Pasar Malam Saujana Prima - Stadium Kajang

Alhamdulillah, aku masih diberi kesempatan untuk menikmati kehidupan di bumi yang indah ini. So, semalam aku dan housemates pergi pasar malam kat Saujana Prima. As usual, bila ke pasar malam especially dengan budak perempuan, mesti akan over indulge.

Since ni first time aku pergi pasar malam kat sini and since one of the girls balik lambat dari ofis, kami semua ke sana lepas Maghrib. Mana nak tau pasar malam kat sini is more like pasar petang je. Bila kami sampai, almost 50% of the vendors dah bungkus2 nak balik. Nevertheless, kami dapat la juga memborong laksa, nasi kerabu, murtabak, roti john and also apam balik. Yang nak makannya 3 orang je. Punya la mengikut nafsu. Masing-masing kelaparan, so itulah hasil tangkapan malam semalam.

Sampai jer rumah, terus makan sambil tengok tv cerita apa tah. Aku sangat-sangat bersyukur coz dapat housemates yang masuk je terus click. Maybe sebab aku ni fleksible and bebudak ni hormat aku coz aku yg paling tua. huhu.... susah nak admit the truth. Nak type ayat tu pun susah ok.

Neway, bila dah kenyang, memasih penuh rasa bersalah and made a promise to run and run and run tomorrow morning. So, pagi tadi kol 6 pagi semua orang dah bangun and kol 6.15 kami bergerak ke stadium Kajang. To our surprise, more than 10 people are there already, running and walking. Kajang people are really really active so I don't mind catching the active's bug whilst I'm residing here.

So I jogged and walked and did some abs exercise. The usual routine. Squats, push ups, kicks. I definitely burn some calories. We spend almost an hour there and then head back home to shower and get ready for work. Alhamdulillah... I feel so healthy today. But tonight I might want to indulge again. eheheh...

Have a great weekend everyone!

Rezeki

Penulisan ini buat peringatan pada diri aku sendiri dan kepada sesiapa yang terbaca post ni,

Rezeki tu pemberian Tuhan Yg Maha Esa.
Ada orang diberi rezeki sihat tubuh badan sepanjang hayat
Ada orang diberi rezeki untuk berkahwin awal.
Ada orang diberi rezeki dapat keluarga yang sentiasa bahagia dan gembira
Ada yang diberi rezeki mudah dapat pekerjaan
Ada yang diberi rezeki pandai semasa pengajian
Pendek kata, rezeki orang semua berbeza. Terpulang pada Tuhan dan amalan kita, apa dia nak bagi.

Ada orang masa sekolah, belajar tak lah pandai sangat, tapi masa kerja, dia berjaya, senang naik pangkat. Ada orang yang masa sekolah dia pandai tapi bila masuk alam pekerjaan, dia tak boleh survive. Ni orang booksmart. Biasanya, mereka akan pursue kerjaya dalam education.

Orang macam aku ni, orang yang biasa2 jer. Masa sekolah memang execelant tapi aku pakai cheat sheet la coz my parents both teachers. Aku ada extra push kat rumah, cikgu2 pun treat aku differently coz aku anak kawan diorang. Aku bersyukur aku sentiasa ada family yang supportive. Alhamdulillah, career wise, rezeki aku sentiasa dilapangkan Allah.

Anyway, back to the topic, rezeki. Kebanyakkan orang lupa yang rezeki tu datang dari Allah. Mereka rasa semua yang mereka dapat atas usaha mereka sendiri. So, if ada orang nak tumpang sekaki rasa rezeki dorang sesama, mereka jadi marah. If orang pinjam duit mereka and lupa nak bayar, jadi gaduh.

Ada juga anak yang rasa tak best bila mak ayah brag about their career success kononnya, mak ayah tak play any role pun dalam kejayaan yang mereka dapat. Kononnya, tu semua hasil titik peluh dia or orang lain yang banyak tolong dia masa dia susah.

Now that's a true story. Mungkin si anak tu tak tau dalam diam mak dan ayah mendoakan kejayaan dan kebahagian mereka duni dan akhirat. Sepatutnya si anak tau la kan. Tiap kali mak and ayah solat, pasti ada doa untuk anak2 mereka. Itu usaha mereka yang paling mahal, paling agung, paling besar, paling suci, paling mulia. Tapi, anak-anak tak tau. Dah berjaya, terus sombong. Lupa apa yang mak ayah bagi kat kita. Always fikir pasal diri sendiri. Termasuk lah aku.

