the last 9 nights into ramadhan.



I just completed the second batch of cornflakes tonight.

the mixing and putting all the ingredients together is really a lot of fun. the smell is awesome. but baking - once you spoil something; over an ounce more on the measurements, over a minute in the oven, will spell disaster. cleaning up is a complete chore with really tough grease and lots of unnecessary tools. arranging the cookies into containers is another task.

I'll take cooking, over baking, anytime.

izhar: no matter what the outcome is, I will be very proud of you.


and that was the sweetest thing anyone had ever said to me. thank you love, for your constant encouragement, undying support and endless believe in me, even when I lost hope in myself. thank you for every ounce of patience you had - even though I know how unbearable, irritating and ridiculous I can get with my constant worrying and totally lack of self-confidence.

i love this boy to bits.




today, i saw the 5 months and money ($1k was bapak's contribution) being paid off.
i thought that the heavy downpour would work against me, and given the lack of confidence I had, the feeling of unpreparedness that I felt, I was going to blow everything.

But - God is greater and He had plans for me, and for that, I thank you Allah. Alhamdulillah.

and bapak's and muzakkir's reactions at the dinner table after breaking fast tonight was timeless.




Just as promised, and I do keep my word, a thank you card to the ever happy and positive mr. yeo, as well as a dinner treat for the family at carousel or straits kitchen in time.

Be careful not to make a woman cry, because Allah (swt) counts her tears. A woman came out of a mans’ rib. Not from his feet to be walked on, not from his head to be superior over, but from his side to be equal. Under the arm to be protected, and next to the heart to be loved.

angry
sad
unmotivated
hopeless
disappointed..

.. with myself.


and these are the last feelings that i need especially today.
its too close, its too quick, its too nerve-wrecking, its too scary.

just because i checked tumblr and i really, really like this:

Today, my boyfriend came over and met my parents.

Then he left, and my Dad told me that my boyfriend loved me.

I smiled and asked, “How do you know?”

He said, “Because he looks at you the same way I look at your Mother.”

its the 13th day into ramadhan and alhamdulillah, it has been great so far. (:

just as i thought i could give geylang a pass this year, my grandmother wanted us to accompany her there to get an entirely new living room set and other festive must-haves. apart from the crowd, the difficulty to get a parking lot and the midday sun, i actually enjoyed myself. nenek's new living room set gave off the i'm-chilling-at-a-kampong-house vibe. this would be something new altogether, to replace her sofa set which was more than 30 decades old. i also loved the deep orange tulips, baby's breath and white peonies nenek got for her living room.

seeing the amount that we spent for our entire room makeover for the past two hari rayas, syazana was not in favour of spending a cent for our room - not even to replace the overused huge cushions that lay limp on the carpet of our lazy corner. she clearly stated that the only thing she would have changed for this year would be her bed sheet.

on the other hand, seeing that my things are still strewn across my side of the room, (read: things from TA, my birthday celebrations, as well as the paper bag for my blackberry purchase eons ago!) i know that i need to go through an organization overhaul asap. thank goodness the sister had been really patient about the mess i made and im not about to push her buttons any further.

IKEA, here i come! (:

i want this, in chocolate. ):

6ixes celebrate my birthday

date: 10 august 2010
location: woodlands crescent, woodlands waterfront, champions way, civic centre

the only day i would walk around looking like that.

so much so for the kate spade closed door event with nurul, i got a shock of my life when i saw ila and ain appear at my floor landing, from the block staircase, just as i was waiting for the lift to go downstairs. a quick mumble of "sorry syaz", and i was blindfolded, dressed up (please do check out what i was made to wear!!) and deafened by music blaring from wani's headphones. my questions (where are we going? who is in the car? are there anybody looking at me? hello, can anyone answer me?!) fell on totally deaf ears - i was wondering who was the deaf ones there.

the unvealing of the blindfold brought me to woodlands waterfront, where we had a scrumptious brunch of nurul's nasi lemak, nuggets, fried chicken and jemput-jemput. the birthday cake was totally so me; of strawberries and chocolates. i got a pretty 'kate spade' bag and one of the loveliest birthday card i have ever received.

we went kite flying at champions way, where the wind blew so strongly even when the sun is shining mercilessly upon us. kitey was the kite which flew way up, up high into the blue sky - so high in fact, that the entire reel of string flew away with it, high above the roof of christchurch secondary. and then it was gone.

nonetheless, i enjoyed every second of the entire celebration (that blindfold and dressing up part too!).

♥ nurul, wani, ain, ila & sha.

thank you lovelies so much, for making this happen.

just last night, i found myself feeling really embarrassed and asking the boyfriend, "please dont be angry with me, but could you tell me what did you get me for my 21st birthday?" and he started off explaining the surprise birthday celebration he threw me in the afternoon while i was walking nasrin to school. he had a lovely cake all set up with candles at that small hut near my place. and next to the cake was pooh bear, wearing a necklace, bearing my name. later that night, he gave me an mp3 player.

i realised that i needed some way to remind me of these little accounts that happened in my life. cause i know that one dreaded day, i would forget them. and that scares me, a lot. cause these were the things that had once made me smile, wide enough, if not, wider. and these moments are the ones that i would want to capture in my memory - forever.

so no matter how late of me to blog about an event, i should do it. so that when that dreaded one day comes, i'll visit this space of mine and remember what it was that once made me smile.

