Bag Wishlist

Am bored..Here's a random post on the bags in my wish-list..
Presenting to you Tod's Zip Bauletto and Marc Jacobs Casey & Bruna..
Hint..hint..Mr Hubby ;)

A Year Older..A Year Wiser?

I definitely hope so..I always pride myself for being a KL girl born on KL Day (Federal Territory Day) and as it fell on Monday this year, we had a long weekend then..Hubby treated me to a birthday getaway in Singapore and would definitely say it was good! Not only that, he surprised me with a birthday surprise party upon touching down..Thanks Sayang..Love ya!

Crisis

Birthday's approaching, am starting to feel old and what's really bugging me is that I'm starting to think that I'm having a mid-life crisis..Am wondering what am I to do with my life? Starting to ask questions like :

- Do I like my job?
- Do I want kids?
- Should I go on for fertility treatment to try having babies?
- Can I become a good mother?
- Why can't I make a career out of what I really love doing?
- Should I try looking for overseas jobs?
- Should I quit my job?
- bla..bla..bla..

All the whats, whys, hows...The questions never end and they keep popping now and then..What am I to do? Guess, I need to be in a far, far away land to kinda reevaluate my life I think..It's not that I'm not doing well with what I'm doing..I'm good at my job eventhough I've to drag myself outta bed every morning, I'm happy just living with my hubby and coming to terms that the stork is taking its time to deliver us a baby, I'm happy with the wealth and health I have now (of course I want more of the dough) ;) But I think something is missing..But what??? Urghhh, I hate this feeling..

Happy Birthday Joe!

To my football freak, Man U die-hard-fan husband,

Happy birthday! May all your dreams and wishes* come true!

Love you loads!!

* ermm..i don't think Man U will win EPL this year though..hehe..

This Is What I Think....

Picture googled...

Happy 2010

Greetings from UK!

It's been 2 weeks since we arrived in UK for our holidays and it's time to leave for home tomorrow. As much as I am looking forward to go back to the hot and humid KL and meet family members, I am feeling pretty sad to leave the icy cold UK. Icy? Yes, it's been between 1 to -5 degrees so far. It's been a walk down the memory lane for me here this time and it's many of firsts for Hubby. First time in UK, first time seeing snow, first time in Old Trafford etc. Can't actually believe that I'll be back in UK this soon after graduating 11 years ago. Had the chance to bring Hubby to visit my alma mater and even managed to show him where I stayed and where I spent my student life back then. Overall, the trip's a good way of reminiscing the past in welcoming the new year. And what's in store for me in 2010? Hope there'll be loads of more good things in life. Aminnnnnn.....

Happy 6th Anniversary, Joe!

Joe dearest,

Can't believe it has been 6 years for both of us as husband and wife,

We've been through ups and downs of the emotional roller coaster,

But never have I any regret of saying yes to your proposal...

I know we have a long way to go,

We have so many dreams to realise,

But I know we'll hold each other's hands tight in paving the way,

And I can never imagine doing it with anyone else,

Coz never can I imagine life without you...

Joe dearest, I love you with all my might,

Thanks for being the ONE for me,

Thanks for all the wonderful moments together,

Thanks for being a GREAT you,

Love you, Love you, Love you!

P/S: Thanks for the anniversary trip! It's sure a great anniversary gift! Hehehehe...

My Own Little Laduree?

It's really hard to find good quality gourmet pastries in town. You can find people selling gourmet chocolates all right, in fact they're mushrooming and you can find the outlets in various high-end malls. I remember I was craving for macaroons the other day and the ones I found sold in a bakery tasted like chewing gum! To make up for it, Hubby dearest took me to Mandarin Oriental and there I went gorging on the macaroons like there was no tomorrow. It was pretty close to the ones sold in Paris, but still not quite there, you know what I mean.

I am a dessert person. Apart from eating them, I love experimenting dessert recipes. I am constantly looking out for unique and different dessert recipes by top chefs and try to turn them into mine with my own improvisation and techniques :) Plus, you know how these kinda desserts are always soaked with alcohol rite? So, changing them into halal desserts remain as challenges as alcohol is always the main ingredient..I also love serving family and friends with my "experiments" and it never fails to delight me when I get good reviews and praises :)

Wonder what it would be like to have my own little gourmet pastry shop like Laduree (http://www.laduree.fr/index_en.htm). Fancy-schmancy huh?

Drool.....

