Bahrain 2013: Ramadan Kareem

During Ramadan, all restaurant closed in order to respect this holy Month of Ramadan.
This is the local brand fast food: Jasmi's

I follow my cousin and uncle to this tailor shop that tailor high quality suits, etc.

I did follow my cousin for taraweeh prayer at the nearby mosque. It was a great experience though. They all mostly in black, but we Malaysian like to pray with white. Since I don't look local - Chinese or east Asian looking are pretty rare - I feel that maybe they see me a little bit 'rare' haha. There's a lot of Indian, Nepalese, Indonesian and Filipino working in Bahrain.
But we everyday pray taraweeh at home.
Malaysian here are mostly professional worker, like engineer, architect, etc..

During Ramadan, I follow my aunt, cousin, uncle to go shopping.
Basically we just stay in the house most of the time due to hot weather outside (its summer here).

Some vegetables that are normal vegetable in Malaysia like okra is frozen.
Since Bahrain is a desert-like topography, it doesn't allow any vast agriculture - in other word, it is not suitable.
TOP: Bottled chocolate water... I found it rather peculiar! lol

This is the popular brand here for Milk.

More photos here on our break-fast food here in Bahrain!

1434H Ramadan - Self Control

Hello everybody, its been a while since I've been updated anything to my diary blog here.

(It's always 'I will update soon' means I'll update in a month time, or completely forgotten... -_-)

The fact that I rarely update my blog even though I have a lot of fascinating stuff happen in my life is because blogging is something that I need to put lots of effort! Haha.

Besides that, since there's a lot of people around me reading this blog, so I need to be cautious with whatever I'm writing..

From photo to the writing, it took me few hours, even half a day to post a blogpost.

Since its been semester holiday right now, I'll try to update as much as I can. I "try".lol

The main problem that I have right now is "self-control" and I believe that this holy month of Ramadan will able to let me get control of myself, my emotion, physical and spiritual.

I'm ready to fully use this year Ramadan to be a better person, build up my self confidence back and relax.

I'm ready to cleanse my soul, my mind, my body and myself.

So, I have a lot of things I want to concentrate about is about "myself".

All these while, I kept thinking of how my image is represented and judge by people.

Hence, I keep on punishing myself with negativity.

That's why I have no motivation to even update my blog (that's mostly about myself and my life).

I lose control. I lose myself.

This.cannot.go.on.

I need to change this, I need to be in control.

So, Ramadan is the best month to regain my control.

Its all about self-control.

Wish me all the best~!

By the way, I'm working on my first ever song, which I found it kind of strange song.lol

I'm into music more on interest and passion. Basically, musical noob. XP

I need to work on the lyrics and the melody, so I can let my friend to arrange the song.

Then I can submit my demo for next semester performance!

=)

Singing koala~~

Twenty-one. 15-08-2012

A note to my 21 years old self  =)

So it is a tradition that I posted something regarding my birthday every year. So this is it.

I feel that I am so blessed that I could celebrate my humble 21 years old of me with my parents.
No need mountains of presents, no need of a party.
I feel that my 21st birthday should be celebrated with grateful and down to earth moment.
Since it is coincidentally on the last 10 days of Ramadan.

Every steps, every journey, I'd like to celebrate the moment to the fullest.
I no need a present. I already got my present.
Hong Kong, HKUST, the experience is the biggest present that my parents give to me.
The experience is priceless.
I treasure every moment and every second of it.

I'm so blessed that I have such a wonderful parents, family, friends, teachers and people around me.
Thank you.

So here is some note that I wrote for myself:

That is the simple version of these version below:


Human live with choices.
Sometimes we regrets what we choose, sometimes we got delighted with our choice.
Life is a bittersweet experience where we embrace the consequences of the choice to learn and live the life to the fullest.
Every moment counts we try to understand humans, so that we learn from each other.
Every choice that we make, is the one that define who we are.

Life is more than luck and hard work.
It is full with emotion, passion and memories.
Treasure them.

Another step taken, another year gone, another day bring us closer to death.
Looking at the bright side, it is another day to change the world.
A small idea, a simple thought, a tiny hope and with a bit of luck; it is another day to make world a better place.
Believe that one day, the summit of your dream is not as far as you thought.
But do not forget the ground to where you belong when you fly high up to the sky.
Never give up, never lose hope and never stop believing.

It is a reminder note to 21 years old myself.

Life is not always lonely and miserable.
At least, I able to celebrate with my parents alongside with me.

What's a birthday without cake? lol
I got myself different slice of cake of different flavour. lol
So long haven't eat cake =D

Thank you Daddy and Mama.
Without you, I'm nothing.
You're my heroes.
I always wanted to make you proud of me.

