Samsidar dreams of making pilgrimage for dead brother

Samsidar dreams of making pilgrimage for dead brother

Brian Murphy, Associated Pressm, Banda Aceh, Aceh

The fisherman had waited all his life for this moment -- when he
would put away his old nets for a while and join the Muslim
pilgrimage to Mecca.

His sister threw him a party with balloons and special spicy
rice. The gifts included a new Koran and guests started calling
50-year-old Mat Saleh by the honorific haji, reserved for those
who have made the holy trip to Mecca.

Mat Saleh was packing when the sea withdrew and roared back
with killing force three weeks ago. His beachside home was among
the first wiped from the Earth in the tsunami. He and his family
were gone.

"Someday, God willing, I'll make the haj as an honor to my
brother," said his sister, Samsidar Usman, who also lost her
husband in the Dec. 26 disaster and later found a place in a
muddy refugee settlement around a mosque. "But there is little
time for happy thoughts like that now."

Mat Saleh was among the estimated 500 pilgrims from the
devastated province of Aceh, on the northern tip of Sumatra
island, who did not turn up for government-organized flights to
Saudi Arabia from Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim
nation.

It is still unknown how many of those planning for the haj
were killed or made refugees by the waves that first steamrolled
northwestern Indonesia and raced across the Indian Ocean within
hours -- taking some 162,000 lives, more than two-thirds of them
from Indonesia.

The tragedy has left a shadow on this year's main hajj, which
coincides with a period during the 12th month of the Muslim lunar
calendar. The haj -- a spiritual journey of prayers and rituals
-- comes to a climax Wednesday.

An estimated 2 million pilgrims, including 200,000
Indonesians, are expected to pass through the holy cities of
Medina and Mecca.

Mat Saleh's sister had planned to welcome her brother back
with another party and a present of new clothes to replace the
simple white cloth worn by men on the haj -- a once-in-a-lifetime
duty for all Muslims who can afford the trip and whose health can
withstand the rigors.

"The tsunami took it. It took everything we owned," said
Samsidar, 40, who wears a small towel on her head instead of the
traditional white "jilbab," or cowl, favored by many Indonesian
women.

It, too, was ripped off by the sea. She and her three children
were washed more than a kilometer inland. She remembers seeing a
neighbor decapitated by a piece of metal roofing. Somehow, she
said, they stayed atop the swells -- which many survivors recall
had a strange gray and lifeless color.

Her husband was off fishing that morning. His body has not
been found.

"When the wave came, some people were pushed down. We were
tossed to the surface," she said. "Why is that? I can only say it
was God who kept us from drowning."

This is why she hopes someday to take the hajj.

"It would be like a double haj: for me and Mat Saleh," she
said. "I like to think he would be watching me and happy. But
first I must take care of the living here. How I will do that, I
don't know. We can't go back to where we lived. It's part of the
sea now."

Her first goal: find a better place for her family outside the
camp, a collection of wood-and-plastic tents in a mosque
courtyard that never dries out from the daily downpours.

Then -- just maybe, she says -- her oldest son could find some
kind of job and the family can start saving again.

"The haj will always remain a dream because of my brother,"
she said. "Without money and without a home, it's a distant
dream. But I won't forget it. I owe it to my brother."

The haj culminates with prayers on Mount Arafat, where Islam's
founder Prophet Muhammad delivered his final sermon, before the
Eid al-Adha, or the feast of sacrifice, commemorating God's
provision of a ram for Abraham to sacrifice as he was about to
slay his son to show his devotion.

No special memorials or events have been announced during the
haj for the tsunami victims, but some survivors have offered
special prayers upon reaching Mecca.