Voices In Her Head

Salah siapa?

2011-11-11T23:49:00.000+08:00

Tempat: Surau Central Market, tengahari

Scene: Di saf pertama beberapa orang wanita sedang bersolat, manakala di saf kedua seorang wanita telah selesai bersolat dan sedang membaca Ma'thurat. Aku pula baru masuk kedalam surau setelah selesai berwuduk. Sedang asyik aku mengenakan telekung, terdengar suara wanita yang membaca ma'thurat menegur wanita yang baru selesai bersolat dihadapannya, "Kaki nampak tadi, tak sah solat tu" wanita tersebut terdiam sebentar seraya menjawab "tapi saya dengar kalau tak sengaja tak apa", dan dia berlalu untuk membetulkan rambutnya di cermin, meninggalkan wanita yang menegur tadi terdiam.

Persoalan: Siapa yang berdosa dalam hal ni? Wanita yang tak sengaja terselak kainnya semasa sedang bersolat ataupun wanita yang duduk dibelakangnya membaca ma'thurat sambil memerhati tanpa membuat apa-apa?

Pandangan peribadi: Kalau dah nampak perbuatan tak betul tu, tolonglah betulkan (mana yang sesuai ikut keadaan). Kalau dah kain orang tu terselak, sanggup tengok aje kaki orang tu terdedah sampai dia habis solat, sedangkan kita tahu hukum mungkin solat orang tu tak sah. Kalau dah ada ilmu tapi tak diamalkan dan dihebahkan, tak berguna juga - baca ma'thurat seribu kali pun tak dapat faedah. Dan tunggu sampai orang tu habis solat baru nak tegur, pada saya, bunyinya macam riya' dan macam sengaja nak memalukan orang tersebut. Ini tengok saja benda yang tak betul berlaku tapi tak ada kata nak tolong, semua pakat-pakat tengok lepas tu pakat-pakat melepat.

Kesimpulan: Lain kali kalau ternampak saudari seIslam yang sedang bersolat terselak kainnya, tolong lah tarik kain supaya kakinya terlindung. Tak payah tunggu orang tu habis solat baru nak tegur. Mungkin kita yang memerhati tanpa membuat apa-apa pun dapat dosa sebab mendiamkan (no action) perkara tersebut.

Wallahu a'lam - Allah lebih Maha Mengetahui

Wardrobe Malfunction!

2011-10-19T22:30:00.000+08:00

When I think about wardrobe malfunction, the Janet Jackson incident at the Superbowl a few years ago comes to mind. Be it intentional or accidental, these incidents can be very embarrassing indeed, both to the "doer" as well as the onlooker!

Opppsss!!!

I think most of us will experience wardrobe malfunction at least once in their lifetime. Personally I've had a few of those mortifying moments but the one that stuck out the most from my memory was the one I had at the office a few years ago.

The story goes: a bunch of us were on Friday break and was just killing time before we commenced our duties. I was standing at the entrance of my cubicle while some of my office mates (which included one male immediate supervisor) were sitting on a sofa in front of my cubicle. We were yakking away when suddenly *poof* my black sarong skirt suddenly went down to the ground. I didn't even feel that the skirt was not on my hips anymore because I was wearing one of those corsets that covered my tummy down to my thighs and stops just above the knees. Fortunately, I had that on, else it would've been a more "exposed" free show for my colleagues. Anyway, my colleagues were screaming and pointing at me then I realized what had happened and bent down quickly to pick up my skirt. I was mortified because my MALE boss was there and wished that the floor would open up and swallow me so I could avoid the awkward moment. However, with my colleagues laughing I forgo the thought and joined in the laughter.

We were perplexed as to how the skirt came off. For one, I was standing and not doing any rigorous movement that could warrant the skirt off. And secondly, my skirt was the zip and hook type. How did it became unzipped and unhooked, thus falling down?? My theory was that, because I was wearing the corset, my waist could've been smaller than the measurement of the skirt thus with some movement, somehow could've unhooked the skirt, and probably unzipped it too. And because of the corset material was made of some kind of spandex covered with satin, I couldn't feel the movement of the skirt when it came undone. I think the satin layer may have contributed to expedite the velocity of the skirt downwards.

Anyway, I was stuck with my male boss for the evening as we had to go to some emergency meeting outside. Embarrassing moments aside, I had to maintain my professionalism and just do my work. I guess the situation forced us (ha!) to overcome the incident. Of course, we never talked about it, ever. So that kind of helped, too :p

Garden stool for indoor living

2011-10-16T09:14:00.001+08:00

I love this lime green garden stool. I first saw it in snippets of Samantha Pynn's tips on Astro HD channel 706 Lifestyle on how to refresh a living room. This stool is multi-function and can be used either for indoor or outdoor, as a stool or coffee table - put two of these stools side by side and voila! it can become an instant coffee table, replacing the conventional coffee table. A fresh and modern idea that I can easily adopt for my (future) home.

More ideas on how to use these garden stools indoor, here and here.

Buying a home or just a house?

2011-10-12T22:30:00.000+08:00

Appalling! That's what been going on in my head when I surfed the net for prospect home to buy. I do not get the mentality of home owners that feel the need to showcase their house in very messy conditions. Do they think that prospect buyers would want to see how messy can a house get - with clothes lying around, helmets in the house, dining table full of clutter?? I do understand that some of the houses are rented out but if the home owners or agents are planning to snap pictures, I would highly suggest that they inform the tenants to clean up and clear the room of unnecessary clutter.

I don't need to mention the atrocious curtains and furniture coz its a matter of style and taste, and furthermore we are not buying the house fully furnished! The bedroom and bathroom is none the better - beds unmade, clothes on the bed & floor, dirty bathroom, tiles missing on wall in the bathroom. Just makes me want to gag thinking about it.

Another thing that bothered me was that some houses have really, really loud color. I get it that they may want to have a feature wall or a splash of color in the house but some of the colors are really bright that they are almost fluorescent that I think you would need wear a Ray Ban inside the house. I always thought that this was just a mistake on the part of home owners that they may think of some color but ended up with a totally different colour. Maybe the tone of colour that they bought was a tad too bright and ended up with fluorescent paint all over the house. And maybe they think that "oh well, since I already bought buckets of this paint might as well finish it off" and proceeded to paint the rest of the house in similar colour. That's how home owners ended up with a fluorescent house, in my opnion.

When you see makeover shows like Flip This House or The Style Department on Astro, the house is given a makeover a simple as giving it a fresh coat of paint, de-cluttering and re-positioning furniture to emphasize the space so that prospect buyers can see the potential of a home.

Meanwhile, I am still searching for my dream home in this challenging time and budget :p

A Day in Sepang F1 Circuit

2011-09-30T21:30:00.000+08:00

Being someone who is involved in the meetings industry, we are required to source out for unique venues to organize events or to recommend to clients. We had the opportunity to inspect the venue with the H.H Tham, Head of Commercial, Sepang Circuit, and was pleasantly surprised that the F1 Circuit is not only selling race track but now they have expanded to selling facilities available on the venue. This circuit is highly suitable for incentive groups - to do activities on the circuit such as tour of circuit, driving lessons, race-off, special tour & tailor made events.

The Grandstand overlooking the F1 Track

Perdana Suite overlooking the rooftop

Roof top

The Race Control room is normally off limits to people not involved in the race, however, we got special access into it. We were told that during race period, owners and race managers would be sitting in this small room (can fit about 30 pax) to monitor the race going on at the tv screen. Owners/race managers can contest the outcome eg penalty to drivers, accident, emergencies.

Paddock Club has 4 large air-conditioned walls with attached tv panels on the pillars. Ideal for product launches, cocktail events even sit-down dinners.

Paddock Club overlooks the grand stand

VIP Suite at the Grandstand

The Paddock Suite is situated above the car garage

Media Centre - can fit 400 media with overhead TV screens. It can also be converted to a lecture hall or if for seminar hall for briefings

A view of the grandstand from the recer's view

Space behind the paddock is large enough for 3k pax with stage built. Again cost for staging outdoor event includes marquee, catering, stage, AV, lightings, etc

The Helipad where the Rain concert was held could hold 100,000 pax or more. Great for outdoor events eg carnivals, concerts. Equally big budget needed to stage the outdoor events for tenting, platform, sound system, etc

And the winner is.......yours truly!

Childhood daydream

2011-09-25T22:00:00.000+08:00

When I was little, I always daydreamed that I could fly, literally. Back when I was in Kelantan when I was 9 years old, we used to live in a bungalow house surrounded by a small orchard overgrown with bananas and red and yellow rambutan trees. We used to see foxes crossing the lalang field on the side of the house or get the occasional house calls from small snakes or a crossing biawak, whom I think were confused with this house in its path to the other side.

We didn’t have many friends outside the house. So we had to amuse ourselves with our toys and made up games. I used to climb the railing on the second-storey building which was near the balcony, and it was quite a climb as there were no safety net below but we were determined to go to the front part of the house which was actually the roof for the porch below, and then we would play and probably had some sort of picnic there. Or I would stare out the windows to look at orchard the below. I’d always dreamed that if I jumped out the window, then I’d be able to fly. God’s angels would break my fall and bring me to safety. I was tempted many times to jump out the window from the second story bungalow, each time the temptation was bigger than the last. But each time I grew more cautious of the inner voice, I didn’t know if that was my conscience urging me to be more sensible or was that my fear, preventing me from jumping out the window. Maybe it’d be a different story if I’d jumped.

I guess the imagination of a child is boundless, but as the years passed they grew up, and that's when they gradually lost the magical feeling of dreaming and thinking that they could doing anything. They had to make the decision whether to jump or not to jump...

The Kampong View : Kedah

2011-09-22T08:30:00.000+08:00

Gunung Jerai, Yan, Kedah

Wouldn't it be nice to have a view of the mountains when you wake up everyday?

This view is picture perfect from my aunty's house in Sg Petani, Kedah, where it is surrounded by paddy fields. You can almost breath the mountain air, and let me tell you that the clean air was refreshing to the point that it made me dizzy.

Kellie's Castle - Part 2

2011-09-20T08:00:00.000+08:00

TheCastle is indeed grand and eerie at the same time. The rooms for the childrenwere quite sizeable and there were connecting passages behind what was supposedto be the bathroom and there were (what I think) is the escape or emergencystairs in the connecting passageway. It is quite an interesting architecturewith its hidden nooks and crannies - especially on the lower roof top. Anotherunique feature is that the rooms are connected by an outside corridor - muchakin to the hostel corridors, and one can really feel the eeriness when walkingthru the corridors.

The daughter's room

Proposed bathroom in the daughter's room

The connecting passageway between the daughter's & the son's room and there's a staircase in the middle

Visitors were warned not to make much noise whenentering Kellie's daughter room as it was said that her spirit still roams theplace. I was told that there were strange happenings in the castle, whenforeign film crews came and erected camera on a tripod to capture anysupernatural activities during the night, they found in the recordings that itwas knocked down by a white being - presumably Old Man Kellie himself.Paranormal crews from local and overseas have been coming in droves to studythis phenomenon.

Prayer altar with imported stones & marble from India

A favourite place for wedded couples to take picture - where the picture was taken was on the lower rooftop, the couple are on the third floor and people can still go up on the upper rooftop, above the third floor (albeit the "gayat" feeling you get on top of a high building without security partition on the sides)

The elevator shaft for the 1st bucket list in Malaya

If you are a fan of history & paranormal sightings - then a visit to Kellie's Castle would not disappoint.

Kellie's Castle - Part 1

2011-09-18T23:30:00.000+08:00

I was in Perak last June for work and one of the tourist spot that I have been wanting to visit was Kellie's Castle. It is situated in Batu Gajah, Perak, and roughly takes about 2 hours drive from Kuala Lumpur, and only 20 minutes to Ipoh town. I was fascinated with the historical side of the castle. It was built under the commission of the Scottish planter - William Kellie Smith in 1915 but was never completed due to his death when he succumbed to the pneumonia during his visit to Lisbon.The house was designed for his family to live in - wife, one daughter and one son - but after his death the project was abandoned and the family moved back to Europe.

Kellies Castle, 31000 Batu Gajah, Perak, Malaysia

The castle is surrounded by a moat and is on top of a hill - perfect for sightseeing and defending against enemy attack

Bear figure emerging from the batai tree at the compound of Kellie's castle. This tree was said to be 40 years old and the bear figure only emerged in 2006 and was the source of mystery to many who visited the castle

Castle is divided in two parts - front part is the new castle which is six stories high with 24 rooms and suppose to be installed with the first elevator ever to be brought in Malaya. It also has a wine cellar. At the back of the unfinished castle was the old house where Kellie and his family used to stay - ravaged by war and time.

Kellas House - built in 1905 but damaged due to war

The proposed living room on the ground floor

More pics & stories on Kellie's Castle - Part 2

Sydney

2011-09-14T13:39:00.004+08:00

I was in Sydney in June for work. Winter has just started and the weather was around 16 degrees. Not too cold but a bit chilly in the mornings and nights. My visit was brief but as it was my first trip to Australia, so I was considerably excited. I only saw the Sydney Opera House at night (no pic as my camera quality wasn't so good) and just missed the week where they had colourful lights on at the opera house. One of my regrets was not doing the Sydney Harbour Bridge Climb because of time factor and any visit to Australia is complete without looking at pandas and kangaroos. Australia is a melting pot of culture, races, religion, food - and its interesting to observe this in Sydney. I was told by one of the Melbournian in my office that Melbourne is much more diverse than Sydney and have more interesting to visit. I am partly making it up for my Gold Coast trip in April next year and surely want to cover interesting activities while I'm there.

Sunset in Sydney

Seafood galore! Crab, lobster, prawns, clams, squid, huge fries. This order was for 2 persons. There were 3 of us and still we couldn't finish it....


Under the bridge overlooking Darling Harbour

Our main aim was to look for Paddy's Market

View of Darling Harbour

Paddy's Market to buy souvenirs and local produce - being the tourist that I am, needed to buy fridge magnets for friends and family. Cheap and reasonable prices too. The sellers are mainly outsider eg Chinese, Singaporeans, Vietnamese - hardly see any real Mat Salleh selling the souvenirs.

Abundant of seagulls at the harbour - they are considered as pests - as do kangaroos (shocker to us non-Aussie)

I really liked this artistic feature - real whale bones in transparent casing - it looks almost alive - a reminiscent of the whales' lives once upon a time


Traffic light for bicycles to Go! Bicycles is one of the main transportation for the people in Sydney - a good way to travel minus jam and you get some exercise too!

Gastronomic adventure up North

2011-06-04T23:02:00.002+08:00

I was up in the northern state for a 3 day trip. Of course any trip would not be complete without a food hunt. Feature here some of the food that I sampled on my short trip:
Cucuq udang & tauhu goreng - marvellous!

Proprietor of the cucuq udang stall next to Chowrasta. The stall is located in the bazaar right next to Chowrasta Penang

Interesting signage for food stall branding. Unfortunately, I did not manage to sample the Nasi Kandar due to time constrain

Highly recommended by Ms Fantaghiro. This stall in located in Padang Kota Lama foodcourt next to Fort Cornwallis

Mee sotong goreng. Basically mee mamak fried with sambal sotong. In my opinion, this taste like mee rebus. If you like mee rebus, than you will definitely like mee sotong.

Next to Hamid Pata stall, is the drinks stall selling fresh cocnut drink at RM2 for a tall glass. Good match with mee sotong.

Yummy coconut drink with fresh coconut flesh

A bit detour from Penang, this was found in Kuala Kangsar town near the river. We were looking for laksa but found this interesting looking apam manis instead

Cost RM2 per pair and was advised by the makcik who sold this to eat it with shredded coconut flesh and sugar for added taste

Bersantai di Salak Denai

2011-06-03T14:13:00.020+08:00

Pertama kali saya ke chalet Salak Denai adalah pada 2006. Chalet ini terletaknya di bandar Yan Besar dan dibawah kaki Gunung Jerai. Konsep chalet adalah setiap chalet mempunyai kolam mandi sedalam lebih kurang 4 kaki. Setiap kolam ini akan dipenuhi dengan air dari kaki gunung dan apabila pengunjung telah puas bermandi, air kolam itu akan dilepaskan dan dipenuhi semula untuk pengunjung yang seterusnya. Harga chalet beserta kolam amat berpatutan dan tak mengikut kepala (seperti hotel) asalkan dapat tidur didalam chalet tersebut.Sila lawati lama blog Salak Denai untuk tempahan dan info lain di sini.

Pandangan hadapan kolam

Setiap kolam disediakan gelongsor, sesuai untuk kanak2 dan dewasa!


Pancutan air untuk melicinkan pengelongsoran turun dan memaksimumkan keseronokan	!

Tempat barbeku disediakan

Ruang tamu dengan pakej Astro

Sampel salah satu bilik tidur

Dapur dilengkapi dengan tempat memasak, periuk nasi, peti sejuk, etc

Bilik air dan bilik mandi yang bersih dan kemas

Verdict: Chalet Salak Denai amat sesuai untuk percutian keluarga terutamanya bagi kaum Muslimah untuk enjoy mandi sungai tanpa risaukan kehadiran orang lain kerana chalet tersebut amat private. Bagi saya, keseronokan mandi air sungai yang sejuk dan nyaman ini ditambah pula dengan rasa selamat kerana tiada batu-batu yang licin yang boleh menyebabkan kaki luka atau tergelincir mahupun haiwan yang tidak diingini di sepertimana mandi di sungai yang biasa. Sangat disarankan untuk percutian keluarga dan pastikan tempahan dibuat awal, terutamanya musim cuti sekolah kerana chalet in biasanya penuh. Saya dikhabarkan ada pengunjung yang booking satu tahun in advance untuk pastikan mereka dapat mengunjungi tempat ini.

More Cats Pics

2011-05-15T21:42:00.001+08:00

My interests in cats hasn't waned but now am content in observing them from far. Below are a collection of cat pics that I captured in various places - KL, Kedah, Rompin

In KL: This one here is called "Boifren" coz he's the only male cat around my apartment. He knows that I called him Boifren coz he would get closer to me but would never let me touch him. Feisty one, this is.

In Rompin: Three generations of cats sleeping together, the aunty cat called Belang is smothering the little one, but he doesn't mind, whilst the mothercat "Kelabu" doesn't care what happens to her kitten

Closer look at how Belang is smothering the littel one (he is nameless at the momemt coz we don't know if he would survive or not since his two siblings died weeks before)

Kelabu - Sleep with one eye open

Playing with its mother

I called him "Si Gemuk" coz he's fat like a cow and eats a lot - needs supervision during mealtime coz he hogs the catfood

Belang sniffing around


The little one in action

In Kedah: I met these two in Sg Petani when we were checking out houses there. They looked starved so I gave them some catfood

These two fatties were around the turkey cage at my uncle's house in Sg Petani. Not very friendly though and obviously about to burst with kitties.

Biskut Mazola

2011-05-10T14:19:00.000+08:00

Biskut kacang courtesy of Hanim

Whenever it’s Hari Raya and its our turn to go back to Yan, Kedah, I would look forward to eating biskut Mazola - a slightly salty peanut cookie that is so simple but decadent at the same time. My aunty who lives in Yan make the best biskut Mazola that I’d ever tasted. The peanut cookies are so good and none came close to hers. Sometimes I’d buy the readymade peanut cookies (as pictured above) but it never tasted as delicious like the ones she used to make.

