Dua's Please

There's a lot going on these past few days and I'm going to hit you guys up for some dua's. We need to get an exchange going.

Dua Number One: Please pray for Sapargali Aubakirov, the Kazakh diplomat who I seldom saw but always enjoyed on the rare chances that I did. He never passed by me in the hall without smiling and saying hello. He told great fishing stories (it was this big. Not the fish, just the fish's eye!) and educated me in the Russianization of Muslim last names. His last name, Aubakirov, is actually a transformed version of Abu Bakr.

He was shot in the back of the head yesterday, execution-style by two men who entered his home with him. They shot him four more times before leaving with his car. Embassy staff broke into his house 12 hours later when the servant said he was not opening his door. They rushed him to PIMS, where he underwent surgery. He's in a deep coma right now. The doctors are not expecting him to recover.

Dua Number Two: A serious possible buyer for the house and restaurant (Chez Daddy: good food, slow service) showed up last week and a verbal agreement has been made. It seems almost too good to be true, since we had been planning to sell the restaurant first and the house later, and the price agreed upon is perfect.

Our move to the UAE has only been waiting on those two things, the restaurant and house sale, because it's the capital in those properties that will be used to invest and live in the UAE. If the papers are signed after Eid, as is expected, the restaurant will change hands next month and we could be off! Insha'Allah. Don't kill me for writing this, Chai, Crayon, Hemmie, you know I love you guys. And plus, I'll warm a dune up for y'all. We'll go 4x4'ing and camping under the stars in the powdery mountains of warm yellowy sand and wrestle with belly-dancing scorpions and all that kind of fun stuff. And then we'll roast a camel.

But yeah, those are the two Dua appeals. It's a strange mix of emotion, knowing that on one hand your world may be coming nicely together and on the other, someone's is rapidly falling apart. I can't imagine what Sapargali's friends and family must be going through. I don't want to imagine what he went through, one minute he was entertaining two guests, the next minute they pulled a gun and made him kneel down. The sickening rush of fear, the terror, the sense of betrayal…

May Allah have mercy on Sapargali and grant him life so long as life is good for him, and death whenever death is good for him. May God heal Sapargali by his grace, or receive him in mercy and forgiveness. Inna lillahi wa inna ileihi rajioon. Verily we are God's and to Him we return.

posted by Abez @ 1/20/2005 03:28:00 PM