while I am silently listening ...

personal space invader - tone abuser - weird whisperer
pet peeves Monday 001 & misc list 001

I've been meaning to do a post of list of random things other than the usual pop culture, and since I am quite stumped in this moment in time, here is a random personal one that is closely related to my religion actually, regarding specifically my admittedly petty pet peeves when I went for solah jemaah in the nearby surau:

#001: personal space invader

By taking into consideration that everyone have their own 'style' of praying that is based on their physical body and stature and the different mazhab there are following (although I still haven't seen one who is not using Syafi'i mazhab here locally), I know that when you are praying side by side, you should use common courtesy in trying to not be a nuisance to others which I am always keep in mind when presented with the opportunity. Which is why it would irk me if the person next to me didn't have the same thought in mind! Thankfully it is far and few between but hopefully my luck would stay the same and keep on improving, not letting it distract me from my prayers ... 

#002: tone abuser

Okay, look: I am not a religious person or as religious as my recent posts would suggest (there are more alim or religious person out there ...) and it is a given and safe to say that I do not understand the Arabic language as I do with English. This is why I try to use it the best way that I could by correctly pronouncing the word and using proper tone when reciting the verse. Compared to the world class reciters, I am nowhere near their level of talent but I can appreciate the proper tone and melody used that are used properly during proper Al-Quran recital or (on topic) during jemaah prayer by the imam. Regarding the latter, this was what I experienced a couple of times before by the same imam whereby he was using improper tone and melody when reciting a surah after Al-Fatihah time and time again! Basically, if you've been to jemaah prayers many times before, you've started to pay attention to how the imam would use different tone and melody that would suit its place, i.e. how different the intonation is between the takbir before the first rukuk and before the final tahiyat  and more specifically how the verse in the middle of the surah differ with the ending one of the surah. The different in intonation when it would continue in monotone for the former while it would end in a downward tone for the latter, which I would look for especially if they are reading a surah that I am not familiar at all and I would have to wait when it is going long and I couldn't guess where it would end. When you keep ending every verse with the same downward intonation, you can forgive me for assuming that the use of that intonation would suggest we are moving forward to rukuk. I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed and slightly annoyed that he is not mindful of the makmums That's it.

#003: woeful whisperer

In the similar tone of the first entry, this is another taste of different people, different flavour but I don't think that this particular person actually knows what he does is actually wrong or more precise distracting. Let me break it down for you: you should utter every verse in your prayer loud enough that you could hear it by your ears, just above whispering and ideally below normal speaking volume. My mother let me know of this information last year and I had to say it is better for me to hear what I am uttering rather than just moving my lips without making any sound, making me much more aware whether or not they are correct, slowing my pace down significantly to the betterment of my overall prayer. With that being said, there is this one older gentleman (they generally are ... I am one of the young few) that whisper loudly a certain phrase of the verse like a certain Joker or the more recent Pennywise (I am not joking! He would always sounded so sinister or at least that's what I was reading from it at the moment) but by how many time he repeated that tone every rakaat, I don't think he knows that he is actually distracting and bothering others by using that creepy tone time and time again. I don't have the hearts to tell him though ...

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Well, that's all folks! Thank you for your time and please do come back for my future posts! :-)