The Tuna Heist and the Moussaka’ah Mistake

Before I was the mom of ten, I was a girl with a tangled tongue in a very cold room.

My husband and I were traveling to California to meet his parents. They hadn’t been at our wedding; they had never seen my face. This wasn’t just a trip; it was a Grand Opening. And looking back, it was the first real test of my Hayaa, my nerves, and my stomach.

The Tangle of Tongue

The US Embassy room was clinical and freezing. I sat there, a new bride, feeling the heavy weight of a secret: a tiny life was already beginning inside me. When the interviewer asked about my father-in-law, I had the answer ready. But my nerves knotted the words.

“Plant Pathologist,” I meant to say. What came out was a jumbled, botanical alphabet soup.

The interviewer didn’t smile. He just stared through the glass and said, “What?” In that one word, I felt my “new wife” confidence vanish. I felt like an imposter. If it weren’t for my husband stepping in to untie the knot, I might still be standing at that window today.

The Back Row and the Great Betrayal

Then came the flight. 18 hours of being “newly pregnant” in a Transatlantic flight. The last leg of the flight between NY and LA, we were seated on the very last row—where the seats don’t recline and the scent of the galley is a constant trial. I got the window, Alhamdulilllah, my husband in the middle seat.

I was in a state of quiet delirium. When they offered refreshments, I reached for a cup of tomato juice, thinking of the sweet, refreshing fruit drinks of Indonesia. I took a deep gulp and my soul left my body. It wasn’t juice; it was cold, salty soup.

And then, the Oreos. My husband, the ever-generous guy, decided this was the perfect time to offer his pack of Saudi Oreos to the kind, large man sitting next to him. I watched those cookies leave his hand in slow motion. I loved my husband’s heart, but at that moment, I was a hunter-gatherer in a cardigan.

I was hungry. I was pregnant. And I was too shy to say a word. So, I ate his tuna.

I didn’t just eat it; I cherished it. It was the Coronation Tuna of my dreams—salty, creamy, and life-saving. It remains, to this day, the best thing I have ever eaten at 35,000 feet. It was the only thing that kept me anchored to the earth while we flew toward a family I had never met.

We landed in LAX like two survivors of a shipwreck. The California sun was too bright for my tired eyes, and my body was still vibrating from the engine of the back row. Then, the meeting: my parents-in-law.

They were the definition of polite. They were welcoming. But in my state—newly pregnant, the experience of being tongue-tied from the embassy still fresh in my mind, and still recovering from the tomato juice betrayal—every hello felt like a mountain. We drove two hours to their home, a journey through a landscape that looked nothing like the lush, green canopy of my home. It was brown, dry, and vast.

The Moussaka’ah Mistake

I thought I had prepared myself for the cultural shift. But no one told me about the Egyptian Moussaka’ah. A few days into the visit, we sat in the kitchen. My mother-in-law set a dish on the table. Not the formal dining room, this was the casual space, the heart of their home. I saw the deep purple of the eggplant and the rich red of the meat. My heart sang: Terong Balado! My Indonesian soul was ready for the spicy fire, the salt, the heat of home.

I took a large, hopeful bite. The shock was physical. It wasn’t the spicy fire of home; it was the sweet and savory dance of Egyptian Moussaka’ah. My palate, heightened by pregnancy, simply could not process it. My face turned a shade of red that matched the tomato sauce. My husband noticed, and with a hero’s grace, he let me sneak the rest onto his plate.

The Weight of the Unspoken

In the middle of this cultural whirlwind, there was a quiet ache I didn’t speak out loud. My great-aunt and uncle—my grandfather’s sister—lived in Columbus, Indiana. Growing up, they were the American branch of our family, the ones who made the long journey to Indonesia every single year until their bodies were too old to fly.

They were right there, on the same soil at last.

But I didn’t make it clear to my husband. I told him, but I didn’t tell him with the weight it deserved. I was too shy to be difficult, too bashful to demand a detour. I let it sound like a casual suggestion instead of the soul-deep necessity it was. I thought being a good wife meant having no needs, no demands, and no past that required a four-hour flight to Indiana.

I never did see her. She passed away before I could find the voice to say: “This is who I am. This is where I come from. We have to go.”

The Disneyland “Someday”

Then there was the matter of the Mouse.

We were right there in California. The castle was practically visible from the highway. But again, that quiet, polite girl inside me didn’t push. I didn’t want to seem frivolous. I didn’t want to ask for too much after the moussaka’ah incident and the delirium of the flight. I told myself, “We’ll do it later. We’ll come back when we have more time.”

I look at my house now : the laundry hills, the ten pairs of shoes by the door, the beautiful, loud chaos of my twelve-person tribe, and I have to laugh.

Later has arrived, but the math has changed! Taking two people to Disneyland is a date; taking twelve people is a strategic military operation and a small fortune. My bashfulness back then cost me a carefree day in the sun, and now I’m the one explaining to a dozen faces why we are building a sanctuary at home instead of standing in a six-hour line in Anaheim.

Beyond “What If”

I used to carry these missed moments like heavy stones. I would look at the “what ifs” and let the regret settle in.

But I am learning that the Prophet ﷺ warned us: “The word ‘if’ opens the way for the work of Shaytan.”

Every “missed” door was a door Allah closed for a reason. If I hadn’t missed Indiana, would I be so fierce about teaching my children their history now? If I hadn’t skipped the crowds of Anaheim, would I cherish the quiet sanctuary of our home as much as I do?

I am practicing and learning that while I was busy regretting the doors I didn’t open, Allah was busy building the ones I actually needed. I am practicing and learning to replace my “If onlys” with “Qaddarallahu wa ma sha’a fa’al” (Allah has decreed, and what He willed, He has done).

I am no longer the hungry girl in the back row. I am the Mother. And I know now that while I was worrying about the doors I didn’t open, Allah was busy building the one I actually needed.

It wasn’t a “failed” trip. It was a foundational one.

I have a heart full of stories to tell my children, and a soul that has learned that while my plans are small, His Decree is vast. And in that vastness, there is more peace than a trip to Disneyland could ever give.

How do you balance your “what-ifs” with your “Alhamdulillahs”? When you look back at your own missed doors, can you see the beautiful home Allah was building for you instead? Let’s find the beauty in the “unwritten” parts of our lives.