Plane Journey

Abdullah was waiting in the long queue of passengers at J.F.K International Airport. All around him, he could see a teeming cultural mix of humanity and hear a din of dialects from around the world. Listening was one of Abdullah’s favorite pastimes. If a person had no one else to listen, he should be listening to his own heart. Abdullah considered silence as the ultimate culmination of the process of speech.

 

Every person in his line was fixed in his spot adamantly as if he or she intended to spend their entire life there. For some people, finding a spot in a line and then staying fixed in that spot was success in itself. Then there was Abdullah who remained restless even after having reached his destination. Some passengers lose themselves after getting to their destination; as if it’s the destination that starts to look for them. Some forget where they intended to go and then spend a lot of time trying to figure this out. It is hard to ascertain which of the two is the successful; the one who gets lost at the destination or the one who forgets where he was trying to go.

Abdullah considered the different nationalities of people to be their specific type of personalities. This personality was symbolic of their culture, religion, traditions, and societal modes of behavior. As the world moves from the east to the west, it gets more refined. Pushing, shoving, and cursing is replaced by an organized system of rules and regulations. There is peace instead of agitation, peacefulness and calm instead of fatigue and boredom, and smiles instead of apprehension and sternness. However, as soon as one starts to travel back to east from the west, humanity gradually switches back to the old modes of behaviors and reactions.

There was also eighty-year-old gentleman in the line of passengers in which Abdullah stood. He was returning back to India from New York. In a sea of brightly colored outfits and mostly white Caucasian people, he was one of the misfits, out of place among them as gold fabric on burlap and velvet on cotton. Since Abdullah was standing the closest to him in a tiresomely long line, he seemed eager to strike up a conversation with him. Perhaps he saw that Abdullah was the only person who wasn’t already engaged in conversation with anyone else.

‘Oh what a dearth there is on this earth of listeners,’ Abdullah thought to himself as he started to listen to what the old man was saying.

“I have come from Hyderabad, India to visit my son here who is a doctor,” the old man said. “I stayed for a few days at his home, then he told me that my cough had become a nuisance to his western wife. He later moved me into a hotel. He used to visit me three to four times a week, but today is the twenty second day without coming to see me. But I understand. My poor son works very hard. He must have gotten tied up with his patients. He sent a taxi to drop me to the airport. It would have been nice if I could have met him just one last time. Who knows when, or if, I’ll ever be able to see him again.”

Abdullah felt a sting of pain from his heart flowing down his body. He decided to change the topic and smiled at the man.

“Sir, don’t you have any luggage with you?” The man sighed.

“That’s a long story,” he said with a sad smile. “When I was coming here, my wife told me it was not necessary to pack anything since our son was well off. She said he would get to buy me all new things. These mothers’ hearts forever brim with the love of their sons; they blind in all good that is said or mentioned about them. Though once I came here, I didn’t feel like asking for anything from the one to whom I have given whatever I had in my entire life. So I didn’t ask and it never happened to him to give. Plus, when one is eighty years old, no one else listens except the Lord. Whether it is your children, the people around you, the organs of your own body, or even your conscious; not one thing listens. Even if the conscious gets inclined towards sin, the body angrily tell it to shut up because there is no more strength in it for anything but breathe. At this age, it is the living that kills a man every single day. Death kills him only once.”

Abdullah turned his head slightly to wipe his welling eyes. He took out the $500.00 he had in his wallet and pressed them into the old man’s palm.

“Give these to your wife when you get home,” he quietly told the surprised man. “Tell her that they are from her son.”

“You don’t have to…” the man started to speak. Abdullah smiled.

“Am I not her son too?” he interrupted the old man gently. “You won’t be lying when you say that.”

The old man was so amazed to say anything.

The line suddenly moved and the old man had to move forward. As he turned to wave goodbye to Abdullah, Abdullah could see the shine of tears in his eyes.

Seeing a little gap in the line as it moved forward, a lady with an overflowing luggage trolley made her way just behind him. It was hard to determine whether the number of bags was greater or less than the number of children that noisily milled around her. Abdullah helped to balance a falling bag and adjusted it back on the trolley. As she thanked him, she struck up a conversation too. Obviously the lady loved to talk. Without being encouraged, she gaily told Abdullah that she was going to meet her family back in Pakistan, had been married for the past fifteen years, and had seven children.

As Abdullah was still trying to figure out how to shake free of the talkative lady, a group of European girls moved next to him in the adjacent line. The heads of all the men in Abdullah’s line instinctively turned to face the group of girls. Glasses were removed, polished, and put back on again, hair was smoothed back in place, and a few steps were inadvertently taken to create a distance between themselves and their wives and kids.

The group of females seemed less of a collection of humans than a collection of white legs. Some necklines were so deep that it was hard to figure out whether it was an attempt to show the dress or the body. A couple of men resorted to lowering their gaze for fear of their wives who were by their side and watching them sternly. Others opted to look elsewhere for fear of other people. Despite this, they couldn’t refrain from throwing an occasional look or two towards the glorious scene anyway; the white, meaty bodies were proving to be intensely tormenting for them. The damsels of Satan’s paradise were openly challenging Allah’s (swt) promise to the pious for the seventy two nymphs in paradise.

