It's Almost 8 Years

I've been a mother for almost that long. My baby will turn 8 this December and she is definitely the best gift I have ever received in my entire life. She's such a blessing and everyday she fills our lives with so much joy. We don't read parenting books, all we have is our kasih sayang yang melimpah ruah, everlasting overwhelming love for her. Did I prepare myself for the journey (of motherhood)? Well I did read 'What To Expect When You Are Expecting' but that was just about it. I think every mother has her instinct and I always hold on to what-is-right formula. 

When she was a toddler (couldn't remember actual age), a mother made a passing remark that made my blood boiled. "Dah besar dah masih bawa kencing dalam pampers?" Errr.. Takkan sesaja pakai kak, aksesori punggung je. At that point in time she wasn't ready to go barebottom. When I finally stopped her pampers, she didn't wet the bed until today. Every child has his/her own time, why did you think your opinion would make a difference to our plan? And comparing your child to mine is just so irritating. My kid umur x dah tak pakai pampers. Yeay! Shall I nominate you for an award or something? Being a mother, I am defensive and protective of my child. I could go into an attack mode if i have to so be careful of what you say.

Alhamdulillah Tia grows up to be someone with good values because that's what we and her environment teach her to do. She loves her friends to death and she would defend her friends with everything she has. Her father likes to tease her and kind of talks about her friends. She would go "Paaa...Those are my friends you are talking about. Stop it." Haha! And definitely we are her pillar. In everything she does, we are the center of her world. On the plane back from KK to KL, her father had a tummy ache due to long distance running and he couldn't take any food. She was so worried, and with her quirky Malay slang "Sebenarnya, Tia risaukan papa," and she insisted that her papa ate something. I saw her teary eyes and she cried silently, worrying about her papa. We are her pillar, she couldn't bare the thought of us getting hurt or anything like that. This is my baby, she cares and loves about the people around her so much. One day she came back from school and told me this, "Ma, just now we had japanese week and my friend's mom didn't give her any money. So I gave her my RM10 and I asked her to buy what she wants and give me the balance. My friend bought a lollipop and returned me RM9 ma." I was so proud of her kindness. She's that type of person.

Today is Mother's Day and she was really excited to celebrate it since Monday. She had prepared two cards in fact, one was a decoy and one was the real one which I never saw. She saved some money and bought me a flower. She hid everything well (with the help of her papa I guess). But today morning she wasn't feeling well. We went to celebrate but it broke my heart watching her suffer. We ended the lunch early for her to rest and she returned to her health this evening. Without her smiles, everything is incomplete. Her chirpy self came back and suddenly she was inspired to make an art project. Haha.

Being a mother teaches me so much. Yourself is not a priority anymore. My late mum always adviced me, "Kalau bukan kau yang uruskan, siapa lagi?" -- "If not you who take care of her needs, who else?" She will always come to me for everything. I play a giant role in her life, no exception. So far, I think we have done a pretty good job considering the type of person she's growing up to be.

Tia, celebrating Mother's day is going to be your sole responsibility as long as I live. I hope you will not be tired of your mama for as long as I live. I love you with all my heart and I will protect you with all that I have. Be a good girl always, mama papa love you!

XOXO
Mama

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ALL GREAT MOTHERS OUT THERE. 

