Tiny Thoughts : All things random in my life

• Writing: Other than my personal blog, I write as a Chief Designer of Fin.my at: Fin's Medium, although I have my own personal Medium as well but I haven't written anything except replying to Mike Posner's posts and liking other people's articles on weekly basis. Note: I write at Medium when I put on my nerd hat.     

• Data: My new hard disk, Mr. Buffalo *barely 4 months where I kept all data: works, projects, portfolios, inspiration, writings, downloaded vectors, and pictures were taken since 2009, was having a hard time performing since it fell down flat on the floor. I tried to copy all the files *worth 200gb for the longest 5 weeks before any of my computers can no longer detect it. I went to the shop again with the hard disk and the receipt so they can send it back to the factory to get it fixed *3 years of warranty and the guy said that all files were corrupted - with no luck in retrieving anything. In 2 minutes, he wiped out all the data when I said 'ok'. 2 short freakin' minutes. So I lost all my pictures, the ones that I kept since 2009. What did I learn from this? I should have at least 2 backups, not 1 & don't ever trust ONLY ONE DEVICE to keep all your data - ever and print out pictures that I want to keep for the future. T^T 

• Books: New books coming up (they are still fresh on shelves, not even in the paperback edition yet): The Spy by Paulo Coelho, Three Daughters of Eve by Elif Shafak, Absolutely on Music by Haruki Murakami, The Magic String of Frankie Presto by Mitch Albom, Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult. I'm going to buy all these books once they are available in paperback versions, or should I really consider converting to an e-book reader on Kindle (?). This year I only managed to read: 20 books only! - this includes a lot of audiobooks and graphic novels, so I cheated!

• Series: And have you watched the Gilmore Girls revival? I've waited 9 years for this T^T I missed them so dearly, so I didn't wait long to watch the whole 4 hours short series after they were released. It felt more like a new series just about to come out than a continuation of the old series. Not sure whether I'm still in Team Jess or whether I should think like a 30-year-old now and be in Logan's team. When I was much younger, I know I would opt for Jess over and over but now I'm older, I'm a bit realistic when it comes to the choice of father-husband material. Ha.

• 30 days challenge: My current challenge is to digitize everything in my sketchbook for at least 1 page, daily. By the end of my 30 days challenge, I should at least have enough for my first printed zine. I still have time for my Saturn returns !! :F

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Movie : Life of Pi - Part 1

I took a month to actually be ready to write this, since I watched the movie in January, and decided to read the 428 pages novel written in 100 chapters , so I would have a better understanding. The lack of knowledge in translating hidden meaning from a story *if there are hidden meanings, lead me into making extra effort in reading other people's reviews, and thoughts - all over the world. My favorite was from David T. , whom helped me to understand 'The Floating Island' chapter, by far my most favorite part in the story. 

The book is about India, religions, a zoo, a shipwreck, and survival. 

Stories in a story. 

At time when Yann Martel wrote the book, he said he was having a minor existential life crisis. He wrote 2 books before Life of Pi but did not became bestsellers. He started to question about his sole purpose of writing and even considered to get 'real job'. This is normal for people who choose to live a life as a full-time artists or writers. 

Which then after spending 13 months in India, in 3 trips : in second trip was mostly on practical research on the book and the third time to tidy up details of the stories, he published Life of Pi. Read how he wrote the book here.

When I watched the movie, I fell in love with : 

1) The idea of the freedom to talk about various religions so openly. 

When questioned about it, Pi just asked what s wrong in wanting to love God, no matter in which religion ? I loved it because I always felt the same about how the world is separating religions in quite a harsh way when the sole purpose of each religion is to devote oneself to God/s. 

2) The visual effects, the movie was so beautiful, vibrant, and colourful. 

It reached my ultimate standard of a great movie. The way they portrayed India was so beautiful , the scene with the swimmers in the crystal clear French swimming pool was interesting, the scene with the whale and glowing planktons was breath-taking, and not forgetting the floating island. I was wonderstruck. The color scheme and lighting was almost too perfect, and this statements came from the person who just saw the 2D movie once ! Those scenes keep on playing over and over again in my mind. That's how good it was. 

