Coming this Summer

Happy Birthday, Dad!

After I reformatted my notebook a couple of months ago, I choose not to install Rainlender, as it always lag up my windows start time. There, I usually post all of my family and friend's birthday.

So, is it an acceptable excuse for me to use for forgetting my dad's 50th birthday yesterday (Nov 5th)? Damn, I think this is the first time I TOTALLY forgot it. When my mom reminded me this night, I just couldn't believe I just did it.

So I quickly went over to Photoshop and email him my a little e-card. Mujur zaman dah moden skrg haha.

Perfect First Month... (At Least I Think So)

Yep, today marks my first month working here. Maka dengan ini saya mengumumkan kemasukan terma baru dalam adianictionary iaitu jubli atom iaitu sambutan ulang bulan pertama... sebelum atom-atom tersebut bercantum dan bergabung menjadi jubli perak, emas, intan, zhulian, zirconia dan sebagainya.



So, how's working life so far? I would say, it doesn't feel like working. Because basically I am doing what I've been doing in the recent months at home - only this time, I get paid monthly (besides other payments lah). And yes, for the umpteenth time I believe, it was Him who personally intervened in my little life, because if not for that totally unprecedented call from my current boss on the morning of that very day I was supposed to confirm my job with another one, I would not sitting happily writing this now. And for that, thank You, God.



What happened during the course of one month? Well, the first week I got involved with Pecipta 2009 in KL Covention Center, stayed a night at Impiana Hotel there, then the week next with SUCOMBS Symposium and stayed a night at Boulevard Hotel, Mid Valley. Then last week (less than legally) with another event at the same place. Ah, yes. I lost my iPod in the bus during Pecipta. Takpalah. iPod tua itu dapat percuma. Cepat-cepatlah gaji masuk, I'm so in love with the new nano.



I managed to get cinema-free for the entire several months I'm home. And it was summer blockbuster season. Tup-tup bila balik sini je, I already watched 4 movies this month alone. And it was an October (a slow season for movie release). So reviewing each movies in one sentence, it will be "Ni ke yang terbaik sangat tu" for Papadom, "Blah blah blah" for Sorority Row, "I don't understand how Gedik who was asleep managed to explain the plot to me who's totally awake" for Surrogates and "wow this might be the most laugh I ever got in 90 minutes" for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.



I got two brief roomates fo the past month, but two days ago I finally got a permanent one - and boy, did I ever had a friendlier roomate that this (and yes, that includes my own coursemates turned roomates). As I said before, the amount of our conversations in the first 10 minutes is more than my past 3 roomates ever combined. Yep I'm not kidding.



To say that "duit mengalir macam air" is an understatement. Tiap-tiap hari ada je barang habis nak kene beli baru, benda nak dibayar, benda yang kena dahulukan duit sendiri, dan sebagai-sebagainya. I was so scared to check my Maybank transaction history, pejam mata, pasrah, cucuk (kad, that is). But finally I got my strength (cewah over), and head over to maybank2u and started clicking on the calculator.

And guess what?

Only RM1200 for the whole month! And that includes my college rent for two months, so my actual spent was RM800 je. And minus the money I forked out for 1U exhibition, RM700 je! RM700 untuk makan-makan luar dan jimba-jimba 4-5 hari seminggu, kira oklah kan. Kalau makan nasi putih-telur dadar-sup kosong RM2 tiap-tiap malam kat kafe kolej tu mesti lagi saving kan. Haha. *Matilah belum ada kereta bolehla berangan saving-saving. Kelak nanti setiap kali ko isi minyak meraunglah dekat stesen tu.*



Maka, apa lagi yang berlaku dalam jangka masa sebulan ini? Ikut bos jumpa klien yang banyak songeh nak mampus / meeting di "White Town" / tengok series baru / ukursahkan ukuran site / sketchup / photoshop / makan di Williams / tengok paranormal activity / dengar gossip-gossip jabatan / logo / makan kenny rogers yang tercaj lebih untuk ayam yang tidak dipesan / mendengar kisah piap-piap / poster / website / print bunting / makan nandos / kad nama / Deepavali (hmm perlukah dimention?) / open house rumah Puan Akmal / dibelanja di Murni masa harijadi Alyaa / terjemahan tesis / keluar dengan ED, Ameer dan Tuty / tulis laporan / design exhibition yang sebenarnya salah saiz / karaoke 3 jam - Alyaa belanja / dengar konflik-konflik workshop / gunajaga kereta Gedik 5 hari / Pelan Deraf Rangka Kerja.... hmm... ni yang terlintas dalam kepala sekarang.

