Nali

I do not know what to name the Post Title.

A few days ago, I received a friend add on FB. It was from a former classmate in MRSM. The last time I met her was in 1983, the tearful goodbyes at BM train station.

I accepted her friend request, chat with for a bit and then I told her I was going back home on Thursday and asked if she would mind if I were to make a slight detour and went to visit her at her house. She did not, so I did.


We were happy to see each other after more than 30 years. It was like we were never apart. Back in school I was mean towards her at times. She is the type that can easily be bullied. I am so sorry for what I did a long time ago. I hope she forgives me.

After SPM Nali completed her matrix courses but did not further her education. She chose to be a stay at home mom when she got married. She now has 5 kids, the eldest is 21 and the youngest is 7. She seems genuinely happy and it showed as she glowed with pride when she talked about her kids and her husband. Honestly, I have never met anyone my age to be so contended with her life. Meeting Nali the first time after more than 30 years was a humbling experience.I will definitely make more detours after this.

I was in tears driving back home. Thank you Allah for this reunion. I can't imagine me in Nali's shoes. I would have a lot to complaint! I cannot be as easily contended as Nali is.

I should learn to be more syukur and sabar.. syukur and sabar.... syukur and sabar.

Alhamdulillah ala kulli hal.

Wallahu a'lam

My wish may come true (finally!)

InsyaaALlah

Remember when I was contemplating what to do post relinquishing my employment?. One of the thing is what is closest to my heart. Teaching excel and what you can do with it.

I do not have many skills, but I do have one that I value very much.My excel skill. I am by no means an expert but I noticed that amongst the people in the financial fraternity that I have come in contact with over the years, I am better than most. The only people that are above me or at par are those that specialised in preparing Financial Models for a living.

Once many years ago the company sent me to a 4 day workshop for FM with excel and lotus in Singapore and paid a dear sum for it. That was when I realised that I have something of value. The workshop was attended by 15 people (the maximum they would take) mainly from banking industry, advisory firms and a couple from a renowned firm that specialised in preparing FM for new projects, financing etc. I ended up being the assistant to the presenter, who was specifically flown in from South Africa for the workshop. I have to assist him to check the work of others and he checked with me now and again when introducing a new thing. You see, his knowledge is more academic while mine is more hands on and practical. And during that time I have already mastered both excel and lotus equally and I can use the keyboard for shortcuts with eyes closed and he was so impressed!

Enough self praising!!!

Anyhow, my motto is always knowledge sharing. No matter how trivia it may be, share and you will end up learning more.

I want to impart this little knowledge that I have, but so far only one person has taken that offer and I have taught him and his son how to do cashflow projections using excel. Alhamdulillah, he found it to be a very useful skill to have. While he planned for me to do this for a few of his entrepreneur friends, they do not seem to be interested.

And then out of the blue my partime boss suggested that I should conduct a class for the Finance staffs, mainly those who joined after I left and I jumped at the opportunity. Elation!!!

The dates have been set, it will be 29 April to 2 May. I actually sat in front of this PC to start doing the power point presentation but why oh why am I here instead?? I have all the things I want to teach in my head, but putting pen to paper, so to speak, takes a lot of will power. To steer away from FB, from games and blogging, does take a lot of will power!  haih!

On 3 May, insyaaAllah 8 of us killerladies and 6 nonkillers will be  flying off to Bandung for a 4 days shopping extravaganza, I am so excited. Hopefully this is the first of many trips we will be taking together, Allah willing.

Syukur

This entry is a continuation of the last one.

While driving to Kayel yesterday, I was listening to radio Perakfm. On Thursday, they have a program called Santai bersama UKE. I very much like to listen to this, and I plan that in the future, if I were to drive through Perak, I would make sure that it will be on Thursday evening, so I will get to listen to this, 3pm to 5pm.

Yesterday the topic was menghargai jasa baik orang lain. Kalau jasa orang lain pon kita kena hargai, apatah lagi nikmat dan pemberian Yang Maha Esa, lagi Maha Pemurah.