Aku belum lagi bergelar ibu. Tapi aku rasa apa yang mak and ayah nak rasa is bahagia. Kalau kita dapat bahagiakan mereka selama hayat mereka kat dunia masih ada, alhamdulillah. Sekiranya mereka telah pergi, kita kena banyak2 doa untuk mereka supaya mereka dibahagiakn Si Pencipta di akhirat kelak.

Semoga aku dapat jadi seorang anak yang solehah, yang sentiasa mengingati mak dan ayah dalam setiap doaku. Amin...

Operasi Kecikkan Perut

Alhamdulillah... Luka operation sembuh sepenuhnya. Kadang-kadang je terasa sikit sengal2 kat kawasan luka. So, aku kembali ke gym almost every evening.

My exercise regime is in full swing. Sebab dah lama tak exercise, bahagian perut ni terasa agak flabby sket...Tambah pulak dengan luka-luka operation. Sebab aku underwent 4 open abs surgery, bahagian abs aku ni memang dah pelik la rupa dia.

So semalam aku spent some time tengok video exercise kat youtube untuk mendapatkan idea and tips on abs exercise. Lepas puas tengok video, petang tu jugak aku praktikkan dekat gym ofis.

Aku mula dengan light stretching kemudian 20 mins on treadmill. After that, weight exercise and last fatty abs destroyer. Memang destroyed la aku semalam. Plank as always is the killer. Aku boleh tahan 5 saat je k. Tu pun rasa separuh nyawa hilang. Squats, not so bad. Semalam baru try push up. Hasilnya, arini perut agak sengal2 and dah terasa ketegangan dan perut sedikit flat. Yeay!

InsyaAllah, if I continue this for another 1 month, I will get the desired result. Flatter tummy and fitter me. Actually, the main reason is that banyak baju yang aku beli lepas operation dah tak berapa selesa nak pakai. Agak fit kat kawasan perut. Seluar slacks pulak tak berganti lagi. Semua dah longgar abis. So sekarang aku end up pakai skirt labuh and palazzo pergi kerja. Memang ayu abis la kan. Ayu is so not me.

Note to self : buy some slacks!

Pisang Goreng Cheese

Last week news feed kat FB dipenuhi post Pisang Goreng Cheese. Makanan yang viral kat fb memang agak senang mempengaruhi aku okeyh.

So, last weekend lepas jumpa mak and ayah dekat Tg. Malim, adik aku Wah bawak la aku pergi cari goreng pisang cheese dekat dengan area rumah dia, Sri Gombak. Aku pun beratur la. Adik aku kata kat sana sedap sangat.

Setengah jam okeh aku beratur. Orang dok beli 3-6 bungkus sekali. 1 bungkus 5 ringgit. Ada la dalam 10-12 ketul kot dalam bekas tu. Resepi dia sempoi giler. Pisang yang dah digoreng tu, panas2 dia simbah dengan susu pekat manis kemudia ditabur dengan serbuk coklat kemudian cheese yg diparut plak ditaburkan atas tu. Memang berbaloi la bagi aku harga RM5 dengan kuantiti bahan-bahan yang dia pakai.

Walau bagaimanapun, aku tak berapa sure kenapa benda ni boleh viral. Bagi aku takde la sedap sangat. Maybe sebab aku bukan penggemar cheese kot. Entah lah.

Maybe tempat yg aku pergi beli tu tak sedap sangat ke? Alasan nak pergi try kat tempat lain plak. Eheheh...

Gym Addiction

Rasanya this is the 3rd week aku mula workout di gym office. After almost 6 bulan tak ke gym gara-gara takut injured, so now I'm back. Biasa aku akan spend 20-45mins jer kat gym. Lama-lama sangat nanti bosan. Objektif pergi gym, untuk mendapatkan hormon happy. Boleh? Berat aku takde la naik banyak sangat after all the operations. Cumanya, kat bahagian abdomen ni cam weird shape sket. 4 kali surgery kot...aku pun tak reti nak describe camne shape abdomen aku ni. Yang pastinya, memang dah tak normal. Hopefully dengan workout, boleh normalkan balik shape dia. Only recently jer aku baru berani buat sit up sikit... If aku ganas sangat, memang akan rasa slight pain dekat scar especially the most recent colostomy scar tu.

Let's not talk about pain anymore. The weird thing about me kan, aku sangat malas nak berlari dekat public park. Housemate ajak ke stadium Kajang. Aku peri sekali je. Kat stadium kajang tu ada race track. Memang untuk orang berlari la kan. Aku lari satu round je kot then jalan lagi satu round pastu aku dok main2 some exercise equipment/tools around the place.