Abdullah found it strange how satanic temptations such as these that lure a man with all their vice could cause within him the strength to heed the commandments of the Book that promises the commencement of all bodily pleasure from the moment of death.

It is a near impossible task to separate a cup of water from the mouth of the thirsty desert wanderer by telling him that the cool water he is about to drink is poisoned and that he could instead get damsels to take care of him when he dies.

Abdullah closed his eyes tightly. But as soon as he did, the eyes of his inner self flew open. Abdullah, instantly opened his eyes again. He turned not just his eyes but his entire body to face the other way. Thankfully, it wasn’t long before he got his boarding pass and was on the flight.

He was glad to find his favorite window seat. As he watched the runway beneath the airplane, he thought of how similar life was to an airplane journey; everyone had the same destination but harbored different hopes, feelings, aspirations, and ideals. As the plane rose higher and higher into the air, the buildings and the people on the runway, the cars, and the roads got smaller and smaller. Suddenly the plane was in the white, snowy clouds. The hustle and bustle of the city was substituted for the oblivion of colorless, puffy, masses. It was like an entire river was enclosed in a nutshell.

Abdullah thought of how necessary it was for people enamored by the wonders of the world to take a meditational plane ride. It was the best way to comprehend the real insignificance of the self. When Allah (swt) looks down upon the earth, He must see nothing but a fleck. Within that fleck, to see countries with millions of cities and billions of humans must seem so ludicrous to Him. He must surely laugh out loud at the man who professes to be God and makes plans to annihilate Muslims, wipe out Islam, and terrorize and butcher other humanity, thinking there is no power to stop him. How nonsensical and absurd such a man must seem to Allah (swt)? Habitual villains and rogues definitely needed to take a ride in a plane.

Abdullah’s reverie was broken by the sound of food being served. For Abdullah, getting one’s food respectably and having enough to eat was also one of Allah’s (swt) greatest blessings. This is because there were countless in the world who went to the greatest lengths of degradation and indignity in order to attain their one meal a day. They stand in lines, visit charity homes, and often, at the end of day, still end up suffering the torture of an empty stomach.

Pondering all this at that moment while getting his meal served thousands of miles above earth, Abdullah thought it was amazing how that particular meal of his life was destined to be served to him at that very spot; within the clouds and in the air. If his hosts in the air were so extremely hospitable, thought Abdullah, how greatly more hospitable must be the hosts that Allah (swt) has promised to appoint for the deserving.

Abdullah’s eyes misted over with thankfulness, rendering murky the image of the long, white legs.

After the meal, most of the passengers dozed off; the old man from India, the married lady with the seven kids, and the group of European girls. All of humanity was at par at that moment in time. If something was to happen to the plane, all would suffer equally. This was quite contrary to what the state of affairs would be in the narrow, dense, darkness of the grave. There too, though all would be sleeping at that moment, the actions of each person would decide the end result. Abdullah shivered involuntarily at the thought.

The sudden sound of a child’s cry broke the quietness of the air. The child’s cry awakened several people who were no doubt cursing both the child and the mother for the rude interruption of their blissful repose. Abdullah raised his hands and made a prayer for the child. One by one, a number of passengers joined him in the prayer and there was a collective sound of ‘Ameen’ at the end. Abdullah smiled and gave a short dua to all who had joined him. No doubt, to gain a prayer from another is just like getting a meal; it had to be in your fate to be awarded that blessing.

There was a young man of about thirty years of age seated on one of the last seats of the plane. He appeared to be suffering from some sort of an illness. His body was constantly moving and shaking and every ten seconds or so, a loud, heart wrenching sound would emanate from the bottom of his throat. It was obvious that the young man had no control over his movements or the sounds coming from his mouth. Many passengers had literally fought with the airhostesses to the have their seating moved forward so they would be as far away as possible from the suffering man.

Abdullah started thinking again. What if Allah (swt) had preprogrammed every human so say the word ‘Allah’ after every ten seconds? What if uttering this word was as necessary for their existence as breathing? What would people have done then? Abdullah felt the pressure of the blood within his veins heighten as if his heart was saying the first kalima.

The plane was due to stop at numerous destinations, and at every destination there was loss of familiar faces and the addition of new. The old man from India was gone and so were the European girls. Finally, Abdullah’s destination was in sight. The huge aircraft started its descent downwards from the bowels of the skies. No doubt, everything has to go downwards, into the ground.

As soon as the passengers disembarked at Islamabad Airport in Pakistan, the enamel of civility and graciousness cracked and fell away. Adults were brushing aside each other and children rudely, there was utter disregard for lines, and a mad scramble ensued for snatching the luggage carts and making their way to the very front of the luggage carousal. Abdullah saw not luggage rolling forward on the tired, slow carousal but suitcases of narcissism, hand carries of vanity and pride, strollers of bigotry and intolerance, cartons of hate, bags of exhibitionism, and backpacks of deception.

Abdullah stood there watching the chaos around him and thinking whether or not the Islam which was preached by the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) was even existent in its real form in today’s world or not? If not, where could one go to seek it?

It certainly could not be seen or found in the Muslims of today. Perhaps it was better sought in some far off tribe in the thick of Africa.

Abdullah picked up his two bags of worship and forgiveness and set off to find the lost Muslims.

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