The saints in paradise teach that the start
Of drawing near is to renounce the heart.

- Farid ud-din Attar

and when i think about the reasons why i am struggling, i failed to realise that the first step to bettering myself and my position, is to nurse the condition of my heart. for how can i expect to be guided if the heart is in no condition to accept His Light?

........

i have found the perfect solution to a writer's block.

i'll be ceasing all activities on this journal.

and i seek your help,

keep me in your prayers, for my journey towards His Grace is one paved with multitudes of challenges i struggle to bear.

so before i end,

i seek your forgiveness for all of my shortcomings, surely i am full of them, and for all the failings of this journal. i have been frivolous with my time, bestial in my thoughts and deeds and clearly in need of a spiritual uplifting to mend my ways. forgive me for my many harsh words, my presumptious ways and all the spite and envy i kept towards any of you. may we find it within us to better ourselves so that He may view us favourably at the end of days.


Ameen.



"sampai kapankah
aku mampu bertahan
tetapi aku jalani
semua kisah hidupku ini

tak akan terganti
setiap kenangan yang telah terukir
kan terekam indah
dan melekat di hati

akankah berakhir
semua rasa yang telah tercipta
di dalam benakku
dan di dalam asa ku"

i get upset at people who tell me there is something i lack but never offer to teach me or suggest ways in which i can learn. well then i guess i should go find my own teachers because clearly the ones i look for answers to aren't keen on sharing. :( that's just downright disappointing, not to mention, insulting.

so today there was a ceramah after terawih and the ustaz was narrating how heaven is awaiting the arrival of the faithful in Ramadhan and how the bidadari in heaven all look forward to make husbands the believers on earth.

and then i prayed that my husband would be among the ones they are waiting for. ;)

my nose is a broken tap. i wonder if harun can prescribe me some antibiotics.

the trip to kl was super fly. i think i did what i sought to do. to be honest i wasn't half as interested in the topics covered, and slept pretty much all throughout the forums and presentation. haha. that's partly because i was up the previous night either surfing in the canteen, having supper at PJ or in meetings preparing for the presentation. what i wanted to do was to network, which is a cold and jargonic way of saying "making friends". and hell, i did!

i made friends with the people in nus whom i've never met before, but now am thankful to have had the opportunity to get to know e.g. yin hwa for his tell-the-taxi-driver-to-fuck-off and wave-to-those-in-queue-at-taxi-stands-cos-we-got-one-by-the-road antics. and i met a variety of personalities from vietnam, hongkong, australia, thailand, taiwan, yemen and even sudan and kenya! *waves at abdi* and of course, the locals. [no, i still don't know what to think of the fact that they think i am one of them, but it sure is cool to ride cheaper than yinhwa]

i really have to thank the malaysians for proving to me that we are in essence, one and the same. and there were many a times during the course of the symposium when i was ashamed of the traits singaporeans portray which pales shades in comparison to our neighbouring counterparts. the malaysians i met were more hospitable, deeply caring and conscientious individuals. i learnt a lot from them. surprisingly, those are qualities which was once so pervasive in our own singaporean culture but now eroded by self-importance and ignorance.

cheers to the organising committee headed by christine. they certainly proved to me that professionalism among student organisations is neither an idealistic concept nor one which relies on experience.

i'm still missing gys '08. and though i didn't manage to snag meself an anak dato'[damn the term break!], at least anwar won the by-elecs! *snarls at hasan*

pictures will be up on facebook once it decides not to fuck up. :)

thanks to everyone who's made the experience sweeter than expected. i can't name all of you because my memory would do some of you injustice. God bless.

call/sms me at +60 149332789.

i am damn bored here.

but at least i get to stay in a boy's hostel block. this morning i saw a boy half naked walking to the toilet with a towel on.

not so exciting.

and i ate beef chilli cheese fries at carl's junior. yummy.

