Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri to all Muslims, particularly to my Malay friends and blog readers here! A month of fasting finally came to an end and may you have a wonderful and festive Raya celebration with your family, relatives and friends! If you are returning to hometown, have a safe trip and don’t be stress out by the traffic congestion (it is inevitable). For those who are not celebrating, happy holiday as well! This is a slightly longer weekend, thanks to the Hari Raya holiday that falls on Friday this year. Hence, I wouldn’t miss this opportunity to return home to spend a bit longer time in KL.

I’m already expecting a huge crowd tomorrow at the two border checkpoints between Malaysia and Singapore after working hours. A lot of Malaysians working in Singapore (like me, and especially the Malays) will go back to Malaysia for this celebration or simply enjoying the holiday. Usually it would take an hour or two to get through the checkpoints, but for tomorrow, I’m expecting about 3 hours. That is craziness that will only happen a few times in a year (only during festive period). A bus ride from Singapore to KL will usually take 6 hours, but for tomorrow, I’m thinking 8 hours or even more. My bus ride will start at 9pm and I think it will be almost morning when I reached KL.

The crowd at the checkpoints is my first concern. The second one is the traffic congestion along the route. Authorities in both Singapore and Malaysia should really look into making the exiting and entering procedures more efficient and less time consuming. My suggestion is to combine the two checkpoints into one, making it much easier and convenient for everyone. For bus passengers like us, we do not need to get down the bus twice if this approach is implemented and the buses do not need to queue again and again. People would ask me, why not just take a flight? Well, affordability is still my priority.

There isn’t much Raya mood going on here in Singapore, mainly because Malays comprises only a very small portion of the population here. It’s considered just a minor celebration here as opposed to being one of the main festive seasons in Malaysia. I recalled the time when I was working in a small office where all the other employees are Malays. They would turn up the radio with all the repeating festive Raya songs, share the Raya snacks and biscuits, and organize break fasting session and I would join in the fun. When my former colleagues were taking additional leave on the Raya week, I am the only one left working in the office. That was some cool experience though.

Anyway, I would like to take this opportunity to wish to all the Muslims Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri again! Have a great one! I’m looking forward to this weekend too in KL!

(Images in this post are from various sources throughout the world wide web)