Last weekend aku bawak housemates aku pergi Tasik Cempaka dekat Bangi. Again, aku berjalan je. Tapi bila dekat gym, aku boleh je lari atas treadmill tu. Takde masalah pun. Tapi nape tah bila sampai open public area aku jadi segan and malas sangat.

Anyway, hasil pergi ke gym masih belum nampak kot. Aku timbang cam sama jer berat aku. Hari ni cuti dari gym sebab baju seluar semua aku basuh malam tadi. So perhaps, akan buat some light exercise jer kat umah petang nanti. My definition of light exercise is 30 jumping jacks, 30 squats, floor exercise including planks. Tu yang paling seksa la aku rasa. Planks. Not sure if I got it right or not.

Apa pun, hopefully aku boleh keep the momentum and try to get my ideal weight with just a bit of sexy muscle on my tummy area. Good luck and all the best to me!

Lelaki Curang @Suami Mah - Kita ni Suci Sangat Ke? Dah Confirm Dapat Masuk Syurga?

This week, news feed FB dipenuhi dengan kisah suami curang. Oleh kerana aku takde suami, aku pun agak malas nak layan benda2 viral and takde efek kat kehidupan aku. Somehow, aku terjebak jugak lepas terbaca article kat blog ni. Tambah pulak dengan colleague yang tetiba open up to me about same situation. Husband dia pun curang. 

I was like, "Viral kat FB efek dia sampai ke real life ke?" Tapi bila fikir balik, apa yang diviralkan dekat FB tu adalah true story. Real life situation. Its no surprise kalau kita pun pernah dalam situasi yang sama or much worse.

As for me, aku pun pernah alami benda ni. He was seeking solace elsewhere and when I caught up with his antics, he blamed me. Sama la macam Suami Mah tu. Dia yang curang kemudian dia salahkan isteri dia tak jaga badan pulak. Memang psycho lelaki yg justify his wrongs by pushing the blame tapi since I had first hand experience, I know for a fact that this is men's natural defence mechanism.Macam automatic reflex pulak aku rasa. Kalau bini ko tangkap ko curang, ko salahkan dia balik. Suami Mah punya blame shifting memang extreme la bagi aku. 

Typical typical men.

The question that comes to mind is, whose fault is it when shit like this happened?

My humble opinion is both are at fault. Its true that trust is fundamental in a relationship but before trust, there should be honesty. How to determined honesty? Through communication. When you are with someone you loved, you should be able to communicate openly, be vulnerable, share everything with your partner. 

If you can't do that, you have a problem. Most of the time, we can see the signs, but sometimes, we refused to believe the signs because you love your partner so much. You refused to believe that they could do something so unspeakable. Then you just let him continue with what makes them happy to avoid further conflict.We are to be blame also.

Bagi aku, dalam relationship kita memang akan face this type of shit but takde manual or a definite guide on how to solve such problem. So, tepuk dada tanyalah hati. Setiap masalah ada jalan penyelesaian dia. Kalau tak tau, tanya pada Allah. InsyaAllah, Dia akan guide kita.

Suami Mah memang teruk dikutuk di FB, blog etc. Tapi bagi aku, siapalah kita untuk judge kesilapan dia? Kita dah confirm masuk syurga ke? Kita ni baik sangat? Korang sure ke Suami Mah tu masuk neraka sebab dia curang tu? Kalau dia bertaubat, korang ada hak nak tolak taubat dia? Korang siapa?

Sebelum kita maki orang, pass extreme judgment, korang tengok la cermin dulu. Suci sangat ke kita ni. Hina sangat ke suami Mah tu? Aku bukan nak defend Suami Mah. Cumanya, sebelum kita hembur kata-kata nista, lebih baik kita betulkan amal kita dulu. (peringatan untuk diri aku juga)

Struggle

A list for self improvement purposes. I am gaining weight. Not much but still I am drifting for my ideal weight therefore I need to take some action.

I am cutting down on sweets and creamer in my drinks. I am also re-starting my gym from today on wards. However, I am still eating rather unhealthily. I am constantly skipping dinner these days. I opt for Gardenia butterscotch bread whenever I feel the hunger pang.  

I think it is not so bad but it is going to be bad if I don't exercise and make skipping dinner a habit *sigh

Cholesterol Control

I've been packing extra pounds after the recent health scare. I weighed 57kg after the operation. Currently I am 64kg. 7kg gained in 7 months. I've been eating unhealthily and refused to do any work out. I was afraid that I might hurt myself in the process.

However, last Monday I went for a jog with my housemates at a nearby stadium early in the morning. It was refreshing. Might do it again tomorrow morning and make it a new habit. I also need to eat more cleanly. My dad just had his own health scare last Wednesday. He had a heart attack. It was a major heart attack as one of his artery was completely blocked.

