Ramadhan Mubarak

Blue Mosque, Istanbul
Winter 2007
Taken using Canon S3 IS (sold now)

Ramadhan Kareem everyone.

May you have a blessed Ramadhan this year. I'd like to ask forgiveness if I ever did wrong to any of you, intentionally or not. Kosong kosong lah.

I rang home and got a chance to hear the Ramadhan announcement on local telly. My parents, my eldest sis and brother in law including Naqib were all ready in their masjid suits. Conversations were cut short coz they have to go to masjid for tarawikh. How exciting.

I watched this movie yesterday and couldn't help balling my eyes out. Great cinematography, great actors, great musics, honest portrayal of the religion; overall very impressive and no less than 5 stars from me.

Jom tarawikh! (sorang-sorang lagi tahun ni..)

Penat

It's a heavy and difficult lifestyle doing this.

What's making it more difficult is going home after work to an empty world.

Truthfully, I'm trying my best not to lose the grip.

It's so tiring holding on like this, I'm feeling old and pregnant..

Mak & Abah in Makkah

2 years, no more.

cuti

Thank you Ali and Yanie for your concerns on my disruptive instant noodle diet before. No worries babes, I've reached the non-palatable limit for them for the moment, it'll be a while till it ceases I promise. So here's for dinner tonight, a quick Italian pasta penuh nutrisi dan kasih sayang he he. Ayam + sundried tomatoes + beans + dried Italian spices + Parmesan = speaks for itself. Oh ye, sangat pedas walaupun nampak pucat.

Buon appetito!

Anyhooo..

I'm on a week's break and going nowhere for the first time ever. Must say that I'm enjoying it. Being a housewife is not easy, there's linens to be taken care of and groceries to buy and children to be fed (hypothetically). I developed biceps after few rounds of hot-pressing the bed linens and hovering the place. Man it's not easy! How did mom do it, on top of her daily job as a teacher, and without an instant help of a bibik! My hero!! T_T

Mom reminded me that Ramadhan is coming. Yes my most awaited and anticipated month. I look at it as a starting point of self-correction, also renewing and polishing the imaan. And there's a 30 days opportunities for it to begin with. Which is abundant. Here's a little plan for a start

1. Daily suhoor and early Fajr
2. Pray at earlier time
3. Solat sunat, solat tarawikh and qiyam
4. Finish the whole Quran at the end of the month
5. Increase wirids and du'as
6. Read more; medical and non-medical materials
7. Call home regularly
8. Coffee cutbacks
9. Music cutbacks
10. Eat healthily, less greasy, less fat, high protein diet

10 is a good balance for a start. I must say I will terribly miss the old student days when I excelled Ramadhan dashingly with the aide and the spirit coming from the good mates. Those were the days when we took turns leading the prayers, gave a small reminder after solat, secretly raced with each other to finish the Quran, went to the Masjid together for the delicious free tandoori for iftaar, cooked nice traditional kuih for buka to make the ambience more homely and after lectures cookies baking series with Yanie. Cakap aja kuih siput kuih sarang semut semua kita buat. I really really miss those days.

Anyway, Mak pesan banyakkan bersabar. There's no success without sacrifice.

ma chere et bon maman

Dear Mak,

I got a bad toothache for 3 days. I became dependent on painkillers, which you know I can't take anything stronger than PCM. So I kept waking up in the middle of the night when the effect of the medication weaned off, from the pulsating one side of the jaw. I went to work with an asymmetry face and noticed by my boss. She was kind enough to give me an afternoon off for the dental appointment. So I went and got charged a freaking EUR110 for a simple saline injection and a prescription for antibiotic. Heck I can do that myself. No I'm telling you lies, I can't. My mouth is too sore.

It's getting better now. The boss gave me a bouquet of flower in a vase yesterday. No she didn't actually. But it's complicated to explain - the end point is she gave me the flower and I took it home. It's a nice bouquet. She said it's for the toothache. Thank you boss!

You know Mak,

Italian food is one of the best delicacies on my tongue after our local rations. It's because of the spices they use and sometimes they can be quite generous on their chillis and spices, which are the essential components of a good cooking. And you know how much I love pastas. It's a pity you are not here now. Coz I can cook you one of my best recipes for white sauce and tomato based pastas. I know they'll never beat your sambal nasi lemak and daging masak asam pedas but I'd love it if you can taste them.

There was a local market being set up in front of my apartment. I love this area because it's so cultural, there's always something going on every week. There's a cultural cinema one block away from me as well. Anyway, I went to this Italian stall today evening after work. They have the Italian essentials of cook ingredients sold there. I got myself a bottle of extra virgin olive oil coz the one at home has finished and this jar of mixed vegetables and chillies in sunflower oil with tarallini . Ah heavenly.

