Raya in London 2007 (Day 1)

It was a better raya this year although it came as a shock since we all thought it was going to be on Saturday. But we had an unexpected guest when Acik came down from Newcastle to join for Eid-Fitr in London.

That very Friday morning, we all went for the raya prayers in MSD and Acik was confused with Smq's Takbir on MP3 thinking it was from a mosque nearby. As usual, the missing-Malaysia feeling started to pinch my heart as more and more Raya songs were played.

It was a short and sweet khutbah after we had a 30-minute takbir together and when it all finished, people took their already basi nasik lemak for breakfast before posing for the cameras. I had a few shots of myself while thinking how old I already am since I was the most senior in the KMYS get together photoshoots. Smq already left for work and Ihab could already be on his way to class. Then we had the UiTM people, the Cass Business School people, KYS people, old flames, new flames, Ramadhan crushes and others set to be immortalised on Arwin's now-wrecked digital camera.

It's one of those days, my friend.

And then we (Acik and me) needed a place to crash before the Jumaat prayers and so we went to Arwin-Atiqah-Soraya-Afif's place in Shadwell bringing along the rotten sambal nasi lemaks which were deemed as 'Harta Rampasan Perang'. Being a greedy small guy with a big belly I thought of eating two sets of nasi lemak before the girls Didi and Atiqah discovered how the sambal not being 'eatable'!


We chatted and had some Cadbury 'kuih-raya-wannabe' candies before leaving for the Bangladeshi mosque under the DLR where to my surprise, there were 'millions' of them. We met two Malaysians the moment they opened their mouth and they were actually working in Canary Wharf.

Such inspirations.

Next, would be our adventurous journey to the Hicom's open house in Hampstead. I had never used this route before and thought I gambled a bit. It was simply because of the long journey I had stopping at Finchley Road, took a bus and yet had a tiring walk to that castle last year. We had our second thoughts when we met a dead end where actually it wasn't. It was pretty quick though from the Hampstead Station via the Northern Line to that grand mansion.

At the Hicom's, we met some familiar faces and also the faces of people who went to approach you only when they are in some actuarial-academia-related difficulties. It's quite weird when they weren't even waving at us but only boasting their dodgy green handbags. Soraya remembered one of them as an old friend back at school but she was ignored as well. However, the spirit of raya sort of shadowed that incident and we had a wonderful time munching on the kuih rayas. Ces sont rares!

Of all the incidents, the part where an old 'pimp' trying to woo all the pretty girls stood out the most! This guy, codenamed Jeffrey had the courage to persuade one of the girls (won't tell her name) and asked for her number. You got lucky your old wrinkly *(censored but plural)* didn't get smashed by her absent boyfriend! It was so funny because I thought that Jeffrey (not that Special Branch guy) was her supervisor or sponsor official. We couldn't hold our laughter when she revealed Jeffrey was asking for her number and all. We even noticed he tried many other girls on the first day of raya! Obviously, Jeffrey is back on his fitrah after a long-month Ramadhan -- Pimping! haha!

So watch out girls for this sick man. Don't tell me I didnt warn ya.

I met some friends of mine too. The KYS juniors. The Arsenal lady-supporter. Siti who came back for her graduation with her family. PNB Scholars super juniors. Touch rugby people and others. I guess this is what Raya is all about. Meeting people. Meeting new people too. It's up to you to decide to take it as a bad thing or a good thing. For me, it's a good thing. Unless when they were acting like they didn't notice as if they were Paris Hiltons or something. Haha!

But anyway, it was a great raya though when finally we decided to leave Datuk J (Datuk K wannabe Jeffrey) all by himself struggling for a 'Siti Nurhaliza', consistently wiping his dodgy moustache with his saliva and we strolled back through the bushes for home. Like elves, we were!

The next day would be another cracker. Shadwell's Open House and Sushi as Lemang raya.