Photo Friday # 1 : Green.

 

  While on our way back from a friend's wedding at their hometown (which a bit far off from our place), we stumbled across this majestic place known as Sawah Ring. Just had to stop the car and capture this.

My ever so faithful Crocs, all worn out and extensively used; especially during traveling.

A view from my afternoon run in the office gym.

Right : Walking about taking picture after a run 

Left : Jatih Luweh - the epicentre of Terrace Padi field in Bali.

Things that kept me feeling positively cheerful!

Synchronised Steps.

Trying to feed a lazy cat.

Catching sunset while stuck in the traffic.

Good-hearted friends.

Holidays with loved one.

p/s: The thing I love about December is, it is the time of the year where I get to pack my things, shove it in my knapsack and run away from hectic life into doing two of the things that I do best, seeking adventures and taking pictures.

Think: We are the less fortunate ones, but we will support each other no matter what.

Photo: My dad's cat.

I called my mom yesterday's evening to wish her a blessed fasting month of Ramadhan. When she answered my call she sounded normal; well normal like how a mother would be, soft spoken but a bit irritated because she probably had to slowly waddle or stretched/pushed herself to get to her phone.

I asked her my routine sickeningly structured series of questions that came in a predictable sequence ; consisting of health - how is she feeling , wealth - did she strike any number today, about love - is she still annoyed with my dad's constant whining and last but not least her favourite activity - what's special on the menu today.

It was a normal mother-daughter day to day phone conversation, until she said, "wait" and then she was talking to someone at the back, "it's ok, it's ok, don't cry anymore."

At that moment I knew something was wrong.

When she finally turned back to me to resume our daily exchange of self-loathing and boring bits of our lives, I asked her who was it that she was referring to. She explained that all the while I was talking to her, my auntie was crying at the back and immediately her voice turned sombre.

My auntie (Auntie Lah) is one of the closest to me. We grew up together because, age-wise, we are not that far apart. It was heartbreaking for me to have listened to her soft cries.

My mom continued telling me that she discovered that her boyfriend of 5 years, has been married for 9 years. You can't imagine my disbelief and how shocked I was when I heard that bit of a news because it just doesn't make any sense at all.

Let me explain.

We've known him through a family friend who introduced him to my newly divorced Auntie at that time, 5 years ago. We've met his family, nieces, nephews and he came around to our family's house mostly every week, but all this while it was never brought to our attention that he is actually a married man. Not from OUR family's friend, not from HIS family. It is just totally dumbfounding. It is like a conspiracy theory. So, to found out that he's married AFTER 5 YEARS of being in a serious relationship with my Auntie, is a complete electric-kaboom-shock!!. Things just don't add up even when I tried very hard to gel them together.

It is out in the open now and it is better late than never. There's nothing much that we can do about what had happened and it is just a waste of time to lament about it over and over and over again.

I told my Mom to just let her cry until she can't cry no more -until she wears herself out, until she no longer has a voice and has completely drain all her energy out. Just like the last time when she was dumped by her then husband because he was having an affair with a younger woman. I know, just like the rest of us, she is strong and she will rise again from this tragic fall. She will emerge stronger than ever.

But for her to do that, she has to endure this painful phase. She has to go through this on her own and we must make known to her that she has our love and support no matter what. My mom was angry albeit sad by this whole episode. She's the biggest supporter of my auntie's relationship and knowing my mom, am sure she felt a bit responsible towards what had transpired.

I SMSed my auntie before I went to sleep last night.

"No matter what happen, you know you'll have us until the end of time. We love you, and you should love yourself too. Call me when you are done with the crying bit."

She was there for me during my meltdown from my previous relationship and I was there for her after her devastating divorce, and we will continue to be there for each other even though it seems that this cycle of tragic relationship ceases to end for all the women in my family.

Left: My mom's. Right: My dad's.
(How do we differentiate the two? My mom's cat is a cam-whore and my dad's cat is very shy. He never really looks directly at the camera)

Think : Imitation is the best form of flattery.

Photo credit to Mr.Snots. Summer night in Sweden.

When I first heard of this phrase,"Your eyes are the windows to your soul", I seriously think that who ever came up with that was totally delusional. I can never tell whether people are being sincere or lying to my face just by looking at their eyes. The only thing that I would probably notice about their eyes is how captivating it can be.