La Cannonata, means the cannon shot

Nonetheless Mak,

I learned that food is tasteless when eating on your own. I totally lost interest in cooking coz I'd end up eating them alone. I know you won't like it if I said that I've been eating meggi mee only these past few days. Pathetic. 2 days ago I was passing by the local so-called Chinatown area of Dublin on the way home. I stopped at one shop to buy water and found out they sold telur masin. One egg for EUR1! Now you know how much I miss home. I bought one anyway and ate it with meggi tonight. It tasted perfect. Well it has to be for the cost. You remember when I was a kid I sneaked into the kitchen one evening during Ramadhan to eat telur masin and got caught by you for not fasting. He he. I miss those times.

Well Mom. So glad it's finally Friday. I'm working Sunday anyway. I'll prolly be old and kerepot when I can finally have my full weekend off.

I miss you so.

when the going gets tough, the tough gets going

The big boss came in this morning with a big elated smile on her face cheering big 'Hi' to me. I knew something was on. Apparently her boys were taken to her sister's place so she had good 2 nights' sleep over the weekend. It was obvious. We were seeing patients when she started asking J her girlfriend's name. It was R. Then the nightmare began. She turned to me with her bright eyes and asked,

"So Wan, are you kissing someone?"

"Er?"

"Yeah, are you seeing someone? Or I may say kissing someone??"

"Er.." *Gulp

J intruded, "Oh give Wan a break."

"No it's fine, I'd like to know whether she's kissing someone or she's looking for someone?"

Err..

***

We were all amazed on her level of elation today, even the nurses did. When we talked about it, J said,

"You should see how Wan started to blush from top of her face down. She went absolutely red. It's funny though coz you usually go red from down up not the other way round."

We agreed that she might've got a little bit more than a good night's sleep over the weekend. *Giggles*

Nonetheless, I think she's the real superwoman I've ever came across with. I'm speaking highly of her all the times that one of my friends started thinking that I need to re-check my sexual orientation. No it's just so different when you have someone that you look up highly to and want to be like someday, then treats you so humbly and guides you through all the times. She just blew my mind away. Right, now I started sounding like a real gay.

I'm just so grateful that in times that I've been up to my eyeballs trying to be at a lot of places at one time, I've granted a real good boss that is, through her OCD-ness and achieving perfections in everything she does, still doesn't look down on me who's lacking of A LOT of things, with knowledge in the field being one major thing. She trusted me and taught me to do bronchoscopy on the kids, heck I didn't even get the chance to do it in adults! So Alhamdulillah, though I'm always wrecked at the end of a real hectic day, I always know that this is what I've always wanted to do.

On a side note, the housemate has flewn home today for a holiday and I'm all alone. Not that I see her much these days anyway coz she's on the night's shift and I was always home after she's gone to work. So yeah, here goes series of bujang dinner, full of MSGs. Thanks to whoever invented instant noodle.




And these are for desserts. A 3 in 1 teh tarik and heavenly Lindt Nocciolatte. I'm after taken Solpadeine for my bad tooth and gum-ache so might as well savour everything before the effect of the medication wean off.




Toooodles!

free flyer, soul searcher

Happy post-long weekend. It's gonna be a short but intense week. First day back I already had to stay back till late. Sometimes I wonder is it a curse or a blessing to lead a single life like this. Both I guess, depending on how you wanna look at things.

Living abroad like this, away from your familiar ones, it is only your own faith that would keep you straight on the path of righteousness. It's almost like a free world. DO whatever you want to do, the western or the eastern style, nobody cares. Everyday I keep praying that Allah SWT won't take His love away from me. Like mom always said, iman senipis kulit bawang, (sambung seniri)....

Just a little reminder to myself.

Anyhoooooo..hehe panjang sket.



The long weekend was well-spent. We travelled down south-west and hit the beach. Went surfing and came back with the tan. Good fun! Definitely a good escapade. I came back refreshed (with the real muscles ache as well).



Surfing is all about picking the right things. The right wave, the right timing, the right side of the board, the right paddling, the right pop-up. It's not easy to be all-right. Sometimes you thought you've picked the correct wave and timing, only to stumble at the bottom of a strong and wrong one. Air laut sangat masin. It's not a nice thing to drink liters of.



Nonetheless, it was a great beginner experience. I got Monday off, at the expense of working full weekend this coming weekend. So you won't see any of me come the end of the week.

Boohooo..

Nice day ahead peeps!