Kehilangan taufik dan kedatangan hidayah.

Satu hari Jumaat yang lalu.

1.

“Buah apa yang menjadi tanda tanya?” Godop, boyfriend si Hidayah berteka teki dengan aku.

“Buah fikiran?” aku meneka dengan anggapan ianya permainan bahasa.

“No no, what kind of fruit that makes the people wanna ask about it?” dia megulang dalam bahasa asing.

“Durian?”

“Nope,”

“Rambutan?”

“Nope,”

“Give up je Ajie,” Hidayah memang gemar memanggil aku Ajie.

“Ok la give up. Buah apa?”

“Watermelon,” jawab si Godop.

“Why?”

“There you go,”

“Hahahahahahahha, cibai!”

2.

“Ada seorang pak Arab ni, dia tak boleh berbahasa Melayu mahupun English, boleh cakap Arab je,” si Godop bermula lagi. “Dia pegi petrol stesyen, nak isi minyak, tapi minyak kat petrol stesyen tu dah habis. Pump attendant tu punya la guna semua jenis bahasa isyarat nak cakap minyak dah abis. Tapi pak Arab tu tak faham-faham. Tahu pump attendant tu cakap apa last sekali?”

“Tak tahu, dia cakap apa?” aku mula tersengih mendengar cerita si Godop ni.

“Dia cakap, ‘Sadaqallah hul Azeem ¹‘,” cerita si Godop sambil mengeleng-gelengkan kedua tangannya.

“Hahahahahahahahahahah,” aku ketawa sampai hilang pedoman.

3.

“If this is a spear,” aku mengangkat jari telunjuk, “what is this?” lalu aku ayunkan jari tersebut, ke kiri dan ke kanan.

“A dancing spear?”

“Nope, Shakespeare!”

“Hahaha,”

“Ok ok, if this is Shakespeare,” aku mengulang perbuatan tadi, “what is this?”, kali ini, tarian jari aku menjadi sedikit gila. Ke atas, ke bawah, ke kiri, ke kenan, dan berpusing-pusing.

“Britney Spears?” teka Hidayah.

“Hahahah, how you know one?!”

“It’s just too obvious. Only Britney dances like that,” terang si hidayah dengan senyum sinisnya.

Dan kami bercerita perihal politik terkini di Waroeng Penyetz, The Curve berkongsi makan malam kami. Kami bentangkan kerisauan ekonomi negara di atas meja makan. Dan kami ringankan gundah hati kami dengan gelak tawa yang biasa.

4.

For quite sometime, i had not been eating rice using hand. I had become too hygienic and boring.

Rice was no longer a staple diet, i had switched to eating low-carb-hi-pro diet for many years. I only took carbs from whole grain bread or a small portion of noodles, but even that wasn’t daily. Rice was a once a week food, taken in the smallest portion possible, eaten using a set of cutlery, with white meat and vegetables being the larger portion to feast on.

But i thought, “hey, life needs a little sunshine,”.

That Friday was the best Friday when i cleansed my hands and my fingers were dancing with largest portion of rice.

5.

Hidayah and me went to DÔME after dinner at Waroeng Penyetz. To have earl grey and coffee with a slice of chocolate mousse cake. Godop, Hidayah’s boyfriend had went back to his night shift.

“Are you easily offended, well, if i were to come clean to you about my religious status?” i asked Hidayah.

“You obviously do not know me Ajie. But if it is offensive, i’ll let you know.”

Hidayah was a 10-year female friend of mine. Because of the Malay custom, we never really talked about religion openly even after knowing her for 10 years. But that night, that custom had not been practiced.

“Recently kan Dayah, i got problems with my family,” i bared my chest and showed the worries i had hanging inside it.

“What about it, tell me la. I saw the post on your blog pasal mak Ajie tu.”

“Have you read the post before it? The one that i’ve taken down tu,”

“No,”

“I’ll show you,” i booted up my laptop and login to my blog. “I’ve put it to private,” i turned my laptop to face her, “I hope not to offend you with it.”

And then she read the post.

Like many before this, this conversation about religion took its flight and visited the many lands and cities; Saudi Arabia, Mecca, Israel, Jurusalem, Iran, Tehran. Its journey travelled to the birthplaces of a single God, one almighty God.

That night, monotheistic beliefs had their origins.

Although i forgot its name, i managed to tell Hidayah about Zoroastrianism and its influence on Judaism. About other beliefs such as Buddhism and its dharma, the doctrine of karma. About suffering and the enlightenment in nirvana.

“You know what can shake my belief about God?” Hidayah asked me.

“What?”

“Aliens. What if one day humans make contact with aliens. Lepas tu we learn more about Gods and everything,” told Hidayah.

“Hey, i’ve mentioned about that in my post. I actually fikir lebih dekat dari itu. What if after thousands of years, the animals evolve, like kucing, anjing and dolphins sekarang pun dah bersosial and communicate with humans, dan dorang nanti one day, ada ability to acquire and apply knowledge. Do we humans, force them to practice what we already believed in, or do we let them to have their own perspectives about God?” because of the popular beliefs of Adam, Eve and the original sin, i somehow felt my question sounded rather rhetorical.

If it was an open question, most people would have told me other than humans (and Djinn in Islam), none of the creatures in this world, had to worship God.

And i would have been sad to know that God made it compulsory to worship Him just because we were humans.

6.

“Dayah dah niat puasa?” i asked.

“Orang dah niat sebulan dah.” replied Hidayah.

After all the religion talk, Hidayah followed me home. We watched movies and cartoons and i cooked sahur for her. She left my house at 5.30am.

To have cooked sahur for Hidayah, put a smile on my face.

It was a good sign that if God ever existed, He would have wanted me and Hidayah to stay friends and to respect each other no matter from which angle i pointed my view on Him.

In her name, i saw some guidance. Nur Hidayah, cahaya pentunjuk.