3) The idea of telling stories in a story and letting audience choose their own story. 

After being spoon fed for over 20 years plus when we watch stories, a movie with a little twist is like being given a smart phone when all we used before was a normal mobile phone. It is interesting and addictive, not a must but a bonus. 

4) Symbols & Hidden Meaning. 

Again, I love hidden meaning, but I am not well-equipped with the ability to decipher the codes. It's a long learning process. Having a story like this give me a spark that trigger my mind to explore the unknown. When I watched the movie I knew it talked in codes, it was just too odd. Animals, religion, the floating island? What makes a salable movie is not combining animal and religion and by all odds, floating island in the middle of the open sea. 

There must be something else. 

So that was how it all started.

PS : Part 2 is my rambling thoughts on the meaning of some portions of the story, after a month of digging into various explanation. If I don't share it somewhere, I might explode ! In spiritual way, I found out that having a guide to decipher unknown things are the most blissful cheat-code anyone could ever find. If I choose to only watch the movie and read the book, I might not know a lot of things that I want to find out. Searching for guides are the best decision so far. For that, thank you Allah.

Little Things 56 : New Year

In life, 

I asked for several things.

Make me happy,
and make people around me happy.

I said to myself that I'll learn about life, I'll learn to accept, to understand, to open my mind towards possibilities, risks, choices, decisions, and outcomes. 

I learned many things in my life last year. 2012 was by far a bit challenging. Yet, I survived, we all did. There is no point in comparing our years, because like usual, they were all mixed with sugar and spices. 

I've been living in this life for almost 26 years now. Sometimes I feel like I've been here longer than it seems. If there is reincarnation, I am pretty sure I lived before because I learned to connect several dots in life that seems out of place, but belonged. If there is no such things as reincarnation, then I still think there are rather amazing explanations behind it all.

I am very thankful for all those incidents in my life that make me who I am now.
And I hope I'll survive this year, and more upcoming years.

I hope we can all start anew and leave those negative grudges.
Life is too short to be wasted on unimportant things.

And in two days, I'll reach 26.
I lived well. I had fun.
And I am ready to continue as long as it is written.

01.01.2013

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PS : 

With God's will, I want to keep on exploring. 

My explorer's heart is burrrrning ! 

Travel : Post Beijing Thoughts

For the Beijing trip last week, I am doing a homework on China. I found my National Geographic : China , Inside the Dragon Special Issue from my book shelf. I once read the magazine and failed to take any interest on the subject, now that I've set my foot to the land of old civilization, I can finally connect those dots. 

I am learning about my root. 

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Suddenly, a friend in Facebook also posted a status :

China claims world's longest high-speed rail line, takes travelers 1,428 miles in a workday.

Read more here. 1,428 miles = 2298 km , with 865 Yuan = RM 424 , from Beijing to Guangzhou.

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Suddenly China starting to dance around me. Those days fighting extreme coldness and odd foods, just starting to make more sense. China was not really a place in my wish list. When a chance came, I just grabbed it without thinking twice. I even warned my brother on the state of the cold weather and how I will handle it. On the first 3 days, I whined to my brother a lot about the weather ! I was the annoying whiner, not him. Surprisingly he became much more mature while traveling. 

Truth to be told, I told him that I will not set foot in Beijing for the next 15 years, especially in winter. Days later, after coming back home, those thoughts vaporized and new ideas came. 

I got a thing with train and bus rides. 

High-speed train or not, 2298 km on the train sounds terrifyingly romantic than candle light dinners in a fine restaurant.

Except in winter.

And for that, I rest my case. 

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I'll share this soon.

Little Stories 22 : Passion and Defensiveness

Did I ever told you? If I can list down my passion :

1. Travel
2. Books & Writings
3. Arts

It always circulate around that. 

