:bism: Hi!
Lol - definitely friends, not just hopefully! Hehe.
So, I went to Hajj when I was about seven years old with my parents. I didn't really understand what was happening. There was such a crush in terms of the crowd that I was scared and one time due to my small height (being a kid of course - lol) I felt suffocated, and my mom (from what I remember) had to go to find me a spot in which I could breathe normally without feeling as if all the bodies in the crowd are restricting my air passageway.
Well, hmm, when I was a little kid, I didn't know really about Islam or anything, but I believed in one God. Anyway, thinking back (now that I'm an adult), I am actually surprised that my parents at the time even went to Mecca to Hajj as they were secular people. Being a kid, maybe they thought I wouldn't understand and so they didn't even tell me why we were going to Mecca or what Hajj was. So, I can't even say if I felt spiritual or not. But I could tell as a kid that this was some important big thing happening. I also remember this one childless couple who we happened to meet, and apparently they came there to pray to be blessed with that child; later, as a child, I remember hearing my parents discussing that their prayer was answered Alhamdhullilah (praise, blessings, and thanks to God).
My parents don't speak Arabic; and I don't recall them having any trouble in communication.
Oh, one other odd thing I remember is that my mom did tell me to stop crying when my mom couldn't find my dad and younger sister in the crush. Maybe to scare me a bit, she asked me to keep quiet or otherwise people and police might get the impression that my mom has kidnapped me - so, that quieted me immediately - lol.
So, actually, for a period of time I was raised a cultural Muslim. In my preteen and teen years, in life, I turned atheist/agnostic. Then I read a lot about other cultures and religions in college just because I was a voracious reader and loved to read about faraway places and people, and I don't know why, but I didn't study Islam. I studied Islam much later in life, and then when I fell in love with the beauty of Islam, and it became one of my biggest dreams and ambition to go to Hajj or maybe even Umrah. (Sighs.) In-sha-Allah.
So, lol, I don't think that was the answer for which you were looking, but that's my answer anyhow.