Raya, Rumah Baru dan Rewang

Kelip-kelip mata, dah bulan 5. Cepatnya masa berjalan, rasa macam baru je sambut new year di tepi pantai Gold Coast, Sepang. Lebih kurang dua bulan dan nak sampai Ramadhan. Puasa belum ganti, badan belum kurus, muka belum licin, sampul raya belum ada.. Aiii... Kenapa laju na masa pergi, bergegas-gegas cam ada orang kejar pulak. Siapa kejar masa ni?? Takdelah rasa macam nak pasang badan ke di hari raya, tapi dah namanya hari raya, mestilah nak cantik juga kan? So, apa soalan sebelum nak sampai raya? Baju dah tempah? Kuih ada? Baju color apa? Tapi cakap betul le, beli baju kurung untuk raya beriya, tup...tup setahun pakai dua kali. Perlu ubah ini, tak bagus betul! Si kecik nak warna biru. Saya rasa macam nak warna kelabu. Abang memang leave it up to us. Masa kecik2 dulu mak tak tanya apa pun. Dia beli je kain cotton, potong, jahit, pakai. Haha! Takde nak share proses membuat keputusan. Satu tahun pink, satu tahun hijau gelap, satu tahun biru.. dah siap, pakai je. Takde nak style2 le, baju kurung pesak je mak tahu jahit. Can I have that now? Tapi raya ni lain sikit sebab kami akan beraya di rumah baru, insyaallah, dan dua hari raya akan terbang ke Melbourne, bercuti. Jadi boleh tak kalau nak skip buat kuih?

Punyalah tempah baju kurung pink penuh sulam, last2 pakai macam baju pinjam. Dah terlanjur, pinjamlah satu baju yang warna sesuai daripada kakak sendiri. Haha!

Nak baju macam ni.. mana nak cari? 

Rumah baru sekarang tengah direnovate. Dah seminggu mereka bekerja, tuan rumah belum menjenguk. Bukan apa, saya tak suka tengok proses, saya nak tengok yang dah siap je. Can or no? Masa order bukan main lagi nak itu ini, memang tak ingat bulan tu tinggi rendah. Sekali designer bagi quotation, abang tersenyum sinis. Haha! Ada orang nak awan di ceiling... alahmak sayang..demi kasih sayang mama papa pada Tia, kami uruskan jua. Bukan mudah nak uruskan tatarias rumah, kalau nak pergi cari semua sendiri memang lagi murah tapi masa dan skill itu masalah utama. Kalau takde masa dan skill membeli memang takde, memang nak kena tipu le jawabnya. Menggunakan satu contractor/designer lebih mudah, apa-apa silap, panggil dia je. Harap-harap semuanya menjadi seperti yang kita plan. Kita punya kerja hanya cari benda-benda kecil seperti chandelier, lampu meja tepi, stools untuk kitchen counter, hanging lamps etc. Itu pun tak berapa ada masa nak melaksanakan. Satu benda kita dah beli ialah chandelier dan side table lamps. Yang lain-lain kena tunggu sebab bos super busy dengan mcm2 aktiviti. Haritu ada lah pergi shopping untuk kitchen items, seronok juga pergi kedai Kitchen shop di Empire. On my way to become Nigella Lawson. (yor yor or.. )

Ni antara tangkapan di Kitchen Shop. Kalau lepas ni kek tak gebu, apo den nak salahkan? 

Ooooo... drama betul chandelier yang kami pilih kaaaannn?? Jenuh menunggu orang kedai tu dismantle the details satu persatu, sempat le tunggu abang lari habis 5km.

Inilah rumah kesayanganku... misi selepas ini.. mencari burkini.  Seswatuh. 

Dan di dalam kesibukan kerja, anak sekolah, rumah baru, nak raya, anniversary nak sampai bagai, kami ada lagi satu plan lain iaitu bercuti ke Melbourne, Australia di bulan Ogos. Abang book December lepas so perit menunggu. Hahahah! Tapi ni dah dekat dah ni, excited bangat. Tapi sebelum tu... Uruskan yang lain2 dulu!!!!

Come To Kay Kay - Kota Kinabalu, Sabah Bah!

These were the faces of excited people who wanted to get away from Kuala Lumpur just for a while.  (Well maybe the child was slightly disappointed to miss her art class but the mother was super excited and the father just drove the car. Haha!) So, last weekend we took a short trip to Kota Kinabalu, Sabah.

Look at that bag, it has travelled the world and nothing ever breaks. We put many packs of Kuih Cincin inside and nothing cracks. It could also be a 'vehicle' for a 7-yr old girl to go from the parking lot to the airport terminal. How useful.