I've got a fair bit of travelling to do come next year and I am adding this into my wishlist :) Drool....

Should I Be Nice? Nahhhh....

Scene : Mum's Raya Open House

Elderly lady : "Mana anak kau?"

Me : "Belum ada lagi."

Elderly lady : "Lambatnya kau ni. Adik kau dah dua tu anak dia!"

Me (thinking that I should tell this lady off) : "Tanyalah Allah, auntie. What are His plans for me. I'm sure He knows what's best for me.."

Elderly lady : ....... (Only smiled like kerang busuk)

I don't think I wanna be nice anymore to those who just love to give their unwelcomed comments on my situation..I think I should play "psychology" with them..The feeling after telling these people off? Priceless...Hahaha (evil laugh)..

p/s: Pic from zentoad.com. Why frog? It's one of my fave animals ;)

Eid Mubarak

Losing My Virginity

Realised that I haven't been reading nowadays. I mean, apart from the strategic and management documents I go through each day at work, I have not been reading..ehmm, leisurely. So, made a point to drop by the book store quite recently. Oh my, there are just too many new books, especially on my favourite chic lit and thriller fiction shelves! While I was skimming through Sophie Kinsella's Twenties Girl, The Time Traveller's Wife, John Grisham's Associate, Sidney Sheldon's Mistress of The Game etc, my gaze fell upon the non-fiction shelf and saw one attention-grabbing autobiography of the famous adventurous English industrialist, Richard Branson. Titled Losing My Virginity, it speaks of how it all started for him. He's definitely a born entreprenuer, risk taker and surprisingly a family man. It is very interesting reading about how his parents supported him in everything he does and what more interesting is both parents especially the mother herself is someone adventurous too! Guess it runs in the blood for Richard. Overall the book is a very interesting read. It's like reading a novel but encapsulates a lot of business values and lessons. I find it candid and spontaneous too. Richard's sense of humour is wonderful too. I found myself giggling and laughing hysterically at times. Nevertheless, the book is inspiring!

Burberry Beautiful

When Emma Watson became the face of Burberry for the 2009 Fall-Winter ad campaign, I started paying more attention to the brand. The handbags she is seen with in most of the ads are certainly not the ones with the classic tartan patterns which I used to find boring. Having browsed Burberry's website and 'ooh'ed and 'aah'ed over the many, many new designs, I am now a self-confessed new fan of the brand. Particularly love this Prorsum bag she’s holding in the photo below (pic from Burberry). Definitely something I’m going to check out for myself! Mental note : To put aside enuff dough for the trip to the Burberry flagship store on New Bond Street next year :)

The Spiritual Journey

This is a seriously long overdue entry:

I’ve never felt such peace
I’ve never felt so close to God
I never knew I could miss the Prophet so much
Until I stepped onto the Holy Lands

Hubby and I considered our Europe trip last December as the ULTIMATE holiday ever since we got married. Yeah, it was the furthest destination we’ve ever been to together. Well, we felt really good having had the chance to see all the nice places, absorbed the different culture, shopped for loads of designer goods and snapped like over 2000 pictures! But the excitement ended right upon returning home, upon stepping onto the Malaysian soil. No, wait! The excitement ended once we’ve distributed souvenirs to families and friends and saw their delighted faces upon receiving the gifts and after showing the ‘Photobook’ I created for the pics we took. Luckily we used mostly cash for the trip, if not the excitement will surely be short-lived if we had to pay off our credit cards kan?

A few weeks later after the trip, I casually threw the idea of going for Umrah to Hubby and he agreed. But it wasn’t anything concrete because he said,” We’ll go one fine day”. Well, one fine day can be any day kan? And me, being a consultant, one setback of being one is that I can never properly plan my holidays because consultants’ schedules are always ad-hoc, it all depends on when certain projects are secured and when they should start. And trust me, it can be anytime!

Anyway, I told Mum and Dad of our intention. And the people that I planned to go with were certainly them as I would describe the Holy Lands as their second homes, looking at how frequent they go there. They have been visiting these lands every 2 years and lately, it has been something like an annual thing for them. In March this year, Mum came back with a quotation from the travel agent, and Hubby and I were lucky that we could go missing from work for the 2 weeks of the intended dates in the itinerary.

