[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam]
Day 24: Living on a prayer
Got up bleary eyed at 02:45 and brushed my teeth, hopefully with my own toothbrush. We made our way, luggage in tow to the pick up point we agreed with the cabbie the night before. It was 03:30, dark and warm as we bade farewell to al-Haram.
We didn't stop on the road as planned and made it to the airport by 04:45. We prayed fajr with the Imam at the airport mosque and then had tea. After checking in I bought a couple more overpriced presents.
Time is now 07:00 and I'm listening to my 'Istanbul' play list on the mp3 player. Man I love this music. Haven't heard any songs during the whole trip. I thought it would be inappropriate and it would have been.
We board around 08:00.
Glory Days
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, shopping, airport, glory days, living on a prayer, duty free]
And so Esha prayers concludes
And with it my Umrah trip 2009. It went calmly with not too many (all relative of course) people attending. It was rather cool as well.
I'll miss it.
Dinner was KFC. The last time I eat it in a while.
Now I just have to make sure we get up on time early tomorrow morning.
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, shopping]
Where did the time go?
It was on the 25th of June that we set out on our pilgrimage, all those days ago. It has been 23 days, it's not as though we've been doing loads of things yet time has flown by.
There are now two sets of prayers left before we leave. We should be checking out at 03:30 in the morning, doing fajr prayers and having breakfast on the road. We're scheduled to land at Heathrow around lunchtime. So inshallah, we should be at home on Saturday afternoon.
Went to Mecca Tower yesterday, it is massive. No I mean it, it's massive and it sparkles. They sure as heck spent money on it. They have some familiar brands in there such as Starbucks, mothercare, Next, debenhams, KFC, BK and Pizza Hut. While impressive, it's not my sort of thing.
Time has flown and our trip is near its end. When next will I have the opportunity to come here again?
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, nomaz, maghrib, esha, starbucks, pizza hut, BK, mothercare, debenhams, kfc, next, mecca tower]
There are now two sets of prayers left before we leave. We should be checking out at 03:30 in the morning, doing fajr prayers and having breakfast on the road. We're scheduled to land at Heathrow around lunchtime. So inshallah, we should be at home on Saturday afternoon.
Went to Mecca Tower yesterday, it is massive. No I mean it, it's massive and it sparkles. They sure as heck spent money on it. They have some familiar brands in there such as Starbucks, mothercare, Next, debenhams, KFC, BK and Pizza Hut. While impressive, it's not my sort of thing.
Time has flown and our trip is near its end. When next will I have the opportunity to come here again?
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, nomaz, maghrib, esha, starbucks, pizza hut, BK, mothercare, debenhams, kfc, next, mecca tower]
Day 23: Last Christmas I gave you my heart
So far today has been a bit of an emotional day what with it being my last proper day in Saudi Arabia. I have no particular love for the country or it's people. It's more that this is the home of Islam. This is where Islam was born all of those years ago.
Jummah prayers was hectic as you would imagine it to be. I sat very uncomfortably for the most part but the prayers went very comfortably. I wasn't hindered as I thought I might be because of the sheer number of people.
More and more people seem to be arriving as the days go by. We picked the perfect times to come to Saudi and return to the UK. Although I hear the swine flu is raging over there. Perhaps we should stay in Saudi a little longer.
Fajr prayers was quite busy. It has been for the last few days, though I'm still able to find a good place to sit. We performed the prayers to Wham's Christmas classic Last Christmas which somebody had rather unwisely chose as their ring tone. Still no harm done.
You'll be happy to hear I didn't forget to have lunch this time!
Asr, Maghrib and Esha left and then that's it.
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, shopping, cockroach, stubble, beard, shave, wham, george michael, last christmas, jummah, crowd, pray, prayers]
Jummah prayers was hectic as you would imagine it to be. I sat very uncomfortably for the most part but the prayers went very comfortably. I wasn't hindered as I thought I might be because of the sheer number of people.
More and more people seem to be arriving as the days go by. We picked the perfect times to come to Saudi and return to the UK. Although I hear the swine flu is raging over there. Perhaps we should stay in Saudi a little longer.
Fajr prayers was quite busy. It has been for the last few days, though I'm still able to find a good place to sit. We performed the prayers to Wham's Christmas classic Last Christmas which somebody had rather unwisely chose as their ring tone. Still no harm done.
You'll be happy to hear I didn't forget to have lunch this time!
Asr, Maghrib and Esha left and then that's it.
[Category saudi arabia][tags saudi arabia, umrah, pilgrim, photography, photo, al-haram, ka'aba, mecca, medina, people, mosque, religion, islam, shopping, cockroach, stubble, beard, shave, wham, george michael, last christmas, jummah, crowd, pray, prayers]