You also can't obviously think of me as a very nice, warm loving person just by looking at my eyes, or that I do charity, and feed the homeless or carry grocery bags for old aunties. Right? But of course none of these are true. I am quite selfish and a bit self-centred at times. Then again, if you have been living your life alone for so long, why would you want to care or bother of what's going on with other people.

Talking about other people, there are countless type of people out there with different needs and views on life. You might have encountered some few annoying ones, good ones, or sometimes the ones you would love to emulate or imitate in life.

On that note, I once dressed up with a cap pull backwards, baggy jeans with an awesome soldier belt (because they had this camouflage print) and also my oversized t-shirt because I thought it was cool to be like TLC, especially T-Boz and Left-Eye. LOL. I also had multicoloured handyplast plastered on my face and on my hand because it was deemed up-to-date.

There's this time when I basically had NKOTB posters on my bedroom wall and was dancing to Linear's saving all my love.. saving all my love to you...., I cut my hair short and put on so much of hair gel and hair spray, I had caused the thinning of the ozone, above the path I had walked on. It was even cool to be a boy for a girl like me. Lucky I didn't end up being a lesbian. (not that I have anything against them, I'm just saying you know). I even put on a choreographed performance (each of us was in character, I think I was Jordan Knight haha) with my "gang" in school during the Teacher's day and boy, they were so lame, they really loved it. We were freaking lame as well, because we wore torn jeans and a black leather jacket. LOL.

Then I came to know a bunch of skateboarders and listened to RHCP, Ugly Kid Joe and etc. Now I remember that we were divided into 2 groups of skaters back then; those who listened to rap/hip hop music. This group was further classified into 2 subgroups - east side and west side. How freaking ghetto is that? We had Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G wannabes. The other group, the rest of the brat pack, those (like me) who listened to rock/alternative rock songs that were on the rise back then. We donned the skinny jeans, t-shirts and the hi-tops shoes.LOL. This fashion has made a comeback, and now we have a bunch of teenagers with this fashion sense who associates themselves with all things Indie.

Growing up, one transformation after another took centre stage in my life, every time I discovered something new that I can totally relate to, or something I think I would want to become, or ought to be.

Luckily for me, at the end of my journey in search for so-called self identity (somewhere when I was 15), I reverted to my all time favourite; jeans, t-shirt and anything that I feel like wearing without putting any constraints on me - my comfortable self.

Since that point of time, I never had any urge to follow any trend, be it music, fashion, accessories and others.

These external changes influenced my image, my song choices, friends I mingled with, but deep inside I always feel the same. All I ever cared about was finishing up school so that I don't have to wake up way too early in the morning, my sports activities and try not to get on the parents' nerves because, this you guys have to agree with me, when they were much younger they were really mean and roarrr arrgghh *shows claws*, merciless towards us.

But life was so much awesome nonetheless.

Krabi Trip 2010 : Pictorial Edition.

We promise each other that we would spend time away every year together. I'm talking about my girlfriends here. Last year we made it to Bali, and for this year's trip - Krabi, Thailand. Did nothing much but lazing around, talked, shopped, read books, and whatnots. Good times!

I'm still pretty much obsessed with white fluffy clouds I guess.

What is it about these girls that I love so much anyway? We don't actually have anything in common except for enjoying each other's company. Each of us came from different background yet when we sit and talk, we can REALLY talk. I don't know, everytime I spend time with them, it feels as if am free of my worries. I can always count on them to be around everytime I give out a distress sms/email/call.

Sunset in Ao Nang beach.

We share stories about love, life, expectations and the lack of it, ambitions and everything under the sky. I have no idea why is it that everytime we meet each other, there's some kind of a magnet that attracted/extracted stories out of my chest/brain or something. I.must.tell.them.what.has.been.going.on.lately. or else I would curled up and die. Seriously.

The girls.

But that's the thing, I have other girlfriends but I don't have that urge to tell them anything. These four (it's five actually but one of them would only available whenever she wants to meet us; hehe - but we love her nonetheless) silly girls (or otherwise known as The Cacklers) would always have a special place in my heart.

The beach.

Thanks for the friendship and am looking forward to our next outing. Probably tomorrow, yes?

The books.

