hobby

Eid 2016

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Alhamdulillah. we meet Eid again.

quite honestly, i am not the type to look forward to Eids so much. the feeling is more mild and void of the tranquility we had in ramadan. of course, the first day of Eid is a symbol of success after going through the fasting month. but really, my eid is up to solat eid. after that, the feeling slows down and going through the motion of visiting. as always, i had to rush.

but oh well, all is fine. i am just glad that i have the week to have some recuperating apart from the visiting.

the one difference and excitement i had this year was the sudden crafting urge to make flower arrangements and finally had the opportunity to just go for it and do it. perhaps i may have went overboard about it. i spent close to 300$ on the flowers from bazaar, some tools from spotlight and the vases from ikea. but i am happy. and i am quite surprised that i have some talent in it! initially it was out of need to give some colour to my PV house. but turned out, i have awesome skills and eye for it. i am glad i did it. i absolutely loved and enjoyed the whole process of arranging the flowers. i couldnt stop looking at them!

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i also arranged some for my mom and sisters and for HC home. i am on a roll. i don’t mind pursuing this. arranging the flowers are almost therapeutic, just as i had with my scrapbooking and bookmarks. i loved it.

and i hope to make it a yearly thing. maybe it can be gifts that i can give to relatives for raya. i can take this time to make it as a serious hobby to learn the trades and one day, it can benefit others too. i posted the pics on fb and ig and i was surprised that many people approved of it. maybe next time it can be a sideline, i could learn about fresh flowers and more. could be just one of the skills that i can be proud of.

well i guess that is the highlight of my eid.

cycle noob

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one thing about turning 30 is the ability of knowing your body well. I am more in tuned with my body, I listen to my body and what I need and/or capable of. i know when to stop and when i can push my self further.

you see I was never a sporty person. I didn’t do sports back in school all the way to high school, hey, my school don’t have sports back then, being an all girls’ school. the sports we had was all self initiated. there was that occasional badminton games we play among friends and for a while, a soccer fever in the all girls’ school with kains and all until the teachers couldn’t say anything to us all because we were always playing ball! I knew then I was never going to be interested in soccer. back at home, dad was an avid badminton player. he was our unbeatable badminton hero. 🙂

and then there was ye-ye, an old school game rubber bands tight together to make a rope and two persons will hold each ends going up from the knee to the highest level while the rest will take turns to go over it. i can say i was among the best in the game.

so i was choosy. but what i know now is i love badminton, second only to cycling, and always will be, archery. (Now, archery, I am so going to return practising that, I had so much fun during Uni years and I never regretted taking it up as part of my extra curriculum activity, and its a sunnah plus point).

I have always loved cycling. the funny thing is, i only realised my body relationship with cycling today. it helped that hubby loves cycling too but he has more stamina and he cycles much faster than I can. so it always makes me wonder (I just realised I am an analytical person anyway), what works and what don’t for me. Cycling is almost becoming like an art that I need to learn.

Well, today I realised that this bike hubby bought works best for me (I have tried many other bicyles, they don’t always come out as faves). It was not heavy, light tyres and the gears, thus far, I know I can go gear 5 and mind you, up a hill at that gear ok. I was smiling ear to ear when I could cycled up ok! and your noob here just realised that even the height of the bike seat also determines whether I can cycle fast because otherwise, it just feels terribly hard to pedal comfortably, your leg should stretch out the whole length so the thighs will not be too strained out when you pedal down. your posture as well, how at times you just need to bend forward to preserve a bit of energy. hah, it take me to be 30 to finally realise these! but i still havent mastered the art of breathing though. It was fun nonetheless.

psst, I have been cycling 25 km all this while. Yes, just found out about that too. 😉

Starting out as not a sporty person, I can finally say I am taking care of myself by doing sports, and doing it with the man I love nonetheless.

hmm no, no running please, my knee cannot take running.

there I know my self.

a mountain of crumbs

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A Mountain of Crumbs: A MemoirA Mountain of Crumbs: A Memoir by Elena Gorokhova
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Russia has always been a mystery to me. And when i saw A Mountain of Crumbs, i did not hesitate to buy it. Loving it so far because it reminds me of how much i love Diary of Anne Frank when i was a teen. I like how it was written in innocence, staying as down to earth as a normal child can be. Currently i am reading on the protagonist in her young adulthood, working and studying. I like that it doesnt talk so much about the politics but a middle class family living their days, struggles of having daily stipend food, working hard to lead a decent life. And author shared significant memories from her life like the death of her father, becoming a guide, her sister’s play.
Overall enjoying the book.