Thank you so much. =)

Oh ya, I should go and register myself as voter and be counted! =D

YouTube: Love Letter To Malaysia

Hi there!
Happy Merdeka Raya~!
Well, I'm going to tell you about my Raya celebration later but first, I want to share about this awesome thing about: Love Letter to Malaysia.
The best part is...
I'm in it!
Check out  1:52 and 3:49. :)


I did this bentō long time ago.
I feel so patriotic on that day.
I know a lot of people who understand, will feel the same thing too.
709
Does it ring a bell?

The video.. To be honest, it was kinda last minute because I was thinking about what should I write...
At last:

"Malaysia, Negaraku
How about you?"
It rhyme isn't it? :P

I know that its kind of not so clear in the video.. I'm out of black coloured pen.LOL
But when I took it using my camera it was solid nice.
Then converted it to wmv, then to mp4 format for Apple... it gets like that.
But... it turn out to be awesome!
Special thanks to Calvin Ong.

Binn Teoh come out with something interesting too.
Malaysia = Makan
hehe
It felt like Maths T though!
Equation and the word 'Since' for proving. LOL
Hope you reading this! :P

My turkey! Really Calvin, you make my turkey famous in the video!
The turkey really busybody. Haha!
Calvin suggested I name it Si Ketot Penyibuk. LOL!!!


My turkey also very patriotic~ He wanted to say how proud he is to be born in Malaysia!

What is independence mean to you Malaysian?

Merdeka Raya!

I'd like to use this opportunity to wish all the Malaysian Happy Independent Day!
Stay united and bring change to Malaysia towards a better future!


And...


Happy Eid ul Fitr
Selamat Hari Raya!
If I did or write anything that's offensive that hurts your feeling, that's unintentional and please forgive me.
May God bless all of us.

P.S: When I was recording the video, my mom was wondering what am I doing out there. She thought I was fighting with the turkey!
Sweat*

My 20th birthday...

Hey there.
Today I'm 20.
I am no longer a teenager.
I'm a young adult now.

Lets talk about today.
15th August 2011.
Today is my birthday.


15th August this year coincidentally is on the 15th of Ramadan.
With beautiful full moon today.
1st day of the week, Monday.
16/7 for Chinese Calendar: Hungry Ghost festival.

******************************

My turkey lay her first egg today.

Today is coincidentally is a Hungry Ghost festival.
So there's loud noise near my house here.
Like a party. Sort of.
Not my party.

Today is full moon.
Beautiful moon tonight.

My 20th birthday is a extremely normal day.
Which make me extremely sad.
I'd like to have special something on my birthday.
Well, I hope too much is it?

No cake, no friends and no presents.
I miss those time that I open the present's wrapper to see what's inside.
Nobody give me any sort of that.
I guess I need to grow up.
I can't expect present isn't it?

Well, I still feel grateful that I receive a birthday card from lovely 3 pretty ladies, Michelle, April and Mandy 4 days before my birthday :')
Thank you so much!

No cake candle, the normal candle also can la~

I really enjoy meeting you guys! Hope to meet you pretty ladies again!

I get ang pau from my dad for my birthday. =')

I get 1 day free talk time by Hotlink and birthday voucher from J-card membership that I need to go and collect.

Other than that, I get SMS from my close friends.

I didn't online one whole day.
Because I just feel sad...
I feel so envious for those who get to celebrate their birthday with friends, cakes and presents.
My birthday always been the most unhappy day.
I wonder when the time come when I'll be happy.

When I was a small girl, we always have birthday party.
School, Ibu's house, my house...
We invite friends and families.
We have cute gifts, cake and a loud birthday song for me.

I'm just letting my honest feeling here.
I know there're more unfortunate person out there who are not as blessed as me.

20th birthday cake not for me to eat. 2 leaves = 20 =')

For my little chickens!

I guess my 20th birthday I celebrated with my little chicks and chickens.
I sound so pathetic isn't it?
Well I am.

I'd like to take the opportunity here to thank to about 110 friends from Facebook who wish me Happy birthday.

Thank you so much ='')

Fascinating Facts about Fasting for Health :)

Hello~
In the holy month of Ramadan, Muslims are required to fast for a month.
So why are we fasting anyway?
There's a lot of benefits of fasting!
I stumble across a very nice article about fasting.
Its written by both Muslim and non-Muslim.
In my opinion, fasting is universal.
And there's another article from Muslim's point of view.
There's so many articles in the net. I select few to share it here.

In short, for Islam, fasting includes:

Thanks to princessvd a.k.a. Seryna Jin H S (^_^)v

For me, fasting month is not about Bazaar Ramadan.
Haven't visit any Bazaar Ramadan yet!lol
It is about cleansing ones body and soul.
This is not only for Muslims, non-Muslims can get benefits form fasting too!