Well, the summary :

Madinah
Transportation :
We flew direct to Madinah from KL via Saudi Arabian Airlines. Journey took around 9 hours with a 30 min transit in Riyadh. Immigration in Madinah was pretty all right. We arrived around 8pm their time, so some of the counters were closed and the queues were quite long. Other than that, no questions asked. But we noticed that some men were taken their photos and some were even taken their thumbprints. Guess they have their own ala-terrorists database kot!

Hotel :
Dallah Taibah. A 4-star hotel. We were given a suite with 3 rooms and each room were filled with 3 twin beds. Orang Arab kan besar-besar. The hotel was recently furbished and everything looked new. The hotel is located right in front of the mosque specifically the Bab Nisak i.e. the main doors to the Ladies Entrance.

Do:
Tours, like most of other Umrah pilgrimages, trips should be already organised by your travel agents. The trips are normally called ‘Ziarah’ and they are categorised into 2 namely Ziarah Dalam and Ziarah Luar. Ziarah Dalam means visit within the Mosque while Ziarah Luar means visit to Masjid Quba’, Jabal Uhud, Masjid Qiblatain, Masjid Tujuh, Dates Farm, Dates Market. Some tips, take your ablution before heading to Masjid Quba, buy your dates at Dates Market as they are cheaper compared to Dates Farm (like 50% cheaper). For souvenirs shopping like abayas and scarves, Madinah offers better quality ones. Shopping can be done around the hotels as there are plenty of shops around the mosque and hotel areas. My personal favourite place is Ben Dawood. I went crazy buying chocolates, fruit juices and cheese there. Those chocolates that you can’t possibly find here, you can definitely find them there. Ben Dawood is basically a better version of Cold Storage/Village Grocer /Mercato.

Eat:
Food is provided at the hotel as this is already included in the package. But I did go try some falafel, shawarma, kebab, Arab version of roti canai and Kudu, their ala McDonald’s for their cheese nachos. Sedap!

Makkah
Transportation :
We flew to Jeddah from Madinah via Saudi Arabian Airlines. Journey took 30 minutes. From Jeddah we were fetched by the travel agent to Makkah. Since there were only 6 of us, we went on a van. Journey from Jeddah to Makkah is around 1 hour. Told Hubby, would prefer to fly from Madinah to Jeddah the next time too Insya Allah. It’s so convenient.

Hotel :
Zam Zam Grand Suites – True to its name, this 5-star hotel definitely reflects grandeur. Once you enter, it’s as if you enter some Arabian Nite setting. Very rich and elaborate. You can see that those staying there are those rich Sheikhs. The hotel is above a 5-storey shopping mall ala our Pavilion here. So, everytime we need to go to the mosque we definitely need to go down to the mall. The entrance to the mosque from the hotel faces the Door No. 1 i.e. King Aziz door. It’s just 10 meter away from the door and if you’re given a room with the mosque view, depending on which floor you’re on, you can definitely see the whole mosque including the Kaabah. The Azan’s from the mosque is piped-in into the room where you can hear the Azan every time. On Fridays you can even hear the Friday sermon right from your room. As for TV, there’s IPTV for you. My favourite channel is Huda TV. If the local networks here can think of a contemporary way to spread Islam to the young ones, Huda TV is a good reference point for them! Hey, Astro Oasis and TV9, check out Huda TV!

Do:
When you're in Makkah, the thing that you wanna do most is of course, perform the Umrah itself. The tawaf, the saie, the prayers. I felt so connected to God while performing Umrah. We had our talks all the time I was there. It was as if I had nothing else to think about other than Allah when I was there. It was as if I was in a care-free world! Oh, how I miss being in that world again!

Apart from Umrah, you'll be brought to the historic sites including Arafah, Gua Hira and many others. And as what I do best i.e. shopping, it was really easy for me because there’s a souq below the hotel. I went pretty crazy shopping for cotton material and scarves. And I tell you, the material is beautiful and different from what you can get here..Enough said :)

Eat:
I walloped lamb Samosa and mango juice (specifically Caesar brand) almost on daily basis. Got the former from a kebab stall next to the hotel and the latter from Bin Dawood. Hehe..If it’s not for the Tawaf and Saie, I bet I could’ve piled on pounds and pounds of extra weight home!

Hmm..writing about this makes me miss the Holy Lands so much. Especially now, as the days are creeping into Ramadan month..It’s been 2 months since I got back but seriously looking forward to be 'Tetamu Allah' again. In the mean time, I aim to be a good wife, daughter, sister, friend, Muslimah, InsyaAllah…Happy Ramadhan everyone!

