My trip to Madina...

This February, I am writing about my umrah trip from 30Jan-9Feb 2014

The first part of my trip is at Madinah Munawarah.

Madina holds the Masjidil Nabawi, better known as Prophet Muhammad's SAW mosque.
It is here that huge hidayah came from Allah azzawajal. It holds Prophet's grave and it is where the Islamic state was first practiced.

The mosque is huge and very calm. When I arrived at 4.30am on Fri 31 Jan 2014, I can feel the calmness and the peacefulness of this place.

It is as if the Prophet himself, is present and greeting you. He is the perfect human being whom which we must follow, and he will be the one who will save us in the hereafter with his syafaat.

The mosque is very beautiful. As an electrical engineer, I am very impress to see that not even 1 light is faulty. This is truly a remarkable feat.

I can see many people from all over the world here. From the far east (Malaysia, Indonesia) to South Asia (India, Pakistan) to Central Asia (the Tan countries) to Iran to Europe (main Turks) to China.

What is not nice, is I observe some people, kind of worship the Prophet's grave. This is not what was taught. We are to worship Allah and only Allah.

There is this place called Rauthah, which is a small confined space between Prophet SAW grave and the mosque's mimbar. This place is what they called the "garden of the world". You have to struggle with many people in order to get into this place. People who successfully "got" this place will remain there and do not want to give it to others.

I knew my chances is very remote to even enter Rauthar, let alone stay there to perform 2 rakaat prayer. I made doa to Allah so that He make it easy for me to enter Rauthah

On the second day of my stay in Madinah, I tried to enter the Rauthah area but failed. There were too many people and this was just after Asr prayers. So I exit to the nearest door. When I reached the door to exit, the masjid people closed that particular door and asked me to exit to another door.

So I went to the adjacent door and again that particular door was also shut for cleaning purposes. I had to exit via the Rauthah area as there was no other available door. I forced myself into the Rauthah and after some great effort managed to enter Rauthah and exit through Rasul's grave.

Masyaallah, this is entirely Allah's plan, to invite me into Rauthah. Although I did not have the chance to perform 2 rakaat solat in Rauthah, but I knew that this is Allah's plan to make me enter Rauthah. If the 2 doors were not blocked, I would have just exit the masjid Nabawi.

Conclusion: It is difficult to enter the paradise (jannah). It is already very difficult to enter the garden of the world (Rauthah), what more to enter garden of the hereafter.

But, with some effort AND doa to Allah, insyaallah Allah will make it easy for us ALL.