Happy Valentine’s Day

Yes, so 14th February 2023 and/or 14th April 2023 is worth celebrating if Covid-19 or a Russian missile has not got me before that. If not, it will not matter anymore, and those still alive please raise your glasses and drink a toast to me…yam seng…

NO HOLDS BARRED

Raja Petra Kamarudin

I don’t really celebrate Valentine’s Day — or even Hari Raya, Chinese New Year, Thanksgiving, Merdeka Day, Malaysia Day, Guy Fawkes Day, Halloween, Prophet Muhammad’s Birthday, Muharram, Ashura Day, and so on, for that matter.

I do, however, celebrate Christmas, more or less my only ‘celebration’ — but not because it was the day Jesus was born (because Jesus was not born on the 25th of December, 2021 years ago, like we have been led to believe) — but because it is the only time the entire family can be under one roof and forget what an awful world we live in.

Muslims are not happy with what they see as a ‘Christian’ Valentine’s Day, and they want Muslims to celebrate it the Islamic way. I’m not sure what that means. Merdeka Day and Malaysia Day are not any more Islamic than Valentine’s Day since these are celebrations of events that turned Malaya/Malaysia from a British colony into a secular state, which Islam is against.

Our first wedding anniversary in 1974

So what’s the difference between Valentine’s Day, Merdeka Day, or Malaysia Day? All are ‘kafir’ celebrations anyway, kalau nak kira halus.

Anyway, next year I shall be celebrating 14th April 2023, not Valentine’s Day, but Marina’s and my 50th wedding anniversary, whether Islamic or not.

Marina and I were married on 14th April 1973, and in this day and age it is not easy to survive 50 years of marriage, which Marina calls two-and-a-half “life sentences” (one life sentence in the UK is 20 years).

In 2009, Marina got cancer, and survived. Last year, I got Covid-19, and survived. Over the last 54 years I have survived 13 motorcycle accidents (with broken bones all over my body, which I am now paying for in my old age) and one bad car accident (without a scratch, though the car was quite beaten up).

So there is much to be grateful for and to celebrate. The fact that next year is not only our 50th wedding anniversary but would be my 72nd year of still being alive is probably a miracle considering both my parents died before their 50th birthday.

Marina and me, 14th April 1973

Somehow, for a long time now, I have always thought I would live at the most to age 73 or 74. Why 73 or 74 I don’t know. Maybe it’s my mind conditioning me to accept my mortality so that, when the time comes, I can face it with calm and without any regrets. It’s like someone on death row who has exhausted all appeals, including for a pardon, who now just waits for the hangman’s noose.

Anyway, if that happens, this will mean my 50th wedding anniversary next year will be the most important and final celebration. So maybe I might celebrate Valentine’s Day next year on 14th February 2023 as well, Islamic or not. And maybe I will return to Malaysia to do that even if the police are waiting at KLIA to detain me and cart me off to the Sungai Buloh Prison.

I mean, if I am ‘leaving’ in a year or so, what difference does it make? Malaysia and the entire world are already screwed up anyway and way beyond repair. In fact, if Russia attacks Ukraine, and WWIII breaks out, I, and millions of Europeans as well, might not even survive 2022.

Yes, so 14th February 2023 and/or 14th April 2023 is worth celebrating if Covid-19 or a Russian missile has not got me before that. If not, it will not matter anymore, and those still alive please raise your glasses and drink a toast to me…yam seng…