Whilst he was being treated at Ipoh Cardiac Care Unit, he was visited by a dietitian. She ordered my dad to totally quit smoking. Apparently, my dad does not have high cholesterol level, however since he is a heavy smoker, his healthy cholesterol is too low making his cholesterol ratio unstable. Apart from that I learned that 3-1 drinks is high in cholesterol because of the creamer. I also learned that egg yolks contained high cholesterol so my dad need to limit his egg yolks in take to 2 yolks per week.

As for me, I need to stock up on green tea. Apparently, green tea not only reduce your waist line, it also reduce the level of cholesterol in your body. I need to exercise more. I can do squats and a bit of weight lifting while watching my favourite tv shows. I need to change my coffee intake too. No more non-dairy creamer. I am going to substitute it with low fat milk.

So, that's the plan. Will update my progress in the future. Wish me luck!

Small Business Ideas

Lately, I have been having all these ideas about starting a small business in the office. Perhaps, I could add some pocket money to go to Mecca in December.

I did try accessories trading once. That was 6-7 years ago perhaps. I didn't work out well. Now my love is food. I like cooking and I love seeing people eat my food.

Fruits cocktail pudding is my favourite dessert. My mom makes the best fruit cocktail pudding.

Another recipe that I might try is kek batik. Super easy.You can google the resepi.

Another item that I might want to sell, is aiskrim Malaysia. Just a few simple but yummy flavours like bandung, jagung, milo, asamboi... Miam

I hope I could start the project over the weekend. We shall see..

Me & Spicy Food

Its lunch time. I am trying to cut back on food since I realized that I am expanding sideways. I didn't gain weight tho. But some of my post op clothes almost cannot fit anymore. So today I had breakfast, skipping lunch, drinking a lot more water than I normally does and I will take dinner so that I can sleep well tonight.

Being a typical Malaysian when it comes to food i.e we Malaysians love food. Local, western, Middle Eastern you name it. I love them all. My absolute kryptonite is coffee and cheesecake and spicy food. I used to love ice cream but now not so much and I don't know why.

Back to the topic, for those who don't know, I have a medical history. Last March I had an emergency operation for intestinal tumor. So, I figure after surviving the whole ordeal, I should take better care of my intestine right? I tried. Coz a few month after the corrective operation, my intestine does not digest as well as it used to.

So last week, I made chicken bolognese. Chili powder and coarse black pepper were amongst the ingredients apart from onion, tomatoes etc. It turns out tasty. The first night I had it, I didn't have any issue with it. Since the sauce I made was a lot. I get to reheat it and eat for dinner the next day. Coz I am trying to finish the whole sauce, I ate a huge bowl of pasta as a result.

I could feel there was a slight heat after finished eating the whole bowl of pasta, and then the toilet visits started. Didn't get much sleep that night and it continues till the morning. Its not diarrhea, lucky me. But having to go to the toilet instead of sleeping can drained you. So the next morning, I had a mug of black tea and slept in the whole day.

So I assume that I can't tolerate heat from spicy food as I used to. Recently I had bad experience after eating a smoked salmon sandwich with Tabasco sauce. I think I did go overboard with the Tabasco sauce. Another sauce that my stomach could not tolerate is Life Chili and Garlic Sauce. Its not that spicy but somehow, it irritates my intestine so much.

I need to take good care of my health as it is a blessing that I am still alive after undergoing 4 operations this year.I should start my exercise regime but I am too lazy and there is no cure for laziness.

Customer Service in Malaysia

On my way to work today, I stop by a Dunkin Donuts (DD) shop to get my morning coffee and some donuts. I don't do this everyday, let me tell you that. I just love to indulge in good coffee just to motivate me to go to work early on a Monday morning.

So, since it was pretty early and perhaps I was their first customer of the day and it is Monday, the server attending to me today was not too friendly nor smiley. I am not a cheerful happy morning person my self and I rarely take offence to such behaviour. But somehow today I was a bit offended. Me being me, I keep it all to myself and rant out on my blog instead.

So, I wanted to get iced latte and some donuts to go so when I walk in there is no welcome greeting (that is fine by me) and there is no "what would you like to have?" or "can I get your order?" from the staff. She just stood there looking at me while I look at the menu. After telling her I want iced latte without whipped cream, she went straight to making my drinks. It took her about 3 minutes or so and once finished, she asked whether I want anything else. Which is good coz I do want some donuts. Who went in DD without getting donuts is a weirdo in my book.