Biskut Mazola also reminded me so much of my kampong in Yan. The big old family house in Yan, where everyone gathered for raya, was a fond memory in my mind. Our family, which always arrived last would have to sleep on the upper portion of the house. During the day, the place where we slept was like a veranda, always so airy and cool when all the French windows were opened. There were lime green carpeting on the wooden floor, which I always thought were cheery and refreshing to an otherwise ordinary kampong house. There was also a flight of stairs connecting outside to the veranda, and us kids always used that way for shortcut into the second floor when we played.

For me, its not just the biskut but its the kampong life and being a youth at that time and playing around with my cousins (whom we only meet once a year since we lived so far awat) that I always associate with whenever I eat a piece of biskut Mazola.

Udang Galah in Rompin

2011-05-08T14:59:00.003+08:00

Fresh Udang Galah in Rompin. A Grade B size of udang galah will set you back about RM60 per kilo plus cooking it. Featured here is udang galah cooked in chinese style sweet sambal with egg in it. This was about half a kilo of udang galah (about 16 pieces).

Look for the udang galah sign by the roadside and you'll know where to stop...

Road side restaurant along the road in Lanjut

If you have any doubts about the restaurant just look for the signage on the door that says "udang galah sold here"

Entrance to Lanjut, the udang galah restaurants are dotted on the opposite side of the road.

Strawberry Farm in Genting

2011-05-06T21:04:00.000+08:00

Strawberry Farm in Genting - entrance is FOC, parking is easy

Craving for strawberries? Wanna see how strawberries are grown without having to go to Cameron Highlands? Then just drive up to Gohtong Jaya, halfway up to Genting and visit the Taman Santai Strawberi Genting. Apart from just a strawberry farm, this leisure farm concept is all encompassing area for family fun such as shopping, cafe, mini animal park (bee museum, parrots, albino python), mushroom farm, fresh fruits, vegies and flowers & shopping area. This place is good for a family fun afternoon.

Luscious strawberries in a bunch...tp rasa dia masam lah...

Cacat strawberry

Strawberries in various phase - ripe, green & flowering

The strawberry fruit comes out of the flower

Strawberries systematically planted in a pot, row after row. Visitors can pluck their own strawberries from the pots

Fancy strawberries dipped in chocolate?

The gang having a bit of refreshment with fresh strawberry blended, strawberry milkshake and strawberry tea

Tired of strawberries? Have some fried mushroom instead.

Passion fruits hanging low around the shops

Faris and the giant strawberry

There's also a mushroom farm. Loved the mushrooms there as it is fresh and there are certain species only found in highland

Loh Sang

2011-01-30T10:20:00.000+08:00

We had a surprise last week from one of our partners, who brought in the yee sang dish for our team to do loh sang, which is the act of mixing together the yee sang. Yee sang is basically like a salad dish with different ingredients such as raw fish, shredded veggies, jellyfish and in Malaysia they added crunchy keropok and mix it all together with plum sauce. The dish is suppose to bring greater abundance, so when we mix it together we are suppose to make a wish or wishes on the year to come. Most of us wished for bonus!

The Yee Sangdish set up

Consists of ginger, jellyfish, salmon, keropok, pomelo, coriander, sesame seed

Chef adding plum sauce to the yee sang before we do loh sang

Everyone in position with chopsticks in hand ready to loh sang the yee sang

The dish is mixed up

The aftermath

Burglarized!!

2011-01-18T11:39:00.000+08:00

As I was getting ready to meet a couple of friends at KLCC after Maghrib to relax, I got a distressed call from Hubby who said that our house was broken in. Immediate thing that he noticed missing was his beloved PSP. A colleague of mine was kind enough to send me back that evening, which was raining cats and dogs by the way. Upon reaching home around 8++pm, my frontdoor neighbour was keeping an eye on my house and hubby and friend went to report the incident to the police.

My neighbour said that when he came back around 6pm, my front grill was fine and he went in his house as ususal. Not until hubby knocked his door around 7.30pm and told him our house was broken into did he found out about it. It turns out the robber used a wrench to break my padlock and used a masterkey to open my door. He proceeded to my masterbedroom and took the PSP which was by the bedside and continued to ransacked my dressing table and found the jewellery box and additional 3 Coke bottles full of syillings (but left behind the ones filled with 1 cents!). Next he went to my spare bedroom and overturned the clothes rack but fortunately didn't touch my cabinet (I hate folding clothes). After founding nothing, he went to the gameroom and took hubby's Levi's jeans (which we only realized missing on Monday), a document bag containing hubby's birth cert, car grant/title, house pruchase agreement. Then he went into the living room and to my book cabinet and took three ornament boxes containg my brooches and nail clippesr! Lucky he mislooked into one of the smaller ornament boxes as another of my gold bracelet and diamond earrings was in there. Also, on the coffeetable was my external hardisk, MP3 player and spare keys for both cars (which we found missing on Sunday).

The police arrived around 11pm, and there was one Investigating Officer and one CSI officer. They took photos of the ransacked rooms and dusted the jewellery box for fingerprints but couldn't find anything as there were overlapping fingerprints. But the robber did left behind a wrench and the CSI officer took that as well. I am sceptical that the police would find anything. We suspected that it was the work of youngsters, probably worked in pair and might be an inside job!


The robber ranscaked the masterbedroom and found my jewellery boxed stashed in the dressing table. There were 2 gold bracelets and one pair of gold earrings. One of the bracelet was for my engagement, and the earrings was given by a friend. He didn't took the other golden brcelet which was set with emerald stones, probbaly because it wasn't shiny and maybe he thought that it was costume jewellery. Actually, it was my late grandmother's and it has sentimental value. At least that family heirloom was saved based on sheer luck!

The jewellery box that was dusted for fingerprints ala CSI by Setapak Police Investigating Officer

My spare bedroom was ransacked too and the clothes rack was overturned but he didn't find anything valuable

Hubby was paranoid and next day called for somebody to fix the existing lock and put another two locks inside the grill. One can never be too careful I suppose. What if the robber comes back to my house or someone else's unit, especially when they find its easy to break into the house?

Hubby's on vigilante mode and is rounding the apartment area around 5pm just to see if there is anybody's suspicious lurking around. And he's been sleeping on the couch with the TV on, just to be on the safe side. When someting like this happened, it makes us feel that the place I lived in is not so safe anymore and the threat of that thing happening again is looming around my head. The apartment committee is also on alert and somehow blamed it on the lax control of the guards. There is no recording system for people going in/out the apartment, the gate is not closed and cars and people can freely get in/out with ease.

Somehow I coped with the stress with TV and cooking...hubby's doing all the worrying and thinking how to safeguard our house. Hope nothing like this happens again...

Traipsing around Thailand

2011-01-08T23:47:00.002+08:00

In front of Ayuthayya, the ancient city

The Background
I was in Bangkok a few moths ago for a 4 days working trip. Then I'd extended another 3 days to traipse around Bangkok. I'd been to Bangkok in 2007, but only briefly as I had to go to Pattaya for work. Last time I was in Bangkok, I'd only spent a few hours where I saw the traffic jams and went shopping at MBK.

The Situation

Only on our last day in Bangkok, and on the way to the airport ,that we heard about the red shirt's demonstration in Victoria Monument. Other than that, it was business as usual in Bangkok.

The Plan
So when I was given the chance to go to Bangkok, I'd included some must see sights. The trip was quite interesting because I was joined by my mum and aunty, which I'd not had the chance to travel with both of them before. I like the company because I'm not the type of traveler who can wander on their own to unknown places, especially being a woman and concerned of my safety when travelling. So I'd happily settled into the role of travel planner, researching on places to visit. Since we're not really interested to see the Buddhist temple or Wat, I'd narrowed down the choices to more historical places such as the Death Railway in Kancahanaburi, Ayutthaya, and for culture experience - the Siam Niramit show and floating market.

Budhha head in a tree at Ayuthayya

We'd decided to travel one whole day to cover the sites. I'd rented a driver & car (standard issue: Toyota Vios) for the day (8am-8pm) for Baht1700, and had to fill in full tank of petrol which was about Baht1130.

The Destination
We headed down West of Bangkok to Kanchanaburi, which took about two and a half hours to reach. We visited the War Cemetery which was just by the side of the road. There were more than 6000 POW that perished during the Thailand-Burma Death Railway project.

Entrance to Kachanaburi War Memorial

"Happy memories, Ray Dear. Au revoir. Till we meet again. Mamma, Dad, Ken & Elsie"

In front of the Death Railway Museum & Research Centre, a good source of info for this history. Though I think they could've included more information on Malaya, as the train that carried the POW from Singapore to Thailand went thru Malaya. Even the number of civillians from Malaya who were taken as slaves (75,000 pax) and those who perished (42,000 pax) during the railway project was not mentioned extensively, which I think should be given more credit to it. Everybody suffered during the was and I'm sure that the Malaya people suffered as much as other nationalities. After we saw the memorial we went over to see the Bridge over River Kwae, more stories and pics by kerabu jantung .

The commercial floating market in Ayuthayya

Awesome temple of dragon, shown by our driver. Can't remember the exact location of the temple but this was from Kachanaburi going towards Ayuthayya

The Conclusion
The day ended with us watching the Siam Niramit show. The show is a must see for first timers in Bangkok. The staging and storytelling is engaging.

Highlight of the trip
1. eating noodle soup at a Muslim stall in Kachanaburi. Made me feel like I was part of the community , enjoying a typical Thailand street cuisine.
2. Went for massage which cost 400 baht for two hours in a dingy back alley of Bangkok. Heavenly! In KL a one hour Thai massage would cost about RM40 (Arokaya House at The Mall).
3. Experiencing the BTS system. More extensive than our LRT system and conveniently located throughout the city. I stayed at Asia Hotel Bangkok and the BTS was connected to the hotel. Talk about convenient!

4. Going to Chatuchak market, though it was very hot. Advisable to go at night as they open to wee hours of the morning.

5. Discovering the Arab street in Bangkok and arguably the best briyani and lamb chop in Bangkok.
6. Watching the Siam Niramit show.

I wish I had...
1. Visit the original floating market Damnoen Saduak, situated in Ratchaburi, on the way to Kachanaburi. We only managed to see a commercialised floating market for tourists in Ayuthayya. Oh well...I was influenced by second hand info about the actual floating market was not really that much to look at, plus it is smelly. Next time I must see it for myself and not just depend on second hand info. Seeing is believing as people say.
2. Purchasing the cute charm bracelet with dangling, multi-coloured semi precious stones in silver setting that was sold at the gold market in Kachanaburi. It turns out that the price was much cheaper than Bangkok, and they have a wide variety of precious and semi precious stones set in silver or gold.

The End

New Year, New Direction

2011-01-03T23:51:00.000+08:00

A colleague said something to me during dinner tonight. Said I can easily crossover from government sector to the corporate world/private sector. That was a boost of morale for me. Maybe I am overtly cautious of making the jump since I am comfortable and secured when I landed the government job 8 years ago. Its quite scary to think how I would fare in the "outside" world. Could I make it working for a corporate company? Would I be able to compete with others? Those are the burning questions at the back of my mind that I needed concrete answers before I make a life-changing decision that could break or make my life.

Turns out there is more than just worrying how I would survive in the private sector. There are the matter of personal motivations such as making more money, loving the job and doing a good job, overall satisfaction of handling projects and acquiring new sets of skills. Plus, it'd be good to try other type of working environment that the government one. Working in the current organization gave me a good feel of corporate environment, enfused with government regulations. The work is more systematic and clear cut. I think maybe I used up more brain cells in the new job as I am out of the comfort zone as I have to be more creative, assertive and innovative. Good learning experience too.

So what shall it be?? Dare I move my coffee mug, as a motivator once told me to be bold to make the push. We'll see with the new year, there might be a new direction. Stay tuned!

By the way, Happy New Year 2011.

Being a Teenager

2010-09-16T23:50:00.000+08:00

High school was a trying time for many of us. I wasn't popular in my second secondary school, but I get along well with others. I wasn't conventionally thin like all the other girls in school. I think I was a bit pretty (oh! the vainess of it all). Sure I had a lot of crushes but nothing materialize coz I never did anything about them. I didn't think anybody was interested in me.

Imagine my surprise when one day, a boy handed me a letter, mail from another boy. My heart was pounding in my ears, I was nervous and curious from where it was from, so I read the letter. In it were a school boy's confession of desire to know me more, and could I please call him at the numbers stated in the letter to get the ball rolling. Lo and behold, he was from my class. I remembered thinking that he was painfully shy and a bit reclusive. But he had the nerve to write me this letter, it must have taken up all he could to muster his courage to compose me that letter.

I never thought of him that way. I was indignant that he couldn't talk to me like a normal person would. I remembered thinking that we are classmates, therefore we are friends, and friends can talk to each other. I thought that I could talk to him next day about this 'thing', and I didn't call him as requested. But he didn't show up in school, and it went on for days. Then out of the blue, he would show up in school but missed lessons, and that became his pattern throughout the remainder of the school year. I felt guilty that he had skipped school because he was embarrassed by my rejection, or lack of response thereof by not calling upon him as stated. I felt responsible for him not doing well in school. We did passed by each other in the school hallways but it became one of those awkwards moments that I quickly pushed behing the corners of my mind.

Did I really made him reacted the way he did? I don't know as I never had the nerve to pursue it. I guess in some way, he was braver than me when he wrote that letter. Or maybe I didn't have the chance to explain myself. But anyway, I thought that a person should determine how his/her life's going to be despite the circumstances surrounding it. I'm not accountable for what happened but it would be nice if I could have a chance to say my peace.

Al-Fatihah

2010-09-13T19:16:00.007+08:00

Al-Fatihah to the victims in Datuk Sosilawati's murder case. Takziah to all the family members. I can not imagine what they are going thru now....

This is not a claim to fame, arwah Ahmad Kamil & wife were the same batch with me in Matrics IIU in 96'. However, we are not in contact after IIU but friends used to bring updates about ex-IIU students, so we knew bits and pieces about other friends, including them.

Its sad and shocking to hear something like this happened to somebody we used to know. May arwah be in a better place now & Allah cucuri rahmatNya. May Allah give peace of mind to the families...Ameen

Hope the bastards who did this crime will be caught and heavily punished....Insya Allah..

Eid Mubarak

2010-09-12T23:48:00.001+08:00

Eid Mubarak and Maaf Zahir & Batin to my family and friends.

Hope our celebration is in moderation so that we won't gain back all the kilos that we had shed during the fasting month :p

Happy Burffday to Me...Yeay!

2010-08-25T12:18:00.003+08:00

What a fun birthday this turns out to be. I turned 32 today!!

Last night had an awesome iftar with 2 good friends at TGI Friday's in Wangsa Walk. Ate till I puked afterwards - we ordered the Ramadhan set which had 3 appetizers & 3 main course. Ate till we can't eat anymore. Then had a nightcap at Bangi Kopitiam branch - met a couple of friends till around 12++. Tapau-ed the leftovers from TGIF and I ate them for sahur, but unfortunately puked again. Damn! I must be allergic to the fried mac & cheese. What a shame....

Anyway, we had a Hari Raya video shoot this morning. Everyone was told beforehand to doll up in our finest Hari Raya get ups - the girls in kebayas and baju kurungs and the boys in baju Melayu with songkok, and the odd mat salleh in baju batik!

The video director arranged us in lines, and I had to be in my tippy toes so that my face can be seen. Then the boss have to say a few words and have to shout out the raya cheers and waved to the camera and salam each other.

The boys (2 boys missing from this pic). Note the mat salleh wearing songkok(He's actually our consultant)...hehe...we should buy him a proper baju Melayu with all the trimmings - butang, songkok, sampin, even chapal - to get him ready for all the Hari Raya open houses.

The girls mainly in shades of purple, pink & green

The gediks (ok its just me who's gedik) - secondees from our old job

Room to Expand and Grow

2010-08-09T18:40:00.001+08:00

Its easy to stick to your own niche
Sometimes must learn to grow out of your skin
and be uncomfortable just to feel comfortable
Change is difficult and strange
but to succeed one must gain

Responsibilities must be dealt with
Not stashed or swept away
Neither just to delegate nor escalate it
Maybe some help will set you on your way
Perhaps you'll grow to be good at it

Who knows what the human mind is capable of
For sure there's room to expand and grow
Till then I'll try and try more...

Morbidly morbid

2010-08-01T11:34:00.000+08:00

Hubby's been having a weird fascination for airplane crashes these past few weeks, thanks to Nat Geo's Air Crash Investigation series. So when I come home at night, he'd start reiterating the latest serie of the air crash aired that day. He took it to the next level - forwarded to me a website that reports about air crashes that happened way back in the 60s till now, including the Airblue Pakistan doomed flight, last two days.

In my downtime, I started to browse thru the blog and even read some transcript from the black box recording of the crew on their final moments before death. When I got back from work, we swapped stories about the air crashes. I didn't want to do it but somehow got sucked in this conversation.

What is this morbid preoccupation with mortality or other sensational cases?

Is it imbedded in human nature to be attracted to all things sensation, eventhough it involves death? Hubby says, live curiously (taken from Nat Geo)

Normally, I'd be in my own bubble and try to steer away from stories of death, ghosts, etc. Its my way of keeping my mental health so that I won't be afraid of things. Now I am a little paranoid about flying, though I've done it hundreds of time before and not get hung up about it.

Ms Fantaghiro says airlines are very strict nowadays with safety.

Sure, but what about human error, weather and technical error? Things happen, and maybe they happen for a reason. Ms Fantaghiro says when death knocks, even the simplest act can be a cause of death. True that.

Footnote: Hubby's fascinated with a dead cat we saw on the road yesterday and been making jokes about the poor thing turning into a ghost, albeit a flattened one, to haunt me!

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly......

2010-07-31T11:56:00.000+08:00

I was jobless for about 6 months after I graduated. I think that's not too bad considering I been cramming my head for 6 years in Uni (matrix 2 years, main camp 4 years). Ok, I may exaggerate with the cramming thingy, but being jobless was quite fun and hopeless then. I tried applying for Master and a few jobs.

Then I got my first job with a goverment department. Stayed there for 7 years. Learning thru experience the way a government works. Still don't understand it though, the politics and all. Hated governmental meetings - especially with all the KSUs and SUBs and Ministries and what have you not. Very "skema" and rigid and beauracratic, and long winded and no decisions.

Then I was seconded to this company, albeit for two years only. It made me open my eyes. Working in a small organizations can be an upside. Everybody knows everybody. Everybody knows what everybody is suppose to do and is doing. The job function is very clear cut, unlike in government department its all matrix system. So, a government staff is like a jack of all trade but master of none. In a small company, everybody does his or her own job with efficiency. We can't afford to delay or push it to other staff - so there is accountability for the staff. In a government department, an higher grade officer can push the work to other officers. Or can push it to other divisions, or even push it to another ministry.

But in a small company, the chances of being promoted can be quite tough as there's no room to grow. But there is freedom in work unlike the gorvernment procedures.

