We arrived in Cyprus well after Shaykh Abdul Kerim had already been present.

A video of Shaykh Abdul Kerim’s first greeting of Shaykh Maulana is here:

“Sheykh Mevlana Nazim is very happy and says that Sheykh Abdul Kerim’s majesty (heybet) has increased and for it to increase even more. Sheykh Maulana then said may he wipe off and throw away these scroundrels and he appointed Sheykh Abdul Kerim to lead this- mashAllah”

After arriving in Cyprus late at night we stopped at the house where Shaykh Abdul Kerim was staying. Shaykh Effendi told us to go straight to the dergah through others. We had been very excited to meet him after not seeing our Shaykh for over month already. However, in this regard Shaykh Abdul Kerim was saying that here we must kiss Shaykh Maulana’s hand before meeting him.

As we arrived past midnight, most people were sleeping. There were already a lot of guests at the dergah.

We debated sleeping outside as most of the spots were taken. It was cold, weather had lows of around 2 degrees Celcius. Cyprus had just experienced one of the first snowfalls in many years.

We ended up sleeping inside the Cyprus dergah, in a small cold hallway.

We greeted Shaykh Maulana at Zuhr time when he usually comes to the dergah.

Instantly I had flashbacks to around 10 years ago when I met Shaykh Maulana for the first time, the piercing look which saw inside you and out, the sheer power of his charismatic presence. It also reminded me of how Shaykh Abdul Kerim was *always* by Shaykh Maulana’s side back during the days I would see Shaykh Maulana in Washington DC and New Jersey.

This first day, we didn’t have much time with Shaykh Maulana except a brief chance to kiss his hand and be briefly introduced by name through Shaykh Abdul Kerim who spoke about us in Turkish to Shaykh Maulana.

After Shaykh Maulana was inside his home after Zuhr , then we greeted Shaykh Abdul Kerim.

It was very good to see Shaykh Effendi after missing him so long. All the mureeds near and far miss him when he travels. Seeing his smile made me carry a smile the rest of the day.