See you again, Ramadhan

 Goodbye Ramadhan

It's the last day of Ramadhan today, and the sounds of Takbiran are echoing around my town now! I've always loved and enjoyed this atmosphere, although I'm not a Muslim and I didn't fast for one month heh. But this day, this night, has always become sort of a "checkpoint" in life? Especially during the year. It's like oh it's Lebaran. And with this break, it is sort of a time of contemplation of what I want to achieve in the rest of the year, and what can be done better.

The echoing of Takbiran is also a bittersweet sound for me, because it reminds me of how fast time is flying! Like another Ramadhan come and go, I've experienced this almost all of my life, except when I'm in Singapore of course. But since young, I've always listened to this at night. Back when I was small, I always have my cousins and family gathered together on this night. 

Now that we're adults, we don't do it anymore. And it's fine.

I kind of realised that a lot of people here always "send off" this holy month by saying something like: "May we be reunited with the next Ramadhan". Because truth be told, no knows when we will leave this earth. And of course, we may not make it till next Ramadhan. Just like how last night I received the news of the passing of the mother of someone my family is close with, on the night before Takbiran. And about 3 days ago, the mosque near my house announced the passing of 2 people in one night.

Perhaps we should take this chance to really treasure what we have, and the time we have in this life. We don't exactly know how long more we have here heh. It's kinda the same for the temple in my hometown. We usually have a last prayer session on the last month of the lunar year. And before we go home, the temple head will say like I hope we can all gather together again on the last lunar month of the next lunar year! And everyone just nods off in agreement.

Well I don't want to ruin this festive mood. To all of my Muslim friends, and all Muslims out there, I hope you had a blissful month of Ramadhan! Eid Mubarak to you and your family! :)