Anyhow, after telling her I want sugar raised, chocolate and blueberry filling she told me the total costs. I think it was less than RM 20, RM16.70 or sumthing but since I have no small notes, I had to hand her RM50 note. She asked whether I have smaller notes and I told her no, I don't but I have small change. So I fished out 70 cents from my purse and put it on the counter. As she was counting my balance, I told her, "here, I have shillings". She just handed me my balance and said, "we have so much shillings already".

I was surprised. I remember when I used to work as a cashier during semester break long long time ago, I begged for small change. Normally I asked for small change like 10 - 50 sen max but there will be time when we ran out of shillings that we asked for 50-70 sen. But today, I offered 70 sen and she rudely refused. Whoa... Probably she was mad that I gave her RM50 notes so early in the morning and she is now running out of RM10 notes. I've been in her shoes, that is why I didn't lash out. I simply said, "okay" and walked out. 

I have several other bad examples to share but I think, it all comes down to education. People working in customer service line, need to educate themselves well on how to treat customer courteously. I am not a difficult customer, so why did I do to deserve such a treatment this morning?

There was this one time my sister and I had the worst customer service experience at a Pizza Hut in Kampar that we immediately e-mailed a complaint whilst having our meal. We did not scold the staff or anything like that coz to me, its not their fault they are behaving that way. They did not get the proper training,  that's all.

 

photo from reflectionofsanity.blogspot.com

I was in Mid valley Kuala Lumpur a few months back. At that time, Antipodean, a new coffee joint just opened. It was noon I think and one of the owners were there. An expatriate, and he was showing his staffs who are mostly locals on how to properly wipe a table. I am sure that they were also taught on how to greet customers and how to take orders etc because I always had good experience having coffee there. Antipodean in Mid valley is just a normal coffee shop. No fancy furniture or deco, nothing. But they serve awesome tasting coffee by great servers. I could just sit there alone, having cups after cups of coffee. Totally addictive!     

Customer service in Malaysia is nothing to brag about. Some Starbucks joints do have those amazing servers that will try to make you smile and left an impression on you and there are some who tried too hard and left the wrong type of impression in your life ( I encountered those too) So, as a customer dining and transacting in Malaysia, I advice you to lower your expectation so that you would not be too dissapointed. If you have a fickle partner who had the tendency to complaint and lash out at every minor or major faults, I advise you to quickly run before your partner exploded in front of everyone (I encountered this too but too bad it was a drive thru transaction thus I had no where to run)

Have a great week ahead peeps!

Review: Teater P. Ramlee the Musical

Last Friday I had the chance to go and watch P. Ramlee the Musical at Istana Budaya so here is my humble review.

First of all, the lead actor Tony Eusoff was impressive. Strong voice and he played the part very well. Really as if we are watching P. Ramlee himself. Next, Lisa Surihani where she played Junaidah, P. Ramlee's 1st wife. She could improve on her singing  tho but I must say I was impress. I didn't know she could even sing. However, the part where she had to sing and cry at the same time, not too good.. I know she is trying to feel the character and all, however she really need to control her voice during that part. Good effort still...

Tiara, the Queen. Awesome performance. She is a super senior in Malaysian theater so, no surprise there. Love her part, her voice, her everything! Saloma was played by Nadia Aqilah. Seriously, I don't know who she is before the musical. Upon googling, I think she is a singer. Great voice, great performance. Totally blown away by her talent.

As for supporting actors such as the paparazzi. At first, I was annoyed with their appearance  but towards the end, their performance was getting more and more powerful. Great voice, really great voice, awesome scripts. JJ and Pak Nil did well so does the Shaw Brothers duo.

Overall, great performance.Awesome choreograph! Since this is only my 2nd time watching musical, my opinion is still limited. The first was Lat the musical and that was almost 4 years ago perhaps? Somehow I feel Lat was somewhat better than P. Ramlee. Just my 2 cents.

 Looking forward to PGL in November!

September

Tahun ni bulan September merupakan bulan yang paling pendek aku rasa. Tak sempat nak post satu entry pun kat blog usang ni.

September dipenuhi dengan pelbagai cuti dan aktiviti. Aku dihantar pergi training, bos aku cuti, aku dihantar pergi Singapore dan macam2 lagi lah.

Banyak benda aku nak kongsi kat sini tapi entah kenapa moof menulis tersangatlah nipis hari ni. Beberapa hari lepas aku dapat berita sedih. Berita ni lebih kepada peringatan buat aku. Tapi hati ni degil, betul2 keras masih alpha, masih kefur atas nikmat yg Tuhan dah berikan kepada aku.

Hati ini terasa kosong. Aku perlu kembali ke pangkal jalan...

Semoga dipermudahkan