Ustaz Kasim memetik sepotong ayat "Lainn syakartum la aziidannakum, walainn kafartum inna 'adzaabii lasyadiid" ("Sesungguhnya jika kamu bersyukur, pasti Kami akan menambah (nikmat) kepadamu, dan jika kamu mengingkari (nikmat-Ku), maka sesungguhnya azab-Ku sangat pedih".) Alquran: Ibrahim:7

لَٮِٕن شَڪَرۡتُمۡ لَأَزِيدَنَّكُمۡ‌ۖ وَلَٮِٕن ڪَفَرۡتُمۡ إِنَّ عَذَابِى لَشَدِيدٌ۬

If ye give thanks, I will give you more; but if ye are thankless, lo! My punishment is dire.

Maka, it is very important to be a hamba yang sentiasa bersyukur. There are two rewards when kita bersyukur, Allah swt akan menambahkan nikmatNYA kepada kita, dan kita tidak dikenakan azab, sesungguhnya azab Allah itu sangat pedih.

Nikmat Allah swt tu amat luas. Alhamdulillah.

Ya Allah, ampunilah hambaMU ini yang selalu lalai dan alpa dan sering lupa untuk bersyukur diatas nikmatMU apabila senang dan bahagia. Ampunilah hambaMU ini yang sering meminta-minta apabila dirundung malang dan kesedihan. Ya Allah`jadikanlah aku hambaMU yang sentiasa mensyukuri nikmatMU dan bersabar dengan segala ujianMU.

Alhamdulillah 'ala kulli hal. (Praise be to Allah under any and all circumstances).

Wallahu a'lam.

Syukurku hanyalah untukMU

I am drafting this in word rather than in the blog itself as I am not sure whether or not I will be posting it. (I am posting it, so here it is!)

A few days ago my Njang asked me, “duit adik ni tak luak-luak ka?” I was puzzled by the question. She explained that she did not notice any changes in my lifestyle before and after not working fulltime. I wanted to laugh because we were in my Cik Remia when we talked. What did she mean by no change, hello Njang, kita duk dalam kereta apa ni? Isn’t this a very obvious change in the lifestyle? Very very obvious!

I think she made that remark because I had just returned from umrah and was flashing my brand new silver ring and a brand new iphone 5. Last month she was envious of the iPad I bought for Abah.

So here’s the thing. It is true that it seems like my money macam tak luak. But mana boleh tak luak, unless I am spending less than what I am earning. But that’s not the case; there are months when I spend a lot more. For instance, this month alone, I spent more than double of what I earned in  a month. But how did I survive thus far? And can still pleasure myself with a few luxuries here and there. This is what I wanted to write about. Allah’s blessing. That must be it. I cannot think of any other reasons other than its all from Allah swt. Alhamdulillah. I am so thankful. So very thankful, Ya Allah. Never underestimate the power of duas

. وَقَالَ رَبُّڪُمُٱدۡعُونِىٓأَسۡتَجِبۡلَكُمۡۚ 

And your Lord hath said: Pray unto Me and I will hear your prayer. (AlQuran 40:60)

I am the type of person who calculates. I am not calculative but I prepare a budget for everything, I do cashflow forecast for my income and expenditure. Believe it or not, I have forecasted until I am 84 years old!!!! Just to see who or what will last longer, my money or I. Alhamdulillah based on the projection, bearing no unforeseen circumstances (accountant’s standard disclaimer phrase!) it looks like I will be the loser, money will survive. But that’s only my plan. Allah swt knows best.

Anyway, I budget. I plan for so much to spend every month but so far I have managed to always spend more than I budgeted!! There was always something, some unplanned expenditure. It will always be a necessity. But I noticed when this happened, somewhere in the near future, some unplanned income will surface. This happened over and over again. Alhamdulillah. SubhanAllah.