Since I have started out to work in a government department, it is quite scary for me to switch to private sector. Especially with job security and all. I don't know how long this company will last, eventhough it is a GLC. Somehow, we have to make our roles relevant to the gorvernment in order for them to keep supporting us. A lot of GLCs are now having issues, like Sime Darby, and even companies like Pempena have gone down the drain. I have seen some ex-government staff who opted out to join these GLCs, have to come back and beg for their old jobs, after all these years. It is very demoralizing to do that especially if you are approaching the Golden Era.

Only time will tell. In the meantime, we just have to try very hard to be relevant.

We have Moved!

2010-07-30T18:27:00.004+08:00

Almost two months have lapsed since I update this blog.

Been busy with the office move and recruitment. Things had been so hectic - with movers, new things to order, new network, new telephone, new PCs, new staff, new work.......eveything is new We moved office on 30 June, and new staff came in 1st July, and throughout July. First day of move, and our PCs are not in yet, telephone lines are not connected, network not installed - the most fundamental elements in any office. Starting from scratch contacting all suppliers can be a daunting task, especially when you think the suppliers are out to get you.

Who knew admin work is so gruelling, especially starting a new office. Good learning experience for me and its quite a challenge as I have to literally manage the office set up from A-Z with minimum guidance but with a good team, managed to complete the tasks. All fast decisions in short lead time - must know what you want or at least decide what you want. No time to be fickle minded and changing decisions every so often. On top of that, have to consider the boss's opinion and take on things, besides the other staff's inputs. The fine art of managing and balancing all at the same time, which I find can be very challenging, and somehow quite enjoyable at times.

Maybe after this I can start my own office with my own business. Heh.

Real Friends or Friends with Benefits?

2010-05-11T08:17:00.000+08:00

Since graduating, I found that I only have a handful of friends that I am in touch with. Maybe life has changed when friends got jobs, got married, have kids. Can't expect to see your friends everyday. But then you have friends that you can always count on, are more quality, than quantity.

For me, I am very fortunate Ms Fantaghiro loves coming over. We now diversify our activities...not just hanging out and eat and b***h but we do other stuff together like cooking, exercising, etc. She is one of the longest surviving friend that I have since Matrix days way back in 1996. Oh, and La Signora, too. Though now we have a more cyber friendship since she has moved to Tanah Kangaroo.

But I also have friends at work. Its normal for everybody to have friends at work. But real friends for me transcends the working time. When you work together on projects, have a better understanding of each other, not having to tread carefully with the colleague, then you start being more than just work colleagues. But its taken a step higher when you start spending time after work, to do stuff other than work. You start to be friends, confidante, etc. Maybe berangan together looking for new businesses ideas with Aza De Kaza or holidaying together - which was my first experience going overseas with friends from work.

But I do have suppliers and past clients as friends. We are more like activities buddies - we go to spa, salsa classes, new dining experience. A conflict of interest? Maybe...if the other party does have a vested interest by befriending me, like hoping to be awarded a contract or a job just because of the friendship. But to me work is work, eventhough we are friends. Must follow the criteria just like other suppliers does, and the rest is based on merit -if the company is good enough to be appointed. Thank God that I do not yet experienced my arms twisted to appoint a certain company because pressures of friendship. God help me I become objective when that happens.

Oh, and I do pay for my own spa treatments, thank you very much.

Nasi Kerabu - Resipi Kerabu Jantung

2010-05-08T18:27:00.001+08:00

Nasi kerabu - Kerabu Jantung

(Ingredients in pic is incomplete coz I forgot to put the fish & kelapa)

One of the weekends, I tried my hand on making nasi kerabu. Not really difficult but need some prep work. Recipe courtesy of Kerabu Jantung.

You may ask what's the difference between the nasi kerabu that you always bought in pasar malam with this nasi kerabu recipe. And, no, its not because of the bluish color of the rice. That effect can be made by adding pucuk mengkudu to the rice that you are cooking. The anwser lies in the yellowish kuah lemak. This kuah lemak is something as it adds flavour to the nasi kerabu. Possibly because of the budu in the kuah lemak :p

Again, it is easy enough to make but a lot of prep work. Here's the recipe:

Kuah Lemak:

250 gms santan
1 btg serai
2 asam keping
dash of cuka/squeeze of lemon/limau
1 tbsp budu or as u like it
(boil everything together)

Daging Salai

Marinade beef with onion, garlic, ginger & bit of soy sauce

(Grill till well done and slice thinly for serving)

Chili sauce:

5 chilies
vinegar
Water
(blend chillies than add vinegar and water to taste)

Fish
4 ikan kembung
3 asam keping
(boil the fish till its cooked, then deboned and fry without oil till it becomes very dry like fish floss)

Coconut

Young coconut flesh - grated

(fry without oil till it becomes brown and crispy)

Veggies/salad

Long beans

Bean sprouts

Daun selom*

White Cabbage*

Kacang botol*

(whatever ulam or veggie you fancy - in my case the ones *)

* In a plate combine all the ingredients plus keropok keping, and enjoy!

Bibimbap

2010-05-06T09:15:00.004+08:00

I have been drooling over this dish ever since I saw it in one of the Korean dramas and later with my mum watching the Discovery Channel about Korea. Apparently bibimbap is a popular Korean dish which literally means "mixed rice" and in the old days it was the dish for the Emperors and also for ceremonies. But now it has become a common and popular dish, besides kimchi.

So last night decided to make this for my buka puasa as I thought about it for the better part of the afternoon (!). Saw the recipe here , and here, got the basic idea about bibimbap and improvised on the ingredients. Main ingredients are: rice, beef, and different types of veggies. Its best to have 3-4 types of veggies. I had bean sprouts, carrots, white button mushroom and kangkung in my kitchen. Korean food is all about health, color of food and presentation. It does reminds me of nasi goreng and nasi kerabu, because you have a rice dish filled with veggies like nasi kerabu, yet the all the ingredients are cooked but the rice. Tastes like nasi goreng too.

Here's my version of bibimbap and how to prepare it in a hurry (I did it within 30 minutes for break of fast):

1. Cook the rice with beef stock, let it be moist or slightly lembek;
2. Cook all the vegies seperately with oil, garlic and salt to taste;
3. Beef bulgogi - my corrupted recipe is to season the beef with minced onion and garlic, dark soy sauce, stir fry it;
3. Red pepper paste or gochujang - since I didn't have this, then I just fry my cili boh with some oil and put some seasoning in - like sambal olek;
4. One egg, cook over easy;
5, Assamble the bibimbap - rice first, then arrange all the vegies and meat around the rice. Koreans have a specific way to arrange the vegies so that you have all the colors in order. Then top of with the over easy egg. One tbsp of sambal on top of the egg.
6. Mix eveything in the pot. Eat and Enjoy!

This was how I arranged the bibimbap in a bowl. It didn't look so appetizing coz this was my second helping with one scoop of rice. I was too hungry to take a picture with the first batch.

This was actually my first bowl of bibimbap with two scoops of rice. Mind you I had seconds after two hours (for sahur heh heh)...and still had left overs for tomorrow.

I have never tasted the real bibimbap in a Korean restaurant. I'm sure the taste maybe different - with the gochujang paste, sesame oil, and the sweet element in Korean food, but I'm already liking my version of bibimbap.

This post is dedicated to Ms Fantaghiro who is ever so silly whenever she hears the word bibimbap and to my mum who told me to cook the bibimbap for her.

Cat Killer

2010-05-05T12:38:00.005+08:00

I am deeply saddened by the act of this person who commited freely that he had stomped on his cat just because the cat bit him hard when handled. As a result the cat died. May Allah bless the soul of this cat and may it not suffered till the end. And the guy wasn't feeling remorseful or guilty by his act. He even kept the ppicture of the dead cat on his phone, bleeding and all! What a bastard!

Cats are animals, and thus very instinctive. We have to be patient with cats. Especially when you just bought the cat to a new place. Its understandable when it's scared and refused to eat. Give it time, not stomp it to death. What a waste of RM1300.

I do admit I lost my temper at times with Mami the cat, when she did something wrong. But cats know when you're angry with them. They'd sulk and try to avoid you. But its a love hate relationship. They always come back to you, and you to them.

Makes me wonder what kind of a father this person would be to his children in the future.

Shanghai

2010-05-04T08:28:00.001+08:00

I was in Shanghai for work last April. It was so cold - about 10 Degrees, with rain and wind blowing. Luckily, I was mostly indoors for the tradeshow, so only feel the cold while waiting for our driver to bring us around.

Shanghai is a metropolitan city. It's not the same with Beijing which is more cultural and more chistorical. I didn't see much of Shanghai due to hectic schedule. But the thing I remebered most about Shanghai is the food. Hmmm...it seems that my entries lately is centred more around food...anyway. I managed to sample lovely Xinjiang musim cuisine which is easy to find in Shanghai. Just look for the food signage with Mosque logo and "Halal" and InsyaAllah you'll be greeted with Chinese men wearing ketayap.

The food is cheap and delicious, and most importantly, fresh. They favour beef and lamb in their dishes, and lots of spices. Its very hearty and fullfilling. We went to three different types of Xinjiang restaurant - posh steamboat restaurant, roadside shop and another posh restaurant.

Eatery 1: Xinjiang steamboat restaurant

Enjoying steamboat on a rainy night - hot soup with thinly sliced beef, a garden of vegetables - including lotus root, green veggies, mushrooms, potato, etc

Eatery 2: Roadside shop

We ordered stir fry beef with a type of long beans, then beef with potates - taste similiar like padprik but more spicy

My menu: freshly made noodles which tasted like pasta al dente with beef and with a type of long beans - whihc tasted sweet and something like asparagus. Due to language limitation, we'll never know what it is!

The propreitor of the shop with his family

Me and Siti whose living in Shanghai and spoke basic Mandarin but enough to get by with ordering food! She told me once she had tried to ask for a an extra plate from the shop and pointed to the plate in the menu and the waiter brought her a plate of dish! Talk about miscommunication...

Eatery 3: Posh restaurant

Stir fry chicken with lots of spices, one of it looks like ketumbar but has a very stinging and numbing effect to the tongue...not really pleasant but the chicken was good!

Lamb with long beans - another spicy dish but this one was overtly salty. At first we thought that the dish was intentionally salty but Siti confirmed that normally it wasn't so...

And my verdict? Eatry 2: Roadside shop - even though very humble looking but it was unpretentious with food for real people. My favourite dish of all was the freshly made noodles with toppings of beef and type of long beans/asparagus like. I think I can try to make the dish out of pasta noodles but it won't be the same as the freshly made noodles.....

Updates

2010-05-03T13:33:00.002+08:00

* Another person from the office just resigned 24 hours. Again! What the hell is wrong with everybody, quitting their jobs is like missing school kah? The thing that pisses me off was that person had prior knowledge that the day was coming because that person was interviewed a few months ago. At least gives us a heads up lah....haiyo, mah fan lo!

* Suffered terrible jam last Saturday - I had to attend a cousin's wedding in Melaka. We departed from home at 11.30am and reached Melaka at 4pm! The jam was terribel, it was just lots of cars and everybody rush to enter the Ayer Keroh exit, whcih took us one hour to complete the last 5km to the tol Ayer Keroh. Never again travel on public holiday.

* Job interviews going on for the new office set up - 14 job positions all in all. Hope to have a really good team so that we can start fresh.

* Office renovation finally underway after the Boss signed the approval. Estimation of completion: early June. Estimation to move in: Middle - Late June.

* Currently reading " A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hoesseini. Awesome book and love the writing style, so precise and concise. Makes an easy reading but very touching at the same time. But loved his earlier book - The Kite Runner better.

TGI Friday's

2010-04-05T20:44:00.001+08:00

Last week I was introduced by my friend Sha to TGI Friday's. We went to Life Centre last Saturday after a heavenly session of spa at Samsara Spa.

The TGIF branch at Life Centre has interesting paraphernalia on the walls - American antiques

I didn't know what to order, and everything on the menu looked good. So to make things simple, I ordered something which have a lot of things on it so that i can sample everything on one plate - Friday's Three for All. It has loaded potato skins with beef bits, Buffalo Wings and Fried Mozarella. The loaded potato skins was ok-lah coz it wasn't crispy enough. The Buffalo wings wasn't so nice as the ranch dressing was only sour and not strong enough. Love the fried mozarella though as it was very crispy and goes very well with the marinara dressing.

Sha ordered the Chicken Caesar's Salad. Loved the romaine lettuce sprinkled with cheese and grilled chicken. Very hearty meal.

On another, visit I tried the fried Mac and Cheese. It was ok, but not creamy enough. Maybe next time I'll try the real mac and cheese, instead of the fried one.

I'm not really a fan of desserts but I find that TGIF have the best dessert ever. My favourite is the Brownie Obsession. The dish is a contrast of warm and cold. The ice cream is brain freezing cold, while the brownies is warm and toasty. I really, really enjoyed it and think that it is better than Chili's brownies.

Another excellent dessert is the Mocha mud pie - its a choc almond mousse and coffee ice cream drenched in choc syrup, toasted almonds on top as well as sprinkled with choc crust. Not a fan of coffee, but the pairing of mocha and choc is palatable for non-coffee lovers. Frankly, it's awesome!

On yet another visit, my friends and I tried the Boneless Wings, Fish & chips and Chicken Fajitas nachos. Love the tartar sauce of the fish & chips, and the chicken fajitas nachos is crispy - better than Kickin' Jack Nachos at Chilis

Verdict:
1. I love the environment as it is less crowded than Chilis and they have great music - try TGIF at Wangsa Walk, as they have a lot of space and still new.
2. Price wise, the ala carte menu is a bit expensive than Chili's.
3. Appeal to the wallet as they have the 2 course menu for RM29.90 every Mon-Fri. Choose one entree and one main course to share it with your friend.

The Etiquette of Quitting Your Job

2010-04-04T11:44:00.004+08:00

I have never quit from a job before, possibly because I was fresh out of Uni and got a job at a government department - that's for life security. The only experience I have of a changing workplace, is being transferred to another division. Even so that involves with some kind of procedure/etiquette.

However, being in the middle management now, I have had experiences with people quitting on the job under my watch. Well, two to be exact, eventhough they were on temporary basis. I don't mean to judge their reasons for quitting, but I just want to share how I feel about being in this kind of situation and how the said employee/s could've done better from just leaving their jobs.

We hate that you quit in the middle of a task before finishing it. Know how hard it is to pick up the pieces and continue from there?
For the employees who are about to quit their job, please give ample notice to the company based on contract be it 1 or 2 months notice, or whatever period it may be. This is because you may have some task that were not completed and the company needs to find a replacement to continue the job or you may need to train the next person who will come in to take your place.

We hate that you have didn't leave a progress report or finish your task
The company may want to have the updates on the progress of your work at that point so it is better to tie the loose ends by finishing the said task or do a proper handing over job by prepraing notes and notifying it to whomever you are reporting to.

We hate people who beg back for their job because when they quit they don't give a f**k what happens to their colleagues and the company
Never ever quit before having a secured job in place. Think long and hard before quitting, or if you can't think properly, take a few days off just to sort things out. It is one thing to quit the current job, but it's another thing to beg for it back, especially when you realised that you have made a mistake and because the other thing didn't work out.

My advice is never ever leave the company high and dry by just quitting without turning up to the office without any reason. It will be long lasting impression that you are a bad employee, and maybe this will stick in your records. The company may not be so generous to give you a second chance.

The Birthday Celebration

2010-03-28T10:27:00.012+08:00

We had a birthday celebration at Chili's for Ms Fantaghiro's birthday after work on Wednesday.

Ms Fantaghiro in her many vain poses

Ms Fantaghiro doing her best Amanda pose

Ms Fantaghiro with her birthday card

Ms Fantaghiro with her Southwestern lamb grill. Yummy!

Ou regular menu at Chili's - the Triple Play's awesome!

Ms Fantaghiro happy and full

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MS FANTAGHIRO!

2010-03-24T08:46:00.008+08:00

Critically acclaimed vain pot, Ms Fantaghiro

Its her birthday today!!

Ms Fantaghiro has many passions in life

10 things that she loves:

1. She loves food of all kind, but mostly she loves Chilis

2. In love with Bradley James - from Merlin

3. In love with Jang Hyuk - from Slave Hunter

4. Love all the pretty boys - Used to love Ben Barnes

5. Loves stripper shoes

6. Loves Kopitiam

7. Loves to be a couch potato

8. Loves magic-related series - Charmed, Merlin

9. Loves books

10. Loves Hindustani movies & songs - though at one moment in her life she boycotted them

10 things that Ms Fantaghiro hates:

1. The heat - it gives her migraine

2. Migraines

3. Other vain pots - nobody can topple her crown of vainness

4. Skanky b*****s

5. Rude drivers

6. Rude people in general

7. Cruelty to animals

8. Being called fat

9. BlueHyppo

10. Undisciplined parents & children

So, Happy Birthday Ms Fantaghiro

Many Happy returns of the day

May Allah bless you always

May we remain good friends no matter how...

How to Not Give Advise

2010-03-20T21:18:00.003+08:00

I have a dear friend who is on the brink of a life changing situation. The problem was that she wants things to change but was afraid to take the next step. She wants to take the next step now, but I cautioned her to be careful and not let her emotions to get the better of her. Its not as if I didn't want her to move forward and be happy, because I can see how miserable she is. Its beginning to affect her at work. I just felt that it was unfair that she didn't receive her dues. I want her to be happy.

How to not give advise? I mean I did not want to be imposing my opinions on her. There is a very, very fine line when your advise can be poisonous to your friend. Just keep your opinions to yourself, lest you influence your friend to take actions that doesn't come from her heart. They might regret making the decision that wasn't theirs to begin with. They might even blame you for that decision in the future, especially if it backfires. But if it doesn't backfire, they would always wonder if they make it because they want to or because you push it to them.

As a friend, you must always be objective about your friend's problems. Approach it from a different angle than what they present to you. See it outside the box, because you are the observer. The point is for you to be objective about it, because you friend will be emotional. Try to suggest a structured approach, see the pros or cons of the situation, give some recommendations but never impose it on them, try to help your friend find a solution, then closure. Be there for your friend when she needs you. Even if you don't give any advise, just be her listener.

Thank you for the Vote of Confidence

2010-03-12T09:10:00.002+08:00

When you're down and out nobody wants to help you.

But when you're up and about, everybody wants to be with you.

It just shows how success can attract people. But it also makes me annoyed cause when we're down and needed help the most, some people just scoff you off.

Take for instance, the new company I'm working in now. It is essentially a sister company to my old company. A few colleagues and myself are only seconded there for two years. But everybody treats the seconders like we're lepers, eventhough we are doing our job to help the sister company for the benefit of all. Why this type of mentality? Because they think we are a corporate company, hence we have more money. Because they think our salary is much more than theirs that they think its fair to dump a truckload worth of jobs & projects on us. Without taking into account that we are newly established and there's only 10 of us for a work worth for 35 people.

So we struggled and preservered. We took 4 new temporary workers. Work seemed to be moving along, we were slowly and surely establishing the new company. Baby steps. Now some of the sceptics began to say to us, "wow you guys now ok lah now oh, you got additional staff" and "when is your office hiring". Now you want to know eh....cause we've done all the hard, groundwork. You think you just wanna come in and reap the benefits, be glamourous in this new shiny company.

