Eat, Pray And Love (Not The Movie)

Today is a public holiday in Malaysia, which is Wesak Day celebrated by the Buddhist. Normally, I would spend my time outside sipping hot chocolate, indulging warm blueberry scone with strawberry jam and enjoying the free wifi at Starbucks. But not today! The weather seems a bit cloudy today since 9am after my breakfast at a "mamak" restaurant nearby my house. So, I choose to stay at home instead doing what I always do, watch DVDs.

I began the day with Julia Robert's Eat Pray Love, a very nice movie indeed mostly because of the theme as well as the places that she went to. If I have a lot of money, I'll to the same thing as she does of course, travelling all around the world, living amongst the people; do what they do, eat what they eat, speak what they speak and others. Well, below are my ideas and thoughts on Eat Pray Love.

EAT

Food is the one thing that I really enjoy which I never quite mind spending a lot of money into it. I'll try any new food which of course have to be "halal" in the first place. My idea of an amazing and great food are beautiful, tasty, full of aroma and most importantly, it was cooked and prepared with so much devotion and love in it. The simplest dish that I find very tasty and great is Madam Kwan's "terung masak belacan" or eggplant sauteed with prawn paste. It has all what I described just now; beautiful (the color of the eggplant), tasty (the salty prawn paste plus some spiciness), and the aroma (the smell of the prawn paste). It is great living in Malaysia with so many people in diverse races which have their own special mouth-watering delicacies.

"The only time to eat diet food is is while you're waiting for the steak to cook"

Julia Child

PRAY

Although I'm not a devout Muslim, but I observe the compulsory requirement in Islam. It has been in my plan to visit Muslim countries in the future, mostly because I love the architecture of centuries old mosque, library and universities. Turkey would be a great place to begin with because of their great and beautiful buildings in the old city of Istanbul such as the Blue Mosque, Topkapi Museum and Hagia Sophia. The huge and amazing domes are breath-taking! The second place would be Cordoba in Spain, which is the birthplace of famous philosophers and scholars such as ibn-Hazm, ibn-Rushd and al-Qurtubi, and also where the Great Mosque of Cordoba is located. Once a mosque, currently it is a cathedral for Roman Catholic since 1236. Lastly, I would like to perform pilgrimage (I hope in my lifetime) to the three sacred mosques; Masjid Al-Haram (Mekah), Masjid Al-Nabawi (Madinah) and Masjid Al-Aqsa (Jerusalem).

"It is not the land that makes anyone holy, but one's deeds"

Salman al-Farisi

LOVE

Where is the best place to fall in love? For me, the place should have at least three things; great, humble, soft-spoken and well-mannered people, peaceful and calm surrounding and lastly, a common language spoken. The combination of these will (hopefully) create deep and lasting love. Love, according to Sophocles is one word which frees us of all the weight and pain in life. That is why when you're in a lovey-dovey moments, you'll feel a great burden is lifted, your senses are heighten and you'll feel more happy than ever. Well, I guess most of them are caused by hormones flooding into the blood, but nevertheless it is a universal response for people. I've been in and out of love several times, and over the years when you start to age, you'll find that the idea of love has changed over time.

"All mankind love a lover"

Ralph Waldo Emerson