UM boys have yet to stun me. The girls all remind me of hasan. haha.

so here i am at the canteen of 12th residential college [a.k.a. hall 12] at 1am in the morning cos its the only place with a strong wifi signal. the workers just mopped my feet and the tv is showing olympics women's bmx. i went to catch the fireworks competition earlier on at putrajaya and it was stunning. but i felt a tad miserable. i have always watched fireworks with close friends and family. suddenly i feel...homesick. nani nak maaakkkkk!!!

and i only spent rm1 today. on a cup of bandung at putrajaya pasar malam. food was provided for the day's meals and i am still full from yesterday's subway+carl'sjr junk.

everyone here thinks i am from UM. and i can pass off as a local so i won't get cheated on taxi fares. -_- never has my malay been tested. today i actually used "merangkumi", "ditempatkan" and "senarai" in complete oral sentences. my mandarin was also tested when some PRC tourists wanted to take pics with me at putrajaya.

meeting pmium tomorrow. i'm so nervous, faisal, the secretary, has been trying to convince me via sms that they are humans too the whole night. haha. they are actually going to permatang pauh on sat to [support?] catch the elections cos anwar's contesting. i feel like going with them!! if only i don't have to do a presentation.

God bless all of you reading this and i just want to say that i miss all of you already. hmmm. especially squeeze@engine!

hahahaha

waaah, missing 4 days of lessons! damn.

but thankful to His Grace, i got all of my desired tutorial slots. of which i hope my tutor for PS1101E is my dearest Badawi. *praysprayspraysprays*

i'll be back sunday evening insyaAllah. i'll be bringing my laptop, so you can skype/msn me, and will be having a prepaid number which i will put up here, once i get connected in kl, if you need to call me. i know some of you will miss my voice. as much as you miss my hair. ****ers.

don't worry, i know i'll miss some of your voices too. *hinthint* not fairus' amok voice of course. never give that boy a microphone.

baru gi 6 hari dah macam belayar sepuluh tahun. and kl is so...familiar. i can just run over to nek teh's house if i get scared of momok under my bed at night. eh shit. shouldn't have brought that up.

ok so just pray for my safe journey to and back, and for my safety for the duration of the symposium. can can? many thanks. :)

and khairi's back. like finally.

azhar(mech engine), fahmi and i want to plan a day trip to batam, not cos we know azhar's a virgin(lol), but because we've never been there and just want to see what's there. join us! who knows, maybe azhar will return a.....haha, just joking. *slaps azhar's back*

on the bus home just now azhar and i had a nice chat about matters of the heart. we were being frank and personal about our attitudes and experiences and i think it really helped to reaffirm my beliefs. that i shouldn't get lost or too caught up[not that i think i am] in finding/choosing the right one when it is His love that i should work hard to earn. and make a priority above all else. i am still finding my way around things, and i can never be more thankful that He has brought certain individuals into my life to guide me along, whether they are conscious of it or not. :)

so though currently i am nursing a squeeze who's from engine[now, now i believe this phrase has been carefully scrutinized by some, and it's probably not whom you think it is, kejap lagi fairus mesti tanye siape. ] that is just something i'm using to spend my lull time on. i know i should be spending free thought time on God but i sure am distracted by the one who can do [almost]everything under the sun! oh how attractive! *chope chope*

like i've repeated many times before, siape dapat pikat hati nani sure bertuah punye. how many girls actually keeps every newspaper article on leeds united since 1999? huh? huh? dah lah tu can give you financial and fashion advice, will let you steal her food and lets you get a higher cap score. [/self promo] tapi bab man utd fan tu susah sikit nak telan la. i can't possibly be with someone when everytime i see his face i'll see rooney/fergie. itu muka mintak kene tapak je. end of story.

naib baik squeeze@engine not man utd fan. wheee.

ok dah.

sape2 nak kirim bende ciplak dari petaling sila hubungi saya. kalau tak dapat chewing gum je. lol.

seee youuu from KL!

school started on tuesday for me and by the end of that day i managed to blow $40. and that wasn't on essentials like texts, notes, files etc.

the best reaction i got from my newly betudung-ed status was from zul. he gave me the classic tengkorak face [that was what we called him back in secondary school]. it was as if he had witnessed a mindblowing catastrophe. all those kicks to the head from silat must have done something. haha. mintak mahap eh zul, gurau je.

and business school cannot get any worse when it comes to showering me with eye candies. kalau aku jantan takpe la, berlambak betina2 pakai kasut setinggi gunung stong jalan terkedek2. but it's only midweek so we'll wait and see. things are so bad my current squeeze is from engine. yikes!

i still have no idea how my modules will turn out.

