There is a question that has been in my mind since I was kid; how long will we live in the heaven after we death?
After graduating Elementary School, I continued my study to Islamic Boarding School. I asked that question to my teacher who understood about that, and I got varied answers. One of them answered that the life in hereafter was eternal. Endless.
“Won’t we get bored in the heaven, sir?” I who was really sure entering the heaven asked.
“It won’t!” the teacher explained, “Everything is different between the earth and the hereafter.”
According to his explanation, there will be nobody who pees and poops. There will be very beautiful angels and rivers as white as milk and as sweet as honey. There will not be any fights and riots, everyone loves each other. Everything will be perfect there!
On the other hand, in the hell, the sinful people will be tortured with the very hot fire. Some say, if someone steps on the fire stone there, even the smallest one, it will be enough to boil his brain!
Yes, how scary the hell is! And how tempting the heaven is!
But honestly, I was confused when the teacher gave that explanation. And it was too hard to understand for me as a child. I thought; will the wives be jealous when their husbands surrounded by the pretty angels? Where will the waste in my stomach go if we never poop and pee?
Besides, I still want to be a good person. It is like Ahmad Dani feat Crisye Song, if the heaven and the hell don’t exist, will you still pray to God?
I have a story about that.
In one early Sunday morning, I rode Fikri, my brother, to Depok by Honda-Astrea70-released-in-80 motorbike for a job interview. If I am not mistaken, it was a few days after Ied Mubarok day.
When the there was a tree junction, I slowed my bike. We slipped through the crowd very smoothly. But suddenly, from the left back side, there was some one riding a motorcycle very fast and hit the motorcycle in front of him. Screeeeeech!!!! CRASH!!! Two motorcycles hit the ground. It was horror. Everything seemed like in a slow motion. The world seemed like slowing down and then paused in a moment…
Fortunately, both the motorcycle riders were saved; include one more person who sat behind one of the rider. They weren’t dead. But unfortunately, one of the motorcycles that hit the ground was mine! At first I didn’t know what was really going on. All I know that suddenly there was a strong push from my left back side that caused my bike went trembling and finally hit the ground.
After a while we came back to reality. The people around the crime scene helped us to walked aside. As the innocent one, I tried to be calm.
“How are you? You’re alright, aren’t you?” the man who hit me asked. In my mind I wanted to be angry and shouted at him, but that didn’t happen. I saw that his motorcycle was damaged. It was worse than mine. And I could see he is older than I am. And maybe he was having a complicated mind or problem when he was riding motorcycle.
“I am OK! What about you?” I answered his question. And he explained the chronological event. I forgot the conversation. And with my maturity and a predicate as a good boy, I shake his hand. Before that, we exchanged our identity cards each other. And without my knowing he went somewhere. So my brother and I sat on the side of the road and didn’t know what to do.
And suddenly…. There was a middle-aged man greeted us.
“Wa’alaikum salam!” Fikri and I answered together. Before he came to us we saw him asking some mineral water in the shop near us but he didn’t get the water.
“Is Depok near or still far from here, boys?” the middle-aged man asked.
“Yes, sir! It’s still far from here! We also want to go there but we are having misfortune” I answered.
“We have some water, you may take it.” Fikri said.
“Where are you from?” I asked curiously.
“My wife is in a hospital to give a birth” he gave unasked information, “but I didn’t have enough money to pay the hospital. So, I decided to borrow some money from my relatives in Cikarang. When I arrived in their house, they weren’t there. They went hometown. And because I didn’t have any money, so I have to go to Depok from Cikarang on foot…. “
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Walk from Cikarang?! It's around 50 kilometers far from here!
Yup, at that time my conscience said: ‘Come on Nailal! Help him!” we felt pity and decided to give some money to him. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for public transportation cost to Depok. He finally left after thanking us. And my text messages to some friends were answered relatively disappointing.
It was only a story about my experience. And as long as there is someone needs help, I will always try to do my best.
Maybe there is a question in your mind; why do I never feel enough to help people? I have simple answer; it is because I believe that I will be helped, that some one will help me some day when I need one. Allah still want to help His servant as long as the servant still want to help his/her brother, Rasulullah has ever said that.
Yes, it was true, bro! After helping the middle-aged man, Fikri and I tried to do as he did. Walking home. Not to mention carrying the damaged Honda-Astrea70-released-in-80 motorbike. But there was another thing happened. We finally didn’t go home on foot, because not so far from the crime scene, we got helped by a thin-long-haired-parking-man. He asked what was going on and then he checked my motorcycle right away without even asked permission. But he did ask for a screwdriver and pliers that was put under the motorcycle seat to fix the motorcycle handlebar.
Then.
Hocus Pocus… Abracadabra… the handlebar was fixed! My motorcycle could run again eventhough it wasn’t as fast as before. We got home with some bruises, but most importantly, we were safe and sound.