Me thinks not.

Snow White & Poison Apples

2010-03-09T19:48:00.000+08:00

Snow White died by poison apples, organizations died because of poison letters.

In this case, the organization that I'd worked for for the last 8 years.

I don't know about other government departments, but it has always been the trend in my organization to have a few of this poison letters flying around. Whenever a group of people are not satisfied with the some issues, they write poison letters. The most popular issue for poison letters : overseas posting.

There would always be people who would not be satisfied the other person can get overseas posting. All the slanderous remarks like: "she's sombeody's oxigen, that's why she can go for posting" or "what's so special about this person that he can be cross posted" or "he/she did not perform, there were many complaints about his/her work".

The funny thing about these remarks was that, those people who've wrote the poison letters were probably in that exact kind of position before. Oh ,we do know who wrote the letters, because there are also rumours flying about the writer/s of the posion letter/s! How ironic, right? But when you are in the same organization long, you tend to know who's who and what they're capable of, or so they're rumoured to be! Sometimes they'd brag about it and talk about the issues, and you wonder how they get this kind of info. Sometimes its a mole within the organization who leaks this kind of stories.

Another popular issue is leadership. My organization is quite notorious for having aDG faced with bribery accusation but was acquitted later on. That time there were so many of his supporters, they all were behind him. Now when's he's back in work, some people started to question about his actions such as doing reorg or to send certain people for posting. They say he had ulterior motives. Where are all those people who put him in a pedestal before? Answer: they all been posted overseas for being vocal and disobedient in the eyes of the management. What a cool punishment eh? So now left all those people who were not satisfied with his leadership, and even more dissatisfied cause they can't go for overseas posting for being obedient. They are now free to criticize him, buy they dare not say this to him or bring this on the proper platform. Solution: poison letters.

My take on poison letters: you can't satisfy everyone cause there will always people who won't be happy with how certain things are handled. Its like politics, either you're PR or BN, you play the dirty game. It doesn't matter who's side you are on, dirt would always get stuck to you. Its only a matter of time when the wheels will turn and you'd be up or down, depending on where you were before. Me? I stay away from office politics, and do my work and try not to step on other people's toes. If you do work, rather than waste time thinking and stabbing other people trying to climb the corporate ladder, then I think you'd have more personal satisfaction. Plus we must have a balance with personal life. Leave work at workplace, enjoy your life to the fullest at home. I know that's what I do.

Home remedy: Castor Oil

2010-03-08T22:15:00.001+08:00

A few weeks ago, I sprained my right waist because of some exercise. I was in pain for a week, I couldn't bend down or sit down in one place for a long time and I had to pray sitting down in a chair.

My mum introduced to Cik a remedy for knee ache when we went back to Rompin. It's drinking a teaspoon of castor oil mixed with half a glass of warm water before going to sleep. It helps to "grease" the joints. They both drank it and felt generally better the next day.

Then we saw the Yoga for you programme on Astro. It says that the Ayurvedic treatment for osteoperosis is by drinking 1 tsp castor oil mixed with 1 tsp ginger powder and half glass of warm water, because the Ayurveda believed that osteoperosis is caused by wind in your body. It helps to expel the wind in body and strengthen bone density.

So I though maybe I should try the remedy for my waist ache. The oil & warm water concoction tasted like burnt peanut oil. Its palatable unlike the bitter taste of some herbal remedies like jamu, for instance. When I woke up the next morning, lo and behold, my ache was totally gone. It was like a miracle cure. Cik said it was probably due to wind in my body too.

Last night I tried the ginger + castor oil + warm water. My body felt great today and some of the aches I experienced were also gone. Cator oil is known to be a laxative and helps with bowel movement. It is easily found in Indian stores where you can buy the ginger powder as well. Its also known as minyak jarak.

Nasi Dagang

2010-03-07T13:35:00.001+08:00

Nasi Dagang made fresh this morning!

Last two weeks I went back to Rompin with my mum. Hubby asked me to buy nasi dagang to tapau back, but it was already noon and nasi dagang is always sold in the morning for breakfast in the East coast area.

So hubby must've been craving for nasi dagang, coz last friday's pasar malam he went out to buy one. Then he was harping on me to cook nasi dagang. I am not good with Malay cooking but fortunately, I copied down the recipe from Cik when I was in Rompin. So yesterday we went out to Carrefour to buy the ingredients including ikan tongkol.

Misplaced the original recipe, called Cik on the phone for the ingredients and made a scaled down version of it and it turned out ok!

So here goes the recipe for Nasi Dagang for two persons, from scratch:

Nasi
1.5 cup of ordinary rice
0.5 cup of pulut rice
(soak both rice in water for at least four hours)
5 tbsp of coconut milk - add sugar and salt till its very, very sweet & salty
1 tbsp halba (fenugreek seeds)
Red onion, ginger - sliced thinly

Fish
1 whole ikan tongkol
(cut it to 5 pieces, cook with water + salt + asam keping)
* can substitue with other types of fish such as tenggiri, kembung, etc or prawns, chicken.

Kuah
Wet ingredients:
500 ml Coconut milk - or as much as you want the kuah to be
10 pcs of dried chillies - deseeded and soak in hot water
2 inches lengkuas (galangal)
1 inch ginger (halia)
1 inch kunyit hidup (live turmeric)
(blend chillies, lengkuas, halia, kunyit hidup)

Dry ingredients:
1 tbsp of fish curry powder
1 tbsp of serbuk ketumbar (coriander powder)
1 tbsp of serbuk jintan manis
1 buah keras (candle nut)
2 buah pelaga (cardamon)
3 bunga cengkih (clove)
1 bunga lawang (star anise)
1 inch kulit kayu manis (cinnamon)
(dry roast without oil then blend all ingredients)
2 inch gula melaka

Steps:
Rice
1. soak for 4 hours
2. steam the rice, about 15 minutes into cooking or when its half cook, p0ur cold water on top of the rice
3. close lid, wait till throughly cook

4. once rice is cooked, wade thru rice with coconut milk + sliced onion & ginger + halba till it has a glowy sheen. Easy on the coconut milk + halba, or you rice will have a very strong, overbearing taste.

Kuah
1. Simmer all the wet ingredients till it boils
2. Add fish + 2 pcs asam keping till it boils again

3. Add dry ingredients, and simmer till the kuah becomes thicker (about 30-45 mins) and oil breaks on the surface & season to taste

*Serve Nasi Dagang with cucumber salad (vinegar+onions+cucumber+pineapple - optional)

Cooking nasi dagang seems like a daunting task, especially somebody like me who rarely cooks Malay dishes (not sure if I can do a mean curry). But cooking nasi dagang is simple enough, its just that the ingredients looks like a lot be prepared. Once you have everything ready, its just a matter of throwing eveything into the pot!

P/s: hubby had a second helping!

Middle Management

2010-03-06T23:38:00.002+08:00

With great power comes responsibility, or so says Superman. How did I end up to be middle management?

Being a government servant for the past 8 years, I was always the middle person. I was the go between the bosses and the rest of the staff under my care. If the boss assigned me to do something, I'd call my team and we discuss how best to do it and then we do it. It was mostly one way traffic.

I think it started when I was in Research Division when they entrusted me to take care of 20 research officers (ROs) that was situated all over Malaysia. Their job was to do surveys that the division ask them to do. My job was to monitor them through their work. This includes their quality of work, discipline, salary etc. I barely knew them as my stint in Research was only one year. I've only met 8 out of 20 ROs but I had to do their appraisal as I was their supervisor. How the hell was I suppose to do their appraisal when I don't even know them well enough, some I've never even met?! To be honest, I had to wing it. I had to source info from various parts such as the previous officers who've handled their affairs, state office directors, other officers who've used them on other surveys and on paper - reports, attendance, etc. I had to form an opinion on each individual based on those things, and to best of my knowledge, did their appraisal. That was my part as the first valuer for the appraisal.

I think Top management have it easy. They only amend on the things that you have done. Same thing with the appraisal. The second valuer just put in their score based on my original score and write shorter comments. Middle management do all the work whilst top management just checks my grammar? Hardly seems fair as top management is required to do the thinking and planning. Not just planning to go overseas, but actual planning on how to be more effective at work and achieve our targets. Not just become the boss in name and dumping everything to middle management to settle it.

Middle management is tough. You are the middleman who has to take care of their own backside too. On one hand, you have to please the boss, on the other hand you have to appease your co-workers with their issues - working with inadequate resources, no proper SOP, no backup/support from other div. You have to become the trouble shooter and lend your hands to help them and lend your ears to listen to their problems.

Send me to Management school!

With the new bureau, I became the middle management person. It was conveniently thrust upon me by my so called CEO, as there was no other officer higher ranking than me. Not that I was that high ranking, but I was at the right place at the right time. That said, we are terribly understaffed, overworked and in dire need of a buffer between me and the boss. I can't possibly do all the thinking, planning, executing, monitoring.

Send in the reinforcements!

How to Network

2010-01-20T07:43:00.003+08:00

Being in this line work, we really have to network a lot. Networking with people we already know is easy-peasy. You just reinforce the connection that you already have with that person or the company that they worked for, and add on to that with industry news or other people that we knew in the cricle. And bam! You get the conversation flowing.

But how to network with people you don't know? It is quite painful, especially when you have to make the first move. What do you say to that person standing next to you, looking as akward as you are? Or if you don't make the first move, just nursing the drink in your hand, hoping someone would speak to you cause you don't know anybody there. It can be quite uncomfortable.

They way I see it when I go to this kind of functions, is to bring your associates or friends. Then you'd feel less embarrased to talk to people. Or you friend can introduce you to her acquaintance, or you can introduce your acquaintance to your friend. There's pros and cons to it. You might end up huddling in your small cosy group and not do much networking.

But if you set a purpose coming to functions to establish contacts and network, that you have set a goal to reach a certain quota or meet a few pertinent people, then you'd use the hours wisely. I see people like this all the time;

1. Always look confident when approching people, there's brazen confidence and there's quiet confidence - it's all in the personality;
2. Never sit in a corner or stuck to a location - mingling around means you have to work the crowd, or the least go to all the corners of the room;
3. Always ask about the other person, don't only talk about yourself - get to know what they are about, and maybe you can connect that with your line of work;
4. Stick to topics relating to work, or the industry or if you have no common ground, talk about current issues, but never talk about politics. Networking time is when everbody is neutral and relaxed, don't mar that with politics;
5. Always bring your business card - important! to establish contact and follow up later on;
6. Never leave the function without thanking the host - must be polite.

The steps may or may not work for you. You just have to find yourself and be comfortable with it.

Happy New Year

2010-01-19T07:38:00.003+08:00

Happy New Year...I am still in the zone to wish everyone Happy New Year :)

I know that I had been neglecting to update this blog.

New Year started out with a bang for me. It's as if I never left 2009, that I didn't take the well-deserved 10 days break at the end of the year. But I did took the break, and felt refreshed and ready for work.

My first task was to organise a half day seminar for the industry for 100 pax. I did it within the span of two weeks. Sending out the invitations via email and getting responses overnight. Made arrangements of the speakers and venue through emails and calls. It was easy for me. The response was good and overwhelming too. Last RSVP was 105 pax from 44 organizations. But 92 pax turned up from 41 organizations. The no-show rate wasn't so bad. We'd prepared for 100 pax anyway.

Everybody raved about the seminar. The contents were concise and very informative. This type of seminar they couldn't get anywhere in Malaysia, plus it's FOC. Usually they'd have to attend overseas course/seminar for the meeting industry like ICCA or CMP, somewhere in Europe where'd it cost a bomb. It feels good that we are doing somthing that mattered to the industry.

Our consultant suggested to have this seminar every two months, just to educate the industry. Somebody suggested to do it on the road, maybe move to another venue, apart from Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre. Hey, if you guys wanna pick up the cost of venue & F&B, by all means. It'd be fun to change venue and see how other venue works.

Next on the agenda is Ministerial briefing in February. That is briefing to all the relevant departments in the ministries. A daunting task because you can't just email to them. Must send letters of invitation, all government style. Plus you have to be patient and follow up with calls. Once sending invitation, must give them at least a week to respond. Cause there's chain of command. You send it to the KSU, it will go down to the DG, DDG then Directors, then the staff. It will take longer than response by private sector. Plus we gotta do it at PICC because that's where all the government departments are.

Plus, I got a gozillion things to to do. Appointment of contractor for office renovation, hiring of temporary staff, still doing servicing & bidding, plus undertaker for everyone else who's got a gripe with the boss comes to me and expecting me to do miracles.

Thta's why I love weekends and look forward to it. Dang, it's only Tuesday.

Hanoi

2009-12-15T18:20:00.000+08:00

Street paddlers hustling a gwailo

I was in Hanoi sometime in September. This was a personal trip. I did know much about the city, and this was my first time to Vietnam. Hanoi was almost like every other ASEAN cities, with dusty roads and crowded building filled with shops and the roadstalls, where the Hanois eat their daily meals, perched on low stools.

Midday meal by the roadside

I've also discovered that Hanoi retained some of the French influences in its everyday life. From the casual manner in which baguettes are sold by the roadside, to the small French cafes dotted around the city and the exquisite embroideries on linens.

Halong Bay

On our third day, me and mum visited Halong Bay. The journey takes about 2+ hours out of town. The roads were bumpy once we get closer to the countryside. Then we took a junk out to Halong Bay, which was maybe about 45 minutes out from the jetty.

The junk

Our junk inching closer to the entrance of Halong Bay

Voila! Halong Bay.

Oddly this is a scenery that I've set my eyes on before. If you've been to Langkawi at Sg Kilim, this is the exact scenery that you can see.

Fruit paddler catching up on us via bot, then my mum bought some bananas

Fruits paddler at the makeshift jetty, using a traditional boat.

Fresh seafood for our lunch onboard the junk

Bevy of activities as tourists were ushered to the smaller boats for cave exploration

Same like in Langkawi!

Island of Man

The famous fighting cocks island

Halong Bay

Too bad I didn't have the chance to visit the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. Next time, I would like to visit Ho Chi Minh city, I hear the embroideries are much cheaper than Hanoi.

New Moon

2009-12-12T22:25:00.001+08:00

I've read the book, and I've seen the movie. I hated both of it. The movie was too long and to many mushy moments that made me rolled my eyes. But being a fan of the original Twilight movie, I forced myself to finish both the book and the movie.

Twilight defies all the typical traits of a vampire such as sleeping during the day and hunting at night, they become creatures that never sleep and that if they were exposed to the sun, their skin twinkle like diamonds. New Moon just takes the absurdity up a notch. Jacob turns into a werewolf, joining a pack of werewolves, who were to protect the area from vampires. Bella is so clumsy, you could not believe how a pretty girl like her is so dumb and weak. She is the typical damsel in distress, waiting to be rescued. She got both a vampire and a werewolf vying for her love, but she loves the undead even more. Bella's father, Charlie the Sheriff, is so clueless about Bella and what's happening with her life. On his defense, how was he suppose to know that vampires exists? Heh.

I am still a sucker for vampire stories/movies.

By the way, Taylor Lautner/Jacob Black is hot.

Go Team Jacob:)

My Sister's Keeper

2009-12-10T21:25:00.002+08:00

Jodi Picoult's My Sister's Keeper

I have just finished reading this book last weekend. Verdict: Awesome! Can't wait to see the movie version. I especially love the style of writing - light and fast paced, even though the whole book revolved around issues like family relationship, lawsuit, designer babies, organ donation, sickness and death. Yes, all in one book.

Contain spoilers.

The story is about Anna, conceived as a perfect DNA match for her sister, Kate who suffers from a rare form of leukemia. Anna, who is 13, wants to seek medical emancipation from her parents because she feels that her body was being used to save Kate without her total consent. She is torn between saving her sister and also saving her own life. She is torn between loyalty and love to her family but freedom to her own body. What brought her to this decision was because Kate's condition grew worse and the only solution is to harvest a kidney from Anna. Anna feels a violation of her own body but have no choice but to go along with her parents' suggestions. This is basically the premise of the story.

The story gives the reader a lot to think about. Saving a life is important but one must also think about saving oneself or should we put these selfish thoughts away and save the one we love selflessly and unconditionally? Perhaps Anna feels these things because she is young and felt that life had been unfair to her, all she wants is a normal childhood and that her parents would love her rather than just look at her as a cattle for harvest.

Being parents are hard. But being parents to terminally sick child is hard work. They have to make hard and unpopular choices just to save their child. But will this be a conflict of interest when they use their other child to save their sick child? Would you have another child just to harvest her organs to save her sister? Isn't that ethically wrong? I feel that this was not explored thoroughly in the book, but was covered by so much drama going around with the lawsuit, the complexity of the trial because Anna's mother, Sara was a lawyer and became the defence attorney against her daughter, everybody's emotion in the story, the subplot about the lawyer and guidance counselor, etc. I feel that Sara is concerned only about saving Kate but neglect both Anna and her oldest son, Jesse, who become rebellious and started to become an arsonist.

But read the book to find out more about the story and how it ends. It has a surprising twist , but still a sad ending. The ending is a convenient ending, I must say, because everything just falls into place. You either love or hate the ending. I did not like the ending, but I suppose it gives hope to something which feels impossible at first glance.

But Cameron Diaz as the mother??? I don't think she is suited to play a mother, but I might be wrong. I still want to see the movie and see if it is as good as the book.

Now reading another of Jodi Picoult's book: Second Glance.

Frolicking in Firenze

2009-12-08T20:07:00.003+08:00

Santa Maria Del Fiore - front

Firenze or Florence is a dream destination for any tourisst who loves art. It has gothic bulidings and rich with history and culture dated back during the time of great artists like Michelangelo, Leornado Da Vinci, Boticelli. The great Galleria Uffizzi which housed the works of arts such as paintings and sculptures by those great artists was already functioned as a gallery sometime in 1550. Its amazing to discover that some works of arts were done as early as 1100, to see those life like paintings, its very eerie and magnificient at the same time. Those days people don't have camera or video, so they value works of arts that capture the imagination and the life like qualities.

I was there attending a conference in early November. It was already very cold and windy, less than 10 degrees during the day and at night maybe about 1-2 degrees. The wind bit my skin, and I had to cover my face with cream and scarf. I was wearing long johns and had to bought some scarf and mittens in Florence to keep me warmer.

Santa Maria Del Fiore

The three buildings above are part of UNESCO World heritage buildings
Left: Baptistery (minor basilica) is one of the oldest building in Florence, was built in 1059-1128
Middle: Facade of the cathedral of the Santa Maria del Fiore made from red, white & green marble
Right: Giotto's companile (giotto's bell tower)

The dome was designed by Fillipe Brunelleschi in 1296
We had to pay Euro8 to climb up to the top of the dome, which contained more than 400 steps!

To reach the dome took more than 400 very narrow steps to reach the top for a breath taking view of Florence. Not advisable for those who suffer from claustrophobia and acrophobia.

Enjoying the view from the height...

Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus" 1486.