Perfect First Day... (At Least I Think So)

18630706! Yeay, that's my KWSP/EPF account number. Just got it today, while at the same time dad who will turn 50 next month checks his account to find a 6 figure amount in it. Omigosh! Dad, I definitely WANT SOME of that amount. Please please please..... (matilah kene start bodek dari sekarang)

Today is like an impromptu show being put together at the last minute.

01 Called Za'ba.
02 Called En Azimin.
03 Confirmed meeting with Prof.
04 Pack up things (with my mom constantly nagging... aiyoh!).
05 Departed from home.
06 Followed dad to meet his customers at Gombak.
07 Arrived at Bangi.
08 Stopped at Hentian Kajang's KWSP.
09 Arrived at Za'ba. Lunch time - office closed.
10 Went for lunch with dad.
11 Met with Prof. Back to Za'ba.
12 Managed to persuade the kakak at the office to give me ground floor room (for the first time I move in my things in less than 10 minutes).
13 And no roomate (yippie! - but occasionally on weekends I might get outsider roomate from various activities held everyweek here).
14 Headed down to faculty.
15 Huha-huha in Bilik RA.
16 Met with En Azimin. Discuss.
17 Continue huha-huha in Bilik RA.
18 En Khairul wanted to treat us for a minum-minum outside.
19 Went to Old Town with En Khairul, Shah, Gedik and Kak Huda. Sembang-sembang SUCOMBS. Makan tak hengat. Minum-minum la sangat kan. Dinner saved for tonight! Haha.

In the end, everything works out. Alhamdulillah.

A Day Before

InsyaAllah, tomorrow will be my first day working, well at least that's how KWSP sees it. haha.

Because of the 11th hour confirmation I got from En Azimin, so my plan is kinda mess up right now. If he just called a day earlier, I would be able to check-in to Za'ba and spend this weekend (yesterday+today) moving my things into the room. But whatever lah. So now I'm kinda 'go with the flo' konsepnya. Just what I do know for sure, first thing tomorrow I gotta head up to KWSP to open my account there, before making my way to Bangi. I'll try to settle the application form as quickly as possible. And a meeting with Prof to show the video montage that I spent an entire night learning Adobe After Effects for. Juling mataku!

Maybe I'll pack a day's worth of essential and try to see if I can get a room in Za'ba on the spot tomorrow. And if I do, I'll have to return back home that evening/night and come back with my entourage that night/next morning.

I can sense it's gonna be a very tiring couple of days ahead.

Yesterday, I went to En Mazlan's open house with Gedik, Ya, Shah, Mek Su and Kak Aza - which I think was the first and might be the last open house I went to this Raya. Hahaha. Betapa tidak beraya-nya tahun ini. Baju raya tak beli. Program TV raya entah apa-apa tu pun tak tengok. Family balik kampung, aku jaga rumah. Kawan panggil hari-hari ajak datang tour-de-Gombak beraya aku tolak. Ikut pergi beraya di 1 rumah je (tupun rumah sedara di 500m di belakang rumah). Orang datang rumah, aku samada (tiada di rumah/baru bangun, salam dan sambung hadap laptop/tengah tidur dan tak sedar2 sampai orang balik).

Entahlah. Dah 23 kali beraya. Mungkin dah muak rasanya. Nak kena ada family sendiri kot baru semangat raya tu datang balik.

My Alma Mater. My Pride

UKM recently debut it's new student edition corporate video, an addition to it's 2007 video.



My guess is that it's done by the same production house. No wonder they've been re-hired again, considering that their earlier work is pretty amazing. And this one too. With the millions spent, of course they should. Haha I love how suddenly glitzy my campus looks in these videos, although for a student who spent 3-5 years here, we should know better. But after all, this is a corporate video lah, not a documentary. You don't find Indonesian tourism video showing little children on the streets selling heavy lesung batu they carry on their back do you? Exactly (a depressing memory I can't get my head out of, though)

Anyway, the point is, I love UKM. I know, every student will gloat about they own university/college any given day. But for me, for some personal reasons not to be further explained, I strongly believe I was "directed" here. I always keep that in mind, and for that I'll forever be grateful. That's why no matter how less-than-accredited my course is, how expensive my college is, and how tiring it is to reseat my semester, I'll always try my best to be positive.

I know that some people just couldn't stop complaining left and right. But for every negative point they pinpoint on, I can list 10 positive things this campus had give to me. Long live UKM.

p/s: nice to see they're using our khidmat masyarakat pictures while helping Johor's flood victim over 2 years ago.

