Oxford Trip 2008

I participated in another trip organised by the International Society and this time we went to the infamous city of Oxford, the birth place of the infamous University of Oxford, which according to my tour guide, top 5 universities in the world.

We departed from the University around 8.30am and arrived safely in Oxford around 12.00pm. Yeah, what a journey! I was seated next to a super quiet guy from Italy and in front me was a fellow Malaysian, Joyce. She greeted me upon seeing my reading GuiT (Growing Up In Trengganu) by Awang Groneng or Uncle Wan Hulaimi.

"Rindu ke? Are you from Trengganu? Is it any good?"
"Would love to say that but I'm from Melaka. I'm still at page 45, so can't give you accurate review, but I was told that the book was No.1 for several weeks at MPH."

Well, we didn't talk so much after that, because (1) we were seating on different seats; and (2) I was kind of sleepy, so I spent most of my journey time in sleep. When I was awake, I helped myself listening to sayup-sayup music from "neighbour". He has a tasteful song selection - I Will Always Love You, I Will Survive, Raining Men, Black or White, among others. I don't know, may be he put the volume at 9 or 10, because I can listen the music too!

My first destination upon arriving in Oxford was the Ashmolean Museum, a museum which focusing on art and archaeology. After I got tired with the usual stuff from the Roman and Egyptian worlds, I checked out its sourvenier shop and performed my routine purchase - fridge magnet!

Since I've ample time for the scheduled guided tour, I entered Sainsbury's Local for a couple of Danish to supplement my lunch that I brought from home. This is because I thought lunch will be expensive in Oxford, but it turned out that goods and services in the city was reasonably priced.

During the guided tour, I had the experienced to visit three colleges, namely Christ Church, Melton College and the New College. Based on my brief observation, the buildings here are largely influenced by Gothic style. Man... Oxford people must be greatly in love with Gothic!
According to my guide, similar to University of Cambridge, this university has a long history of unfavourable treatment towards female students too. If you guys are interested to find out more, please send me an email, okay...

And I make new friends - Aylin from Turkey, Arslan from Iran and Aziz from Tajikistan.

Now, let me share with you some pictures taken during my trip to Oxford:

Fire Alarm and the Year of the Rat

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all my Chinese friends and readers a prosperous Chinese New Year. To whoever (of course I'm referring to my friends, not the 1 billion plus Chinese in this world) that I unintentionally missed to send a personal wishes, please forgive my carelessness. I was told by a classmate from China that according to Chinese zodiac, the rat is associated as a protector and bringer of material prosperity. Whatever it is, Gong Xi Fa Chai!

I woke very late today because two days in a row, my beautiful sleeps were interrupted by the firm alarm. The funny thing is both happened at about the same time i.e. around 3.30 am and according to the warden the alarm was triggered from the same source i.e. Flat 6!

I'm sure you guys know the procedure when the fire alarm went off. We have to go out from the building and assemble ourself in the parking lot waiting for the security team to check, verify, mitigate and address the situation. After about 10 minutes of battling the cold winter (in the month of February!), we were, then, allowed to return to our room.

But the suffering didn't end there. I was struggling to return to my beautiful sleep both last night and the previous one. But the previous one was even worse because it took me more than 2 hours before I could sleep again. And last night it was less than an hour. Oh God... please, please... don't let it happens again tonight.

I've class on Qualitative Research today and at 3.15 pm, I've a meeting with the Programme Director and Carole (the Fieldtrip Coordinator) on our fieldtrip to Singapore during the Easter Break. Unlike the majority of my classmates, I'm so not looking forward for this fieldtrip because I was expecting to go any African or Latin American countries or Middle Eastern countries at least. But not to my neighbouring country which I can take a four hour bus ride from Kuala Lumpur.

Looking from another perspective, at least I will be getting a free trip to visit my aunts in Singapore. If I'm not mistaken one is in Jurong something something and another one is in Woodland. Well, after the briefing on the proposed agenda and itinerary I think I should give my parents a call to obtain the contact details of Aunty Som and Aunty Sadibah.

Anyway, the trip is about one month's time so I think I better give my attention to my incoming trip to Oxford this Saturday. Yes, guys... I'm going for another trip with the International Society and it's quite reasonable too (18 pound, including a free guided tour!)

Happy holidays to my friends in Malaysia and Singapore. Enjoy your long weekend.

Maklumat Tamat Pengajian Tahun 2008?

I'm sure by now you alreday know how excited I am to find letters or packages from Malaysia in my mailbox. And today I received another letter from my employer's HR department. I thought I was about to read the letter on salary increment or something, but it turned out to be a letter to take note that (the "kami sedia maklum" kind of letter) I will be finishing my postgraduate study this year and in this regard, I need to fill in a form to facilitate my return home in September 2008.

Wow! Time really, really flies very, very fast! In eight months' time I will be heading home, sweet home.

The letter requires me to notify the HR department on the exact date (tarikh sebenar) of the end of my program, plus a letter from the University to verify the said date. I guess they need to start undertake a couple of necessary processes such as approval and clearance for several special allowances, flight booking and job placement.

