Of Sacrifice and the Passing Time

-Today marks my 4th time celebrating Eid-ul-Adha far away from my home. Today's celebration was fun, I had a great time together with friends and acquaintances, as well as experiencing the great international experience of celebrating Eid with lots of people from different countries with different cultural background, in a land where most people don't trust organized religions. My fellow Malaysians, Indonesians, Bangladeshis, Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, Turkish.....it is really a different experience here in Japan, and I am going to treasure the experience, regardless of my largely agnostic attitude towards my old faith.

-Well, I don't want to be talking too much about faith, as I am still confused and trying to find my way out in a mature way that's acceptable by me. But still, the sacrifice made by Abraham and his son Ishmael (Christians say it's Isaac, but what the hell, maybe God asked for them both, I don't really care no more), that is a kind of story that makes you think, what sacrifice actually is.

-Is sacrifice made out of necessity really sacrifice? Does being forced to lost or give up something can be really considered a sacrifice? Can one sacrifice another, in the name of any imaginable cause? Does God require sacrifice, or is it really us that require sacrifice? Those are some of the questions that went out in my mind, as I tried in vain to focus on the after-prayer sermon, disturbed by noises of children playing (I really don't get it how children who don't really speak the same language manage to communicate and play together. We adults must have lost something as we grow up).

-Yes, the 4th Eid-ul-Adha in a foreign land also reminds me of the passing time. Of course I am aware of the argument that time doesn't really exist in a physical sense; I am also aware of the argument that the experience of a passing time is merely a side-effect of us organizing our experiences in a sensible order. Yet, in the end, it seems that the conventional idea of time really does work for most of us, most of the time. And I am still subject to my mental depression which enhances my sense of the passing time, and this makes me feel like God is playing games with me, a game called Responsibility and Regrets, in which I am being held responsible for every mistake that I did, and as a result, I feel regrets which are useless, because I don't seem to be able to learn anything from them, nor am I able to move forward in a real way.

-I think I need to stop being nihilistic; it is of no real use to me. Let's just be pessimistic.