I have seen this painting upclose and it is magnificient and more beautiful than this replica. The actual painting is quite huge, covering more than 1/3 of one of the wall at the Galleria Ufizzi in Florence.

Street artist recreating Vermeer's "Girl with A Pearl Earring"

Across the river Arno

Our dinner - halal kebab everynight! Costs about Euro5 each

Leather jackets made from lamb skin can be bought at Euro120

Ponte Vecchio, "ponte" meaning bridge used to be a butcher's market but now turned to a shopping are especially on jewellery.

Replica of the statue of David by Michelangelo at Palazzo Vecchio (city hall of Florence). This is the orginal place where the statue was erected. The orginal statue was moved in 1873 to the Galleria del Academia to protect it from deteriorating.

Yours truly in front of another naked statue in Florence :p
The Fountain of Neptune

Florence is the best city that I'd ever reached in Europe. To me it is ideal as a tourist destinations because everything is within walking distance, the gallerias have superb art collection, and everywhere you walk you feel that you are transported back in time, and can totally imagine the great artists working at their new paintings or sculptures...

I would love to go back to Florence for another visit...

Pardon my French

2009-11-19T00:22:00.005+08:00

I was tied up with work. Work has drained all the creative energy in me. After the long hours at work, I don't have any more energy and ideas to write about things.

Work, work, work...hubby's been nagging me for going back from work so late every night for the past few weeks. Its funny, both me and Ms Shazsha has observed that our real work began when its time for everybody else to go home. That's when we have our peace and quite from the outside world, that we are able to sit tight and do paperwork or research. Things that needed our concentration and thinking.

During the day, we'd be busy entertaining calls, attending meetings, clients, emails or running around to get things done. Some people think that we only service their ONE event, therefore they demand our undivided attention and expect us to answer to their beck and call, even to the silliest of enquiries like " what is the size of the poster that you are giving us". We service hundreds of events, please don't bog us down with time wasting enquiries. We have given you the items, its up to your intelligence how to utilize it the best way you can. Resources are limited, please don't expect us to baby you.

Tips in dealing with us:
1. It would help if you are nice to us, maybe we won't mind the silly questions so much. We are here to serve you the best way we can;
2. Please be patient with our service time. We also need to get permission/approval from various other parties before we can actually deliver the service;
3. Do not expect that we can provide everything for you. With the economic downturn, nobody can afford to be Santa Claus, not even the F1 teams;
4. Do some homework before you start thrashing us down. If not it will make you look stupid, and we will despise working with you.

One client came in demanding us to give her a Meeting Planner. When I said we don't produce it anymore, she asked what is the government doing to support the industry and started blaming all sorts of things. Wake up, lady! Don't expect us to feed you with a silver spoon. Other countries' private sectors are proactive in pooling their resources to compete with the rest of the world, and here you are still bitching about why the government doesn't help you? This type of attitude is a testament why Malaysia can't move forward. Always expecting to be spoon fed, and when they don't get enough, blame the government.

We need a change of mentality, to move forward. Till then, I'll work as much as I can take it.

Elvis has left the building.

Sementara tengah free...

2009-11-01T16:58:00.000+08:00

Tag ini boleh dibuat untuk mengisi masa lapang...

Bila kali terakhir anda cuci toilet? Tak ingat dah...
Pencuci apa yg anda guna? Dettol
Dalam 1 minggu berapa kali anda mop lantai? Err...biasanya sebulan sekali jer...har har
Apa tugasan anda sebelum menjelang malam? Tak banyak masa siang pun sebelum menjelang malam sebab sampai dari office dah pukul 6++, rehat jap tengok tv, pastu dah magrib solat, pastu fix dinner.
Apa menu hidangan makan malam anda yg paling simple? Salad + dressing. No cooking required!
Minuman yg anda buat setiap pagi? Tiada. Biasa kat opis minum mineral water atau order teh "o" kalau makan di "Cafe by the river".
Sebelum tido apa yg anda lakukan? Biasanya tengok TV sambil jahit manik atau blogging, atau tengok tv sambil sidai baju. Kalau ada potluck esok, malam dah start memasak. Menu biasa: pasta goreng.
Kena tag 8 bloggers : Aza De Kaza, Kerabu Jantung, Noreez, Adianez, Salfaryna, Hanani, Emmii, Shazsha, dan sesiapa yang rasa nak buat tag ini...

Anything that Can Go Wrong, Will Go Wrong

2009-10-28T08:32:00.001+08:00

Last Saturday I had to work. It was a congress dinner at one of the hotels in KUL. I had to go since the Minister is a Guest of Honor at the function, and will be delivering a speech. Had to make sure everything runs smoothly, eventhough this is not our function. The Minister being a Minister, will turn to her officers and asks what's wrong, if anything happened to go wrong. So, we as the officers of the government must strive for perfection just for the sake of Minister's happiness.

Anyway, my job was to make sure that the promotional DVD runs smoothly before her speech. Its a perfect window of opportunity to show your video as you have a captive audience. Thus, it is very, very important not to have any technical glitch during the actual screening of the video. I'd handed my DVD to the technical person there, who happened to be a mass comm student from UiTM, as managing this event was to be included in their final project. He was supposed to play the congress video first after the first speech, and then play my video before my Minister gave her speech. We tested the video while everyone was milling about the ballroom and foyer. It worked beautifully.

Then, we'd to change my DVD back again to his DVD since there were no additional DVD player or laptop available. I was standing by at the technical area, waiting for the time to play my video. Together, we waited for the emcee extraordinaire aka stage manager, Dato' Dale to give the cue. He gave the cue. Then the guy played the video, but...silence. The video didn't work, it was stuck. He panciked and started to curse, "shit, shit". Dato' Dale came over and said, "tell me can the video work? tell me now, can you do it or not?". The guy panicked, the other commitees also panicked, a few seconds have relapsed. Then Dato' Dale said you guys should've tested the video and went back to the mike and said something to the effect, "if anything that can go wrong, will go wrong, that is Murphy's law" and smoothly covered the glitch. And on to the next speech, my minister's video and speech. Everything turns out smoothly.

In retrospect, I felt sorry for the student, I really do. Maybe it was my fault, coming to add the additional video an hour before programme starts. I'd re-examined this in my head, maybe justifying this to myself. I'd to have the vidoe played, if not the bosses will slay me alive. Maybe the student was inexperieneced enough to deal with ad hoc programme. But then again, I recalled during the panic time, one of the committee asked which video was supposed to be played, since they had two videos to play, additional to my video. Why are they still debating about which video to play at the eleventh hour? According to Dato' Dale they'd attended meetings to discuss about the videos. Well anyone can play the blame game, but on my part I am clear that I was supposed to ensure that the video played without any glitch. Whatever happens behind the scene, everyone was suppose to play their part. No matter what happens, be it a an ad hoc request or a technical glitch.

Let a lesson be learned, no matter how good or bad you are in your job. Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong. That's Murphy's Law.

Propa aje!

2009-10-23T08:47:00.000+08:00

Sick of people trying to run my life. Being so manipulative about it. Give it straight to me (but with tact to soften the blow). I can take it. But when you go behind other people's back just to get the message to me, I'm going to intrepret this as you don't have enough balls to tell me yourself. The message is lost in translation. Some people just take pleasure in twisting other people's knickers into knots, manipulating them. Maybe they don't have enough work in the office, that they start to mess with other people's head. It's just a game to them. Why can't people just let be with themselves, don't try to step on other people's toes on your way up. Get more things to do, have a life outside the office, take up a hobby, do whatever it is to keep your sanity. An idle mind goes to waste, if not used regularly. But it must be used in a correct way, not just for yakking and gossiping...

KL As I See It

2009-10-21T08:28:00.006+08:00

1978-1995
I've lived a nomad life, the first 18 years of my life. My dad was a government man, and he was transferred every 4 years or so to different branches. I grew up around Malaysia since I could remember- 3 years in Kuantan, 5 years in Kelantan, 3 years in Kedah and 3 years in Kuching, all in that order.

1996
It was time to leave the nest. I'd accepted to enter a local Uni based in KL. It was like a dream, both going into Uni and living in KL. I was giddy with excitement.The first thing that I noticed about KL, was the hustle and bustle of the city life. Cars honking, people walking, buses speeding in and out of the traffic, everything a mad rush. For me, those pink mini buses was the epitome of the first year of my life in KL. It gets me where I needed to go around KL, either to Sogo or Bukit Bintang to window shop or hang out. Sunway or Suria KLCC or even Midvalley weren't built yet in the mid '90s. The Mini buses were always full of people, with no air condition, the windows cranked down to allow in some air. People were crammed like sardines. Maybe I learned some survival skills to look out for myself being in one of those buses. A girl has to protect herself from perverts and pickpockets. Getting a seat in the mini bus was like winning a lottery ticket. If I do get a seat, I'd make sure to give it to those in need. Despite the conditions in the mini bus, I was almost sorry to see it abolished one year later.

1997
The new line of Intrakota buses were introduced; bigger seats, with better service and was air conditioned. The drivers are more courteous and cautious on the road. By now, mini buses were a distant memory.

1998
The Commonwealth Games was held in Stadium Putra Bukit Jalil. My sister was a volunteer for the games. So my mum and I decided to show our support to her by going to Bukit Jalil. The first time ever I took the Star LRT to Bukit Jalil. To me, the ride was a bit rickety but it was safe enough. I wasn't used to the movement of the train off the ground.

2001
First time on the Putra LRT to Suria KLCC. This line runs straight from Gombak to Kelana Jaya. I like Putra LRT as the coach was smaller than Star LRT, and it was cool that the train was computer generated, means there wasn't any driver on board. It only took us about 15 minutes and about 7 stations or so to reach KLCC. It made more sense as we don't have to take a bus and go downtown to all the jam, and change to another bus just to reach KLCC.

2002-mid 2008
Spent the next 6 years of my life commuting from Putra LRT Terminal Putra to Masjid Jamek, then interchange at Masjid Jamek to take the Star LRT staright to PWTC station. Learnt that it was smarter to use the monthly pass as it was more economic. My daily ride for the two trains is RM7, to and fro. It will cost me about RM140 per month if I buy regular tickets. With the pass its only RM125, and beats queing up. Learnt to use underground tunnel at Masjid Jamek from Putra LRT to Star LRT, as one of my collegue was hit by a motorist crossing the street at Masjid Jamek. Much safer to use the tunnel.

Mid 2008
Finally decided that I'd enough of commuting. Everybody's on the train, it feels like I'm in a mini bus. So, with the new and affordable Proton Saga BLM, I'd decided to become a motorist and brave the KL traffic. My route begins from Danau Kota, Setapak and cut thru Jalan Genting Klang. Famed for its congestion, I'd to leave home at least 7.15am to be able to reach the office comfortably at 8.30am.

2009
DUKE Highway opened. Jalan Genting Klang less congested and my driving time to the office was reduced to considerably. Now I can leave home at 7.45am and made it to the office at 8.15am. Better conditions especially after the public holidays, the roads are a breeze to go thru. Happy to say that the road of Jalan Genting Kelang is being upgraded now, from 2 lanes to three lanes. Driving is less a hassle now. I might actually like the city, jam and all.

Of being philantrophic and managing your finance

2009-10-20T08:15:00.001+08:00

I was at the mall last Friday, just walking around doing some shopping. I felt a bit hungry and decided to buy one of those Auntie Anne's pretzels sour cream & onion. As I was sitting down beside the kiosk, I saw this chinese lady peeling some nuts with her employee (I guessed she was the employer). First they were quiet, then suddenly the aunty started to talk him and telling him how she was involved with her church charity groups, reaching out to the poor, giving donations and help to those in need.

It started me thinking that I haven't done much charity, that maybe I've been selfish with my quest to achieve the ultimate comfortable state of life. The only charity I'd done is giving away some old clothes and monthly donations to MAKNA, which I can say is quite meagre. Behind my apartment is an orphange, but I'm ashamed to say that I've never donated anything to them, be it in cash or kind. I don't know, maybe it's hard to make the first move to approach them and tell them that I want to donate something. My mum always say, if you want to donate to those kids, bring them food. She'd brought some food over for supper and she said that the kids were very delighted to see it.

I guess that's why I never have enough money in my hands. Maybe I make more than some, minus all the debts, some contribution to the family, I have enough left. Always just enough, never in abundance. Also I am quite the spendthirft, so that's the more reason. Maybe my money is not berkat, coz I don't give it away much. It is said that a portion of your money belongs to someone else, maybe a friend in need or giving to charity. I think the lesson for me is: I need to give more to charity. I should start somehwere, no matter how small. The first step is the most important.

Poetry in Motion

2009-10-09T01:04:00.004+08:00

Warning! A very indelicate entry about constipation, hemorrhoids and such.

A few days ago, I'd come across a colleague who looked sickly.I asked her if she was okay. And she said she's had hemorrhoid, that's why she's not feeling so well and was on mc for two days. This condition was something that I have close connection.

Since I was small, I've had severe case of constipation. I'd go for days without passing motion. I'd tried to force it out by staying in the loo for hours. This continued on till my school years whereby I'd experienced blood dripping when I was "processing" in the loo. I had a scare. I thought I had hemorrhoid or buasir. In my uni days, I'd to take teh orang kampung to ease my troubles. It worked for a while, then my tummy got immune to it, and it didn't work anymore. I went back to the days without passing motion, sometimes 3 days, sometimes 5, I think maybe one time I'd gone 1 week without doing my business. It was discomforting. I'd felt toxic. Back then I was quite active in sports, drank loads of water, ate less.

Alhamdullilah, things improved when I started work. Kerabu Jantung said I need to force myself to do my business early in the morning. I didn't believe her at first. Then I tried it. Over a period of a few months, while diligently sitting at my throne for hours, I'd discovered that I began to pass motion regularly. Then my hours in the loo decreased to half an hour of waiting, then some more. It came to a point where I'd get the morning call. You know, like when you are still asleep but suddenly u had to get up and run to the loo because feel something about to come out! Now, I'm happy to say that I don't have that problem anymore. In my case, it wasn't my diet, but it was something to do with disciplining my body to function properly.

But not everyone is lucky as I am. My colleague still have hemorrhoid, and so many other people out there. Kak Safinah, the owner of Malay Tea House had actually recommended my colleague to use virgin coconut oil. It is reported to have healing properties, and she said you can see immediate result within one week. Maybe you can also try to eat more veggies and fruits that are high in fibre, like bananas, prunes, etc. I would advise to use two prong approach, visit the doctor to get proper medication and then try some traditional cure. Whatever works for you since everyone is different.

Beijing Express Sightseeing: Forbidden City & Tian An Men

2009-10-02T13:54:00.001+08:00

(...Continued from last post on Beijing Express Sightseeing in Great Wall of China.)

Right after our trip to the Great Wall, we set out to visit the Forbidden City. It was a about one and half hour journey back to the city. The sun now is truly hot, and I'm still fasting (Sayang dah nak berbuka sbb dah pukul 2.30pm bila sampai ker Forbidden City)

Our visit to Forbidden City was an express one as I was feeling very-very tired and very-very thirsty from the climb at the Great Wall and the scorching sun. We basically walked the length of the Forbidden City from the North Gate to the South Gate and straight to Tian An Men Square, which is situated just outside the South Gate of the Forbidden City. To truly explore the Forbidden City, one should at least take 2 days to finish exploring all the artifacts and buildings. It was helpful that we had a tour guide, so we managed to capture some of the history of China, and its emperors and dynasties.

Tian An Men - literally means "Heavenly Peace Gate". This is where the ruler of China gather for the National Day on Oct 1. He will address the public on the gate just on top of Chairman Mao's pic.

The statue of the guardians that we normally see in front of Chinese establishments. It is actually the statue of a lion and lioness. The lion is recognizable by the ball under his right paw, whereas the lioness has a baby lion under her left paw

The Emperor's palace and the place where he recieve guests

North gate entrance to the Forbidden City. Entrance fees is RMB60

The Forbidden City was built around a moat to discourage enemy to attack the city. It was told that when Qing Dynasty, the last Dynasty of China fell, the Eunuchs committed suicide into the moat because they couldn't bear to live without the emperor and the special privileges

The inner wall of the forbidden city is on the right of this pic with the red door. Right in front is a small hill with a resting place on top where the emperor and his concubines spend their time

One of the palace where the emperor and his concubines go to relax which is just in front of the North Gate

Earthquake 30 Sept 2009

2009-10-01T08:28:00.003+08:00

I was still in the office around 6.15pm yesterday with 3-4 colleagues when I felt the tremors the first time. I thought I was probably dizzy because I was having a headache due to exposure to the sun and I was fasting sunat Syawal, so I thought it was just me feeling malnourished. My chair was shaking and I thought it was the wheels moving. Then I got up to make sure that either I was dizzy or the building was moving and said to no one in particular, "Is it just me or is the building moving?". Assured nothing happened, I sat down and continued iwth my emails. Then Tasha came and asked me if I felt the building moved, and I said yes, I thought it was just my imagination, and then wham! Both of us felt the tremors again, this time around more visible than the last because we were aware of it and we saw the leaves of the office plants moving. I said to Tasha let's get out of the office, now! We switched off our PCs and collected our bags and quickly went to the lift, praying that there won't be any tremors. A lot of things were playing in my minds, would I make it out alive? would there be any more tremors? I was scared. The elevator came soon enough and it was packed with people. I met En Wan, one of the Directors and asked him if he had felt the trmors, and like me he said, I was having a headache and I thought that was it. Alhamdullillah we reached the lobby without any incident. Later on, I heard on the radio, an earthquake had hit Sumatra with 7.7 richter scale and its tremors were felt in Malaysia, including Angkasapuri. Tsunami alert for Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Indonesia.

Lets pray for the victims of the earthquake in West Sumatra and the tsunami victims in Samoa.

Tunai, Touch 'n' go & Smartag: Mana Satu Pilihan Anda?

2009-09-22T03:56:00.005+08:00

Ketika umat Islam di Malaysia sibuk ziarah-menziarahi saudara-mara di kampung sempena menyambut Aidilfitri, kita semua tak boleh lari dengan kesesakan lalulintas dimana-mana saja. MRR2 ke, Jalan kampung ker, highway ker. Terutamanya di highway. Tp ada pilihan, kalau nak cepat gunakan laluan fast track Smartag atau Touch 'n' go. Kalau tiada kedua-duanya, maka terpaksalah gunakan lorong tunai yang queue nya panjang berjela-jela. Saya terdengar komen hamba Allah mengatakan bahawa lorong Smartag ini untuk orang kaya-kaya sahaja, dan kerajaan tidak telus dalam pembahagian sama rata untuk kemudahan pembayaran tol. Yang ironiknya, hamba Allah ini mempunyai Smartag! Ada pulak komen tambahan yang mengatakan tunggulah kerajaan yang baru...?! (wtf??)