My First Little Reunion

Recently on one of the last days of Ramadan, me and several of my schoolmates decided to meet up for a buka puasa. Time was set. And rescheduled. Venue was set. And re-venued. Thanks to Facebook, we save a lot from SMS-ing this time. Still aching due to miss out the last reunion during the community center project last semester, my heart was pretty much set - I HAVE to go this time no matter what. (I haven't met some of them for almost 6 years after PMR)

So we agreed to meet at Johnny's OneUtama (thanks to Ib for the information he posted on his blog earlier, really helpful for our reservation) at 6.30pm. I can only leave from Klang at 5.30pm, and I was afraid the massive traffic would make me late. And yes, the traffic was pretty obnoxious. Along the Klang bridge, at Shah Alam Federal Highway exit (some cars collide or something), and LDP! Do I need to say more? Goodness gracious! From the cable bridge it's already head-to-bump. It went gradually smoother at some points and then you got stuck again. And I made several unfortunate choices along the way, like when I supposedly can drive under the flyover, I drove over (and a Mercedes broke down at the top, thus forcing the traffic to go slow), and when I can drive over the flyover, I went under (and the traffic light brought the traffic into a standstill), and I geniusly wikimapia-d earlier to find this so-called "shortcut" that could supposedly head me straight from SS22 (I think) to Lebuh Bandar Utama but after I made the exit, I got stuck in this housing area circling for 15 minutes before I gave up and re-enter the congested LDP.

But traffic was finally OK after that (I didn't need that shortcut after all), but then rain suddenly poured heavily (it was a cloudy evening before) but luckily I was just 10 minutes away from OneUtama. I could see the digital clock over OneUtama rainforest showed 1904 when I reached there (although my car's showing 6:58) and then the "finding your parking lot" challenge began! I finally managed to park at top level where there's some empty space (because it's raining!), and the best spot I could find was the one where the roof only covers the front of the car. Haha. So I had to make a 1-meter run from the rain.

My parking lot was at the end of new wing, and Johnnys at the very corner of Old-New Wing. And during my walk through the wing, the speaker already sounded "Sekarang telah masuk waktu berbuka puasa. OneUtama mengucapkan selamat berbuka puasa bagi para pelanggan yang kami hormati". Had a little trouble finding that Johnnys. And when I arrived, there's only 4 people there! Haha apparently yang lain tu pukul 6.30 baru bertolak. So go figure lah.

But it doesn't matter as long as everybody made it (the last one arrived one hour later, and two cancelled after they couldn't find parking spaces! bley?), and we had a long, joyous conversation, reminisce about the past and catching up on everybody's current doing. It's mind blowing to see your group of classmates now blossoming into pilot, pharmacist, future doctor, accountant, engineer, and never-would-be architect. Hahaha.

2 of us had to go home early. Our chitchat ends at 9.30pm and thankfully OneUtama had this piece of kampung nelayan backdrop for Hari Raya so we took pictures there. Hope that this won't be our last and thanks for reminding me why I love my schooldays.

23 Candles

Thanks for your kind wishes. Last year have been pretty amazing for me. Let's hope for another memorable one.

Tangan Dihulur

Seperti tahun-tahun sebelumnya, beraya tanpa perasaan lagi. Tak suka, tak duka, biasa je. Selain kejayaan berpuasa penuh (Alhamdulillah), masih dapat berbuka ramai-ramai bersama rakan ukm, dan reunion sekolah menengah 2 hari lepas, macam tak ada sebab nak bergembira berlebih-lebihan. Baju melayu sarung tahun lepas punya (yang mana betul-betul dipakai sekali saja, maaf saya bukan penggemar busana tradisional ni). Cuma tahun ni puas sikit sebab dapat tolong keluarga cat rumah, pasang wallpaper dan border. Makanya sekarang dah pandai sikit bab-bab tu, maka tambahlah sikit semangat nak membuat di bilik sendiri nanti (nanti, nanti, bila? bulan depan dah balik UKM semula! ayo haha).

Seperti juga tahun-tahun sebelumnya, saya dengan yakinnya mengaku tidak ada melakukan kesalahan zahir yakni berbentuk pukulan, lempangan atau langgar keretaan, sebaliknya jauh lebih banyak kesalahan batin iaitu berbentuk sumpahan, makian, carutan, cercaan, hinaan, perlian, sarkastikan, prasangkaan, cakap depanan, cakap belakangan, cakap YMan mahupun komen Facebookan, yang sudah tentu sedikit sebanyak ada mengguris hati-hati kaca anda semua. Haha. Maka besarlah harapan diri ini agar pihak cik/encik/tuan/puan/tepuan (ni kalau ada yang keliru haha - oops salah batin lagi)/Dr./Ar./Prof dapat memaafkan pihak kami yang seringkali alpa ini.

Semoga beroleh rahmat semuanya sempena Syawal ini.

Utusan Screwed Up - Again

I would like to shout a single sentence for Utusan Entertainment Desk - International Division (if such exist, haha main reka je) - KORANG NI LULUS BAHASA INGGERIS KE TIDAK?

I was browsing the Utusan website as usual where I stumbled this article, "Mad Men raih anugerah utama Emmy", supposedly published on September 19th (but I don't know if it also made it's way to the printed newspaper as well). Well, as any award freaks (like me) can tell you, the Emmys will only be telecast live this Monday morning (21st September, Malaysian time), so what could this Utusan article be referring to? Was it about the Creative Arts Emmy which took place on Sept 12th? But Mad Men certainly did not win anything big there! I clicked on the news, and guess what - somebody's sorry ass should be fired - PRONTO!

Citing AFP as the source (AFP stands for Agence France Presse - the oldest news agency in the world, kind of like our own Bernama, who supplies the news to our local publications) but I don't think AFP will do this kind of screwed up mess you call "reporting". Let me copy the article in case they delete it later:

LOS ANGELES 18 Sept. - Drama bersiri Mad Men dan siri komedi 30 Rock merupakan rancangan kegemaran yang berjaya mengaut anugerah utama di Emmy Awards ke-61 Ahad lalu.

Stesen televisyen AMC mempopularkan Mad Men yang berkisar mengenai dunia politik kotor di agensi pengiklanan New York pada awal tahun 1960-an, sekali gus mengulangi kemenangannya pada tahun 2008 dengan meraih anugerah drama siri terbaik.

Drama siri kritis itu turut dicalon untuk kategori pelakon pembantu yang dimenangi oleh Jon Hamm dan Elisabeth Moss di acara besar-besaran yang berlangsung di Nokia Theater di Los Angeles.

Tom O'Neil, pakar anugerah dan pemilik blog theenvelope.com, Los Angeles berkata, Mad Men berjaya membuktikan ia terlalu kuat untuk disaingi oleh calon-calon lain termasuk Breaking Bad, Damages dan House.

"Mad Men pastinya mempunyai faktor terbaik untuk masa sekarang, ia bergaya, ditulis dengan baik dan ia mempunyai sesuatu yang sangat penting, tarikan yang angkuh, mungkin juga tarikan golongan elit," katanya.

Ia tetap ditonton meskipun populariti Mad Men dikatakan akan membantu Hamm dan Moss meraih anugerah dalam kategori pelakon pembantu terbaik.

Sementara itu, pelakon lelaki terbaik bagi drama bersiri ialah Bryan Cranston dalam Breaking Bad, sekali lagi meraih kemenangan untuk drama yang mengisahkan seorang guru kimia di sekolah tinggi yang terlibat dalam jenayah.

Untuk kategori pelakon wanita terbaik, pelakon veteran, Glenn Close memenangi anugerah Emmy ketiga dalam kerjayanya bagi wataknya sebagai peguam New York yang tidak berhati perut, Patty Hewes dalam Damages.

Pencalonan lain termasuk Moss untuk Mad Men, Sally Field, Brothers & Sisters, Mariska Hargitay dalam Law & Order, Kyra Sedgwick dalam The Closer dan Holly Hunter dalam Saving Grace. - AFP

Are you freaking kidding me? Ahad lalu your ass! Unless this report is written by someone who's been into a time travel machine from "next week". Apart from "foretelling" the "win" for Mad Men and 30 Rock for Best Drama Series and Comedy Series, it also "foresee" the victory for last year's winners Bryan Craston (Breaking Bad) and Glenn Close (Damages) for Best Drama Actor and Actress respectively.

The article also goes on to quote Tom O'Neal, webmaster of theenvelope.com (which I do visit on a daily basis), and I can tell you whatever he's saying is purely a PREDICTION from in-depth analysis for those categories.

Yes, it's not surprising if Mad Men, Bryan Cranston and Glenn Close will reap those statuettes again this year, judging by their performances and other nominees in the category. But for Utusan to fail fact-checked it's report, hiring an idiotic reporter who definitely has to reseat his/her SPM PMR UPSR English paper, and repeat the same screw up (remember the Desperate Housewives brouhaha?)

I bet I can do a whole freaking better job there, damn it. To the so-called "journalist" who wrote translated this story Lain kali kalau nak tulis tentang benda yang kau tak tahu/faham, tolong research/wikipedia sikit. Kalau macam ni, baik kau interview persiapan raya jiran depan rumah aku ni, walaupun tak penting tapi sekurang-kurangnya kau tak adalah buat kesilapan-kesilapan bodoh macam ni.