Unlike the previous Eid, I celebrate Eid in my hometown in Sabah. But, this year it’s totally different because for the first time in my life, I hear ‘Takbir’ without my parent by my side. It would be so weird but it is fact. Well, what can I do. For the sake of my own future, I have to be into it because I can feel there would be no Eid with them for the next five years. I mean after I finished my study here, in UNITEN. The good thing is, I still have my brother to spend Eid with and a few cousins who study and work in Selangor. I supposed to be grateful because without them who invited me to go with them, maybe I’ll end up my Eid morning in UNITEN together with Arabian students. What a scary nightmare…

Before I forget, this year I spent my Eid in Bentong, Pahang, the hometown of Siti Nurhaliza, my favorite celebrity. I wonder how she spend this second Eid with her husband. The first thing that crossed my mind when my brother told me that we will spend Eid there was I wonder how much ‘dodol’, ‘lemang’, ‘rendang’ and ‘ketupat’ I will eat because I know people here love to cook a lot during Eid. Well, our journey to Bentong was quite short because I think the distance from Kuala Lumpur is not really far but it was so tiring as the road to Bentong is so ‘zig zag’. It takes about 30 minutes to Bentong. When we got there, the first thing I figured out was, it’s hard to see young people and town is full of old people. I took a conclusion all of them migrated to big cities like Kuala Lumpur. Not much we can did there because it’s fasting month and many shop was closed as it was the day before Eid. I guessed there were prepared for Eid the next day.

As we arrived, we were welcomed by my cousin’s mother-in-law. I can felt that she is a great cooker as I saw a hawker in front of their house. What I thought was a reality as we were served with delicious dishes during breaking fast. The night before Eid was an unforgetable moment for me as for the first time in my life I cooked "Rendang" with my cousins as I never done it before. Well, chopped up the meat was not really difficult. I think. All of us were fell asleep so early because of the 'tyring journey' and the 'chopped up' project.

The next day, we performed our prayer at the mosque about 200 metres in distance from the house. It feels like home to see how friendly the people in the village. Before I forget, the name of the place is Felda Mempaga 2. So many people were there and it was so hard to recognise every face because it doesn't look familiar for me to perform Eid prayer in a strange place. Usually, after perform prayer I will join my family to our ancestors' grave but since there was no grave we could visit, we just went back home and ate everything that served on the table. Sometimes, I heard voice in my head telling me to stop eating all that stuff because eat so much fat will damage my body someday. But I know it was the only chance for me to eat something special like "lemang", my favorite food of them all. The taste is so unique for me. Unfortunately, there's nothing much we can do there because we never know people we saw either. All I know was ate everything I can eat.

Something happened on second day of Eid. It was so surprising and fast. It happened in front of the last house we visited for the day. A lady hit our car and unfortunately, she fainted just after the hit. There was some argument about the one who should be blame and who should pay all the damages. Luckily, we are not the one who neglected the traffic rules. It was so outrageous and all I knew was I'm going to die that day.

My Eid ended on Thursday where I had to go back to UNITEN early. Well, I know I'm not too brilliant and so many chapters I have to cover for the final exam. Moreover, stay too long in their house make me a little bit uncomfortable. Well, this is my Eid experience. It's so hard to say that this year's Eid was not the best Eid for me because I miss my parent so much. I hope this previous holiday after final exam I can go back home to see them. Luckily, my mom sent me 'Kuih' from home. At least, I didn't miss her cook.