I lost a bet to them. Now I must muster enough courage to eat the most disgustingly foul -smelling (in my own book of course, I don't speak for others) Durian because the two seemingly cowards "I-am-afraid-of-riding-a-boat" had managed to spend two hours travelling from Krabi to Phi Phi. Blearrghhhh!!

I.must.not.give.in!!! BRING IT ON!

Lost and Found II

It takes quite an effort to produce a well organised and constructed post about programming codes, I tell ya. I am about half way done compiling the code and with all the print-screens but still I don't think it is sufficient and it will never pass as a good post. So, until I am fully satisfied with the content and be really sure that people who reads it will understand what I was trying to show them, I will work on it some more.

Tomorrow, Mr.Snots and I will scout around for tables. I need a small yet nice console table for that little work space I have created for me in my apartment. It is right at the corner of my living room. Just perfect. I can watch the TV and do work at the same time. I hate to work in a quiet and empty room. I need some background music or anything that I could immediately turn to whenever I’m bored with my work; like watching TV or DVDs.

I found these two pictures and am not sure whether I had published (uploaded for friends to see of course) or not. And am just too lazy to check on facebook either.

Crystal Mosque in Kuala Terengganu.

Picture of a subway tunnel somewhere in Belgium (if am not mistaken)

I took thousands of pictures, some might be overlooked during the selection/editing time. But am sure I got a lot more hidden somewhere in that "ALL JUMBLED UP PHOTOS" folder of mine. But one thing for sure, I do have a lot of photos of the sky with all sort of clouds formations. *scratches head*..I must have loved looking at the sky before, but I must stress that I rather work indoor nowadays; less sun exposure, less rashes to scratch.

Lost and Found I

Found a couple of interesting photos when I was trying to free some space in the external hardisk. These were taken during a short trip to Rome. Took it with a point and shoot, and in a moving train. Didn't tweak, didn't make any colour adjustment or whatsoever. I remember it was a bright shiny day and everything that was captured was pratically awesome in the sense of levelling and lighting.

I miss taking random photos of whatever.

The storm is approaching Koh Ngai Island.

I have a lot of things to say about our current political scenes, but I would just shut my potty mouth for now.

Outsourcing is a bitch. Especially for small businesses and you can see it for yourself in Phuket.

I just came back and I swear that I would never go back there again. It was not even worth my time and money. It was a pleasant stay for me 5 years ago, but now, everything feels as if they are trying to leech out every cent off the tourists.

Some of it was pleasant, but most of the encounters were horrible.

Most of the shops are now manned by either Nepalese or Bangladeshi. Before this you can only see or hear them screaming and telling you that you need a suit or two, maybe pants, shirts and also tie, and they can tailor made it for you in 24 hours. Right? Now they have ventured into other businesses; selling all those nice craftworks, pretty dresses and bags, souvenirs and whatnots. The business owners, usually the locals, have outsourced it or hired them because they speak better English. Like what the fuck right?

I miss bargaining with a Thai girl; all panicking and blushing when I asked for too low of a discount. I miss that warm accommodating smile that welcomes you to their shop.

Most of these Nepalese and Bangladeshi salespersons were rude, arrogant and condescending. They think they run the country and they are the engine that moves the economy or some shit. Their mere existence irks me.

Tuktuk experience was even worst. My friend wanted to go to the Hard Rock Café to buy a shot glass for her collection. Since we weren’t too sure about the location, we flagged down a Tuktuk, asked him to send us there. He sent us there alright. The fucked up thing was, it has been closed down; yet he charged us 200bhatt for a 7-8 minutes ride? Felt like someone just punch me right on the face; might as well kick me in the gut while you are at it.

That felt like renting a chauffeured Mercedes with a fuckwit as a driver. A pretty fucked up arrangement. He should have just mentioned it to us that Hard Rock Café was no longer in operation, easy as that.

Blardy leeches I tell you.

Tertinggal Keretapi, Katebang, Bot dan Sampan.

Shot was taken in Putrajaya Power Plant, formerly known as Serdang Power Plant.

Banyaknya benda yang jadik masa aku tade idea nak update apa. Aku terlebih malas sebenarnya. Punyalah malas, sampai aku dah janji nak masak spagetti utk Mr.Snots, pun boleh tarik balik. Tak ker keji. Sib baiklah dia tuh baik. Kalaulah aku jadik BF aku sure aku dah tinggalkan aku. Dahlah pemalas, nak bangun pagi pun susah.

