Event : Kidney Day Run 2013

Hello Sunday !

I did my third public run this morning at Putrajaya with my brother, friends, and colleagues. It was by far the most happening running event for me. I was surrounded by people that I recognized :D and I really hope this would not be the end of it. I can't openly say how excited I was, but, yes, I was really excited ! Thank you Azmi, Ridir, Tasya, Faizah, Kak Ina, Ihsan, En.Zizi, En.Aizil, En.Zali and Aliya ! 

New record : 35 minutes for the 5 km run ! 

Much better than the previous run, but that mainly because I saw my friend was trying to beat me - and I hate that. Hah. I was nauseated afterwards, padan muka.

Anyhow, I finally reached my 100km all-time distance in Runkeeper. *it's currently 110km !
And I need to train for the upcoming Milo Breakfast Run and Mines Charity Run, in two weeks time.

Secretgroup Family

My brother, Azmi

Other post :

Brooks Run 2013

Walk & Run List 2013

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Movie : The Darjeeling Limited

Last week I finished my Sofia Coppola's case study, watched all her past movies but I haven't finished up my writing on the topic yet. In the midst of all depressing Coppola's movie, I listed one of Wes Anderson's movie called The Darjeeling Limited. That lifted my spirit, because I loved it so much ! At last, another good movie in my personal movie list.

How should I summarize? You can read it here, for a proper summary or you can just watch it - better.  It's about three brothers, traveling across India to find a better meaning in life - after they haven't met for a year since the death of their father. They can't cope the pain and lost, so they were drifted apart. The oldest brother, Francis (Owen Wilson) , took charge of the situation after his near-to-death-accident and wanted them to face the problem once and for all. The other two brothers were : Peter (Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman). So it was about a self-discovery journey in India.

What I loved about the movie ? :

Read more if you watched the movie and wanted to know what I think about it. 

Book : Manuscript Found in Accra

In the early April, Paulo's new book hit the bookstore, I brought it home right away. After finishing the longest journey with IQ84, I finally started reading it two days ago and continued finishing it yesterday. It merely took around 2 hours on my first read, maybe due to its big fonts. I'll churn it slowly again afterwards. 

The book is set in Jerusalem on the eve of the Crusades, where there was a gathering between a wise man called the Copt and an audience from all religions : Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the midst of a war. In the gathering, the audience asked questions and they listened to the wise man's philosophical thoughts. 

They asked about : the nature of love, elegance and beauty, work, sacrifices, difference between defeat and failure, anxiety,  and death. 

These are all values that needed to be known and shared, not based on religious system but as the same universal values. What Paulo is trying to say is the : "All religion is heading toward the same light and the light is God". This book is probably his opinions on how human should see this as a whole, he is trying to tell everyone about it, in his fiction. Good way of preaching about life.

It is like a book of wisdom, or positive values that people should be aware of. It is entirely liberated from any religion, so anyone who believe in God, can easily relate to it. If you don't believe in God, well, it's on moral values too - so you can still make use of it.

I am not sure why people want to bash him for writing book with positive values in it. I don't care if he made millions out of people for reading his book - if it's for a good cause, walaupun everything is obviously well-known. Lain lah if what he writes will turn his readers into orang2 tak berguna or something bad, kan. 

Extra fun part, 

I found John Crace's article on the review of the book from The Guardian, where he mocked Paulo's book all the way. So, I read other people's comment and I found this :

Great one, Paulo.
You are so cool in handling indirect attackers.

Little Stories 51 : 5 minutes event

I was reading the Manuscript in Accra by Paulo Coelho while standing in the train near the exit door. Deeply immersed in the book, before I heard a loud thud. I lowered down my book and saw a woman laying down on the floor. Her eyes were opened and white. She was unconscious.

Hurriedly I bent down to her and held her shoulder. I didn't know what to do. I thought, "is she having a seizure or she just fainted?". I looked around me, everyone was staring at us.

" Help me ! ", I shouted. 

Nobody moved, maybe they were too shocked to do anything. Then a person helped me lift her into a sitting position and she slowly started to gain consciousness again. I kneeled behind her and rubbed her back. She held her head, her face was hidden behind her shoulder-length hair.

We lifted her up and let her sit at the chair, and I had to leave her because the train stopped at my station. 

I hope she will be fine and people would consider to help her get off the train. Not just stare or pretend you didn't see anything when it happened right in front of you. There were more than 30 people around her at that time.