but first day of school was also first ngaji session. which lasted half an hour because tok ngaji had to go off and sing. -_- anyway, i'm really excited about re-ngajiing cos i'm starting from the very very very beginning and it's hilarious to see me stumble at the most basic of pronounciations. do join me if you want to! my mum highly encourages that and advises me "lebih baik kalau ramai ramai". won't it be great if she had said that about the no.of boyfriends she'll allow me to have? considering how right now it stands at zero-but-i-don't-really-care-cos-you-don't-seem-to-care-yourself. but seriously, of course i am ashamed about how i haven't taken ngaji seriously since my old tok ngaji passed away and looking at my state now i am just grateful that He still allows my tongue to bend it like Beckham. haha. dah lah tu, dah tua bangka nak mampos baru nak pakai tudung. tsk3. just pray that it's not all too late for me ya?

and then the sect from pmium replied! so exciting. like finding a long lost sibling!

AGM this friday. do come.

see you!

Damn, it's been a while!

and fret not, RS1101F will be up soon. This time let's see if i have what it takes to pen advice on how girls should treat boys. i abashedly had no defensive comments when my lunch mates today claimed that "sometimes, girls can be real bitches". maybe it's because i believe so too. afterall, i have been one.

i'm leaving for kl in 2 weeks time but i have yet to plan anything. the other nus delegates are busy planning transport and brainstorming presentation ideas but i have chosen to lay back and go there by myself. i just really just want to network with the foreign students. and skip some lame tourist activities so that i have time to go meet some student activists. i'm worried about missing 4 days of school too. but if i don't do these things now, i'll never do them.

before you know it, it's Shaaban already. i am unsure if i am prepared for ramadhan considering how last year's was the harshest ramadhan ever for me personally. but these things don't wait for you i guess. they just hit you and you have to deal with it whether you are prepared or not. of course i'll pray that i will be able to reap all of its benefits by intensifying the ibadah.

so can you feel its coming?

;)

I was reading a friend's blog and she inspired me to write this. also cos i feel that my journal is really boring, i have lost all my ability to write sensationally and that i should prove to myself that a good nani read does not necessarily have to be about sex nor filled with vulgarities from all major languages of the developed world.

what you're about to read is written specially for boys. there are two kinds of boys. those who think they are men, and those who just. dont. think.

whatever is written represents the views of the writer and the writer only, you are free to agree or disagree and form opinions of your own and share them with me. and many thanks to my lovely friend who has inspired these words.

( RS1101M )

i was surfing around for more info on the recently departed isra' mikraj (which i thought fell on 27july when it was on 30july) and the upcoming nisfu shaaban when i came across another article.

do share with me your thoughts. if u have any. i don't think i have to make any disclaimer on this one. i trust that you know who i am and what i am not.

:P

Since today could be the start of a trying period in our lives, I sought for the uplifting of my spirits. And I came across this article of which I think I should share. Maybe you've read it before.

Anywhere, Everywhere

i wanted to update yesterday but i was so muddled up with modules and tutorial slots and bidding.

just a few things cropped up since i last updated proper. the previous entry was soo..merepek. ignore me i have my moments.

and so does my bff. haha. she flew off to vietnam this morning and before she left she msged me a super emo, nak-pergi-haji kind of sms of which made me wonder whether she was off to vietnam to dance, or to fight the vietkongs.

and i met mave for dinner last night when she finally told me she was pres of ntu contemp dance. i know, i know. my friends are all high flyers. but yes, i am so jealous that ntu camps have crazy fright nights and our foc was rather...unchallenging. [disclaimer: i had tons of fun don't get me wrong, i can almost sense khairiana cracking her knuckles]

then in midweek it was khairi's birthday. of which he has yet to celebrate it with me and i'm thinking of a good day to meet up before he flies to thailand to entertain jenny. cos when he comes back i'll be off to kl. 20-30 years down the road we will think back to that wednesday night on how we planned to teach each other's kids the wrongest things. :)

foc reunion was fun. pasir ris park is hellish when it comes to logistics. filling canisters with water was...but food and company was finer than fine so i wont complain anymore. the car ride was fun cos the car was filled with the aroma of freshly fried chicken wings and nurul had the best seat right next to trays of them. rasa rasa thai seafood place is cooool! should lepak there some time..anw the crowd was unexpectedly large so i hope everyone had a great time. oh and thanks so much to my darling orange julius-es for the gifts for me and jamil.