Later last night, someone sent me a message asking me on similarity with other blogger. First on my doodle - which is fine, because I've accepted the fact that my doodles are quite easy to imitate and I try to ignore it as much as I can and take it as a compliment *or at least I am trying to. Second, on my writing and topics - which I suddenly became too defensive. One thing I learned about myself is I found books and the art of writing are sacred. I don't want to share , let alone imitate or copy other writer - ditto letting other people speak in my voice. 

This is my personal thoughts and I try to find my voice in my writing - which is hard to achieve. English is not my native language, but I love it nontheless - it gives me a chance to connect to the world much bigger than here. 

So last night I accidently opened the Pandora box and became a human and whined so much to Mr.S about it. I whined like a teenager. Like a drama-queen. Like a mean bitchy girls in  high-school they always show in the telly. 

I went home and slept the whole night, dreamed about going to Thailand and woke up at almost 7am. I wrote this fast enough at the lab in the morning because I arrived early just to let this out.

I learned several things :

1. Sometimes even how hard I try to be calm and find zen, there will be a moment when other energy will try to slap my head from the back and say "wake up, be human once in a while". 

2. Acceptance is still something I need to learn. If I get too defensive in the future when someone say I imitate other people again, I'll slap my own head from the back.  

3. Take imitation as a compliment. 

4. Ignore the world and keep on writing.

Real winners do not compete.

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Little Things 41 : Personal Dream

I guess one of the bad thing in growing up is you will eventually get used to things. If you are fine with the consistency, then it shouldn't be a problem. If you are not such person, you may feel bored easily. Adventure and new things are what you keep on having in your random thoughts. 

Sometimes I get annoyed with myself for having such thoughts and being 25, I know it is getting quite wild and hard to control. Since I started to gain my own money by working, I see many roads and possibilities. Life is much clearer. If only I can take out my passport and buy ticket to somewhere far. If only I can stay at some random foreign country and try to make a living by being a waitress in a coffee shop and slowly learn the city and culture. If only I can just leave things here and actually learn about life in new ways.

Sometimes it's getting wilder. I asked my mom ;

Me : I want to go somewhere far, and stay there to learn. There is more than this.
Ma : Why you keep on wanting such things? You don't want a big house, you don't want a car. Why? I am not like that <-- saying that she doesn't understand my need for such things in life 

Me : But I've been here more than 20 years already.
Ma : Don't tell me you aren't planning to get married.
Me : I don't know, it is not something in my list yet, I guess.

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I leaped with excitement when my uncle said that his family is going to Beijing and asked us if we are interested to join them again. Yes! So my brother and I are going to Beijing for this winter season in December. 

My salary isn't high enough to actually use it for fun. But the strong will to be on the road keeps me work hard to achieve this. I need to do this, or I will keep on thinking about it for the rest of my life. And I want what I want, or at least I'll fight for it hard enough.

2009 - Umrah

2010 - Singapore

2011 - Indonesia

2012 - Beijing

2013 - ?

When you want something bad enough, the world will conspires to help you. I just need my parents' blessing and money, a lot of money. Or I need to marry a nice rich traveller that love me to bits so we can explore the world together ! 

Okay, where should I start?

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Little Things 40 : Baking

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I fought with my inner self and found something to calm it down a bit. I keep thinking : do something new. So I made a bunch of cream puffs until late at night. 

For people who know me well, it is amusing to actually see me in the kitchen for other reason than being force to find something to eat and cook. Because I hardly eat for fun, so baking for fun is probably one of the oddest thing I could do.

I dragged both my younger brother and sister to keep me occupied in the kitchen and helped around. I know they were there because I looked too enthusiastic and they didn't have the heart to reject my excitement. Thank you ❤ With simple tutorial from youtube and short reading from the net, I took a note and started it. After several arguments over how to make the filling and the filling actually shouldn't turn out a bit lumpy - wild guess : that was cooked eggs because the milk was too hot :D But the filling was nice and creamy enough.

It turned out okay.

It wasn't perfect, but it was decent enough. 

My siblings ate it happily.

What I learned?