   فَبِأَيِّآلاءِرَبِّكُمَاتُكَذِّبَانِ

Then which of the favors of your Lord will ye deny? Al-Qur'an, 055 (Ar-Rahman [The Beneficent, The Mercy Giving])

iPhone 5 was not a planned thing, my BB was giving me problems for quite sometimes. One day I met a friend and upon looking at my battered BB, she chuckled and said, “MJ, go get yourself a Samsung or an iPhone 5 now, right now, please”. So I did, immediately after we finished our tea and charged it to my credit card. (Buying the phone was another story for another day, perhaps). When I get home, I will open my budget and figure out how to pay for that. I did that but did not reach a solution. Although I have a little money saved elsewhere, I will not touch that unless it is needed for umrah trips. A few days later, an opportunity to earn extra income came a knocking!!! You see what I mean?

   فَبِأَيِّآلاءِرَبِّكُمَاتُكَذِّبَانِ

Then which of the favors of your Lord will ye deny? Al-Qur'an, 055 (Ar-Rahman [The Beneficent, The Mercy Giving])

I went for umrah last month. In the original budget, we assumed 15 people will go with us and based on that, 2 persons can go for free. I am one of them, the other is our advisor. Since I have never handled this trip totally on my own, I felt a little insecure and therefore I thought since I am going FOC and I have budgeted for this trip, I might as well use that money to bring another person with me; someone who can assist me, when help is needed. Initially I thought of bringing Big D, but then my sister has not been there so I might as well bring her instead. When I asked her, she said yes and a few days later decided that her husband will also go. Again a blessing, otherwise she will not be able to go due to mahram issue (aduhai la Arab Saudi and your rules!). Things started to go wrong from the very beginning; firstly, one jemaah cannot go because of mahram issue. Then we cannot get the hotel that we planned, the one closer to Haram. After that another jemaah cancelled due to health reason. We still continued with our plans and continued to pray. The visa fees were more than what we were originally told, hotels were more expensive. And we continued to make duas. 

. وَقَالَ رَبُّڪُمُٱدۡعُونِىٓأَسۡتَجِبۡلَكُمۡۚ

And your Lord hath said: Pray unto Me and I will hear your prayer. (AlQuran 40:60)

Robbi yassir wa la tu ‘assir, rabbi thammim bil khayr

Meanwhile I have to refund the jemaah that cannot go because she has no mahram. With all the increase in the expenses and sponsoring my sister, I ended up spending more than what I originally planned to spend for this trip. Considerably more, about RM5,000 more, that is A LOT to me! But somehow I did not have to touch my savings at all except to pay for the airfare for my sister and I!, this is still a mystery to me. You see, I ended up having to pay for my sister; a full package price, paying airfare for myself, refunded the jemaah, pay the extra visa fees and extra hotel bills. Its mind boggling, really, but I am not complaining. SubhanALlah!

   فَبِأَيِّآلاءِرَبِّكُمَاتُكَذِّبَانِ

Then which of the favors of your Lord will ye deny? Al-Qur'an, 055 (Ar-Rahman [The Beneficent, The Mercy Giving])

Alhamdulillah our umrah trip went smoothly despite staying quite far from Haram, none in the group fell ill, a minor cough and cold were spotted but nothing serious, a few hiccups here and there but otherwise okay. This time around, we were all blessed with good appetite! Alhamdulillah.

Thank you Allah. HambaMu ini memohon keampunanMU kerana tidak mampu memujiMu sepertimana Engkau memuji diriMU. Tidak ada kata-kata yang dapat menggambarkan kesyukuranku kepada MU Ya Allah!

SubhanALlah. Alhamdulillah. ALlahu Akbar!

So, how are you really?

A couple of days ago, I had an extra long lunch with a friend from way back when. The last time I met her was in Feb 2009 when she visited me in the hospital. Back when I had fibroids removed.

We seldom contacted each other, in fact I think from Feb 2009 to Jan 2013, we only made contact via sms at most 4 times!!

She had also left full time employment about a year ago. We shared a few things in common that way.

Then she asked me, so how are you really? To that, my answer was quite spontaneous. I said, I am very happy right now, Alhamdulillah. I could do better in the health department but otherwise, I am happy. I realised I no longer had to think of what to say when people ask me how am I, these days. The truth is at the moment I am the happiest as I have ever been. I cannot recollect being happier and more contented.