and then i missed xs's second league match yesterday against the yellow ribbon project team. i read the match report and they started with 9 men! and had a man sent off. now xs tops the league but that's only cos some teams have yet to play. met shahrul, dan and boonleng at matric fair just now. and a few more andersonians. now nus begins to feel more and more like home.

i've been watching a lot of movies too. online that is. and "no country for old men" scares the living [wants to insert common expletive here but me and nat made a pact to be suci girls so..]out of me. i think the direction by the coen brothers did justice to the richness of the text. a simple movie with a simple plot but one that silently thumps your mind when you least expect it. i'm now watching "dan in real life" and so far it's been a sad one.

cs5 comm is having a karaoke retreat this thur at cashbox orchard at 7.30ish. do join us, we're opening it up to everyone to come chill and lax out before school starts. its not exclusive to the comm members or participant of cs5 or nusms members, so long as you can sing[or even if you can't] and one free hand to hold a mike [or even if you don't], you're invited! the theme is...hari baik bulan baik.

ok dah.

two very exciting things happened today.

1. the league finally started. not that i was looking forward to it. maybe secretly cos i know we'll be playing the ex-prisoners team which nizar's es played against last season. we'll be playing them next week and i think i either wanna watch from the block opposite the field or risk having parts of my ancestor's anatomy be a source of expletive for the vocabulary-challenged minah WAGs. we won our first match, albeit it being rather dirty, 2-1 thanks to a yong xian brace. the weather was unforgiving and so was the opponent. fortunately one of the two could be controlled and so 6yardbox found themselves a man down close to half time for his reckless, almost deliberate challenge on yasin. it left our captain slamming the artificial turf in frustration. i swear he looked like he was on a tamil film set. tapi bila bhai masuk padang tu dah tukar filem bengali pulak eh. huhu. even though the boys have really bad tastes in sportswear, i present to you, my favourite team after leeds. and AC Milan, and Arsenal, and the Azzurri. XSFC.

2. critical construction of the paper began today. and though this has been in talks for a while now, today it looked like the start of what could possibly be the longest journey i have ever voluntarily signed up for. now that plans have taken a more tangible shape, i am really excited to see it unfold.

I was never for work to encroach on my personal life. I am always of the thinking that whatever you do as work should not affect you on a deeper, more emotional basis and let work shake the crux of your very being.

But it so happens that now, that work has become a personal matter. My work is my constant need to be a better servant of God. And in doing so, I have discovered the struggle with not letting serving Him be about serving me.

My father has always been my biggest strongest backbone. Of whom when I started university, adviced me to go ahead and make a change. A real change. To use whatever God-given abilities I have to serve. And shall i also bring you back to his words i once blogged about: "You r a riot."

But right now, all that, though not impossible, seem to be a very difficult path to tread. The inertia against change is so overwhelmingly great it forces me to play a game i know He won't be proud of. What i dream for, what i revel in, and most importantly progress, all seem to have taken a backseat in favour of comfortability. And i am ashamed. to have played a part in it.

So i pray. To Allah, The Wise, The Loving, The Most Glorious One.

That You will lend me the strength to see through these trying days. that You will keep my heart pure of all self-fulfilling agendas, and that You aid me in bettering my akhlak and mannerisms as i fight this jihad. I pray that You will keep us away from all that would incur Your wrath as we push for change in the way of progress, of which will keep us all further in Your favour. I also pray that You keep all bitterness from our hearts and replace them with a sense of gratitude for the blessings You have Generously bestowed upon us, despite it all. For You are the Most Merciful, Most Kind. Let also for us to constantly seek guidance, because we will be full of doubt, in the ways of Rasulullah s.a.w. and take heed from the manners in which he pursued his jihad. And may Your blessings, be on Your best creation, and on his family and his companions.


altogether now....







































Amin.

i went for a haircut yesterday to get me some bangs cos angeline said "you have to do these things when you're young". well, not really cos she said it. more of cos liv tyler kicked ass in hulk and i'm a real pussy when it comes to daring haircuts. so i was showing it off to everyone at home and especially my dad cos i know he'll say only one thing. and i know he says it cos i'm his favourite, and that he will say it even though i look like suria veteran actress rosmini after a cheap buffet lunch.