I saw how my siblings supported me on that night. It was a rare occasion- we don't really do such thing for fun. We slowly turned into adult, with our lives to handle, and our own problems to solve. That night, I learned that sometimes people do something out of love, and to show supports. For that, I thank them ❤

Baking is still strange to me. And eating for fun is still new.

So we will see how it grows in the future. 

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You can find tutorial on the net,

there are sooooo many easy tutorials to follow, I don't want to repeat things thousands of people already shared. 

I find myself a bit chessy when I post on my baking experience. 

Movie : Looper

Another movie made to make human stop and think for a while. After so many movie genres that keep on giving human a distraction from thinking, here comes : Looper. A movie that gave me some minutes to ponder. There will be spoilers in this post, so you should watch the movie before you come back to this post. So if you watched this movie and want to read my thoughts on this movie, click on the link below !

Little Thing 39 : Table Manner

Table manner.

It is ever since that afternoon when my brother pointed it out, I started to be extra aware of it. 

I am not sure how we picked up this habit, I guess our parents trained us since we were so small it actually stayed in our head like a normal routine. I thought it is what everybody does, not until I started to become aware of other people's manner while eating and started to see our differences. 

Some of them are :

Close your mouth while muching foods.

Put your spoon and fork together after finish eating.

Put unwanted leftovers at the side of your plate, not on the table.

When you are leaving the table, put the chair back properly.

Don't play with your phone while eating.

Say thank you to the waiter/waitress.

It is so interesting to see differences around us. My brother and I usually get excited when we find something that we can discuss on. With him, I could go on with some issues that troubles me and he actually manages to listen and give opinions. My sisters are equal to toy soldier on my desk - it  only stares back at you.

Little Thing 38 : iPhone 5

I am an Apple user. 

I use many Apple products daily, from the littlest ipod shuffle to an iMac. Yesterday, Apple introduced the latest iPhone 5. If I haven't bought iPhone 4s early this year, I might be stumbling on Apple's website everyday just to pamper my eyes. 

But the thing is, I bought my iPhone 4s , eight months ago. It is still shiny, still new, and still scratch free. It delivers great job in promoting my works, keep in touch with people, snap memories and ideas, keep me entertained, and help me in my daily life. I love it. 

I've tried Blackberry, and Samsung, but they can never make me feel satisfied as much as an iPhone did. I don't mind really, on who got the better camera, or the bigger screen with clear pictures. It is not a childish competition on comparing who is better. 

Technology runs fast, so stop comparing.

This post is just a personal thoughts after hearing many childish mouth fights over smartphones. I wouldn't mind much if you just stop teasing my choice :D

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Little Thing 34 : Dad's Saying 2

Today while reading this, I found another quotation my dad used to repeat many times :

“If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.” - Albert Einstein.

My dad used to asked us, siblings, pop questions on random things that we've learned at school. Being us, we were as nervous as house mouse, we usually squeak when my dad asked anything and we just mumbled away anything.

My dad said many times that IF we can't explain in our own words the definition or process of something, that means we don't understand it enough. Despite getting an A in Science, or memorize word-by-word definition of something from the text book.

He said in most of job interviews he held to find new staffs, his favorite question is "What is science? Explain it to me". *he is a science researcher. He will then rejects people who can't answer it *harsh. So he can judge the potential interviewee's understanding by that simple question. 

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Almost 6 years ago, I told my dad that I want to continue my study in IT : Graphic & Multimedia. The first question he asked was : What is graphic? Yes, I stumbled and mumbled things about pictures, computers, editing, animations and stuff. He wasn't satisfied with my answer. 

Dad : If you don't even know what is graphic, then how come you want to have a degree on graphic?
Me : I don't know well enough, that's why I want to learn it.
Dad : I didn't know you draw, you can draw? *only my oldest sister draw during that time. 
Me : Yes, I can, I guess. *who would have thought that I'll be known for doodling now! :D

How innocent. I really thought I'll be doing graphic & multimedia during my studies, little did I know, majoring in Information Technology means programming & coding! I've never heard of Creative Multimedia when I was applying for college. Shesh..

Anyhow, I did finished my degree on IT.
Not regretting it.

