Dear Hajj travelers of 2007, last year I visited the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina as part of an Umrah trip along with an American youth group. The following descriptions of what I experienced may help the reader and especially those of you who are blessed to be apart of this years Hajj program. I hope you will benefit from my experience and that it helps you to gain a glimpse of the incredible life changing journey you are about to embark upon. May Allah protect you and keep you safe and accept your Hajj Ameen. Please make dua for us as well. 

Kaba 

As I stepped into the sphere of the Masjid-Al-Haram under a desert night sky in the city of Mecca; I hurried closer and closer, closer towards the magnetic pulse of the house of the one true God on earth, and finally as my eyes set upon the Kaba (House of God) built by Abraham and Ismail some 3000 years ago, a planet of peace fell upon my heart and all the desires of my heart came temporarily crashing down; worry and anxiety, silver and gold no more weighed heavy upon my heart. And then I had an arcane vision of meeting Allah; that I felt so close to my Rab (Lord) and as I looked up I could not take my eyes off the Kaba. A heat wave of love and awe and the thought of Allah (God's) throne up above me and who knows how many light years up into the abyss of the sky belay the throne of my Creator. I began to remember that I was there to beseech Him and make amends for the sins, the horrible sins that I committed, weighing heavy on my heart. What do I say? What should I say? I could not remember a thing as my senses were in tuned with the peace and serenity of the black shrouded house as if I were walking through a golden field where upon the sky breathed red, purple and yellow tints billowing out of an October sky. 

I did not shed any tears and I don't know why, perhaps the result of many years of a hardened heart but I felt that I had a chance now and then I began to recite the talbiyaah (prayer)," Labayk Labayk Allahumah Labayk (here am I am my Lord, here I am to worship you)! "Please put a great distance between me and the sins I committed! Rabi! Please forgive me for all that I did against you and myself! Yah Rabi, please forgive me, I seek refuge in you from the sickness in my heart." In chapter two verse 125 or the Holy Quran, Allah (God) says "Remember when we made the House (Kaba) a center and sanctuary for mankind saying, "Take the station of Ibrahim (Abraham) as a place of prayer; We entrusted Ibrahim and Ismail to cleanse Our House for those who walk around it, who meditate in it, and who kneel and prostrate in prayers." 

And as I circled around the Kaba as instructed by our lord as an action of devotion and worship (Ibadah), I wondered why I had placed so many barriers between my creator and myself. How long had I been sleeping? How long had I been drifting on through the night with one day blurring into the next and not remembering the honor of being chosen by Allah to be a Muslim (believer). He loved me so much even when I gave my heart to something else. He guided me here and it was in this place where I found myself prostrating and meditating as the belief in my heart reached its apex. 

I could not take my eyes of this life force called the Kaba as much as I tried. And as the birds circled up above the House of God in sync with us, I realized that I was in a place where all existence seemed to merge into one idea and one end and one white shroud. I hope that I was forgiven, I don't know if I was, but perhaps I can take comfort in the wing of hope and the wing of fear as described by Ibn Al Qayyim who said that, "The heart is like a bird, love for Allah is its head, and its two wings are hope and fear." The House of Allah s (God) made me feel at home, like I returned to my home in a world untouched and sanctified like fresh rain-drops upon the earth. 

This spiritual journey allowed me to experience the roots of the Abrahamic faith and the birth place of the beloved Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him). I personally gained a realistic vision of what Islam really was and is through being in such a magnificent place and taking it in. 

Before the trip I began reflecting upon my past life and how I had lived it. I asked myself what I had done to change myself and come closer to Allah. I began to fear change, and the inevitable change that I was certain would come after visiting the House of Allah and the Prophet peace be upon him. I knew that it was time; time to come back to the fitra which is the original state that Allah s had created us upon. It was time to renew my faith and exit out of an empty idea of life, an idea that we learn by what surrounds us in this civilization. A friend once related a story to me about a man who was sitting in a cell, yet the cell door was open. He sat there looking out at the freedom that lay before him, but it was his heart that imprisoned him to his cell, it was his sins that bind him to his fear of change and hope. I remember this young American Muslim teen walking the streets of downtown Los Angeles at six o clock in the morning; a scared kid with no sense of direction and so far away from the shade of Islam and the sweetness of brotherhood and Imaan, and all the while, "he was trying to throw his arms around the dunia (world)."