Staring people wouldn't help much, you know. 

Little Things 76 : Little Happiness

I think being happy is over-rated. You can create little happiness and appreciate it instead of waiting for huge ' never-ending happiness' people keep on talking about. Imagine happiness is money. Being a billionaire is like reaching the 'never-ending happiness' , but for most people, having money for day-to-day life is actually enough, and that's little happiness people are not aware off. So instead of pushing yourself to be a billionaire, you can just appreciate what you currently have. 

It's the same as being happy. You don't actually have to reach a certain amount of happiness to say you have fulfilled your life as a human. As well as you don't have to be a billionaire to prove that you have successfully lived a life.

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On Random Updates & Rambles

On Fitness & Health ,

Yesterday I received my third running shirt ! The best part about entering a run is receiving a free gift pack and of course the moment after you finished the run. Imagine never have to buy any running shirt because you just have enough from your previous events :D

9 more days to go !

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On Case Study : Female Director ,

I've been making a case study on female film director and chose Sopia Coppola. The long post is still drafted because I got another one movie to go : Marie Antoinette. I've watched The Virgin Suicides (1999), Lost in Translation (2003) and Somewhere (2010) this whole week. Taking bits by bits, learning her movie styles and messages she was trying to convey. 

Watching Sopia Coppola's movies make me feel a bit lonely and isolated. All her movies were pretty distant and it triggered what I've been feeling inside. Not a great case study, but interesting findings - yet to be explained soon. 

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On Books ,

Paulo Coelho's latest book is out several weeks ago : Manuscript in Accra - my 11th book this year. It's in my next-to-read book list after another 60 pages of the final book in IQ84. 

IQ84, is another book that touches on being heavily isolated and lonely. I think Sopia Coppola and Haruki Murakami can be real best-friends. And I think I need to find much cheerful case-study after this. Their strong energies are consuming my thoughts lately. I spent my nights crying in my sleeps thinking about how lonely a person can be. Shesh, how more human can I be ?

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On Finding Things ,

I mentioned before about my missing glasses. For a week, I was half-blind and life was a bit blurry. I wore contact lenses at work and no glasses at home. It was no fun, typing down things by squinting my eyes, watching blurry movies, and looking a bit childish.

After a week, I bought affordable glasses to replace it. 

I forgot about the missing one.

Until 4 days ago, I looked down while I was surfing the net on my Mac, and I saw it beneath my drawer, just there, exposed. How did I missed it for weeks without noticing? 

Just when I stop needing something, it appears.

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Little Things 75 : Love Songs

I listen to almost every love songs and it reminds of my Creator. I feel like I am becoming sheepishly romantic, holding on to the only Love that seems to make sense. When others seems to lose its reasons. 

So this is what pure love feels like.

Well, it's nice. 

Little Things 74 : Keseronokan Kecil

Antara yang seronok ,

1. Jumpa duit terselit di poket belakang seluar.
2. Nampak orang nak minum guna straw tanpa tengok, tapi mulut tak sampai2 nak tangkap straw.
3. Tengok gambar chantik di tumblr.
4. Hari ais-krim.
5. Jalan-jalan tengok buku.
6. Naik bumper car beramai-ramai.
7. Bila makan popcorn caramel dalam wayang, dapat yg berat sebab caramel dia lebih.
8. Persoalan-persoalan hidup dan variasi jawapan.
9. Perjalanan jauh yang sunyi.
10. Bila dengar suara Ahmad Dhani. Phew. 
11. Sentuh benda bertekstur guna hujung jari contohnya lumut dan pokok dan batu.
12. Hulur tangan kat budak kecil bawah umur dan dia sambut minta dukung.
13. Sebutan yang bunyinya pelik.
14. Nampak buku Shaun Tan di mana-mana kedai sekalipun.
15. Berbisik dengan alam.
16. Perbualan mengenai buku dan penulis.
17. Jumpa orang yang ada taste lagu yang sama.
18. Panjat bunkbed belah atas dan teroka peta dunia.
19. Nampak orang kutip sampah tanpa sebab.
20. Bangun tidur nampak muka Awan.

Anda ?

Movie : One Day

A couple of days ago, I watched another movie directed by Lone Scherfig : One Day (2011) featuring my favorite Jim Sturgess and Anne Hathaway. This movie is a book adaptation by David Nicholls. Previously I wrote about a movie called Education (2009) directed by the same guy, read here. 