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PS :
Information technology is the use of technology to manipulate, save or store, produce, send and spread the information. Bingo!

Food : Ramadhan Buffet

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Hello!

Luckily for this event, we were sponsored to break fast with them at MS Garden Hotel Kuantan, where the event was held. I don't usually dine in hotel to break fast, because I know I wouldn't eat much during Ramadhan month. So a chance to eat as much as possible was not really tempting for me. Ha.

Information :

RM 68 per person - adult

RM 38 per child.

Daily : 7 pm - 10 pm

Date : 21 July - 18 August 2012

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I walked around to see what they were offering and I was excited to see colours everywhere. Like I mentioned before, I am not really a food lover. But to see so much colours from foods, that really captured my interest. I took my camera right away to snap photos. Although it was pretty obvious that people were lurking for food to eat. 7.15pm. It was almost break-fast time!

Let's enjoy colours and food fiesta :

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Pictures were taken by using :

Lumix LX 3

I  hate watermarks, 

so please be informed that all this pictures are mine, 

thank you.

Event : Pahang Tourism Blogger Event

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Hello !

Yesterday my teammates and I helped organized Tourism Pahang Blogger Event at Kuantan. It was originally held by Perbadanan Kemajuan Bukit Fraser (PKBF) and we went there as representatives from Tourism Pahang Website. 

Speakers :

Dato' Shafik Fauzan

Mr. Khairul Azizi , from Pahang Tourism Website

Mr. Ahmad Azwan , speaker

Miss Fatin Suhana, blogger

The idea was to meet and engage with bloggers, especially content related matter. We want to improve the traffic and to get as many live contents about Pahang Tourism. So meeting up with the bloggers was one of the way to get more fresh ideas about this.

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Participants, speakers, PKBF & Tourism Pahang

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There were many seniors and fresh bloggers. It was inspiring and an eye-opener for me. It was interesting to see many bloggers came to share their thoughts and experiences. I only know Emila Yusof and Fatin Suhana, the other bloggers were pretty new to me. 

Many things learned and good advises will be taken into serious consideration.

Participant's Blog List :

2121studio

Lata Jarum Ranger

Kenong Rimba

Jardness

Lily Riani

Fatin Suhana

Travelbug

Rayyan Haries

Emila Yusof

Ajax85

PS :

For any bloggers and travel writers, if you are interested in sharing your travel experiences in Tourism Pahang Website, do email me at : azreen@secretgroup.my

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Random doodle while listening to a talk

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2nd PS :

If you want the sketch above, write a comment below on blogging ! 

Doodle : Thoughts

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Every choices you made, define who you are.

I woke up this morning saying that to myself.

That is what rainy morning gives me. 

Random thoughts. 

Picture taken using Instagram, coloured using Photoshop.

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Book : Aleph

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Hello!

I just finished reading Aleph by Paulo Coelho. I bought this book 11 days ago and decided to read it right away. I read it while waiting for the bus at the bus stop, while I was in the bus, while waiting at the train station, while in the train, after work waiting for my collegue, while having short dinner and before I sleep. Whenever I have free time to spare. 

He took the Trans-Siberian train, travelled 9,288 kilometers to find himself. He found answers to his questions, he found peace. I finished reading the book feeling envy and inspired because he had the courage to take the journey. As his saying says : "Travel is never a matter of money, but of courage". I have the same feeling of insecurity towards most of those countries he travelled in those journey as the feeling I have towards deep dark water. I keep imagine those places as cold and dark. The sense of being in the places so different than what I am used to. If I am asked to put my feet in a dark deep lake from the boat, I would probably cry so bad in my heart for being utterly terrified. 

He took the journey anyway despite feeling like he made a wrong decision. He found answers, he welcomed his past and mistakes, and he freed himself from the memories of his sins. 

“Is it possible to deviate from the path God has made? Yes, but it's always a mistake. It is possible to avoid pain? Yes, but you'll never learn anything. Is it possible to know something without ever having experiencing it? Yes, but it will never truly be part of you.” - Aleph.