Saya tak suka berpoliticking di dalam blog yang tak seberapa ini, tetapi saya terpanggil jugak untuk komen pernyataan di atas kerana saya merasakan ianya sungguh kontradik. Kemudahan Smartag itu kesan dari kapitalisme, siapa yang kaya atau ada duit lebih dan bencikan queue yang panjang, boleh gunakan lorong tersebut. Ada juga guna Smartag sebab mereka dah plan perjalanan mereka dengan baik. Ini pemandu yang bijak, takder kena mengena dengan kerajaan sekarang atau yang akan datang. Pendapat saya, sesiapa yang gunakan lorong tunai pada masa perayaan atau cuti sekolah, memang tidak bijak sebab mereka dah tau queue akan menjadi panjang dan mereka masih tidak merancang perjalanan. Kalau tak mampu beli smartag, pakailah touch 'n' go. Bukannya mahal sangat, RM 10 pun dh boleh dapatkan satu kad. Kalau nak berjalan jauh, segeralah top-up di kaunter tol atau di mesin ATM. Sekarang ni Smartag dan touch 'n' go bukannya satu kemewahan, malah satu keperluan.

Semua kemudahan dah ada, anda buatlah pilihan yang terbaik untuk diri dan keluarga anda. Kalau tak kisah beratur panjang sekali-sekala, apa salahnya gunakan lorong tunai Tp kalau anda tak suka kesesakan macam saya, gunakanlah smartag atau touch 'n' go. Senanag cakap, ini pilihan peribadi (its a matter of choice). Bukannya nak menyalahkan kerajaan sekarang atau yang akan datang, tak kisahlan kerajaan yang mana pun. Kalau nak komen pasal kerajaan tak adil, janganlah kemudahan smartag dipersalahkan. Kalau semua orang haknya sama rata, baik kita jadi negara komunis, macam China. Itupun saya perhatikan semasa di sana jurang kekayaan besar, tak jugak sama rata. Mana ada benda yang adil dalam dunia ini. Allah sahaja yang adil!!!

P/S: Aku pun golongan marhaen, tetapi pengguna jalan yang bijak sebab ada Touch 'n' go.

Disclaimer: Posting ini bukan tujuan untuk mengiklankan Smartag atau Touch 'n' go, tetapi menyedarkan betapa pentingnya untuk merancang perjalanan anda.

Eid Ul Fitri Mubarak

2009-09-21T23:47:00.000+08:00

Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Maaf Zahir dan Batin kepada semua...
Jangan terlebih makan ketupat/rendang/lemang/lontong..nanti sakit perut..
Berhati-hati di jalanraya ketika balik kampung/pergi beraya...
kecelakaan boleh menimpa di mana2 sahaja...

Happy Birthday kepada Kak Shira, ibu kepada tiga anak, bakal calon Phd, kawan sekolah dan geng Taekwondo masa zaman Uni. Mudahan persahabatan kita kekal sepanjnag hayat walaupun kita semua dah sibuk dengan kehidupan masing2.

Beijing Express Sightseeing: Great Wall of China

2009-09-18T08:08:00.001+08:00

I only had just the Friday after finishing the tradeshow and seminar on Thursday. So I had decided to do express sightseeing to the Great Wall, Forbidden City and Tian An Men Square. Morning we started our journey at 8am. I was joined by Peter the tour guide, a surly lady driver and May from Sunway Resort.

Great Wall is about 60km from Beijing, a journey which took about one and half hours drive because of the traffic. Traffic is quite bad in Beijing but it is moving traffic, plus Beijing have four ring roads, which all roads will take you about half an hour to go to any main area of Beijing.

Gondola at Badaling which costs RMB60 (about RM30)

We went to one of the nearer Great Wall entrance, the North Pass which is called Badaling, which literally means "arriving from everywhere", or so I was told. The walls were built such that people can arrive at the 8th tower from any direction. This entrance was the most popular and visited by most tourists, apart from Mutianyu or the Southeast pass. The Great Wall was built from the 5th Century, most famous when China's first emperor, Emperor Qin built it, continued by the Ming Dynasty. It was built as a fortification of the emperor's new frontier and against invasion from the North and Mongolia.

Gondola ride up to the 8th tower, much like the gondola going up to Genting

The 7th tower on the top was cut off by the huge mountain stone, so they built another way at the side for people to access. Below left is the 6th tower and front is the foot of the 7th tower

The climb to 8th tower starts from here

Fortunately the weather was cool, I guess about 15-17 degrees. I was fasting but I was determined to climb to the top to reach the 8th tower. We began climbing at the foot of the 7th tower, at first it was kind of easy because it wasn't slanting till we reach half of the way and it began to become very steep and angle is about 70-80 degrees...scary!

Going up...up

See the angle up? My guestimate it's about 70 degrees angle

I made it!!! The 8th tower at the backNow...how to go down eh? Very steep!!The Great Wall branching out to many different directions

Coming up, Beijing Express Sightseeing: Forbidden City & Tian An Men. Also, Beijing's handiwork.

Work@Beijing

2009-09-17T21:56:00.001+08:00

6 Sept 2009, D-Day: 2200 hours at McDonalds' KLIA

I just came back from Beijing last Saturday. This week has been crazy, didn't have time to update sooner on my trip to Beijing. But the week before departure was the craziest, I had only 3 days to prepare for my traveling arrangements - express visa from the China Embassy (cost RM130), my flight ticket, my hand-carry items - 14 boxes containing promotional items and one clothes bag that I checked in which totaled 174kgs! Lucky I got a warrant. Phew...

This trip had me worried for so many reasons:
1. I had so little time to mentally prepare myself for the appointments and other work entails;
2. I was traveling alone for the first time, but still lucky that I have colleagues to wait for me at the other end;
3. and the current health situation with H1N1, naturally going to China had me worried eventhough there were no death reported.

Hence, the mask. Mak and Ayah advised me to wear the mask, which I did. And throughout the 6 hours flight. I was the only one wearing the mask in business class. Well, better a freak than dead because a passenger had some kind of flu and I got paranoid. However, once arrived I noticed that only the Immigration people wore masks. But in Beijing, nobody wore masks. Even in the newspapers, H1N1 was not yet a cause for concern because it only attack the rural area and mostly in schools. It was almost unheard of in Beijing, people weren't concerned. Plus, China was to produce its own antidote. So, China boleh!

After about half an hour's drive, I arrived at the Chaoyang area. It is not exactly the city centre but its the area where Tourism Malaysia and the Embassy of Malaysia is located. I checked in at the Westin Chaoyang Beijing. Awesome room! Includes Osim foot massager and a nice view of the city.

King sized bed View on the other side of the room. Some of the boxes I carried on left side of the room

The Osim foot massager...ahhh

See thru shower stall, people from the opposite building can see me shower. Lucky I realized in time that I need to push the automatic button for shutter down for complete privacy!

Next day I head on to China National Convention Centre, the venue of the tradeshow. The CNCC is located nearby the Bird's Nest Stadium, where China had the opening for the Olympic 2008. Basically I had to take care of the booth and attend appointments normally with travel agents or meeting planners, advertising houses (more for soliciting ads space), and some trade visitors.

Bird's Nest stadium BeijingIn front of the CNCC

Malaysia booth at the show, back viewKorea Sparkling was our neighbour booth

I love Thailand's booth because of its simplicity and cute signage and ultra-cool lamps
Beijing's booth was the biggest, this is only half size Phillippines booth

Incidentally, Malaysia just won the best short haul destination as voted by TravelWeekly. We were against Philippines' Cebu and Boracay as well as Japan. So, Malaysia Boleh!

New Recruits Reporting for Duty, Sir!

2009-09-02T08:25:00.003+08:00

So yesterday, 1 September 2009, was the day that me and Shasha were required to report to our new boss, ZHS. Despite protests from Bonda in the way of request to defer me from going to MYCEB for at least another month, the powers that be still requires me to go and report duty till further notice comes. So I met ZHS, MD of MYCEB. Nothing new there. In fact, it was like going home. I was in familiar territory. Except that there's a bit of power play with Bonda. Hopefully, that will work out soon. I don't want to feel guilt for wanting to do something that I think I'm good at. Plus, tonnes of things to do already. MYCEB still have a lot of unresolved issues like office space, staffing, SOP, etc. So, we'll take it one step at a time. Oh, I was requested by ZHS to go to Beijing next week to attend a tradeshow. So last minute, need to have permission for travelling, visa to China, book accommodation, etc etc. See how it goes

p/s: Life will be like a rollercoster with MYCEB from now on...

Ayu & baby Johan Iskandar

2009-08-30T14:00:00.004+08:00

We just came back from visiting Mummy Liza Idayu, who had safely given birth to a very healthy baby boy, named Johan Iskandar. He weighs 3.1kg and was delivered in Pusrawi KL. CONGRATS TO AYU & KHAIRIL

Mummy Ayu yang glowing dan happy jer

Kolat yg terencat and Ms Fantaghiro with her "Gollum" pose

Baby Johan Iskandar, born 26 August 2009

Me and Mummy Ayu

Me and Ayu were neighbours from both our parents home in Taman Perwira Gombak. She was emcee at my wedding, and I was the emcee at her wedding. She is currently teaching in SM Teknik Dungun. Again, congrats to both new parents. I'm sure they are both over the moon with their bundle of joy!

When All Hell Breaks Loose

2009-08-30T10:32:00.000+08:00

Some women shouldn't be left in charge. They get too emotional, and prejudiced. Most of the times they would hear about things in the office about something or somebody thru the grapevine. Then they get prejudiced about the person that were gossiped about. They would start to hate that person, eventhough they didn't have a direct encounter with that person! And that in turn would make the atmosphere in the office to be very negative as they would make their displeasure known to other staff *sigh*

Itulah sebabnya aku rasa perempuan kurang sesuai menjadi boss, terutamanya kalau yang dah "senja" sebab dah dekat nak menopause dan hormon pulak tak menentu. Lagilah emosional dalam segala hal. Itulah juga antara sebab aku nak pencen opsional pada umur 50 tahun kalau ada rezeki (dan kerana aku tak ambil opsyen 58 tahun!). Cuba tengok kak Yasmin dari Baking Project, dia ambil VSS pada usia 35 tahun dari bidang real estate dan kemudian meneruskan minat dalam hiasan kek. Baru dua tahun berkecimpung dalam bidang ini, dah terbitkan buku dan juga kelas deko keknya sentiasa penuh...

Begitu juga dengan mak aku, Kerabu Jantung. Pencen opsional pada umur 50 tahun, 8 tahun yang lalu. Masanya telah diisi dengan menghadiri kelas belajar bahasa Arab, dan Al-Quran, sehingga sekarang dia pula yang boleh mengajar orang mengaji. Sekarang dia ada minat yang baru iaitu blogging. Canggih tak canggih mak-mak zaman sekarang??!

Begitulah halnya dengan Sophisticated Office Ladies (SOL) yang dah senja ni. Hentikanlah acara gossip-mengossip dan dengki-mendengki kerana ianya tidak mendatangkan faedah dan hanya membuatkan anda lebih sakit hati, dan seterusnya menyebabkan tension & hypertension. Lebih baik gunakan tenaga yang masih ada untuk buat kerja & rancang masa pencen korang nanti. Kan ke lebih berfaedah???!!

P/s: Aku pun SOL jugak :p

Of Relationships & Good Friends

2009-08-29T23:57:00.001+08:00

Ms Fantaghiro, Kolat and I were talking tonight about friends and relationships and I was reminded about something that happened back in Uni days. There was a very good lesson me and Ms Fantaghiro learned about good friends & relationships:

Cardinal rule: Never get involved in other people's relationship, even if they are your good friends.

We had a couple who were both our friends. Lets call them Jack and Jill. They were dubbed "UMBC" - "University's Most Boring Couple". Yep, you guessed it, they're like "belangkas", it was almost impossible to see the one without the other, unless of course, inside the dorm. They'do do things together, eat together, go places together. They were seemingly the most loving couple you've ever met. But like most couples, arguments do happen about some thing or the other.

One night, Jack was so upset at Jill that he began asking some of Jill's friends about her behaviour and other things that she had done. Some of Jill's friends thought that it was wise to lay all the cards on the table so that Jack would realise what kind of person Jill was. Some of the things said were better left unsaid. They began swapping stories about Jill. Maybe they think that this will give Jack a better insight on Jill.

Not long after swapping stories, Jack suddenly made up with Jill. The best part was that, Jack told Jill everything about what her friends spoke about her. The good, the bad and the evil...laid bare. Can you imagine the surprise Jill's friends felt? Those were the things that her friends talked about her behind her back. Both parties must've felt that they couldn't trust each other. Luckily, me and Ms Fantaghiro didn't say a thing because we didn't like to butt in personal matters, plus we were no relationship expert.

Two important lessons here:
One: Some men are jerks and can never be trusted completely;
Two: Never be in the way of two lovers quarelling, or it may backfire to you!

Which was what happened in the story above. Never get involved in other people's personal matters even if they are your good friends. You never know when somebody is looking for leverage. Even if you are a relationship expert, you should refrain from commenting so biasedly or comment at all if you think you may be trapped in a tricky situation. Don't offer free advice, especially to those who didn't ask for your help. Your friend may not be comfortable with you intruding in their personal matters, and commenting or forecasting the outcome of the relationship. I know I don't. Let your friend live his/her own life, they don't need to know what's going to happen in their relationship. Even if they ask for your help, be sure to dish out your advice carefully. You don't need to be a know-it-all person.

Be a friend, not their guidance counselor :p

Today, Yesterday and the Day Before

2009-08-26T08:10:00.005+08:00

Today is Adam's birthday, my brother's son. He turned 1.

Yesterday was my birthday. I turned 31.

The day before was my Hisham's birthday, my younger brother. He turned 28.

I wanted to write about it yesterday, but so many crazy things happened yesterday. I finally got the transfer order to MYCEB, effective 1 September. Bonda wasn't exactly enthusiastic about it. I had gotten an earful from her since she found out last week. I had to play the innocent victim in all this.

This year is the most I've gotten birthday wishes from friends and family. Thank you Hubby, Kerabu Jantung, Kolat, Ms Fantaghiro, Azura, Cik Lili, Zaza, Fairdaos, Karen, Karene, Mei Phing, Kak Yaz, Kak Norizah, Edy, Shasha, Aza De Kaza, Kak Lin, Gojie, Awang, and others...

Last night, I went out to live my life. Ms Fantaghiro and Kolat treated me to Sushi King and Coffeebean.

Cuppies sold by abang gentle we found outside Coffeebean Ampang Point. The deco was made from Royal icing and the muffin was made from kind of Brazilian coffee/choc (can't remember the details). per box is RM10. Ms Fantaghiro bought one for me coz she was supposed to buy me some cupcakes in Pavillion.

Sushi! What more can I say!!

Kolat mengediks and Ms Fantaghiro doing her boring post

Oh, Liza Idayu smsed my from Pusrawi wishing me happy birthday while we were in Coffeeebean. Apparently she's having contraction and can't wait to get into labour. Will call her to find out her baby status.

Interesting birthday I would say.

These are a few of my favourite things

2009-08-23T12:35:00.000+08:00

There are some things, be it organic or man made, which we love so much that at any time we will not refuse to enjoy it. These are just a few of my favourite things:

1. Cats
I found this cat under a makeshift jetty in Pulau Lang Tengah last year

Doesn't matter anytime of the day or wherever I am, I'd be the first person to spot the cat under the table, a sleeping cat or a cat mewing or washing itself. Doesn't matter if it's a cute cat, baby kitties, a mother cat, a cripple cat, a kurap cat, a carik-gaduh cat, my heart always skips a beat spotting a cat. I would always find ways to pat the cat or at least call its attention to me. Maybe I was born with a cat detecting-radar. Who knows. But I know that I will be attuned to cats forever. I miss living with a cat. *sigh*

2. Islands & beaches

Pulau Lang Tengah

There's nothing like the seductive beckoning of an island urging you for a visit....to swim in its clear water, to walk its sandy white beaches, to taste the salty wind in your face, to have the feeling of being totally free from all your concerns. My mother grew up by the sea. I grew up loving the sea, but at the same time afraid of the deep, dark waters. But still the sight of beach or island would excite me...I'm longing to go to a nice sandy beach and just relax there...

3. BooksThe Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

To hunt and find the perfect book to read is a bliss in itself. Always preferred books to magazines. Its weird how some people I know would shy away from a good novel. To totally immerse yourself in a good book, to feel it taking the space in your head till everything else becomes obsolete, and then to finish it. That's satisfaction!

4. MusicMust have music to function in daily life. Music for work, music for driving, music for cleaning, music for relaxing. Can't live without music. 'nuff said.

5. A good bargain

Aye, I am a sucker for bargains. Why buy only one when you can get two at a discounted price? Or get one free when you buy two items, the more the merrier! The cheaper the better :) Ladies (and maybe some men), you know what I'm getting at.

And there you have it: my favourite things:)

Cake Deco Class with Yasmin Sanusi

2009-08-22T15:41:00.003+08:00

Yasmin Sanusi's book on caked deco using fondant

Salam Ramadhan to all..

Yesterday was our cake deco class with Yasmin Sanusi, organized by Aza De Kaza who is Puspanita's Pengerusi Kraftangan & Keusahawanan. The class was RM190 for a 5-hour session and there were 15 participants in the class. We were taught how to make cupcakes, buttercream icing, how to ice a cake, decorate cupcakes with 6 different designs - Elmo, teddy bear, clown, swirl, rabbit, and one decorated with coloured piping gel. More info on cake decorating class can be found on Yasmin Sanusi's website.

I'm not really a fan of cupcakes but the ones that Kak Yasmin baked in class was the yummiest and fluffiest I've ever tasted. It was a basic yellow cupcake recipe in which she substituted vanilla essence with orange flavour. She'd also taught us how to fill in piping bags with buttercream, some neat tips on how to soften or harden the buttercream, depending on what you want to decorate. If you want to make a sitting clown, then you should harden the buttercream by sifting in more icing sugar, you know its stiffer when you spoon just stands in the icing. If you want to make some delicate motif like leaves, then add more milk to soften it.

Kak Yasmin explaining how to make buttercream icing by slowly (medium speed) creaming shortening, butter, icing sugar, milk/whip cream, cream of tartar, some salt and vanilla essence. Must be patient and give ample time for the buttercream to turn out nice and fluffy

Kak Yasmin demosntrating us how to make shell motif on the cake

Yours truly decorating a cake with woven basket techniques on the side and shell motif at bottom of cake and star motif on top of cake. My cake's is 90% done as shown here

Voila! The cake done with roses, leaf and branch motif. We learned how to make the roses from scratch. And kak Yasmin showed how to make two-tone rose. But mine's not so beautiful lah...kembang semacam jer rose tuh hehe

Elmo's furry face was made with piping tip with lots of small holes, same technique for making grass, then his eyes, nose and mouth were shaped from coloured fondants. The star cupcake were filled in with coloured piping gel, the same piping gel that were mix into buttercream to make it more smooth and shiny. The sitting-down clown was made using building up techinque to form its body, the icing should be a bit sitffer so that you can put the clown's head (non edible)

The proud owner of decorated cupcakes

Aza De Kaza with her cupcakes. During the class, she kept saying "Ini bukan bidang aku!" And look how her cupcakes turned out! I believe anyone can do it, just need to learn the techniques

Soon to be mummy, Teena with her cupcakes. She also made some of the most beautiful roses in the class.

Mother of four - Kak Lin, proudly displaying her decorated cake and cupcakes.