When you see clouds, instagram it! That's what cool people do these days. But these particular clouds were so full of drama,  I couldn't resist! Took this pic from the plane, I used my iPhone Path's Country filter. How awesome! The flight from KL-KK took about 2hour 40 mins and last time, i think around the 80s, the time difference was one hour from the Peninsular but now, the time is the same but by 7pm, KK already very dark.

My husband is a darling! He knows his wife's taste. Hence, Hyatt Regency. I was a bit skeptical when I saw a wall plate that says the hotel was officiated in 1977. But the inside was so modern. The TV was huge and we got to watch the FA cup final in house.

Actually the main reason for this trip was the 10km Borneo International that my husband participated in. We tagged along, of course. The hotel is located very near to the sea. Only 2 mins walk and we were there already.  The view was nice but the fishy smell also very 'nice'! I didn't mind, at least I know I was close to the beautiful sea and how often do you get the chance to smell that? :P

How pretty is the world. Take in the breathtaking view of the blue sea while holding your breath. :) Along this shore you can find a lot of interesting shops. Pearls, coconuts, snacks, crafts, seafood, etc, and don't forget to bargain. 

Why do you think they put these kind of statues around? Well, Tia figured it out. 

You don't need to go far to take great pictures, just use a model that would do anything you ask her to do and have fun!

I found out that the KK's skies was bluer than ours in Semenanjung. Why lah? 

So, here is my hero who travels far and wide to run. This run started at the Likas Stadium until our hotel and back to the Stadium. 10km non-stop and he did it in 60 minutes or so. I can't even finish 1km without panting hard and feeling like the sky is falling. The run started at 615am. This picture very nice kan? See lah who the photographer. *wink*

This Yayasan Sabah building is isolated from the city and look how unique it is. Is it a battery, a rocket, who could tell?  Simple yet very interesting.

We also went to this floating mosque. Masjid Bandaraya. It was raining so we didn't go inside but the design is really pretty.

We stumbled upon this Pintu Gerbang,  it was unintentional at all. But this was further proof that I was in KK, if you ever doubted me. 

People had been advising us to look for seafood. When in Sabah, eat seafood, so they say. The problem was, nobody told me where exactly! After my husband's Larian 40 Taman run we stopped for our dinner at the waterfront and I didn't see so many seafood selections. Rupanya we were at the wrong place lah! We should find this place called Sedco. Takpe takpe (while wiping my tears), we ended up having crabs and squids. Seafood jugak kan?? Next time we'll find this Sedco schmedco place. 

On the last day my husband took us to this observatory point to see KK from the top of a hill. Quite interesting. He found this by accident. Since the roads to the Likas Stadium were closed, he found another route via Istana and taraahh... jumpa lah ini tempat. Nice place to sit and smell the ocean. 

And the trip was not complete without the majestic Kuih Cincin! Love them so much. Crispy and mildly sweetened. Bought some crispy fish balls as well. As for the pearls, I leave that to more graceful souls. I prefer to wear real rock!

Next time I want to see Mount Kinabalu. Read the sentence properly, SEE. Don't ask me to climb. 

I Shop Online

I should have written this piece when I was angry two weeks ago but I didn't have ample time to do it so here goes.

I was so excited when I found this Zalora website that sells awesome shoes and clothing. The shoes are so bombastic, they made me drool a little. Without hesitation, I took that leap of faith. I purchased one pair of heels after 15 minutes of surfing the website. They had this "Deliver within hours" on the website which was really misleading but they have removed it now after they received tons of complaint I guess. I fell for it, of course!  And after having waited for quite sometimes, I decided to give them a call. They told me that the lipstick I ordered was not available. "You ordered a lipstick, right maam?" Apparently, the name of the shoes is lipstick and the girl thought I was buying a lipstick when obviously they didn't sell cosmetics. But they promised to deliver it when the product became available.

