MKI Ramblings Unlimited: Double Birthdays

Some birthdays in my family are close to one another. Granddaughter Najla’s birthday is just one day after mine. My other granddaughter Haadieya and two grandsons Hifzhan and Haziq (all siblings) have birthdays in the same month but on different days. However, granddaughter Haadieya’s birthday falls on the same day as Ram’s. Tessa, Sita and Mini all have birthdays in the same month whilst Shaffik’s and Fahrul’s birthdays are ‘standalone’ days. Traditionally we will group together on certain selected days for dinner or lunch, home or away, and celebrate the birthdays with everyone trying to accommodate time for the gathering. This means that there will be three or four birthday gatherings in a year, and opportunity for the family to get together.

Najla’s birthday this year and mine fell in Ramadan and hence not much was done to celebrate other than the usual wishes and gifts. No fanfare. We have got into the
daily Ramadan routine and hence continued with it and did not feel like it was a birthday. Sita took Najla out shopping on her birthday and some of Sita’s friends and workmates who are very familiar with Najla joined them.

Sita’s live-in maid who takes care of Najla when Sita is at work ran away and left Sita stranded without help to look after Najla. We volunteered to take care of Najla, thus Najla stays with us in PJ and Sita returns home to PJ on her weekend off days. It is nice to have the sounds of the little girl and the patters of little feet running around the house. She would alternate playtime with her grandmother or with me and is not difficult to handle at all. But……… not so when her mother is back. She will demand a lot of attention from Sita and would not allow Sita to do anything else except tend to her. She screams, she cries and she throws tantrums when Sita is around, a complete opposite behaviour to when her mother is not around!!

On certain days of the week we would join the community in breaking fast in the mosque and on these occasions Najla would follow us. We have to bring her along or else Ram will miss out on these gatherings. She will insist on wearing a full dress complete with headgear to go to the mosque. So cute. And when in the mosque she will sit quietly beside Ram during prayers and gave no trouble at all. Other children would be running around and be boisterous and all but Najla will just sit quietly and watch the other children. It is nice to have her around, a little tiring for us having to ‘chase’ after her, but the house seems more lively now. I am wondering now how it will be once Sita gets a replacement maid. Ah well …….. lets see how it goes…..

No prize guessing who this was for!