All in all, it was a fun and quite tiring 5 1/2 hours of class, but we did learn a lot! Kak Yasmin did a really good job teaching us the decorating techniques. Now I know what's its all about, I can decorate my own cupcakes! Next, I would like to learn cake deco using fondant with kak Yasmin, which she I believe is more of her specialty. Look in her website and you'll see many creative things that she had created from fondant such as the burger cake and cactus cupcake.

*FYI: Cake and cupcakes that I decorated yesterday were given to my neighbour who have 5 children, they were so delighted to see the decorated cupcakes:)

Pengumuman Puasa

2009-08-20T23:25:00.001+08:00

Puasa pada 22 Ogos 2009 (Sabtu)

BONUS!!

2009-08-19T23:05:00.006+08:00

*Click to enlarge image

Balik Kampung : Rompin

2009-08-19T08:21:00.001+08:00

Cat in a tree

Kerbau berkubang

Calm before storm in Teluk Gorek

Mami's kitties

Kenduri favours in Kuantan: Dadih & apples

Gamelan group for kenduri in Kuantan

Not much of an entry, just to share some pics which was taken during the school holiday last June. My favourite pic of the lot is the kerbau berkubang. He kerbau was just sitting there in the lovely mudhole when I took this pic. It was a bit unnerving because I was afraid that the kerbau would get up and charged at me! But he didn't move, instead he gave me that precious pose. Not a common sight in KL.

Cerita Semalam, Hari Ini dan Esok

2009-08-18T19:04:00.006+08:00

Semalam (Isnin):
Semalam merupakan hari yang paling panjang dan masa berjalan begitu perlahan sekali!
Pukul 8 pagi: Sampai jer ofis dah terasa panas, air-cond tak terpasang macam biasa. Rasanya takderlah awal sangat aku sampai, dah ada orang lain dalam ofis ni. Biasanya Putrade (PWTC management) dah pasang air-cond, sedangkan exhibition kat bawah air-cond dah pasang full-blast. Ada yang dah telefon Putrade, tp hampa dengan jawapan mereka. Kononya generator rosak. Ada yang kata, kerajaan nak jimat duit, jadi tak pasang air-cond. Gila hapa. Takkan la seluruh bangunan Menara Dato' Onn takde aircond. Kami semua tak dapat berfungsi dengan betul, bengong semacam kepala hotak ni sbb tak cukup oksigen. Sampaikan Prof Amran yang datang jauh dari UTM Skudai pun buat statement kepala otak dia akan jam kalau aircond takder jugak petang ni bila dia buat presentation dalam bilik dengan 30 orang. Seorang Professor pun boleh buat remark macam tu, bayangkan lah kami yang terpaksa berada di ofis sampai pukul 5.30ptg ni :p

3 ptg: Aku dah tak boleh bernafas kerana udara tak cukup. Bau kepam karpet dah naik ke hidung, ditambah lagi dengan bau-bauan badan manusia yang berpeluh, lagilah tak boleh bernafas. Nasib baik aku ada kipas kecik atas meja, tp tu pun tak membantu sangat. Terasa panas dan kepam sampai ke dalam tulang. Ada orang cadangkan tutup lampu untuk kurangkan kepanasan. Kami semua menghitung masa jer nak balik. Dengar kata, hari esok mungkin akan sama jugak. Ya Allah! Ini baru satu hari takder air-cond, macam mana lah panasnya Neraka Mu?

Hari Ini (Selasa)
Nasib baik air-cond dah pulih macam biasa. Baru lah terasa selama ini aku take for granted the simplest things in life, like running air-cond when you reached the office. Hari ni rasa mcm bersyukur air-cond dah kembali mcm biasa.

Waktu makan tengahari, aku dgn Aza De Kaza memanjangkan kaki ke Lorong Haji Taib 1 untuk ke kedai "Bake with Yen" sbb nak cari barang-barang keperluan untuk menghadiri kelas menghias kek dan cupcakes yang Puspanita anjurakan pada 21 Ogos ni. Kak Yasmin dari Baking Project akan menjadi instructor, cupcakes yg dia hias semua cute & creative terutamanya cactus cupcake. Nanti dah lepas kelas kak Min, baru aku akan upload gambar2 cupcakes yang aku hias....can't wait!!

Pic taken from Baking Project

Esok (Rabu)
Takder apa-apa yang menarik akan berlaku esok, diari aku pun kosong. Cuma Immediate boss aka BONDA nak bincang pasal laporan kajian yang aku dah siapkan, lepas tu nak buat follow up meeting dengan Department of Statistics. Sambil-sambil buat kerja Research, aku moonlighting dengan MYCEB. Tak kisahlah asalkan semua jalan...

Ops K.E.T.U.A.T

2009-08-12T19:56:00.001+08:00

Latarbelakang
Saya telah mengalami pertumbuhan ketuat di muka lebih dari setahun, dan mungkin anda tak perasan kerana kedudukannya saling tak tumpah macam tahi lalat manis di bawah mulut sebelah kiri muka saya. Saya sebenarnya dah sampai tahap "pain threshold" 4 bulan yang lalu apabila telah mengambil tindakan drastik dengan membuang ketuat tersebut dengan pemotong kuku. I know its crazy but I can't help it. The two previous docs that I saw was dibelieved that this condition occurs on the face, and conveniently said that the salve for warts is out of stock! Lepas jumpa doktor2 tersebut saya dh jadi bosan dan buat keputusan untuk membiarkan sahaja ketuat saya. Tetapi bila ketuat ni tumbuh kembali dengan lebih besar dan tangan saya lebih gatal untuk mengutilnya sehingga berdarah, maka saya ambil keputusan untuk berjumpa dengan Dr Baharom atas saranan rakan sepejabat saya Natasha. Berikut merupakan kronologi Ops K.E.T.U.A.T.

20 Julai 2009
Saya telah pergi ke Klinik Dr Baharom di Sentul setelah mendapat maklumat dari rakan sekerja, Natasha mengenai keberkesanan Dr Baharom membuang ketuat di kawasan sensitif, terutamanya di muka. Setelah satu jam setengah menunggu, akhirnya pada jam 11 pagi saya berjumpa Dr Baharom. Orangnya kecil molek dan sangat efisyen menjalankan kerja. Rata-rata yang datang klinik dia ramai yang sakit gout atau sakit sendi. Lepas dia examine muka saya, dia telah memberi empat suntikan bius kebas di sekeliling ketuat saya. Tak sakit pun rasa mcm semut gigit jer...

Selepas setengah jam, saya diarahkan ke bilik Ops kecil. Mata saya ditutup dan dada saya diletakkan penebat supaya tiada kejutan elektrik semasa ops laser dijalankan. Bila mata saya dah tutup barulah rasa berdebar sbb saya tak pernah menjalankan rawatan laser. Lagi-lagi bila mata saya ditutup, suspense sbb saya tak dapat tengok apa yg doc buat pada saya. Dulu pernah gak saya buat small surgery, local anesthetic jugak mcm yg ini tp mata saya tak ditutup, maka saya dapat tengok di atas siling bila doc mengodek-godek badan saya. Sama jugak masa buat root canal, mata saya tertumpu pada siling sbb ada pantulan imej dan saya dapat tengok apa doc buat. Tp kali ini berbeza, lagipun bahaya sbb rawatan laser. Silap terkena mata, buta pulak nanti.

Mula-mula doc godek ketuat saya, rasa mcm dia potong permukaan ketuat dan tarik2. Tak rasa sakit kan sbb dah bius, kebas. Lepas tu doc laser muka saya, ngeri gak. Ada bau benda terbakar, mesti sbb kulit saya yg dibuang. Pastu doc godek2 lagi, rasa panjang akar ditarik sampai ke gigi saya, ada lah kira2 panjang dua ruas jari. Panjang tu...pastu doc laser lagi beberapa kali, godek2 lagi dan announce dia dapat keluarkan akar ketuat tu...pastu doc jahit lubang yang ditinggalkan ketuat, panjangnya adalah sekitar 1cm seperti gambar dibawah:

Doc kata jumpa dia balik lagi 8 hari nak buang benang. Muka saya dah macam pirate hardy har har....tapi tak boleh lebih 12 hari, takut bernanah..takder pantang apa2, mandi and amik air semayang macam biasa. Doc bagi anitbiotik dgn ubat tahan lapar/buang angin sbb saya sihat sangat katanya.

1 Ogos 2009
Baru dapat jumpa doc lepas balik kursus emcee seminggu di Melaka dengan Sharifah Shawati. Doc tanggalkan benang pastu bagi ubat untuk sapu dan vitamin C untuk makan supaya kulit cepat sembuh. Lagi doc timbang berat dan bagi ubat tahan lapar sbb saya baru hilang 1kg, ni ubat kena makan 6 kali sehari. Amik darah untuk uji kolestrol. 9 Ogos kena jumpa doc balik.

6 Ogos 2009
Bekas ketuat dah beransur pulih. Bagi saya scar akan sembuh tak lama lagi, so tak kisah lah. Just teruskan sapu ubat dan makan Vit C. InsyaAllah scar akan hilang.

Demikianlah laporan Ops K.E.T.U.A.T untuk makluman tuan-tuan dan puan-puan sekalian.

Dah sudah tutup fail!

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who's the best emcee of them all?

2009-08-06T13:43:00.001+08:00

Last week, I was fortunate to go to an emcee course conducted by Ms Sharifah Shawati from Adamaya Consultant Sdn Bhd. For those of you who remembers her, she was one of TV3's newscaster, still active as a host for the reality show: Wanita Melayu, and now a certified image consultant, an entrepreneur and mother of two, Adam and Maya.

My first impression of her: she is much, much beautiful in person, is always immaculately dressed, with fine coiffured hair, very articulate and have a pleasing personality. In short, she is the most humble and easily approachable personality I've ever met. She's earnest with her advise, and not pretentious like most.

I must confess that I can be very awkward around celebrity, sometimes I don't know how to react: should we gush with admiration, or play it cool or be distant? It all depends on the celebrity, if they are open and friendly, then you can approach them easily. With Ms Shawati, it is quite effortless, maybe because she was our consultant and trainer and she approached us with that warm smile of hers.

Ms Shawati and yours truly

Left to right: Am, Teena & Marleen
2nd day session we were in sports gear for vocal projection session.

Penyampaian sijil and Ms Shawati was kind enough to give us each a copy of her book:
Imej Diri Anda Aset Anda

Emcee extraordinaire, I hope;)
I was told by Ms Shawati that my voice got the "X-factor" that would be good for commercials and voiceovers.
Wah! Kembang mak!
Lepas ni aku pulak yang famous kalau dapat buat VOs *berangan*

Mr Zaini, the vocal projection coach who made us realized that almost everybody can be taught the technique to use their vocal effectively, and ultimately be an emcee or even sing!
But I still sucked at karaoke heh:p

Azah before the makeover

Azah after the makeover, done by Eddie the makeup artiste.

He used Crayoline (?) foundation, made her eyes smoky, super thick eyelashes, chopped and curled Azah's hair.
The result: Azah looked like a million bucks! Macam newscaster pulak!!

Our syllabus during the courses consists of image consultation with Ms Shawati, vocal projection with Mr Zaini, mock emcee for an event, script writing (buat sendiri with guidance from Ms Shawati) and finally makeover. It was fun and educational, and we learn what kind of an emcee we can be, is it just an announcer, or a witty emcee, a serious emcee, etc.

An emcee needs to think on her feet in case something unscripted happens. Ms Shawati used real life examples to test us during the mock emcee session, such as power trip so the emcee has to project her voice to the audience, or how to calm the crowd if its too noisy, changes in programme - how does the emcee adapts to it. It's not easy being an emcee, but it comes with experience and after years of doing it. Most important the emcee must arrive early to check her venue, expected crowd, test mike, and she will keep the ball rolling as the master of ceremony.

Gosh, it's not easy to reach the level of poise that Ms Shawati has exude together with her abundant charm. I aspire to be like her someday. Chaiyo! :)

Water + Lemon = FRESH!

2009-08-05T08:12:00.001+08:00

Image taken from Tupperware Malaysia

One thing that I loved more than clear soup is....lemon slices in cold water! It's just so damn refreshing, especially in these hot, hot days. I've always been intrigued by Tupperware's catalogue supplied by Aja, my SIL-cum-Tupperware dealer, with images of tumbler full of water with lemon slices immersed in the cool, cool water. Never had the guts to do it, coz I was afraid that the water would turn bitter with the lemon + skin soaked for long periods... Boy, was I wrong! I had a couple of leftover lemon slices, courtesy from the Lemon Chicken Rice takeout from Pak Li's Kopitiam near my house. Waste not, I always said. So I washed the lemon slices and dunked them in my 1 litre Tupperware tumbler and let it cool in the fridge for a few hours. The result was HEAVENLY!! and I had reused the two slices of lemon again and again, still fresh and lemony, so kira ok lah tu...haha sungguh perak dengan air rendam lemon, tapi itulah hakikatnya tuan-tuan dan puan-puan....cubalah hari ini!! Tp ingat, tak payah letak gula pun dh best gila. Beats drinking plain water, and suitable for those who are trying to wean off sugary drinks. Don't add any sugar! You don't need the extra sugar.

Thank God my blood sugar is normal!

Torn between two

2009-08-04T13:15:00.000+08:00

Is it the love of the work or is it because you are familiar with it?
I am in a dilemma...to stay in the current division or go back to the job that I'd done for the past 6 years. I thought that I had enough of MICE, maybe I needed new environment and new experiences, because I was getting sick of all the haggling, and begging, and negotiating, and the last minute requests, and the lack of manpower.
I thought that I needed to get away from all that..
But then I discovered that I was good at my old job...
I am still tuned in to the updates, industry people giving updates, old contacts been calling me, I think I missed the old division...and perhaps the action.
I am currently serving in Research Division. The new division did not have clear direction and purpose, we were neglected from attention and care of the bosses...so it feels as if me and the others have no purpose working in the division. Research is a different ballgame altogether, it's more technical what with the programme that we need to learn like SPSS, or forecasting. It is exciting in a different way, but maybe I was not fully trained for that.
I must confess that I am getting sluggish in the PR department, not getting as much action as I was used to. Not that I missed all the late night dinners & functions. My life is more calm and organized now, which is not a bad thing. But more than ever, I think I cared about doing the job properly, and I am confident that I can be better at MICE than I was before.
The only problem is, I have not been inducted into MYCEB yet, and I am sort of doing illegal job for my former boss, ZHS. My immediate boss is vehemently against the idea of me going to MYCEB because she didn't want her staff to be pinched, after a few others were done the same.
Admin Division was not much help, delaying the transfer for months when a formal request have already been made. Instead they offer the position to people who were not willing to join MYCEB, and it also has become a dumping ground for officers who just came back from overseas and had nowhere else to go. MYCEB needs experienced people in MICE to go because the work is just piling up. Anyhow, maybe I am in a dilemma ethically, but as far as feelings go, I can't wait to go to MYCEB!

Kemut

2009-07-22T13:50:00.002+08:00

Aku paling benci dgn orang yang kemut dgn kerja dia, semua intellectual property. Apa salahnya share information, for the good of the organization. Nothing is intellectual property, everything is recycled – minutes ker, surat ker, even email! so tak payah nak kemut kat ko sorang kalau setakat buat kerja yg rutin. Bukannya dapat naik pangkat cepat pun kalau bagi idea best, ini jabatan kerajaan lah...

My experience with this minah was that I asked her for a power point presentation (recycled again!), and she said, she was too busy to look for it, walhal sebelum jumpa aku dh communicator (mcm YM) sama dia and dia kata ok. Tp bila aku turun jumpa dia, tetiba ckp dia busy walhal tengah berborak dgn org sebelah. Pastu aku ckp sekejap jer nk copy benda alah tu, just 5 mins. Dia kata dia busy sgt and tak tau mana letak folder tuh! What a bunch of bullshit! So aku ckp fine, aku pakai jer presentation yg lama. Sbb presentation tuh pun asalnya aku yg buat masa aku pegang portfolio dia dulu, tp sbb sekarang dh division lain, kena la tanya dia dulu kot ada amendment apa2. Serupa tak payah mintak sama dia....

Bukan nak cakap aku best sangat, tp bila ada organizer email ker, call ker, aku respond lah, takder lah senyap jer. Ini sampai organizer and travel agent yang pernah kerja dgn aku pun complain pasal dia lembab, x jawab email, x pernah ada kat tempat, bila tanya lain jawab lain, pendek kata mmg susah nak dealing dgn dia. Dulu orang cakap pasal dia aku tak percaya sbb aku ingat dia ni pekerja cemerlang. Rupa-rupanya pandai cakap jer...

Tetiba hr ni nak mintak bantuan aku, soalan senang yg tak payah tanya aku pun boleh pikir sendiri. So aku dgn snappish nya jawab (dlm comm) “haiya, itu pun mau tanya ka? Just follow the criteria lah, nak justify apa lagi” and she made a remark “ heheh manjer, manjer sgt” – what the hell does that mean??? Maybe dia nk cover line ker apa, lagi aku menyampah, she likes to end her sentence with “yar”. GELI OK! Was that supposed to be manja or sthg?? Sebenarnya, aku dh byk kali tolong dia especially bila aku dah handover portfolio lama, byk bagi advise sbb tak nak kerja yg aku dh buat dulu jadi slack. Tourism industry ni kecik jer, balik-balik orang yg sama gak bawak group insentif atau buat conference. Lama-lama diaorang ni akan bercerita gak...malu ker tak malu??

Tolonglah jangan buat macam ni kat tempat kerja, apa salahnya bekerja sama. Lagipun, sharing is caring!

The Merchants of Bollywood

2009-07-20T19:50:00.004+08:00

http://merchantsofbollywood.com.au/aus/

Ms Fantaghiro, me and my sis were at Istana Budaya last Thursday to watch "The Merchants of Bollywood". Aku mati-mati ingat this is another hindustani concert like the ones that Shah Rukh Khan lip sync to but this is actually a musical theatre.

It is taken from the true life story of Ayesha Merchant (yes, its a family name), who is the granddaughter of Shantilal Merchant from Rajasthan. Shantilal was one of the great choreographers during the great film industry - those days of Bobby and Chalte Chalte. But he had retired and was preserving the Kathak, dance for the God. The family were to uphold the tradition. But Ayesha had other ideas, she also wanted to be a great choreographer in Bollywood. So against her grandfather's wishes, she left the temple for Bollywood. She became a great choreograhper, and decided to make amends with her grandfather. She goes back to Rajasthan, found her childhood sweetheart Uday, marries him and met her dying grandfather and finally decided to stay in Rajasthan.

That's as far as the storyline goes. Well it's not much of a storyline, I must say. This play is purely for entertainment, and boy, the dance moves are superb! It is Bollywood and much more. The dances are refined, and Uday, the lead male dancer, is excellent. When he did his backflip from the tempel stairs, that was hot! Very extravagant show, more than 30 dancers on the stage for one song and the costumes are glittery, sexy, flesh baring and all that. Aiya, susah lah mau explain thru writing. Best viewed to get accurate experience.