The movie is about two young college graduates, who began a long friendship that lasted over 20 years. Both were pretty much different, Emma was an English graduate that dreamed of being a writer and worked herself off to survive, eventually doing things that she hated to do. Dexter, already a son of a rich family, became a successful TV presenter and famous. And they were still friends on and off. I am not good at summarizing a story, so you can read the summary here instead.

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I've been meaning to watch the movie since I read the book last year. Personally, I like the book better, the movie seemed to show a lot of short snippets of years they spent together, it's almost like a fast-forwarded version of the book, almost intangible, vaguely attached. From the movie, I could not grasp the meaning of their really close friendship, their feelings, and emotions, their loss and love, it was all too weak. I would like for you to read the book instead. 

PS: I always watch movie adaptations from books just for the sake of criticizing it! Or comparing, I guess. Some are both good, some are better written, and some are better in movies.

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Instagram : Rayyiu Radzi

This is also one Instagrammer worth following by Rayyiu Radzi, a 24 year old photo-journalist. It's hard not to like any of his pictures. I fall in love with India by all his beautiful pictures shared in his Instagram. Check out his portfolio here.

Little Stories 50 : Impressive Title

While I was reading IQ84 in the bus, standing, next to a foreigner wearing a Faber-Castell's staff shirt, my eyes lingered to the article he was reading :

Bioluminescence assay for detecting cell surface membrane protein expression.

Gee, is that even considered a full-formed statement in English? :O

I feel like reading 1000+ pages of IQ84 is nothing compared to 2 pages of Bioluminescence assay for detecting cell surface membrane protein expression ! 

Instagram : Maddie on Things

I found and interesting and funny instagrammer, "thiswildidea" featuring a dog : Maddie the Coonhound by Theron Humphrey! I love how Maddie closes its eyes and stands so nicely in each photo. Maddie surely got great balance. Maddie even got its own book published, you can buy it here.

I wish Awan loves to be photographed, but - Nope. 

Little Stories 49 : Ribut Petang

It started to rain heavily, once I arrived at the station. Thankfully I brought my umbrella along. I had to fight the rain and wait at the bus station instead, because the bus wont stop at where I was standing. 

There were no longer little puddle of water, there was a rain-made river along the road, which I had to go through. I looked at the little river for several seconds, considering I had to dip in my favorite shoe in the ankle-high water. "This would be the end of it", I whispered, and walk through it.

We were huddled together at the little bus stop. The rain got really bad. People in the first line created a wall using their umbrella, trying our best to lessen the possibility of getting fully drenched. Most buses left us, turning off the service label atop of the bus. 

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Almost 2 hour later, I was finally around my house. It was supposed to be hari pasar. But the road was almost dark. I hurriedly walked towards it. Before long, I saw broken branches along the road, a little burger stall near the bus stop fall down and I saw so many pau and breads, laying on the road. 

Oh, the rain attacked those little stalls. 

Half of them packed up their things and left, leaving all things that can't be saved.
Survivors were still patiently waiting for customers.

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I can't believe I complained on the hot weather at the lab earlier, when I was working in far much comfortable environment compared to those unfortunate hawkers. 

Little Stories 48 : Mosquito

It's a bit hot lately. 

Weather forecast vaguely predicts raining afternoons for the whole week. Sometimes I put the fan next to me while in the lab, because I was sweating lightly - in full air-conditioned office! 

This also leads to mosquito season. I had to ask my brother to buy a mosquito repellent last night, *we hardly use it because my mom is allergic to the smell. Huge fat mosquitos were flying around me since last week, but I haven't got any bites yet - which aroused my curiosity. I asked them, "Aren't you hungry yet?". 

This reminds me.

A couple of months ago, when I was about to take a shower, I saw tiny wriggly mosquito larvae in the tempayan. Quietly, I managed to sit stoically next to the tempayan, and watched them. Mosquito larva breathes through their end segment, that's why they swim to the surface a lot. They will only dive when they are disturbed. 

Being an odd curious person as I am towards insects *again! I scooped every little larva and put it in a bottle. There were fat black larvae or pupa? and there were petite transparent larvae, all wriggling actively. If only I have a magnifying glass so I can really see them better.

I left them in the toilet.

My sister took a shower.

Later I went back to see how's my collected specimens  were doing.

