salam alayk

the super packed schedule is around the corner. will be having dental materials test tomorrow, microbiology test on thursday, pathology test on friday and viva pharmac on 10th. oh and one order of egg tart. :)

honestly, i really want to tell some stories here, but the idea not coming! urgh, but still alhamdulillah for today that Allah still let me breathe and live in iman and islam. alhamdulillah.

so, basically today, i wanna share stories about strangers that we met in bursa. one of the quote that i often heard is "there are times when family are like strangers and strangers are like family."

i was in the toilet in bursa's otobus. we just arrived in bursa this early morning and has yet to decide whether to roam in the city or going to uludag for some snow skiing and snow boarding. but before making up decisions, we went to toilet for some business. and when i came out from the toilet, i saw aiza was talking to someone who seemed familiar in front of the sink, especially her scarf. asian!

i smiled at her and aiza introduced me to her, "ini kakak saya, namanya aida."

"owh, saya nela." she introduced herself and we shaked hands. and the rest is history..

nela was a student (an internship student) at eski shehir, somewhere in the middle of asian turkey. she was studying there for a month for student exchange (i'm not sure) and by the time we met her, she was on her way to istanbul to catch a flight back home, Indonesia back for good. before that, she decided to play skii in uludag! what a fate!

"kalian mahu join kami?" nela offered us. "nanti saya khabarkan pada teman saya." she continued.

i was indecisive at that time, whether to accept or not, but yet, we agreed to follow them and leave the rest to Allah. outside the toilet, we met setra, a young man who is at the same age of nela studying in istanbul. he accompanied nela for her last turkey trip.

we talked and knowing each other while taking a bus to uludag. too bad, the teletric (i guess so) were not working, so we were unable to take cable car to uludag. other options: dolmus. although nela and setra are quite fluent in turkish, we ended up lost and at last, alhamdulillah we got a dolmus to uludag for tl12 for a way. the dolmus is available at topane station.

arriving in uludag, they were so nice to help us finding good equipments at certain shops. we decided to play snow board because ski is too mainstream. the day was friday, so setra took his time to pray jumuah prayer before taking his ski gear.

alhamdulillah, snowboarding is not difficult as what it may seem to be. after few times crashing people, stumbled upside down and some hard work, me and aiza finally get to enjoy our times. i kept crashing this one group of family until when i became quite amateur, one of the boy said "you're very good." i replied thank you.

meanwhile, nela and setra were still nowhere to be found. it was around 1 pm when we saw them started to play ski.

"ayuh, nela!! ayuh!!" i gave nela some courage. she was a first timer too, same with us.

and we took photos together.

actually, me and aiza had just one day trip in bursa, and in the night, we will be taking bus to istanbul. since this is such a gamble trip, we really didn't have any reservations in istanbul hostel. so, we're kinda worry on how we might ended up in istanbul in the middle of night.

so, we took a break from snowboarding and searching some wifi hotspot. although there were some, but the coverage was too slow that we only managed to search the hostel, not book. so, we decided to book in the bus on our way to istanbul. hopefully, there might be some wifi on the bus or else, we might need to join nela and setra to their hostel.

alhamdulillah, we managed to book a hostel before reaching istanbul in an hour before. so, upon arriving in istanbul, there were some shuttle bus to take us everywhere we want. but i'm not sure why there is none to sultanahmet areas, so, we took taxi. it was much easier, however, quite expensive since we're on cheapskate. tl20 to our hostel and it was our last time meeting them.

setra and nela was the best person Allah could give to us in our bursa trip. one of my ukhtis had said,

"sesiapa yang kita jumpa dekat dunia ni, sampai waktu sekarang adalah orang yang terbaik kita pernah jumpa. orang yang terbaik yang Allah dah sediakan untuk kita. Allah berikan kita ibu bapa yang terbaik untuk kita, adik-beradik yang terbaik, kawan-kawan despite kekurangan mereka."

i can see when Allah gives His help in the unexpected manner. when we were clueless where to go and no one to meet, Allah let these 2 persons came and helped us with no burden at all. they managed our bus tickets, negotiate with dolmus driver, asking prices for snow boarding gears, changing bus tickets to istanbul, following us right to our hostel to ensure that we are safe and sound.

alhamdulillah, alhamdulillah. alhamdulillah. sometimes, we didn't know that our fate relies on some strangers that we just met but with Allah's blessing, everything just went smooth.

meeting strangers is like, doubting them curiously but at the same time, yearning for their help. what we can do is try our best and leave the rest to Allah. Allah is the best Protector after all.

my bursa pictures were not much since we didn't have much chances to charge our battery. so, here it is.

of course my shawl is totally messed off!

yup, that's me with bulky bag on my back. -.-"

and this is aiza. she was so fast!

nela and setra. miss them. :)

after all, it is the ibrah that you get at the end of the journey. the journey itself is beyond the sightseeing, stamping the passport and taking pictures of your boarding pass. it is about seeing what Allah had prepared for you and for you to prepare for any outcome. always see the world as a muslim, insyaAllah. :)

assalamualaikum.