Anyway, it was cute when emcee of the night, Dato' Mahathir Lokman said at the beginning of the show "sit back and enjoy the show. Clapping and dancing are most welcomed". Some girls in the front seat were enjoying themselves so much that they were standing up and dancing to the songs. Very enjoyable, but for those with limited knowledge of Bollywood songs, might be disappointed that familiar mainstream Hindi songs from Kuch2 Hota Hai/Mohabbatein/Kabhi Kushie Kabhie Gham/etc were not in the play. But you will enjoy it nonetheless.
This I guarantee you.

*Strictly for those who loves hindi songs and dance moves.

H1N1 Lowdown

2009-07-15T19:14:00.003+08:00

I was on duty as a rapporteur on Monday for the annual Overseas Directors Meeting and so just to share some info on H1N1 as supplied by Dato' Dr. Hassan bin Abdul Rahman, Director of Communicable Disease Control Division from Public Health Department who gave updates on the H1N1 influenza pandemic,

H1N1 is a new influenza which causes a contagious respiratory illness that is communicable from human to human. The first case was reported on 16 April 2009, where it continued to spread around the world and by 16 May 2009, Malaysia had reported its first case of the influenza H1N1. Within 2 months, almost all parts in the world have such reported cases, of which 90% of the cases reported originated from the USA, Canada and South America. As of 12 July 2009, 143 countries have reported 106,565 confirmed cases and 470 deaths with 0.44% mortality rate.

A total of 42 countries have reported local transmission of the disease and 10 countries had sustained the virus via human to human transmission. Earlier cases reported of the H1N1 were those who had traveled to the USA, including Mexico and Canada. Now, the virus is spreading via local transmission in Asia and Europe where it was declared by WHO at pandemic level.

For Malaysia, the first confirmed case was reported on 16 May 2009. As to date, there are 710 confirmed cases of which 71% were imported cases from countries where local transmission has occurred and 29% were local transmission. Currently, only 83 victims are still recuperating in the hospital. There were no deaths reported.

It was informed that H1N1 cases with complications such as pneumonia or diabetes will be hospitalized and those with mild symptoms was advised to be quarantined at home. Government hospitals will give free treatment to those who contracted the H1N1 influenza, be it Malaysians or foreigners.

The Public Health Department (PHD) aims to:

reduce transmission and illness severity;
provide information to help health care providers, public health officials, and the public to address the challenges posed by this emergency.

PHD has recommended that precautions be taken from all level of society, be it individual or household to take safety measures by adhering to the guidelines provided by the Ministry of Health. It is advisable that everyone maintains personal hygiene, practice social distancing, reduce travel, avoid crowded areas and restrict mass gathering to ensure that the H1N1 pandemic will be contained. PHD will conduct disease surveillance by continuing screening at airports. The public is advised to get updates on current situation from credible sources such as Ministry of Health and World Health Organization. With regards to the tourism industry, Ministry of Health has not issued any restrictions for foreign tourists to travel to Malaysia.

Y.B. Minister of Tourism had reiterated that Malaysia is a safe country to visit from the H1N1 virus as we had taken precautionary measures to delay the widespread of this pandemic in this country. Travellers to Malaysia would not be subjected to quarantine if the traveler only showed mild symptoms of the H1N1 influenza.

*text taken from my rapporteur of the session, with info supplied by PHD.

Our Photoshoot

2009-07-14T20:42:00.000+08:00

Nice eh?Compliments to Geoffrey, our photographer of the day. We wanted to have a special memory before Ms Jam left for Brunei, so we had our pics taken at Carcosa Seri Negara after work.

Take it from the top: Nuwal, Noriah, Emi, Kamilia & Jamilah.

This shot was inspired by Che Yah. Best of all I looked kurus heh heh

I'd always wondered how this kind of photo was shot. Maybe the model was jumping on trampoline or that they were supper skinny or very good athletes that they could jump very high. The trick is simple, which the photographer have to shoot this crouching down or from a low angle, and the model, which in this pic ces't moi, was jumping as high as she could. And the result, Voila! Me jumping ridiculously high almost reaching the rooftop. It's a wonder that I hadn't actually broke the heel of my sandals as they were very thin and had to support my considerable body weight after each jump!

Trip to Kijal and KT

2009-07-13T18:43:00.005+08:00

It was my third wedding anniversary last Thursday, and I'd planned for a mid-week getaway with hubby to Terengganu. Why Terengganu? Maybe because I'd always felt a sense of calm and familiarity with Terengganu's idyllic lifestyle and blue coastline...I'd also promised myself that we'd take a journey somewhere for our anniversary. None of that candle light, romantic dinner nonsense for me. I'd be happier travelling to a favourite destination or discover new places.

So, at high noon on Thursday, 9th July 2009, we started the journey to Kijal using the Lebuhraya Pantai Timur. It is a boring stretch of road, and for 3 hours I drove while hubby nursed an aching back. I cranked up the volume on The Essential MJ. Off Jabor exit, we turned into Cherating. Beautiful stretch of beaches where you get loads of resorts like Impiana and Legend Resorts, and once Club Med (not sure if it still exist). Further down the road was Kemaman town, which I might say is quite big and developed, not the small quaint town I'd imagined. Awana Kijal was another 51 km from here, and less than one hour we'd reached the resort.

Since I'd a good friend working there, she put us up in a complimentary room. Yes, the perks of working in the industry and knowing people. But I was booked under PIBG SMK Rantau Petronas. What the...? Because my friend was working the school accounts, she managed to squeeze me in...but that is a trade secret...so if you have friends working in hotel line, I bet he/she can squeeze you in for one night comp!

This is actually my second visit there, I love the hotel despite the rooms having an 80s feel to it. It's got the largest pool in the east coast, they got a wicked spa called Taman Sari, a giant chess set where you'd have to move the pieces as big as those cones you see at construction sites, lovely breakfast spread serving nasi dagang every morning, huge American Breakfast, mee curry(in the morning??), omelet station, congee.....there's something for everybody. Plus, the club sandwich is to die for!!! Hubby was starting to warm up to the idea of travelling, so it was my mission to bring him to new, exciting destinations.

Next day, we continued on our journey to KT, which was only 126km from Kijal. En route we passed by Kertih, Paka, Dungun, etc, and stopped for air kelapa and jagung rebus, which was our main diet traveling that route. This stretch of road between Rantau Abang and Pantai Kelulut was laden with roadside stalls selling kacang rebus, and jagung bakar & jagung rebus, which you couldn't find anywhere else on the stretch.

Upon reaching Pantai Kelulut, the best keropok lekor I'd ever tasted called "Keropok Lekor 008 Kelulut". The shop is a green double-storey house with open front facing a very purple resort, which its name escapes me now. But if you were looking for it, on your way to KT, the shop will be on your left facing the purple resort after the Pantai Kelulut signboard. I swear its the best keropok, because the fish contents was pure and the keropok itself was soft compared to those meaty, commercial type ones which were laden with flour. Cost cutting measures.

I'd compared it to a few keropoks maker in Losong like Adik Beradik and Adnan. Hands down, its Keropok Lekor 008 Kelulut. But being attached to my kampung in Rompin, I was used to keropok with banyak ikan. Surprisingly, my hubby which hails from Johor and some of my colleagues in the office, do not like the fishy keropok lekor. They'd rather like the pasty keropok lekor which puff up when fried because its full of flour, where the fish taste is only for flavour. Then keropok losong is perfect for them such as Adik Beradik or Adnan keropok. But if you like more fish, then keropok lekor 008 Kelulut is definitely for you...

In KT, we stayed in Primula resort which was RM208nett. The room was recently refurbished, and you get the standard features - white sheets & comforter which is identical to most luxury brand hotels nowadays, none of the fancy & heavy comforter, some new carpeting, new walls and touch screen features remote by your bedside for lamps and tv remote. But the breakfast spread here was not as luxurious compared to Awana Kijal's excellent spread. The food was so-so and might I say, a bit bland.

We then went to the compulsory Pasar Payang for some cuci mata. Didn't bought much cause I'd already bought a few batik sutera when I was in Terengganu back in March for my survey. So had that out of my system. We went to Seberang Takir for some dinner and jus gelas besar, but I was bummed because I didn't find the exact same gerai that I went last March, which had some strange combination of fruit juices, like strawberry + plum. Didn't have much time to bring hubby to the seaside where they served fresh ikan celup tepung...next visit maybe. Hubby's now fired up to go to Terengganu again....can't wait for my next adventure on the road!

R.I.P, M.J?

2009-07-12T23:01:00.005+08:00

Still caught up on MJ's reruns on documentary and hit videos on MTV, I'd surfed a few websites for more news and came across this website:
http://sharonastyk.com/2009/07/07/stop-all-the-clocks-mourning-without-object/

I must say that I don't really agree to Sharon's posting because clearly she isn't a fan of MJ thus her post maybe biased to MJ's fans. But please read the posting and all 88 comments, and in it you will find MJ's hater and MJ's supporters, but most improtantly it helped me to see the bigger picture. MJ is human after all, and to err is human, even if he was accused and acquited for child molesting cases. But some of what was said was true, I do think that his memorial was an extravagant affair and those artist who performed or gave eulogoy are either those who barely knew him (i.e. Usher, Jennifer Hudson) or those who hadn't seen him in years (Brooke Shields). Why haven't these people step up and gave him open support when he was dealing with the child molest cases? Only when he's dead that they scramble to offer their grief and support..anyway, I realized that we must now move on because whatever it is he is still dead, and nothing can change it, except that we pray for his soul....

All those stories about his cosmetic surgery or skin bleaching or his claims on vitiligo, that's all is insubstantial to warrant him a freak. Maybe his actions (or alleged actions) do, but he was also an advocator of many charities for Africa, Aids, Heal the Kids foundation. So, it is a war between the good, the bad and the ugly. May God bless his soul.

R.I.P, M.J

2009-07-08T21:49:00.005+08:00

Finally, almost two weeks since his death, MJ was finally brought to rest at the Lawn Forest cemetery...

When I heard about his death, it was 26th June in the morning when Shasha smsed me and told the news, and I'd thought it was a hoax. I logged on to MSN and sure enough there was the news. At that time, I was attending the PTK course and was preparing for final presentation later on that day....so naturally, I didn't dwell much on it as I had other things on my mind.

Much much later on, with the media frenzy and CNN and MTV paying tribute, some people said that he wasn't dead, like Elvis when he left the building. There'd be MJ sightings in the future. It was surreal, I couldn't believe it, couldn't believe he was dead. And seeing how everyone was saddened by his death, but me numbed couldn't feel it. I claimed myself as a MJ fan, but I was ashamed to admit to myself that I'd stopped listening to his records long time ago...yeah, I knew his songs but I haven't listened to his albums in a long time, like I did when I was younger.

I remembered that it was my parents who'd bought his records, what I remembered most was his album Bad as I was introduced to Michael Jackson, or rather I became conscious of him as an artist. I was in primary school. Later on, his movie Moonwalker was my favourite that I'd repeatedly watched, with that magnificent claymation and his stories and video clips - Smooth Criminal, Bad, Liberian Girl. I remembered Dangerous, HIStory but I did not remember Invincible. But there was only one song from Invincible that I kept playing on my pc over my working years - Butterflies....that was the last song that I ever heard and played from him...

So, yes, as any other people wanted to be reacquainted with him, I went out and bought The Essential Michael Jackson. Maybe it was guilt trip but I am a fan of Micheal Jackson and he will be missed...R.I.P, M.J.

More health issues and tips

2009-06-18T20:30:00.004+08:00

I was down with (presumably) a cold and runny nose last Saturday...went to Klinik Idzham at Jalan Genting Klang and the good doctor gave me your standard paracetamol and flu medicine. Sunday, my nose was blocked but my phlegm was thicker and yellower, so I thought I was on the road to recovery. Monday, woke up with worse nose blocked and drowsiness from last night's flu medicine.

Decided to take MC as I feel that I couldn't work that day. Went to another panel clinic, Klinik Wangsa nearby Alpha Angle Wangsa Maju. Met up with Dr Nadir Khan, told him my flu didn't get any better but it good worst. I suspected that I had sinus problem, maybe I was allergic with seafood (I had seafood tomyam on Friday night, that's when the headache and runny nose started). Dr Nadir Khan said that the symptoms are almost similar and went on to declare,"I haven't given any flu or cough medicine to my patients in almost 17 years". Wow. And I thought that the flu medicine is the answer to our flu problems. And cough medicine for our cough problems. He said explained that flu or cough medicine would dry up the phelgm inside of you that at one point your phelgm will be very thick and yellow, and when you cough it will be very dry and hurts your throat.

Therefore, Dr Nadir tought me a technique to dislodge my phlegm. He doesn't want his patients to heal quickly, and I was puzzled by this statement. Aza de Kaza, who introduced me to this clinic explained that the doctor wants the patients to heal more naturally. I have been having phlegm and cough problems for quite sometime now, so what Dr Nadir tought me had been very helpful:

Administer to self, especially when coughing or feeling phelgm stuck:
1. Cup one palm into a half-inverted "V"
2. Pat vigorously on opposite side of the body just above the breast, and feel the phelgm starts to rise in your throat;
3. Same palm, pat vigorously under your rib cage and the side of your body. In no time you'll be spitting the dislodge phelgm.
4. Repeat with the other palm and opposite side of the body.

Administer to others:
1. Boil water and put it in a basin;
2. If doctor provides you with the herbal crystal that can help with your breathing, then drop just a pinch of it in the hot water;
3. Cup palm into half-inverted "V";
4. Patient bent down to inhale the hot water and you pat vigorously behind his/her back to help with breathing. Airway will be more clear and phlegm will thin out.

*can also be done to self for the hot water treatment, minus the pat on the back.

Overseas Posting & Health issues

2009-06-13T01:36:00.005+08:00

My office is now abuzz with people who are going for overseas posting. Some are going to Asian countries like Brunei, Manila, Beijing, Mumbai and some are going to the New York, others are going to Europe eg Milan, Russia, etc.

Exciting times right now, maybe for some it is feeling envious as they wondered why they were not chosen for overseas posting. It is after all, the most coveted position, being able to stay in a foreign country and doing seemingly glamorous job, and the allowance is great! If you bring your family, your partner and kids would get allowance too. The most sought after overseas posting is Japan because of the highest allowance rate, and after that Europe cities like Paris, Frankfurt, Amsterdam, Stockholm, etc.

My good friend and colleague, Ms Jam is going to Brunei this coming 26 June. Tons of things to do like packing things, getting to know the market where you are posted - the arrivals, travel behaviour, preference of travelers, the office and the existing staff. Ms Jam was given a rather neat list of things to bring like:

Pots and pans
Sanitary pads
Cutlery
Shampoo
Kicap
Sardine, etc

You might think the items above don't matter much, wait till you get there and you'd certainly need a familiar brand. You need to be comforted with the things you already know especially when the stuff is hard to get in European countries! A colleague in Stockholm once requested another colleague who's coming for a sales mission to bring a carton full of sanitary pads! Everything is so damn expensive, especially in Euros, when you multiply everything to 5 times.

Then there's the matter of medical check-up. A colleague who was supposed to got to Milan found out after her medical check-up that she had Thalassemia, a condition which she never knew about. She may have to defer or even cancel her posting. It is quite sad when something like that befallen your colleague, especially when you knew that she/he have worked hard for it.

As I always say, "Everything in its own time". If something is meant to be yours, then by hook or by crook you will get it. However, if it's not your rezeki yet, then no matter what, you may not get it. Perhaps it is qada' and qadar....WallahuA'lam.

Diabetes Scare

2009-06-09T21:53:00.001+08:00

Last week in Rompin I accompanied my mum to the pharmacy. It was 7pm and we had just came back from our wanderings in Teluk Gorek and shoppping around in Rompin's pesta pantai. She wanted to have her blood sugar tested. I was thinking "What the hell" might as well got my blood sugar tested too since I'm already there. My random blood sugar (RBS) was 7.8!! It is borderline to having high blood sugar, hence diabetes. OMG!! I was freaked out because last year when I checked my blood it wasn't even 6, and that was even less than an hour after breakfast.

Once we went back to KL, I had my blood rechecked. It's the fasting blood sugar (FBS) whereby your blood is tested early in the morning before you have your breakfast. My result was 5.8. Doctor said it was fine as FBS should be less than 6.1, but it would be better if my BS was between 5.2 - 5.6. For reference on your blood sugar:

FBS < 6.1 - blood taken early morning before breakfast
RBS <8.1 - blood taken 2 hours after meal or randomly during the day

Two hours later, I had my blood taken again for RBS, after I had my breakfast. The result was 6.7. I was so relieved. The doctor said that I don't have diabetes, as a diabetic person might tested 7 or more for FBS. Then I asked her what made by BS so high when I tested it previously? She said that it was probably because I tested it at 7pm when I had already eaten throughout the day, plus my last meal before my blood was taken was less than one hour. I was pacified by her answer, but I wasn't totally comfortable at the state of my BS being on the high side.

My mum then advised that I should take care of what I eat:

1. Eat according to portion: carb 1 portion, vegies + lauk: 2 portions, 1 fruit;
2. Regulate meal time: eat meals on time;
3. Only eat again after 2 hours, so food can be digested properly;
4. Exercise to loose the weight.

Doctor aslo advise that if I'm having any of the symptoms below, then I should have a recheck:

1. Always thirsty;
2. Always tired or letahrgic:
3. Can't control bladder, and kept peeing at night, etc.

So, I guess this is a wake up call for me. I've to start watching what I ate and regulate my meals. I've just started with more vegies diet, namely salad for dinner. My personal favourite: nicoise salad with italian dressing + tuna, its just delicious! I don't mind having it everyday. Will try to exercise more once Ajol's back from Jakarta.

Will check in again with the doctor in 3 months time and see my BS level...

My Gazpacho Adventure

2009-06-08T18:45:00.002+08:00

Essentially, Gazpacho is chilled soup made from veggies. It has thirst quenching ability. The original Spanish gazpacho were made from stale bread soaked in cool water, garlic, olive oil and vinegar. Other gazpachos recipes such as green and oriental gazpacho may included some of these ingredients: lettuce, spinach, cucumber, tomatoes, bell pepper and chicken broth. The most important thing is the chicken broth.

I love soups, they are my comfort food. So over the weekend, I was inspired by Nigella's slime soup which combines frozen peas, chicken stock and mozarella. I had some mix vegies in the freezer and some chicken stock I had made and frozen. I'm not crazy about frozen carrots and corn, but I loved the green peas. Not to let anything go to waste, I combine the two ingredients and heat it up. Add a dollop of mayonnaise cause I don't have any sour cream or milk to make it more creamy. Cool it down, and blitz till smooth in a blender. Chill in the fridge till serving time. And voila!

Tip for blending hot liquid:

Remove liquid from the heat and allow to cool for at least 5 minutes. Transfer liquid to a blender or food processor and fill it no more than halfway. If using a blender, release one corner of the lid. This prevents the vacuum effect that creates heat explosions. Place a towel over the top of the machine, pulse a few times then process on high speed until smooth - taken from Nigella's slime soup recipe in Food Network.

And the verdict? Ms Fantaghiro was my guinea pig. I gave her a bowl and she said that it was delicious with a nutty flavour (because of the corn) and does have a cooling effect. So yay! My gazpacho experiment was a success. Try it, you might like it. Especially in this hot weather....