I realised I do not need much to feel this way. Long time ago, I thought you could only be happy and contented when you have all the things you wanted, dream job, huge income, big cars, big house, a husband and a couple or more children. You definitely have to have bank, that's what I thought. I cannot be more wrong. Look at me today, I live with my parents with meager income which I do not know whether it will stop coming the next month or the month after. I am driving the smallest and cheapest car ever! And yet I feel so free and so blessed... owh what a feeling! Thank you Allah!

The best part of it is that I now no longer yearn for things I cannot afford. I have very little needs and my wants are very few and very far in between and I am okay if I do not have them. Thank you Allah!.

May we all be in Allah's care forever and ever.


p/s, happy birthday to my bffs, Mazmin and Rohana. May our friendship never come apart.

Ahlan wa sahlan 2013

Sudah tidak pernah berazam apa-apa lagi sejak kebelakangan ini apabila menutup tirai lama dan membuka tirai tahun yang baru.

Tapi entah kenapa, bila membuka mata pada pagi ini, tertanya pada diri, bagaimana 2013 bakal disusuri.

Maka berazam jugalah agar ditahun ini, mulai hari ini, walau apa pun yang ku lakukan.... biarlah ianya menjadi bekalan. Bekalan untuk kubawa kehadapan, ke kehidupan yang kekal. Semoga Allah swt permudahkan.

Selamat Tahun Baru saudara mara sekalian, kawan-kawan, rakan taulan, para kenalan dan jiran-jiran.

Jom kita kejar taqwa.

46

That's the number of years I have lived on this planet. I believed that number is greater than the number of years I have left to live. I don't think I will live to see my 92nd birthday but Allah knows best.

As usual there is no celebration whatsoever but this year my birthday is kinda different. For one, the nephews in BJ remember my birthday and sang happy birthday to you at about 30 minutes past midnight, which no one has ever done for me before and I am so touched by it. The other, which to me is of great significance is that my nephew KH, gave me RM50 as a birthday gift (I guess he did not know what to buy so giving me money is the shortcut). Its not the money that moved me, but its what he said when he gave me the money. Maknjang, ni present dari Abang Ayis to show my appreciation of you.....  sebak, I tell you! Thank you very much my dear nephew for making my day, maybe even my year!

His brother also gave me money.... "Maknjang nah 50sen, I am broke you know, not like adik, adik tu kaya." Haih! he has to learn to manage his allowance better. His excuse for his failure to control his expenses is simple. "Allowance sikit sangat, macamana nak manage". Double haih!

Mak and Abah called to wish me happy birthday but Anna refused to talk to me when Mak passed the phone to her, all she can think of to say is "majang lagak!" he he he which means Maknjang berlagak. She wishes that I am back home, so whenever I am not, Maknjang ni berlagak la, sebab I did not take her along. Favourite sayings from Anna these days are "lagak!" "lekut!" for kedekut and "ana tamau kawan" and of course "ana nak ikut" despite earlier calling you names.. Anna is my 2 and half years old niece, by the way. She is my constant  (most of the time, my only) companion whenever I am back home.

Earlier in the morning I received another call. Dia tanya whether I am in KL or in Kedah and said that dia kat Langkawi. The best part of the conversation is that, instead of wishing me a happy birthday, dia reminded me that today is the 1st of July and therefore it is my birthday and went on to describe a person who are born with number 1, i.e. 1st or the 10th. I am supposed to be stubborn. Which I think I am not.... :)) . Every year its the same. Called me and told me its my birthday and never once wish me anything... funny or what? Maybe next year will be different, we shall wait and see.... maybe not! Tak kisahlah!


Officially my birthday is over. I am done thanking everybody who sent me smses and all the birthday wishes on facebook. I do hope and pray that as I grow older, my iman and taqwa will also increase. I pray that Allah blesses me with umur yang panjang didalam kebajikan dan iman, and when my time to leave this world comes, I will die in husnul khatimah.

To all my BFFs, you know who you are, thank you for the lunches, the gift, the tea and coffee etc etc. May our friendship stay strong forever and ever.

Happy 46th birthday Maknjang.