Wow! I've just started my second semester last week and my final semester will only starts in July, but I have to start prepare myself to go home. That is really, really quick. Don't you think so?

And thank you very, very much for your kind wishes for my exams in May 2008. I don't have exams for my final semester but I need to submit a 15,000-word dissertation. Ya Rabbi... I have yet to pick a topic for this work. Microfinance? Measuring DFIs' performance? MDGs? Like what one of my housemates used to say to me, "Lets do one by one". Yeah... that sounds reasonable to me and first thing, first. I need the letter from the University!


p/s: I'm so glad that Wan has been given the visa to come to UK. See you in London soon!

Birthday, Legacy & Tate

I just came back from my friend's place where I spent my weekend with him and his housemates and the wife of one of his housemate. Well, the prime reason for the get together was to celebrate his BIG birthday last Friday. Yes, he just joined the club, the same club that Etty, Hisyam, Fezal, Mus, Rikke, Izal, Rina and I are currently in. Welcome aboard, bro!

Actually, I don't want to talk about birthday party because it reminds me of how inconsistent I am when it comes to birthday celebration. Although I enjoy throwing birthday parties for my friends, but when it comes to my own, I just dislike the idea of celebrating my birthday. I will try my very best not to be around my family and friends on my birthday so that I won't be getting any surprises on the said day. Nevertheless, I appreciate nice suprises on any other days. Hehehe.

It was easy to run away during my school and college days because my birthday were always during the term breaks or on weekends. But it's not the case anymore. My strategy has changed since I started working. I make sure I will be on leave on my birthday week. Not only that, I will go out from Kuala Lumpur to some places to "hide" from family and friends.

My lame excuse for the past six years is "to be alone and silently remember my late grandpa, Cikgu Jaafar, on this momentous Teacher's Day". I guess now you know the conundrum of I traveling to places in the month of May, alone, annually.

However, this weekend might have changed everything. And I don't think it is worth running away from mine after this.

My friend and I had a meaningful conversation about birthday and life after the dinner. No doubt that we might have spending quality time with family and friends, out of our busy schedule on, let say, holidays or festive seasons. But, directional-wise, all of that are beyond personal level; it could be family or society institution levels.

Birthday is all about me or you, directly. What and how have I or you become the way I am or you are, now. Family and friends are the best keeper of my or yours legacy, aren't they?

While talking about my bank of stories (my collection of stories which I dream might be worth telling to the "world" in various forms or mediums), my friend said this to me, "why don't you write about my story instead?"

"No offence... I don't think I know you too well to write about you."
"In that case, you have to come and celebrate my birthday more often. I see no one but you who I can trust to write a good piece for my memoir"

As I looked into his eyes, he said, "If, and only if, I become the PM."

I'm sure birthday celebration won't be so scary after this. I had great weekend and I'm sure others too. We had delicious dinner, fulfilled Ina's hasrat to see the works of John Singer Sargent at the Tate Britain and of course the pleasure of viewing a film from Germany for our World Cinema agenda.

Happy birthday, Joe (and it is Nora's too). Thank you very, very much for the invitation.

Stop complaining about your hair, Ms. Flockhart!

I'm not on my highest point of my life right, but thank God, not on my lowest point either. But believe me, I just not in my best form at this point of time. Literally.

As you can see from the pictures from the Belfast trip, I'm currently having bad hair. As much as I dislike my hairstyle right now, I'm dying to keep it grows long. Stop laughing, Mus. Okay, okay... I'm very keen to have a similar hairstyle as M. Nasir, Anuar Zain and Jamal Abdillah (I was told that Jamal is having his hair short, is that true?). And based on my previous experiences, a year is too short of time to grow my hair to match theirs' lengths. In case you don't know, in about eight months' time, I've to back to my office, which means go to back to the government servant (or should I say semi-government) haircut.

The reason I dislike my hair is because not only it will awkwardly curl at its end, it kembangs too. Yeah, I come from a family with thick, strong, healthy black hair. Well, at least every male in my family still keep the hair for decades.

Besides bad hair, I'm so unfortunate to be attacked by pimples. Mus called it jerawat nasi and they are all over my face. To add salt to the wound, I've a couple of what I call as "horny pimples" at several noticeable spots. Wait... don't get me wrong. I don't mean horny, horny. I mean when I get excited such as the arrival of Ally McBeal DVDs or excitement to go places, these unwanted things will suddenly appear on my exotic face.

And I don't have my nailclipper with me for almost two weeks now. Oh God... am I becoming like Ally McBeal? Stop laughing, Mus! I'm not vain, okay...

So, Mazlina... I hope this answers your question as why I didn't take close-up pictures of me during my vacation with some of my classmates.

Also, I would like to bid farewell to Fairuz, who will be returning to Cairo to continue his Master degree there. All the best, brother and thank you very, very much for your nasihats. If you're having problem to download the following pictures, don't feel hesitate to let me know so that I could email them to you.