Apa-apa pun alasan, satu benda yang paling kecoh sekali ialah bila blog dah jadik padang sasar, tempat mengutuk dan mengeji. *Takut*. Kalau salah langkah, boleh masuk gaung. Nyaya. Banyak istilah keji yang aku belajar dari baca blog panas tuh. Banyak benda yang tak pernah tahu, tetiba leh jadik subject matter expert, sebab information overloaded. Baca entry tuh kira setakat baca mukadimah jer, all the raunchy details semua leh dapat dari baca komen. Terus aku boleh mengaku yang aku kenal betul si simpolan bin simpolan tuh. Walaupun sebenarnya tidak. Hehe. Kelakar pun ada; walaupun aku rasa sometimes melampau tahap cipan gaklah cacian orang-orang yang memberi komen. Bukan lah aku kata aku baik, cuma ngeri baca orang boleh sampai tahu hal-hal dalam kain sampai macam tuh punya detail. Sekali kau dah kene featured dalam blog tuh, sampai sudah orang tak abis bercerita. Nasib baiklah blog aku ni blog bangang.

Cerita pasal keje, aku baru balik dari course 3 minggu. Course yang company bayar dekat usd6000 semata-mata untuk dapatkan professional certificate. Bagus jugaklah aku kene pilih. Banyak exposure yang aku dapat, dari goverment office sampai lah ke private sector banyak lubang dah aku korek untuk test market.

Aku ada dapat 2-3 offer utk keje. Kenaikan gaji tadelah banyak mana. Tapi aku masih kene timbangkan betul-betul. Ni time recession, silap langkah bungkus aku jawabnya.

Cerita pasal family pulak, Angah baru balik Sabah. Cuti 10 hari, bawak anak balik rumah Mak, sebab anak dia, Kak Long, (anak sorang jer tapi dah panggil Kak Long sebab kononnya train awal-awal untuk dapat adik kata Angah aku. Podah!!) dah rindu betul dengan mak bapak aku. Maklumlah aku rasa dah dekat 3 tahun dia orang tak balik. Kak Long tuh cucu kesayangan Ayah aku. Mau taknya.. kalau orang tua tuh bawak dia pergi shopping mall, dia tak pernahnya nak pergi toys section. Selalu carik buku, or barang sekolah. Itu yang Ayah aku makin sayang. Dahlah kaki bodek. Walaupun umur baru 8 tahun, dia punya kipas bapak aku, mengalahkan kipas bersaiz industrial.

2 hari lepas, Ayah transfer duit kat akaun aku suruh bagi Ajak untuk belikan cucu kesayangan dia laptop. Mak Aiiiiii. Baran jer aku dengar. Kecik-kecik dah dapat hadiah laptop. Aku dulu, umur 8 tahun, kalau dapat pencil case baru itu pun dah kira bertuah. Paling hebat hadiah aku pernah dapat pun ialah basikal Le Run. Tapi itu pun masa umur 11 tahun.

Tak patutlah aku nak rasa jealous ker apa. Tapi tak payahlah Ayah nak belikan laptop, sebab dia tuh kecik lagi. Angah aku memang kaki freeloader. Diamkan jer semua. Orang bagi jangan tolak itu rejeki katanya. Aku rasa cam nak lempang jer. Tapi takperlah. Aku tahu Ayah memang sayang betul cucu dia yang sorang tuh. Dahlah anak sedara aku tuh pandai amik hati, pandai belajar, baik dengar cakap. So okaylah, she deserves it. Aku jer yang jealous tak sudah.

Mr.Snots cakap aku ada sindrom anak bongsu. Can't help but to compare what ever that I have with everyone. He also asked me to count my blessings. Yelah yelah. Tak syior tau. Nak mengada skit jer, asyik kene tarik telinga balik ke jalan yang benar.

Pasal hubungan kelamin (haha cam siak), i mean pasal lovelife, next month banyak betul plan nak berjalan. First week, since Mr. Snots will be working in JB, amiklah kesempatan nak menyeberang tambak. Family aku tak sambut raya haji, so bila dia offer nak pergi Singapore, apa lagi. Angkat skirt lah aku kan? Yahoo.