After weeks, they delivered the good and I love it. Then, of course my appetite for shoes knows no boundary, I happily placed another order and waited again. 3 weeks had gone and nothing came, not even an email. I tried to chat with their online chat, hopeless. When the conversation started to get heated, he went offline, ran crying to his supervisor. I emailed them, they always got back with "Somebody from the CS will contact you soon" when in fact the customer service was the person who replied the email.  So my last resort was to harass their Facebook la! Don't judge me! What a girl to do?

To cut the story short, after one month waiting, my order which was supposed to come from Germany and guaranteed to be delivered that next wednesday, was nowhere to be found. And they are supposed to refund me the sum within 7 days, which I haven't checked on that yet. I am okay if they are late a little but at least they should have the responsibility to inform me as a customer about my order(s). Keeping quite and hoping that the client would be patience is not acceptable.

As I read their FB wall (stalker much!), I found so many complaints and many of them threaten to go to the tribunal for consumer if their requests are not attended to. How could you simply take people's money and not delivering services/products that you promised? They should have cared more about their customers than their marketing, how come their management does not see this.

I am an avid online buyer. I love to shop online. So far I have tried many places and nobody has failed me like Zalora did. I once bought a handbag, the quality was poor but what to expect when I paid peanut. Haha! But the service was awesome! I've tried The Pop Look which is not bad at all if you want to find affordable fun fashion pieces and they delivered the goods quickly. I bought cakes, tudungs, baju kurung, books, flowers, coffee, ipad, you name it. Now, the market place is the Internet, because while working, people do DO their shopping.

So, my advise is, before you go and splurge on an online shop, read around. Find their facebook and such and get to know what other buyers talk about them. If you found a blog that bitches about a website like this blog, final decish is always yours. If you feel comfortable, indulge. People say, if there's no wind, the tree wouldn't sway (eh.. ini pepatah mana? melayu ke inggeris?)

Right now I'm waiting for my orders from asos. Don't let me trash your Facebook wall please.

Louis Vuitton: Zippy Multicolore Canvas Wallet

One day my husband casually told me about something he read somewhere. That, if your salary is x and you work like your salary should be x+y.. then you'll get y in some other ways. But if your salary is x and you work so much less than x, you'll lose that difference somehow.  

A week after, I received a happy letter from the management stating that everybody gets a handsome labor day reward. We can shop for anything we like and claim the company for that sum. 

And what did I get myself???

After contemplating for not very long, I decided to go for an LV wallet. Do I want to show off? No la.. for what? Got some already. So why? Because to me, LV delivers satisfaction. You buy, you hold, you use, regret never comes. :)

At first, I wanted to go for the white multicolored zippy but the shop assistant kinda discouraged me to do so. White ar.. dirty one, said she. Unless you know how to take care la. But who really knows how to take care?

Then I asked her to bring me the Secret Long Wallet with embossed monograms. Turned out too large pulak. I asked for the white multicolored with the buckle, pegang-pegang looked like auntie a bit. 

And when she showed me this one, I fall in love instantly. Let me show you around. Let's! 

The size is just nice to hold 8 cards, 6 compartments and one zipped coin compartment. And it's wrap-around zip keeps everything in the wallet securely. 

The LV Zip is special. You can easily tell the fake from the real by looking at this zip.  But that's besides the pointlah.. the point is the zip is uniquely LV.  

The coin compartment's zip is even unique and cute! I love the monogram being embossed on top of the  oval shaped small zip! The workmanship of LV products is top notched.

Can you believe the color inside? The lavender hue of the inside layers is so gorgeous and the material is calf leather. They have it in fuschia but my heart was set on this one.  You can keep your passport inside if you want as well. iPhone also fits. 

The monogram multicolored is the creation of Takashi Murakami and I would like to say to him, me likey!


The moral of the story, work hard always. The reward(s) will come later in any form if you deserve so. By the way, the price of this baby is RM2850, in case you want to know.

