Charity drive for a surau

One day my mom told me that her school is collecting donation to build the school’s surau (musolla). Trust me, I can’t believe a Sekolah Kebangsaan does not have a proper surau. They basically make use one of the classrooms. Lay down a mat and a few sejadah. Men and women have to take turns. Thousand of questions ligers in my head, it is totally not a new school, is someone telling me there’s no drive at all to build a surau before? I really feel like badmouthing about their PTA. Breath in, breath out..

My mom was actually asking me to take those documents (as proof) and help in collecting the donation among my friends at work.

However I’m faaaaarrr tooooo shy to do so. At the same time I am truly aware that this is for a good cause. However, at the same time, there are too many scams going around, I’m afraid people might look at me as one of the scams. Mom was upset with my refusal, I think. She turn to my dad straight away and said,

“Abah, let’s donate (RMxx) each month until they have enough fund.”

And my dad agreed! (May Allah bless their heart & soul).

Then it strikes me, if mom and dad could pledge to donate monthly, why not I just join them. So I also pledge to donate certain amount each month until the fund is enough. Deep in my heart I know, my mom won’t be able to use this surau as she’s retiring by the end of this year.

I shared this story with my friends, and most of them said,

“Go to the newly appointed state government and ask for fund. They are filthy rich!”

or

“ True ar? I thought the previous ruling party was religious? Why don’t you go and ask for their help?”

I felt like I was hit by a huge lightning.

I am really lousy at convincing people.

I calm myself. After a while I think, as much as we refuse to channel our money out, why would we want to ask other people to hand us cold, hard cash? Be it a normal citizen like us, a pauper like me, or even a multi billionaire. At this point I almost give up.

Then, I keep listening to religious talks on youtube. I especially love ceramah given by Ustaz Don on wakaf. Usually after listening to the ceramah, I feel like, does it mean what I have today is a test from Allah? If I could pamper myself with monthly facial treatment, monthly insurance payment, monthly spending on clothes, daily spending on food and once a week spending on fast food, why can’t I cut any of these and channel the money to this surau?

Alhamdulillah, Allah had given me an idea. Mom loves to sell stuff, such as tudung, kain pasang, caftan, kain batik. So last weekend, I followed mom to get some stuff from the wholesaler. I will try to sell kain pakai (used for praying) and caftans (short & long sleeves). I just want to try my luck. I start small, 6-pcs kain pakai, and 6-pcs caftan.

All the profit from selling this stuff will go to the surau of this Sekolah Kebangsaan.

I think it is easier to get money this way than asking people to hand me cash.

I think I can sleep soundly at night doing such thing than go and rob a bank. (How could I think of robbing a bank to build a surau? Pfftt!!)

I think by doing this I will know those strangers at my workplace; the ones I usually exchange smiles only.

I left those stuff I’m selling at the surau of my workplace and during Zuhr prayer I can clearly see I have no business at all. I was down for a while. But I keep chanting, "I believe in God-given rezeki".

Few minutes past 5, one sms came in. An SMS from a stranger called Ainun. She’s my first customer. She bought a long-sleeves caftan!

May Allah bless you Ainun! How I wish I could tell you that I’m doing this for a charity drive. But I have to protect my inner-self at the same time.

If I could, I would want everyone to buy a kain pakai for solat or a caftan from me. If one person buying one, I could help them faster. Buy I think I’m greedier than that. Could you please pray that I have enough strength to continue doing this and it not okay if it takes a longer time to get enough fund, as long as the stuff I’m leaving at the surau of my workplace don’t go missing (we have few cases of this) and can you pls pls pray that my heart won’t go astray.

p/s: I sincerely don’t mean to be riak about this (what’s to riak about? I achieved nothing so far). But if you cannot offer me a good word, a motivation, a stack of cash for the surau, pls at least, offer a prayer for the surau. Thanks!