View all my reviews

bookless reader

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I know. i love books, madly love books. There were times when i can just sit and read a book the whole day and had difficulties doing other things because i was just so engrossed in a story.

But the era is changing and i am catching up fast. I embraced the ebook reader. I still buy books. No way can i not read a book in its book form. But i also love the ebook for the simple reason of having a couple of ‘books’ in one cool device! I especially love it that classics are available free. And i must say i have downloaded almost all the classics from kobo, my choice of ebook-shop and reader.

Ebooks is also making it easier for my thirst for the fantasy genre. Because it was too many, its the one genre which i cant afford to buy. The library had been my sanctuary for them books. But as in the case of george r martin’s games of thrones, i purchased them online as ebook collection and i got them at a much cheaper price and i can bring all 4 books wherever i go! Hwahwahwa.
Still, only the favourites though. I will still make the library relevant by visiting them now and then for my fantasy fix.

Not forgetting those emagazines! I love them too haha! Especially reader’s digest! It gives a different experience of reading that mag with videos a click away and the animations they have! Very cool! Just this month’s, when u ‘open’the e-mag, you are greeted by this celebrity featured!

Nevertheless, as all booklovers all over the world, we still want to read books in its natural way. Its the joy of reading it, admiring the cover, flipping over the page to keep on reading, slipping a bookmark(in my case, colour coordinated) with a heavy heart because you do not want to stop. And more so, in these times when you are always connected and screen eyed, you just want to look away and go easy on the eyes with some nice book, with a nice hot drink, and just indulge in another life, another world, another story.

I really really hope the luxury of holding a book is not lost in time. And yes, my children will be book lovers too. Definitely.

seri the seamstress

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and so i did it! i signed up for the sewing class!! burnt a hole in my pocket a bit but i guess its worth it. i am so excited to start class next friday.  and my goal is to finish class by May perhaps and who knows i might just make my own raya dress!! weee i am so so excited!

and life seems a bit more…well, life! and heh, the name kinda rhymes, seri the seamstress..

january had been fun so far and already its february, it really is going fast nowadays. i was just discussing with my teachers yesterday that out of sudden we have so many things to achieve and do already. no more dilly dallying. and so have decided to have a meeting with teachers every thursday so we can be updated every week on our pending items. time is really precious.

i am glad i do no teaching this year…which i really hope this will stay as it is for the rest of the year!

by right i have many things to say. but to keep it short: productive muslim series in singapore was great. the guy was really awesome and inspiring. what do i know, the website i had been following, useful posters i had been using for classes, and the person behind it was here!! and having a real discussion with him and his wife. and i was even more humbled when during one of his talks with the youth, he asked for my opinion of how he as the speaker was doing. my goodness. brother, you were doing just great. its our students who are not responding. but really, im touched that he thinks my opinion matters. alhamdulillah. hope productive muslim will continue to be successful and be a great  speaker and motivator for the muslim youth.  awesome and humble guy. he should come down again and give more talks.

and i settled all my pme (performance management evaluation) with the teachers and the youth officer. and this time around i had been better in delivering it and more confident. i was a bit soft previous years and doesnt really know how to conduct an evaluation, but i think i improved a bit and it was so much better to actually be discussing it. things are more clearer and the teachers are also clearer with the expectations and they understand better why a rating was given as such.

i was invited to an fgd one of the days with the colleagues from ace centres and that was another discussion which all of us were really honest and really let out our opinion and grievances of the system. our stand was especially the recognition for our teachers in terms of salary and training. enough of paying them degree holders pittance. they must be recognised as all those recognition that even maids and cleaners are getting.  me being where i am, i really dont care how much they are paying me because really it doesnt help at all, but i care for the teachers and what they are getting is just ridiculous. its not ten years ago when you can live with that kind of pay.

sorry, this is supposed to be a light happy post. haha. but really it has been all discussions for me this week.

must be this three 0 thing.

on the playlist.. Mojo. this band might just revive my interest to msian bands again.