Me : Someone threw all my jentik-jentik !

Aja : I did ! Are you kidding me? They are disgusting ! 

Me : But I scooped them one by one ! 

Aja : I don't care ! 

Shesh, human.

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Book : IQ84 *updates*

Notes :

Although I am a woman, I am not much of a normal-chick-lit & romance fiction's reader. Book reviews reading experiences mostly came from something as odd and heavy as this or as light and inspiring as Mitch Albom & Paulo Coelho. I know majority of this blog reader is pre-adult : below 24, due to my doodle interest. So I hope you won't take my book recommendation into your account, unless you are as bookaholic as me and read for life. Thank you ❤

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Book 1 : IQ84

It has ended well, I took longer than I intended.
Maybe due to the very slow start.

It reminds me of The Girl with a Dragon Tattoo trilogy with less big words, odd names, political complications and wordily-visual brutal scenes. Both touch topics on publication and the dark horrifying side of rape cases. Aomame is a lot like Lisbeth Salander but without the super genius brain and photographic memory. If you loved Stieg Larsson's trilogy, most probably you'll love IQ84. You can read synopsis & reviews here.

This book is not suitable for young adult, because it is a little disturbing especially the terrifying scenes on child rape - at least it was disturbing enough for me. *Although Haruki Murakami did not visually written any of those scenes - the simplicity of his writing is quite impressive. Stieg Larsson was too visual and that was impressive in a different way. If you want something different than normal fictions, maybe you can try the book. 

Self-note : 

IQ84 is not IQ level - 84 but 1984, the year the event took place and Q stands for 'question'. 

One of the main character in the book, Tengo, reminds me of my colleague at the lab. Although he doesn't write books and teach at cram school.

I love his simple way of telling stories & emotions. Might read more of his books later.

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Book 2 : IQ84

I can bear any pain as long as it has meaning. - IQ84

Along with the long story dragged slowly, I managed to keep on reading, sometimes for hours in the bus, and train, completely unaware of my surrounding. *which was pretty impressive. There were disturbing intense scenes : on Air Chrysalis and those creepy Little People from the book that Fuka-Eri wrote, on finally meeting the Leader, on purification part between Tengo &  Fuka-Eri? - I need a deeper understanding on why must intercourse has anything to do with self-purification , this reminded me so much of the Dan Brown's book - Da Vinci's Code. 

If Haruki chose not to explain it in the third book, well, he would be some-what a very irresponsible person. And I'll dislike him. He can't possibly dug a hole and leave it empty. A good writer needs to explain his story.

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Currently on
Book 3 : IQ84

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PS : Amazon bought the GoodReads ! 

Is that good? I hate Amazon, they are not Malaysia-friendly.

Little Things 73 : The Seed

Things that come easily don't last long. 

In China it took forty years to make a porcelain bowl, while a hundred a day pour out of a kiln in Baghdad. 

Which is worth more? 

A chick fresh out of the egg pecks its own food, while an infant remains helpless for many years. 

The first never raises its gaze from the ground, while the second can find stars and galaxies inside. - Saadi of Shiraz

Many times when you are planning to do or decide something, and you stop to focus for awhile you will feel a hunch, an instinct, or an inner voice that talks directly to you. 

Sometimes it says that you are on the right path, and you'll just know. 

Sometimes it carries an edge of fear, like a warning or alarm, and surely you'll know. 

In making a big decision, you need to ask yourself, and ask you inner-self. Whether this is the right path, whether if it is the right time ? If it is not, perhaps it is a seed-time for you, give it time to grow, don't dig it up just yet, because when the time comes, it will grow.

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On travel :

When I bought a flight ticket to Europe last year, I asked God,

If this is not the time for me to go yet, give me a sign, because I am planning to book hostel soon.

The whole flights to Europe were cancelled, we were the last batch who bought the cancelled flight. I took that silent disappointment as a a sign that it is not the time yet. 

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On work :

When I thought about resigning and find better offers, I asked God,

If this is not the time for me to go yet, give me a sign, because I am planning to find better offers, I am almost nyawa-nyawa ikan.

Nope, it is not the time for me to go yet. 

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On travel 2 :

A year passed, I started having another panic-attack, I asked God,

So, is it the time ?

Daww, I haven't got any answers yet. 

Come on little travel seed, please grow faster.

