “mellow.” The meds really did their thing. At the very least, during all this quiet chaos, the chatter in my mind subsided. The doctor asked what my plans were for the future, where I saw myself in five years. “I want to fall in love with the law again, Doc,” I replied. “I really want to finish law school. I’m reading novels and literary books everyday so I may be a better writer. I hope to publish something in five years too.” She nodded approvingly. And rather haughtily added, “This is good. Anyway, plans and dreams change. It didn’t really matter what you would say as long as I heard that you had actual plans. Had you said ‘I don’t know,’ that would have been cause for me to worry. But this is good.” She prescribed Lexapro and Quetiapine everyday for the next couple of months. Expensive diseases call for expensive medicine.

With the constant irritations of power outages and slow internet reception (and now the sticky feeling and body odor of not having to bathe everyday because of drought), I began reconnecting with my friends in Manila. She replied, he replied, they replied. Small acts of kindness that became large waves of greatness for me. And a huge relief for my ailing mind. They poured over their plights and anguishes. Like me, some of my writer friends have been struggling mentally as well, and took the same medicine. Some were still challenged with going back to school to finish their programs. Some were on the hunt for jobs. 

Depression to me comes in the form of immobility, and with it follow despair and exhaustion. There are times when I would simply cry upon waking. There are days when the simplest tasks would compel to me to lay in bed until sunset. I would disregard the lower back pains, and simply stare on to the white ceiling. There are days when I would open a book, read a sentence, and close my eyes thinking, enough. And there are days, thoughtful and encouraging my friends may be, that no piece of wisdom or love would penetrate the brick wall of depression surrounding my person. 

On top of these personal problems, there are also the waging wars in the world that affect us all. Russia and Ukraine, Israel and Palestine, the open and armed conflicts in Myanmar, Sudan, Haiti, Burkina Foso and many other needless fights… a person maybe at the ends of the world and the sadness will still reach us. How do we engage to help and shut off the madness at the same time? 

All of these are both everywhere and in me all the time. All the time!

A very rare occasion happened to us: all of the family members were present for dinner one night. My two siblings who now live with their in-laws came with my nephews and nieces. The children were all playing in one corning, their nannies carelessly feeding them while getting sucked in their social media. Older Brother and Father were discussing some powerful politician who had the power to do this or  alter that, for sure secretly wishing they had the same clout and riches. And mother was yapping away to whomever was at the table, somewhat directed to my sisters who were only half listening. I was on auto-pilot, silently but quickly munching away, hoping to go back to bed to rot. My eyes and mother’s linked one moment and she asked, as if she had been talking to me all this time. She said, “so what do you say, would you like to come with us to Saudi for Hajj?”

“Yes! Of course!” my younger sister replied for me. She faced me and said, “Don’t say no.”

“I don’t know if I can leave the boys and the store in such a state,” I replied. 

“It’s just a store!”, my mother said.

“Well, I’ll think about it. It’s a month’s time abroad, after all.”

“We’ll use the money I started saving for you since you were born. I saved it just for this. As I did with you all,” she said looking at everyone at the table. “But since you’re out of law school for now, you’re the most free this year.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Say Yes. So we can arrange for your passport and ticket.”

“I’ll think about it.”

Sometimes I truly admire mother for her sheer cunning. She has the ability to pick the most random of times to ask the heaviest of questions. She was asking me to partake in the most important journey a Muslim can make on Earth. Being caught off guard was an understatement. It almost felt like taking a bullet. Feeling numb, I walked silently to my room, to my bed. I closed my eyes, trying to find clarity amidst the chaos that no one in the house knew erupted in my mind. It was like dust of an entire city rising up from the first drops of rain. Confusion, excitement, anger, surprise, anxiety, everything mixed up. I took a pill with a side effect of drowsiness to help me sleep.

The next day I messaged my mother. I told her that the main reason I was hesitant was because the store needed constant tending to. It was true. My lovely boys, hard-working as they are, are not the brightest The only real thing they knew how to do in the store was sell. The organization, cleaning, counting, inventory, were all left to me. I can help you with that, whatever you need before we fly, she replied. It almost feels like I sin if I refused. So yes, I’ll be going with you and Dad.

Heart reaction** from mother. And that’s how my Hajj journey began.

End of Part 1