End of december, we'll be going to East Java for 10 days. Itu pun aku tak sabar, sebab dah lama plan, tapi sampai sudah tade confirmed itenararies lagik. Banyak sangat tempat yang nak pergi, sampai tak boleh nak decide mana nak start dulu. Tapi takper, ada lebih kurang sebulan lagi.

Pasal rerakan, can't wait for Babe's birthday getaway. It has been a long time since kita ada weekend getaway ramai-ramai kan? Tak sabar nak jumpa and spend masa dengan korang. I'll bring the WINE!!!! Toots cakap dia nak bawak beer just for the sake of it, walaupun tempat yang kita nak pergi tuh tade fridge. Tapi aku nak suggest letak dalam sungai jer. Kejap jer sure sejuk. Hehe.

Oh, one last thing before I go, Bangkok huru-hara. Jangan pergi sana. I'm sure semua orang dah tahu, tapi since aku baru tahu, so aku beritahu ler. Aku tahu sebab Mr.Snots pagi-pagi dah beritahu aku sebab dia tahu aku tak tahu. And since aku dah tahu, aku rasa obligated untuk beritahu. Tahu? Tahu kat pasar.

Later fuckers.

Spontaneity

I was hunting clouds.

What was supposed to be a surprise birthday bash planned for me was canceled at a very last minute due to someone's excitement for knowing that this coming weekend is his semester break.

"Jom! Let's get out of KL!"

"Huh? You are crazy!"

He had totally forgotten about the plan he made with my darling girlfriends about my surprise birthday party. But since this is the only window of opportunity that we have to spend time together, my girlfriends let him go (with warnings of course!) and reschedule the not-so-surprise-anymore party to a more feasible time. Thanks girls, I love you guys! Thanks for being so understanding.

..sebenarnya takut bf kene kutuk ...hahahaha

So yeah, am taking a leave tomorrow because someone decided to give me an early birthday treat (as if! am sure he has something in store for him too :P), and am off to some place nice and relaxing to chill for the weekend.

Back to the 'old faithful' where it all started. ;)

The old faithful.

Stuffs.

picture taken with EOS 350D, Location: Cameron Highland, Pahang

When I first started this blog, initially I wanted to make it some sort of a gallery for me to share my collection of photographs. The idea was stunted by the fact that after doing so much of scrutinizing, I don't think any of these pictures can be considered good enough for public view.

Takmaulah orang cakap orang nak amik gambar dia pun sibuk nak amik gambar. Tapi nan ado katanya... (haha tetiba bahasa fefonen..jgn marah)

But lately I have been getting good reviews from my flickr page and emails saying that I should give a photography a serious try. Some of them were really impressed with my "good eyes".

(matilah sebenarnya rabun ayam tapi tada siapa tahu? :P Gambar amik tada angle, sekali jer snap sesuka hati.)

Those supports and admirations somewhat injected me with a bit of confidence, and force me to think, maybe I can do this. *berangan tahap dewa*

So here I am. Back to the initial plan. I'll start to publish one or two pictures per entry, although it is not related with the entry of the day. Ok?

macamlah ada ramai sangat orang yang baca blog ni.

Taken with Nokia D60, Location : Batu Caves, Selangor

*
I now pronounce my brother a divorcee. They have officially separated on the 6th of Aug. Adik(Nasri) and him planned to have a joint celebration (Adik's birthday was on the 5th Aug) to commemorate his new found freedom.

Since after the separation, he has been taking Baby (his daughter) to my place every weekend, so that they could spend time together. I love having both of them around.

Meriah skit rumah.

So on Saturday, I'd be spending quality time with my niece while Mr.Snots can go and attend his classes. It's a win-win situation.

My fave niece. ..Baby and her cat, Kucing. *rolls eyes*
Shot was taken by point and shoot SONY DCS T5 , Location : Old Apt.

All of my nieces and nephews called me Uchu, being the youngest in the family. But Baby can never say it correctly. Most of the time she'd be calling me Achu. Close enough. But there's this one time she called me Tochu :O

Sib baik bukan tauchu. hehehe.

Her fave sentence is "Ini Baby punya". Once she blurts that thing out, don't even think of taking that stuff away from her. Even my new TV now belongs to her.

kalau tiga hari dia duduk rumah, tiga-tiga harilah kita orang semua tengok reruns of Lion King, Barney, Teletubbies and Dora. o_O