5-week stint

the 5-week ta stint was the main reason why i went on hiatus. it was a complete 5 weeks of turmoil but it had a bittersweet ending. i had always loved the 10 year olds ever since the first day i took over their class. but i did not realise how fond i was of them, until the very last day. and on that eve of the national day celebrations, i was fuming angry with myself cause i left - without a single picture of them.

alhamdulillah, the 5 weeks went by pretty quickly and ended off with such a drama (the kind you would expect only on tv), but, all went well. of course friendships were forged and all of them were so lovely , in every single way you could imagine: (from left-right) aza, sim wii, sutha, me, wei wei, connie, shah and ramesh.

the weekend of 31st july

my birthday lunch could not be any sweeter - with both my best friends. right after mendaki, i headed to causeway point and walked around aimlessly for a good 45 minutes, before meeting the both of them. izhar presented me with a super cute flower bouquet and his birthday card while nana handed me all the stuff she got me. siam kitchen makes a pretty good alternative for thai food, but no doubt that nothing beats the real deal. i especially loved their green curry chicken! thanks to syazana, she picked the entire lunch tab.

the tiramisu birthday cake from eatzi gourment was brought out by one of the waitresses. i opened syazana's present and was pleasantly surprised to see a really lovely nine west messenger bag (which was fossil inspired) and a baby-g watch which totally made me squeal in delight. the entire frame was masculine black, with a hint of feminine pink around its face. pretty!! (:

iz made sure i opened his card only when i reached home. upon reading his card message, he gave away the first clue for my treasure hunt, which would take place downtown.

thanks to makngah and pakngah, they got me seats for the rentak singapura concert @d'marquee and a chalet room @costa sands downtown east. in addition, i got an entire ben & jerry's tub - all to myself! the rentak singapura concert did not disappoint, especially performances by my favourite duo, sleeq and hady mirza. sleeq sang 'untuk dia' and they still amaze me with their sound-like-recording voices. they manage to make every song unique to their genre. you could just hear this song on air, and recognise that its sleeq's. even ramesh and sim wii requested me to play their song while we were doing our stuff in the resource room while we were in school. check out their song here!

the concert ended really late. we wanted to get snapshots with sleeq and hady, but syairah was too excited to start the treasure hunt. we toggled between downtown east and e-hub while finding stick-ons which lead us to the next clue. the final pit-stop was at the bowling alley, where i received my 'treasure'!

the boyfriend got me a lovely tote bag from forever 21 and a beautiful caricature drawing of me! the one thing i cant imagine is the boyfriend stepping into F21, picking the bag from its shelf and paying for it at the cashier. (:

that sunday afternoon after checking out of the chalet, i had the tallest burger in town at mad jack's, thanks so much to pakngah.

my birthday weekend evening was spent with rage, who spoilt me with a box of goodies - including a set of colourful notebooks, hand cream, nalgene bottle, mini polaroid postcards, slabs of chocolates and a lovely card.

so much love and thanks also to ibu who presented me with the most sparkling pair of silver shoes, nasrin for the beautiful stationary from kiki.k, the cute YOG 2010 keychain bearing merly and lyo from muzakkir, a deep turquoise bag from busu and a hairdryer and a new set of bed spread from nenek.

definitely worth remembering, i love you.

Hello! (:

First and foremostly, I would like to wish you happy national day, as the nation turns 45 this year. And all of us are looking forward to it (especially me, no doubt about it cause of the long weekend holidays). Except mine will stretch all the way till september till a new school semester starts. And because of this long end of year holiday for us, which so coincidentally clashes with ramadhan, I'm complaining cause it means that my end of the year trip to egypt will happen without me. ):

I have been on a really long hiatus, missing out important events of july, and I'm really sorry. The 5-week ta stint drained everything out of me, so much that my room (only my corner) looked like its been hit by a typhoon. And don't get me started on the state of my wadrobe! It got hit by a combination of tsunami and cyclone. Thank goodness the damage done to my wadrobe has been cleared - I've yet to save the aftermath of the typhoon still.

I decided that I'll post pictures of my entire july just to fill you up, and to also remind me of what happened in july 2010 when I happen to read through my past posts down the road.but for now, I'm going to enjoy my long weekend and weekday before ramadhan settles in.

I'll be heading to the cinema for the last airbender but I have a feeling that I wouldn't enjoy it as much. I enjoyed the cartoon tremendously and I'm sure they'll make great alterations to the story. For one fact that instead of a chinese buddhist monk, aang is played as a bald white boy instead. We'll see about the rest of the movie and I'll tell you about it!

Till then, enjoy your monday too! (: