Self Reflection

And today I decided to change the blog to the darkest color of the day. It must be a personal reflection, I told myself after I completed it..

Do you find that sometimes you yourself dont know what make you tick? That after living with yourself for so long you dont actually know your own self?

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The School Break

And we went to PD / Melaka last school break (bukan macam setengah orang cuti pergi Melbourne, Syedney, Bandung, or China etc etc kan..)

Things I find charming..

This is a clothes boutique. Inside there is a beautiful spiral staircase leading up to the first floor. I'd love to tangkap gambar but unfortunately the owner said no pictures please..

These roof tiles are very distinctive.

This is a hotel in an old and beautiful building with lots windows with wooden shutters.

Things I saw and love..

Bright terompah on the street - we bought a couple; never bought any terompah in my life! Now we make great noise on the porch in one of these.

A toddler walking on the beach in these cute car shoes..

Things I hate..

Unsightly besi, payung and bangku littering on the beach (it is all about the money) that there is not even space available to spread our own tikar. Tak boleh ke buat beach tu cantik macam Malibu ke Saint-Tropez ke.. These operators really spoil the beach actually.

And last but not least, how can I survive a holiday without the grown up kids, nevertheless..

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I Dont Think We Should Do This Again

And we did something crazy last night - on a weekday, on a school day...

Iman came home one day last week and asked if we would want to watch Transformers. Her office would buy the tickets (of course we would have to pay from our own pockets) - and she said it is on a Wed night so ticket would be at a discounted price. And it would be a first evening show too.

The boys were excited about the movie.. so we said yes, let's go watch. We were told it was an 8:30pm show. It seemed a decent show time. I have to leave office on time but I guess I could still make it. And Eirfan doesnt have class on Wed evening and we should be home not too late for Thur classes and to the office.

So yesterday I left office early enough for people to raise their eyebrowses. I said it is 1st Rejab and everyone at home is fasting; which is the truth - therefore I have to go home on time. The sky was dark. It started to drizzle when I got to Bangsar. By the time I got to Ulu Klang, traffic was terrible. Trees had fallen onto the road due to heavy wind and rain earlier in the area. To make matters worse there were at least two accidents on the road. By the time I got home it was almost Maghrib already.

Luckily everybody was ready and after buka puasa we quickly left for GSC at Pavillion - which is already almost 8 by then. A black sleek BMW driver took the parking space that was rightfully ours! When we got to GCS, we found out the show is at 9. So we were not late after all.

The boys love the movie. I personally prefer the first movie. It has a charm in its own way. We got home at midnite. In a blink of an eye Eirfan was snoring quietly away.. I dont think we should do this again on a weekday.

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Murhpy's Law?

And unfortunately this is about work too. Yes I know, again. However this is a post on work but with a different flavor.

It's like this. We are going through a series of system upgrade. There's a lot of methodology about it. Lots of school of thoughts. Lots of arguments. And definitely lots of testing and work.

We made through the development and QA testing with some (cough, cough, lots?) of hiccups. But we finally completed all tasks with the testing beautifully done (konon; hint : anything we are involved in would definitely be beautifully done).

Then came the crunch time - the upgrade of the prod server itself. We were told to treat the downtime like a normal system down time due to maybe electricity failure at the data center - which actually had happened a couple of times - despite the extensive DR process we had covered and massive plans for user notices. We abide by the instruction, siapa lah kita kalau dah bos kata tak payah kecoh-kecoh?

The d-day was last Fri. The system was schedule to be up at 8:00 am last Mon. Unfortunately today, close to midnite Thur, the system is still inaccessible by the users.

We were instructed to come in very early this morning for final verifiations before the system opens to the users. Unfortunately that didnt happen. Then we were told it'll be up at lunch. Didnt happen either. Maybe tonight at 10 or so. Zip. The last words are maybe tomorrow morning. Early.

I pray for the sakes of the Technical team that it will really be up tomorrow morning. Bukan apa, kesian kan budak2 yang teruk kerja pagi petang tak balik nak up kan jugak server tu. If we are restless about this, I have no doubt whatsoever their pain is thousand times over.

Remember Murphy's Law? Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. Namun qada' & qadar semua nya di tangan Allah. Berdoalah.

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Books, Books And More Books Part 16

And I finished this recently.

If I can write a book I'd love to write something like this (or even better, his Travelog Haji) so that I can maybe tuliskan secebis cerita yang mungkin dapat meninggalkan sedikit kesan, walau sebesar zarah sekali pun, di dalam hati mana-mana insan. Tapi hidayah tu tak sampai seperti yang dirasai oleh penulis.

But then again I suppose you wont get it if you dont look for it or work for it.

Nevertheless I still prefer his Travelog Haji over this. Travelog Haji tu power sampai boleh menitik air mata. Baca lah kalau belum baca. And again, it is not specifically pasal pergi haji. I feel it is more about berdoa, berserah kepada Allah and percaya semua yang terjadi adalah kehendak Allah.

Baca lah.

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Time Out

And whilst enjoying a quiet day at home doing nothing (do read that as ONLY busy doing the laundry, cooking, cleaning, tidying up after the 4 boys and all those boring stuff moms do but Insya'Allah banyaaaak pahala..), I thought of the top ten places I'd like to visit.

Any shrink would have a field day with my story - boring doing the at-home stuff therefore dreaming about a getaway. Typical la.

Nevertheless, here's my countdown of the exotic-but-not-necessarily-paradise getaway places..

10. Greek Islands (seem like paradise with the blue ocean and white washed buildings; and taking cruises around the islands)

9. Anywhere, Italy (love the olives, pasta, lemons, cheeses - but not blue cheese of course - and the anchovies)

8. Andalusia (almost magical with the historical buildings and places)

7. Egypt (would love to cruise on the Nile and see all the ruins. Oh, and belly dancing of course)

6. Serengeti (just cant get the beautiful colors of the place out of my mind)

5. Marrakech (the sun, the people, the market. I can almost smell the food)

4. Istanbul (love the mosques and the place where east meets west)

3. Mount Kilimanjaro (isnt the mountain so haunting in a way?)

2. Big Sur (was told it is the most beautiful place; like there is romance waiting. Yeap, as if..)

And the number one on the wish list is...

1. Rocky Mountains (cant describe to you how beautiful the place is. In winter, in spring, in summer but most of all in autumn when the aspen leaves would turn gold and would flutter in the windy Sept / Oct chilly days..)

Scrreeeech - so let's get back down to earth here.

So yeah, other than working hard in cleaning, washing, cooking it would seem I also had worked very hard on my day dreaming today.

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Years Speeding Us By

And suddenly things are picking up in life. Let's not mention work for a while longer - I am on leave!

I have lots to update after the lull in the last month or so. But like the schematics of a database (what else would I liken things with but a database structure?) I like to keep things neatly arranged and catalogued in different tables and thus blog posts would be written according to topics..

Anyway.

I love this photo. It reaffirms life is wonderful, if indeed I need any reaffirmation on that, that is. Let me be a cliche and ask, where have all the years gone?



And I pray for them that days ahead would be as wonderful as it is on this day.


Life is so uncomplicated at 20, dont you agree?

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