Post open house...

By now, most who read this blog would know that I am a huge believer in "hikmah" behind everything. Those who have read my entry on our Open House, would know about the ‘incident’ involving a group of girls. Surprisingly, some of the readers responded with various emotions – anger, sympathy and so on. Truth is, I was not angry at them, more worried in fact, as to their future dealing with the community at large…

Well, last Friday saw me receiving two visitors. They came to apologize on behalf of their juniors. They came with explanations –

• that the seminar was organized by some juniors and the girl who said that they might help after the seminar was over at noon was present in the capacity of a “speaker”, not organizer;
• that they were both ignorant of the fact that I asked for their help (albeit half jokingly) on the phone; and later (quite seriously) when I was passing by near their congregation;
  
• that (perhaps influenced by Japanese well-know diligence,) they were so absorbed in their own program, trying their best to make the most of their limited time with juniors from far away, that it just didn’t occur to them to check if I needed any help despite knowing well that I was holding my open house the next day;
  
• that they were sorry some of their juniors who attended the open house did not greeted me properly before eating.

One of the girls confessed she felt so guilty that when she went to school on Monday, nothing seemed right and nothing went right. Friends at the lab were alarmed to see she, who is usually jovial, looking pretty much miserable. When asked what the problem was, she confessed that it is a ‘relationship’ problem, and she was quickly told to try fix whatever it was that bothered her because it is so unlike her to be down in the dumps. That was why she decided to see me at the end of her school week, accompanied by another fellow ‘senior’ friend.

I am glad that something good came out of the incident – that some of the girls were at least ‘awaken’ by the fact that they would never be in the safe ‘cocoon’ of their own limited company for the rest of their life. They said that part of the reasons they ‘terlepas pandang’ to check whether we needed any help that night was because they lack experiences in socializing with more ‘adult’ society. It somehow did not occur to them that with my two small kids and all, that I would most appreciate their help, even for a short while. Somehow they thought that I must had had all the help I needed, since I did not specifically ask them for their help.

What happened that night really opened their eyes – that there is a more ‘complex’ life outside their small usual ‘group’; that half of the religion – the hablumminannas part – could be actualized in simply helping out in the kitchen; that their doings or un-doings could speak louder about them than their words or beliefs.

Open house is not an end in itself. It is a means to an end. There is more to it than merely providing an avenue to eat and chat. Open house is a tool for silaturrahim, for ukhuwwah. It is a place to get to know others, to meet different people, to broaden one’s horizon as we listen, learn, exchange thoughts and opinions – and all these could be done not merely while eating, but also while dicing nasi himpit, stirring soup, pouring gravy into bowls, cleaning up used plates, even while holding up a baby for a tired mommy…

So, there was a "hikmah" behind the incident after all – at least some girls learned their lessons about socializing with more ‘adult’ community here in Japan, while they are still students, before they get exposed to a larger society back home in Malaysia. Like I said, they are good girls, with good religious background – so I really hope that their doings would not, in any way, cause ‘fitnah’ to others like them. “It is a lesson I would never forget,” one of the girls solemnly vowed.

Ah, but of course, since a true Mukmin is not bitten by a snake twice from the same hole...