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Little Things 72 : On Love 2

Everything is now gone. The wide smile, the small jokes twinkling at the corner of his eyes, the light spirit draped in his presence, all vanished in mere seconds. I killed a soul instantly, in front of my opened eyes. 

The air to breathe vaporized, leaving just the remaining of those unwanted histories. 

I tried to touch his soul, but it disappeared into the thin air. Since then, I know I had lost him. For things that has been written, for a fight that was never mine. 

A lost that will be missed and remembered. 

And so I will miss your existence in my life. The love and the loyalty, histories and episodes, the very beginning of my soul searching. I hope you will live well and may one day, remembering me only triggers a soft smile on your face.

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140 words | 40 seconds

Little Things 71 : What You Want ?

In one of the Zubedy day we attended in February, Mr. Prakash asked us to close our eyes. He gave us 1 minute, to imagine what we really want to achieve in life. 

Later he asked us, " Was it easy for you to imagine it ?"

For some people, 

it was a bit hard at first and it came slowly, 

for some it was easy, 

for some it was not. 

Does it matters to know what you really wanted in life? 

Yes. It gives you an invisible goal as a head-start, because your whole life will be built around it. When you know what you want, your attitudes, your plans, your goals will be slowly crafted to make it happen. 

Paulo Coelho said "When you want something, the whole universe conspires to help you." Rhonda Byrne wrote a book called The Secret - The power of Attraction, just to tell and teach people the same concept. 

It is no secret. 

"Pity for those clueless people, if they don't even know what they want to achieve in life".

Grooveshark

I want to share one of my most favorite daily website. It is definitely not Youtube, *that is too common, I hardly use Youtube due to their non-stop ads. It's Grooveshark !

I am not sure whether it is legal to share songs in there. Some sites/opinions said that it is legal, some said it is not. Anyhow, I don't recommend you to upload songs that is not originally yours. I use Grooveshark to listen to songs and find new songs.

The best part about Grooveshark :

1) Huge list of songs.

2) Their intelligent song matching - based on what you recently listen to, they will give you song recommendation and I found so many great singer and songs from here! I don't listen to current popular songs, and most of the time my range of music genre is a bit off from the mainstream. Grooveshark is a great platform.

3 ) Create your own playlist. Here is an example of my playlist called " Wandering Soul " - I imagine going to far places and listen to all these comforting songs. My personal digital mixed tape. *PS : It's rather dreary tho. Plus "Wandering Soul" make me think of white-vapoury lost soul that keep on wandering - but I don't want to change it !  

PS : If I really like the song, I'll buy it from iTunes, that way, I'll keep on supporting the artist's effort. I don't do illegal song downloads, I hope you don't too ! :D

Little Stories 47 : Migraine and Fun Rides

My head pounded rhythmically for over 3 days now, a bit longer than what I usually have. I used to warned myself that there's a small tumor living up in my brain but I read brain-tumor symptoms many times and it is nothing near to tumor. So I made a self-diagnosis and called it a migraine cycle. 

For that, I decided to go to the park and have a walk after work with Tasy. I can't run yet, it was a bit painful to move too much. I managed to walk for over 6km, less than 1 hour , *wohoo! We went back to the lab, had a cold delicious new Chatime flavor that I've come to adore : Cocoa Latte , a mixture of chocolate and milk and lots of sugar.

We had a nice little surprise birthday party for my colleague - Happy Birthday Kak Ina ! and we went to the Euro Funfair at Bukit Jalil, near our lab. Good old little fun-fair. I mentioned in my previous blog post on my favorite rides, so we had those ride. Imagine having all 7 grown-ups on a bumper car rides, crashing one another, laughing as hard as the stomach can handle. I love their faces on the 3 minutes ride, it's priceless.

The price of each ride was a little expensive to my liking, imagine we need to pay RM 12 for Vortex ,  RM 10 for Ghost House, RM 8 for Top Gun, RM 6 for Bumper Car and such. Oh, plus RM 4 entrance fees. A bit too pricey. So I only took 2 rides. 

The Top Gun was fun, I thought it would be fast, it wasn't. And the most fun part was when we were turned upside-down, it was a beautiful sight! Shimmering colours were everywhere ahead of us and the pitch dark sky was below us. Maybe I got used to those previous fun rides with my siblings, so I didn't feel nauseated and I actually enjoyed it. Ahh, I love being young. 

PS : New sticker stocks coming up soon - *at last !

The Top Gun !

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