Holistic ‘Hair’ Homeopath

I was awaken by my son at 11 o’clock last night. Someone had knocked on our door wanting to see me for treatment. I had just gone to bed an hour earlier. I had waited for a patient who had made an appointment for 9.30pm but did not turn up. I thought it was this lady turning up late. To my surprise it was someone else. At about the same time my handphone rang. A lady at the other end wanted to come and see me then. I told her I was already sleeping. Don’t  Syrian doctors sleep? This has never happened to me before. Patients don’t call at 11pm and casually ask if they could come over for consultation for something which is not an emergency. Maybe it can happen during Ramadhan when people sleep in the day and stay up at night.

So this is something new to me. Cultural differences do sometimes cause such a shock. The lady called again and asked to see me at 5.30am. I consented as I was leaving that morning as well. And surprise, surprise, they were on time and it was the lady that had missed her 9.30 pm appointment. She did not even bother to let me know that she was not coming the night before. I did not finish with them until about 7am and my friend Iyad arrived 15 minutes later to pick me up and send me to the airport.

Today is the 17th day of the fasting month of Ramadahan. I had spend  the first week of this  Ramadhan in  Madinah  and Makkah.  I had never before performed the Umrah  ( visit to the two holy cities) during the fasting month and had always wanted this experience. Truly the one week that I spend there was really testing especially in Makkah.

Compared to the Umrahs that I had done before the last Umrah was very testing. This Umrah one performed on a thursday afternoon. I had performed the Tawaf after Asar prayers. The heat of the late afternoon sun and an increase in the number of people began to take its toll. It took me a hour from the usual 40 minutes. Then I proceed to do the Saie. Here the crowd had increased greatly and I lost my temper after being bumped at the rear. I almost tripped the guy..how I regret this. May Allah forgive me. I could still see the shocked on the face of the boy sitting in the wheel chair when I motioned a karate chop to this neck after he bumped into me whilst playing with his friend. I did this with a smile and saved the situation.

I might have failed this test of performing Umrah during Ramadhan but InsyaAllah I will try again next year. Hopefully I will fare better then.