Dataran Perjuangan

Tergerak dengan keberanian anak-anak muda untuk berkhemah di Dataran Merdeka, saya menulis. Saya tahu tidak semua bersetuju dengan tindakan mereka itu namun tindakan mereka membuat saya bertanyakan diri sendiri, apakah itu kehidupan? Apakah makna kebahagiaan? Soalan klise mungkin? Saya menjangkakan jawapan yang paling median iaitu apabila kita sudah berkeluarga, kewangan selesa, pasangan dan anak-anak sentiasa berada di sisi, ibadah tidak dilupa, harta dikumpul dan dijaga, perkahwinan bahagia - maka kebahagiaan itu sudah sempurna. Adakah kerana kita diulit kesedapan zon selesa, lantas tidak berani bersuara walaupun terlihat sesuatu yang jengkel di mata? Agak-agak kalau digegar zon ini, huru-haralah paksi kehidupan, rimas dicuit kepayahan?

Teringat saya ketika Bersih 2.0 dulu, cerita yang dipapar di media massa termasuklah rungutan isteri tentera dan pasukan keselamatan apabila suami mereka disuruh bekerja di hujung minggu. Merengus tidak suka, kenapa diganggu masa suami bersama dengan keluarga? Bukankah itu kerja bahaya, kata mereka. Agaknya mereka tidak periksa portfolio pekerjaan pasangan sebelum berumahtangga. Ibubapa di rumah resah jika anak mereka terlibat sama apabila tujuan asal di hantar ke menara ialah untuk menimba ilmu semata. Membesar, bersekolah, bekerja, berkahwin, beranak, lantas bahagia. Itulah pusarannya. Jangan dikacau peraman ini, kematu jadinya. 

Saya melanggan majalah dunia TIME dan sering di sana dipaparkan kisah-kisah mereka yang berjuang tentang sesuatu yang mereka percaya, jiwa mereka penuh bernyalarasa. Ramai yang hilang segala-galanya demi satu perjuangan. Lantas saya terfikir, di manakah kita apabila kisah perjuangan ini ditanya. Adakah kita akan mencungkil sejarah lama, tentang perjuangan menentang Jepun, Inggeris, Belanda dan ini membuktikan bahawa jiwa kita juga punya jiwa pejuang yg waja? Pendapat saya, itu semua cerita purba. 

Mari muhasabah di manakah kedudukan kita saat ini. Adakah kita sudah cukup selesa dan bahagia sehingga sedikit pemberontakan jiwa dan keinginan untuk berjuang tentang sesuatu mengelisahkan sanubari? Ketika pemimpin diulit mimpi atas tilam empuk di rumah berhawa dingin, budak-budak yang mahu berjuang tentang sesuatu yang mereka percaya, diserang tatkala hening pagi. Kata pemimpin yang segar bugar ini, usah tagih simpati kalau suka tidur di padang. Kata seorang pemimpin lagi, hati-hati, ini semua mainan wayang. Di mana letaknya jiwa pemimpin tadi? Mungkin dalam peti besi di dalam bilik utama yang berukuran 1000 kaki persegi. 

Tepuk dada tanya selera, berapa kerat di antara kita yang masih punya sifat berani. Berani bersusah, berani disergah, berani bersuara, berani berpayah, berani kehilangan, berani berantakan demi untuk masa depan. Jangan dibuai keselesaan tanpa menyedari rumah kita sedang dimamah amai-amai. 

Changing Gemukland to Gorgeousland, And Activity No 1: Let's Move for 20 mins!

Okaylah, Gemukland is not an attractive name for something I want to do so to hype it up, I'm calling it Gorgeousland! Better, na?

And to start off, our activity no 1 is to move our body for at least 20 mins per day to your favorite tunes.

We can dance, we can jog, we can walk, we can shuffle, we can cycle, do it for 20 mins per day for at least 4 days a week.

We can choose to do it in the morning before work or after work, to our best convenience.

The point is Let's Move!!

Welcome to Gorgeousland!