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MacGyver, Quantum Leap, and My Wildly Unqualified Childhood Confidence
I sometimes think old television gave children from the 80s and 90s an unreasonable amount of confidence 😭 MacGyver made us believe intelligence could solve almost anything using: a paperclip, duct tape, and emotional determination. Knight Rider convinced us that the future would obviously include emotionally supportive talking cars. Airwolf somehow made helicopters feel deeply dramatic and spiritually important. And Quantum Leap? Quantum Leap convinced me that time travel was not only possible, but emotionally manageable. Which is how childhood me ended up creating an entire imaginary storyline about becoming a time traveler accidentally stranded in the Wild West. Naturally, I adapted extremely well. I became a cowgirl. I learned…
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An Example of My Jumbled Mind (The Forty-Tab Brain)
I talk a lot about having “forty tabs open,” but let’s be real—it isn’t just about being busy. It’s a survival mission that lives entirely inside my head. And look, I’m not trying to make myself sound like the center of the universe. I know, deep down, that life would go on even without me. The world doesn’t stop because a mom takes a break. I also don’t want to belittle the massive part my husband and kids play in keeping this family moving—they are the ones spinning the wheels every day. But even when the wheels are rotating perfectly, the mental load is just… there. It’s the invisible architecture.…
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The Trail I’m Leaving Behind
I really have to share why I started Barakah Roots—not as a “brand” or a project, but so you can understand why I am here, opening up my house and my head to you. I was born in 1981. I’m a child of that bridge generation—the ones who remember the silence of a house before the internet lived in our pockets. Now, it’s 2026. I live in Sharjah, managing a house of twelve. Ten children. A multicultural marriage where we are constantly translating our very souls across different languages and unspoken codes. Most days, I am the logistics officer for a small army. My mind is a Forty-Tab Brain. I’m…
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The 10:00 AM Ramadan Heist
We like to think of our childhood memories as deeply spiritual milestones. But if I’m being truly honest? One of my most vivid Ramadan memories involves a storage room, a locked door, and a very poorly timed snack. I wasn’t even hungry. That’s the funny part. It was only 10:00 AM. But the house was quiet, the day felt long, and I was… bored. And in the mind of an eight-year-old, the best cure for boredom is a forbidden banana. I remember the strategy. I snatched the fruit and made a run for the storage room—that dark sanctuary of old suitcases and dust. I didn’t just hide; I locked the…
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My TV Memory Lane, from Oshin to Si Komo
Memory is a funny thing. When I look back at my childhood in Indonesia, I often lump all my favorite shows into one giant, sunny morning. But if I’m being honest, they didn’t all happen at once. They were a patchwork—some were for Sunday mornings, some were for rainy Tuesday afternoons, some for those times after school, and others were the quiet, heavy dramas we watched with our parents in the evening. They didn’t just occupy a timeslot; they occupied different seasons of my soul. Oshin Taught Me About The Lessons of Resilience: If I think about my very first “telenovela” experience, it wasn’t a glitzy soap opera. It was…