you're beautiful

and so i fly.

so the pictures are all up on facebook. glamourous ones are all up there alongside the defaming ones and the irreversibly damaging ones.

i've had such a blast for both events and i can't help but thank the Almighty for his blessings even when spirits and weather were down.

challenge shield was a bittersweet memory because the comm went through hell getting it all prepared. we've had awols, lack of moral support and i guess people have doubted yusof's ability to organise an event of that stature. we stood our ground when ocassion calls for it and though i foresee that the debacle is far from over, i can look back and be proud that we have brought nusms to places we were once, and probably still, too afraid to tread.

FOC this year was but a docile distant cousin of the one i went through when i was a freshman. the participants were verbally milder but they made up for it by bursting like a sonic boom when time calls for it. i loved this camp more than its predecessor because i got to mingle with old friends while bonding with new ones and at the end of the day the camp brought me to two points of revelation. spending that late night with the girls exploring in great depth issues pertaining to the male genetalia, learning to play pool from izzati and then proceeding to almost beat the duo of haekal and hanan, staying out at west coast till 5am discussing love life and religion, singing i'll stand bhai you and going absolutely bonkers during water games.

He is too kind.

and then i found a new squeeze of whom i was too blind to notice before and that would be my holiday project now that everything is over and done with. it was my bad i tried looking to the past and the imaginary when the one who feels just right is well, right here. i shan't be too coy or shameful about it. i just have to admit it.

i have had only 9 hours of sleep in the past 96 hours. and i really hate project-withdrawal. not when 2 major projects came and went in the past week and we're only at thursday!

and then my internship was terminated early and i did feel a little buttfucked when CSO called to confirm the accounts given by my former employer 2 days ago. but looking at the kind of things i was doing immediately after i got fired, i have no regrets doing what i did. taking leave so easily. the money was peanuts, the experience was bitter, personal growth was stunted.

i went on, thinking i could make some changes in people's lives through CS5 and FOC, but at the end of them both, it is CS5 and FOC that changed me.

because finally, my spine tingled

and i am bent to be the change that i want to see.

Fisabilillah.

so i was at sentosa the whole of saturday. it started pretty cloudy but it got sunnier and sunnier and....

me sq and mave were there to work as game marshalls for a nickelodeon kids event at palawan. so me and sq manned the ever-so-familiar fish balls from kiddy pool game and a colouring booth in the nick jr corner. and mave was shipped off to man a hula hoop game at the avatar station. now who the hell is avatar and danny phantom? and i got dora's friends mixed up. like i care about latino-named creatures of the tropics?

the event was pretty, eventless. there were cute kids all around, no one was too bratty or trampy and deserved a nani-bitch slap. everyone wanted to win the game and the losers didnt care much cos they got the same prizes. i had to apply millions of temporary tattoos on kids as young as 6 months old. talk about a mini miami ink booth. those cartoon tattoos are so hard to remove i swear my hands are hairless from all the scrubbing. wait..won't nail polish remover do the work? shit.

by the end of the first shift, i was too damn tired from being jie jie and blowing whistles and counting ping pong balls. it was minute after minute of fishing nonstop. there was a perpetual queue! i died at lunch. which gave me diarrhoea i think.

and thats how it went for the next few hours till it rained at my breaktime and everyone got mildly wet even cute spanials. yup there was this leashed spanial taking cover at our station tent and it was just sitting quietly in between its owners legs. i'm a sucker for long dog ears! i said hello and i swear if the dog wasn't wet i'll crumble all over it. it tried to follow me back to my place but hey, a leashed dog is a leashed dog.

then at the end there was fiona! this real cute two year old plus filipino girl with big eyes, jet black bangs and wet shorts. she told us so. haha. we just accompanied her at the drawing table and rested. me and shuqi were dead shagged by then. fiona was quiet and kept to herself and is bloody afraid of spongebob. but in the end she allowed shuqi to apply a spongebob tattoo on her arm. oh so cute.

so we packed up, ate fastfood[omg!] and went home. i love the nick shirt! the pictures are with random people we don't know so i doubt i'll get hold of them. oh wells.

ok gtg. bosses are in. lol.