The 1st article that I'd like to share is from celestinechua.com
The article talks about her Fasting Experiment including benefits of fasting according to her research.
It is the claimed to be the most complete fasting series you’ll ever find online.
It is very informative and worth reading if you are searching for answers. :)

I grab some of the catchy title for summary:
1. What's Water Fasting?
2. Why Fast? (Benefits of fasting)
   - Natural Way to Heal
3. Why I Embarking on this Fast?
   - Immense Benefits of Fasting: Mental Clarity, Increased Creativity, etc
   - Emotional Purging
   - Enabling Others to Learn and Grow
   - Weight loss
   - Building a New Relationship with Food
4. How Long Should One Fast?
   Stage 1: Daily food

   Stage 2: Glycogen from liver (Glycogenolysis)

   Stage 3: Glycogen from our muscles

   Stage 4: Ketosis (Fasting)

   Stage 5: Starvation (eventually leading to death)...etc.

Some of the catchy facts:

These tend to happy from Day 3 onwards of their fast. One of the big reasons is because since there’s nothing to digest, our body stops diverting energy to our digestive systems and instead directs them to our brain, leading to higher level output (i.e. thinking and creative work).

Discover the technique of correct fasting so that you'll gain the benefits that you wanted for your health!

No worries for the Muslims though.
Since we've been practicing since small.
Plus, there's guideline that is made especially for Muslims.
Follow it, and God's willing, you'll be fine. :)

I found the next article regarding fasting and Islam.
I copy and paste from this site: http://forums.understanding-islam.com/showthread.php?945-Health-Benefits-of-Fasting
Edited by emphasizing some facts since the article is quite long.

Health Benefits of Fasting

Food is needed by the body to provide energy for immediate use. This is done by burning up carbohydrates, that is, sugar. Excess of carbohydrates which cannot be used are stored up as fat tissue in the muscles and as glycogen in the liver for future use. Insulin, a hormone from the pancreas, lowers blood sugar and diverts it to other forms of energy storage, that is, glycogen. To be effective, insulin has to be bound to binding sites called receptors. Obese people lack receptors. Therefore, they cannot utilize their insulin. This may lead to glucose intolerance.

When one fasts (or decreases carbohydrate intake drastically), it lowers one's blood glucose and insulin level. This causes a breakdown of glycogen from the liver to provide glucose for energy needs and break-down of fat from adipose tissue to provide for energy needs. On the basis of human physiology described above, semi-starvation (ketogenic diets) have been devised for effective weight control. These diets provide a calculated amount of protein in divided doses with plenty of water, multivitamins, etc. These effectively lower weight and blood sugar, but because of their side effects, should be used only under the supervision of physicians.

Total fasting reduces or eliminates hunger and causes rapid weight loss. In 1975, Allan Cott in his Fasting as a Way of Life, noted, "Fasting brings a wholesome physiological rest for the digestive tract and central nervous system and normalizes metabolism." It must be pointed out, however, that there are also many adverse effects of total fasting. That includes hypokalemia and cardiac arrhythmia associated with low calorie starvation diets used in unsupervised programs.


The process of decomposing and eliminating waste toxic materials by means of Islamic fasting can improve or even cure the above mentioned diseases and other ones such as : cardiovascular and circulatory diseases, diseases of digestive system, diseases of the locomotor system including rheumatism, respiratory system diseases including asthma, and the early stage of malignant diseases like cancer.
  
 1-All mucus diseases such as colds, flu, asthma, hay fever, sinus and bronchial troubles are rapidly dissolved and eliminated from the body, leaving the user free from the varied allergies which cause difficult breathing and clogging of the sinus cavities…. I.E: My aunty used to be a patient that suffered from a severe asthma for 2 decades or 3. When she was over 50 she decided to observe the sunna fasting (every Monday and Thursday). As a result, she was thoroughly cured after a period of time.

   2-The types of diseases that are a result of calcium deposits in the joints, muscles, cells, and glands are readily dissolved and removed from the body. Cholesterol deposits in the arteries and veins also respond to the cleansing power of fasting (p13).

   3-Fasting can be used to normalize our weight. As our common sense says, weight reduction is achieved by fasting, along with other health benefits. There are many diet programs using an unbalanced diet that can be dangerous for our health. Fasting is a natural way to normalize our body weight.

   4-Fasting dissolves all unnecessary and unnatural fat deposits all over the body and the body is relieved of a tremendous burden.

   5-When we fast for a few days, the stomach shrinks to its normal size and the hungry feeling gradually fades away. When we go back to the normal diet, we won’t have exaggerated hunger and won’t overeat (Bragg & Bragg, 1999).

   6-Surprisingly enough, fasting programs can be used for underweight people who cannot gain weight even if they stuff themselves with many fattening foods. The cause of both overweight and underweight is a nutritionally unbalanced diet. “People are not nourished in proportion to amount of food they eat, but in proportion to how much they digest and assimilate” (Bragg & Bragg, 1999, p120). Thus what underweight people need is exactly what overweight people need revitalizing the digestive and assimilative systems to work efficiently.