You can find many other beautiful quotes by Paolo Coelho's Aleph from here or you can try to read his top 9 travel tips from here considering he travels a lot all his life.

Along with The Zahir and The Alchemist, I recommend reading this book, Aleph too.

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Little Things 31 : Reading Riders

I commute to work by walking, riding bus, trains and taxi everyday. I watch faces half asleep, faces boringly playing their phones, faces wondering idly while listening to music through their earphone, sometimes quite rare, I see people reading actual physical book. My eyes will automatically linger to the book cover just to know what they are reading. 

By far, I've managed to finish off reading 3 books while on my way to work and home. Sometimes I got so immersed in a book I didn't feel the time passes in the 1 hour journey. 

So, I am so excited to see this ! A photography project by Ourit on reading riders in New York subways. To see so many people, from wide range of ages, colours and ethnics reading various books instead of doing nothing.

Do you want to be a reading-riders? Let's read to work, while waiting for the trains and buses, while queuing up, while eating lunches alone or while having a 15-minutes break. Make use of the time. Stop playing with your smartphones that aren't making you any smarter * HUGE self-note. 

I have quite a lot of good books, so if you want to borrow any books, just send me an email requesting a book, if I happen to have the book or own similar genres, maybe we can sayhellogoodbyes at the train stations, exchanging books! 

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Read, let your soul read.

Why you don't need a dSLR?

Before you buy a dSLR, you should consider these :

Your opinion might be different, but I just wrote this according to my experience only. We can agree to disagree on any matter :)

1. Size & weight.

dSLR is big and bulky. It is definitely not an ideal camera to bring to your friend's wedding or a reunion. You need to bring it everywhere. You can't leave it on the desk, you can't keep on asking your friend to hold it for you while you want to take some food. 

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2. You love to travel.

Travel light, pack everything up in small potions, only bring what's important. Why bringing all 3 lenses and extra batteries and external flash in a huge bag?

Last year when I went to Universal Studios with my siblings, like everybody else, we queued for a ride in one of the roller-coaster. Guess what? No bags or camera were allowed. So, where should we put our bag & camera? The bag's compartment was full. We wanted to take that ride together. The queue lasted 45 minutes. 

Solution : We left it with our aunty whom apparently had to wait outside with her baby. 

Traveling with a tour is a fast-paced activity. So, you better think of something convenient to use. *I high-lighted the word 'tour'. May not be the same as traveling solo or with your friends & family :)

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3. Long learning process

Having a dSLR won't make you a better photographer instantly. If you are really interested in learning the technical process, know about the aperture, shutter speed, composition, lens and any other things professional photographer loves to brag about, then it should be okay.

Because it is a continuous learning process. Your picture might still be the same. As dull as before. Or worse, you photoshopped every piece of your picture taken by your dSLR. What's the point?

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4. The Reason

If you want to snap a good photo of your product, you DON'T actually need to use a dSLR. I frequently come across peoples who are planning to buy a dSLR for their investment in taking their product's picture. You can buy a good compact camera with the same macro, filtering function that is far much easier to use and pain-stakingly as beautiful as dSLR photo. 

If you just want to share your activity. Fast and easy? 

Use a smartphone eg : iPhone 4. Post it on instagram or facebook right after you snap the picture. 

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5. Money

It would be appropriate to plan ahead! dSLR is not a cheap device. With all those accessories eg: lens, filter, memory cards, external flashes, tripod, battery grip, cleaning equipment, this and that. Oh dear.

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Other alternative :

Panasonic Lumix LX5/GF3

*this is a super awesome compact digital camera. You can change the lens if you insist on changing it, but with the lumix adapter. It is super easy to use. It is super small. The video quality is awesome, in HD. Hang it on your neck and it won't bother you. The macro function, oh, just fine. I'm currently using LX3, and I'm not regretting anything since I sold my dSLR d40. Oh, and you should buy GF if you want to spend more!

Olympus PEN E-P1

Sony Nex-3/Nex-5

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Loving high quality point & shoot camera

Pure satisfaction.

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