   7-As metabolism is improved through fasting, the body recuperates the capability to assimilate proteins, fats, carbohydrates, starches, sugars, minerals, vitamins and all other essential nutrients necessary because all organs work properly after fasting.

   8-The human body uses the skin as a secondary eliminative organ. Because conditions such as boils, abscesses, carbuncles, and pimples are the body’s effort to eliminate poisons, skin problems also disappear as the rest of the body is cleansed (Burroughs, 1976).

   9-The stomach, intestines and colon are given a complete rest by the fast and are enabled to repair damaged structures. Piles, proctitis, colitis, appendicitis, enteritis, enteric fever (typhoid), gastritis, etc., speedily recover under the fast. The alimentary tract becomes practically free of bacteria during a fast. The small intestines become sterile.

   10- It renew cells, in other words, those who fast look younger than those who don’t. Amazingly, when someone looks at the face of a 40-year-old Muslim woman who reared eight children, they might think she is under 30.

Obviously, this is due mainly to fasting.

Finally, fasting can help people to break addictions to harmful substances: tobacco, drugs, alcohol, tea, coffee, and other habit-forming beverages. 


Fasting leads our body to get rid of stored poisons, including addictive substances, and we lose our craving and tolerance for them. 


Thus after fasting we will feel nausea or sometimes have attacks of vomiting, “nature’s purge” if taking addictive substances.

Don't worry if you have bad breath when you fast! It just means that your body is functioning well.

Your bad breath is the result of the elimination of toxins from your body and will shift as your body gets clean. (Q12 Your Fasting Q&As)

You might also like:
Benefits of Fasting
Mosque Leader Explains Ramadan: 'You Feel What Hunger Means'
Benefits of Ramadan - What are the benefits of fasting during Ramadan

Fasting has a lot of benefits and not to mention to get closer to God.
It is not about hungry and thirst. It is more than that.
Islam is amazing.
The more question about why, the more reason for me to love Islam.
Muslims is another story.
Muslim does not necessarily equal to Islam.
So mind the word.

I hope I teach a lot about fasting to myself and you, my blog reader.
Malaysia is a diverse nation with so many culture and religion.
We respect each other's believe.

If you like to insult other people's believe, please be repent.
There's always reason why don't have one religion only in the world.
With differences, we united.
Use the gift of sense to judge something, not by using emotion.
No matter who you are, understanding and respect is very important in life.

I would like to close my post with this wonderful music video.

Great song! I'm so touched. Beautiful voice.

Thank you again to princessvd a.k.a. Seryna Jin H S

"One who, while fasting, neither guards his tongue from telling lies nor refrains from doing bad deeds does not respect his fast, while Allah does not approve of mere abstention from food... When you fast, you should not speak ill of anybody, nor should you be boisterous or noisy. If anybody speaks ill of you or tries to pick a quarrel with you, do not respond to him in the same manner; rather, simply tell him that you are fasting. :) "

May Allah accept our fasting, forgive our sins, and guide us all to the Straight Path. May Allah bless us all during Ramadan, and throughout the year, with His forgiveness, mercy, and peace, and bring us all closer to Him and to each other.

Happy Ramadan!

Happy Ramadan!

It has been a while since I updated my blog. I have a lot of things to share but I am too tired to write it, lazy and no internet access at my current location. Haha

I'll post about it when I'm ready with the materials for it. ^^

A little bit about my blog…

Well, this blog is mostly about me and what happens around me. It sounds selfish isn’t it? But this is my blog, my digital diary that anyone can read. I love to share my feeling, experience and things happen around me. I’m a very mysterious person who loves to see the occurrence of numbers. Sometimes you can see my blog’s date and time is somehow related.

Thank you so much for those who visited my blog and read my post!

This month is the holy month of Ramadan. I'd like to get closer to god.

Its amazing that Ramadan in 2011 start on 1st of August.

My birthday is on 15th August, it is during full moon.

I want to lose a bit of weight too this month :)

I'm targeting to achieve 49 kg. At least 50kg.

I'm around 52.5kg after breaking fast and 51.5kg before breaking fast.

I mean, it is not wrong to be moderate isn't it?

I'm not eating a lot and I still chasing around my chickens.lol

Need to help my dad harvesting chilies tomorrow.

Hope my metabolism stay strong till the end of the month.

My birthday this year... not expecting anything.

Maybe birthday wishes through facebook, I'm sure.

It has been a while since I get anything for my birthday.

Birthday present is rare nowadays.lol

Anyway, my birthday is on holy month means that I can get more pahala from God!

My journey as a Muslim is different than other people. 

But with the same goal and purposes.

I'd like to share more recipes from my mother since I got a lot of hits for my 1st recipe. ^^

I'll slowly compose my next post soon!

Happy Ramadan again!