Screaming.....

Been in hiatus...

Blog is collecting cobwebs....

Will be back when I can find time for myself!

In the meantime, I'll try to manage my stress level...

Naked, No More

Found my ring! It was in my work handbag all this time! Took out keys from the bag today and guess what fell on the floor after that? My wedding ring! It feels good now that I have back something that has been part of me for more than 5 years. Yupp, I'm naked, no more ;)

In Search of the Ring

Been searching high and low for my wedding ring. Decided to leave it behind while I was away for Umrah and can't seem to remember where did I put it. Hmmph..ring, ring, where are you? Come to mama! Feeling kinda naked without you now!

Messing with the Hormones

Up till 2 weeks ago, Auntie Flow has not visited even after 9 months post- surgery. When Mum knew about it, she said I could’ve delivered a baby already! Well, to be frank, I was not worried at all and I truly enjoyed the whole pain-free 9 months! (period-pain free). How could this happen you may ask? Well, right after the surgery I was put on a 6-month Lupron Depot treatment. Every month, for 6 months, I was given an injection of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH). It’s a hormone that stimulates the ovaries to decline its production of estrogen. And with that, I reached the state of menopause after the surgery and was down with menopause-like side effects for 6 months.

I was prescribed with the hormone as advised by the gynae to cure my endometriosis and to certain extent, lower the probability of recurrence of the endometriosis, fibroid and cysts. Lupron immediately stopped the bleeding and whatever pains and cramps I was suffering with before. That was really cool, ay? The gynae told me that the benefits of the treatment could last me for 3-5 years. What?? Five years of pain-free period? SOLD! The idea of being pain-free delighted me and that was the exact selling point that made me agree to the gynae’s pitch. Well, there’s a BUT. The start of the injection means the onset of unbelievable hot flashes. Sometimes I would have to hold my breath because the heat fully surrounded me. To me, it’s truly a sneak peek to what’s menopause is all about! The gynae forewarned me of the side-effects such as hot flashes, night sweats, palpitations, headaches, nausea, fluid retention, joint pain, loss of sexual desire (really?), dizziness, nervousness, and breast changes (huh?- such as tenderness and pain). But Alhamdulillah, I suffered from only hot flashes.

Anyway, last 3 weeks, after almost 9 months of enjoying the pain-free state, I realised that my period has still not come. It’s roughly 3 months delayed bcoz I was told that I’ll be free from menopause after the end of the 6-month treatment. I wanted to just wait and enjoy the pain-free state but with my pending Umrah trip (yes, am visiting the Holy Lands in 2 weeks time) I wanted to be sure that Auntie Flow does not visit while I’m there because I plan to spend a lot of time talking to the Almighty in His and Prophet’s mosques. So, popped-in the gynae’s clinic last 3 weeks and she said that the time of Auntie Flow’s visit after Lupron treatment is varied between individuals but in ensuring that I’ll be period-free during the Umrah trip, she could prescribe me with some medication. After scanning my ovaries and saw that my womb is ready for menstrual flow, she gave me Duphaston to induce my period. Yes, there was a really bloody flow last 2 weeks and it was painful! Earlier, while expecting my period, I tried making mental notes to be prepared for the kinda pain I might face. But I kinda have forgotten how painful my period-pain was after 9 months. But when it finally came after a week being put on Duphaston, of dear, it all came back to me and the pain became so very familiar. Well, I was pretty disappointed because it wasn’t as pain-free as what it was supposed to be, but then again, that’s what I had to endure for messing with the cycle by inducing it, kan? Let’s hope the next ‘uninterrupted’ cycle will be painless. And when I saw the gynae again earlier last week, she gave me Norcolut to be taken in 2 weeks time for the 2 whole weeks of my Umrah trip. This is to delay my period for the upcoming cycle. According to her, right after I stop taking it, I should be getting my period again and the cycle will continue normally in the next one. And I’ll update you whether Lupron really works for me, ay?

Well, that’s the deal between me and my hormones. And the take-aways for you guys? Hmm..

1) Those trying to cure endometriosis, fibroid and the likes, you may check out Lupron Depot

2) Those planning to induce your period, find out about Duphaston

3) Those planning to delay your period, read about Norcolut

Happy Googling!

Confessions of a Bagaholic

Yours truly is one happy bunny today. Thanks to my gal pal who just got back from States, I finally got hold of something that I’ve been drooling over for months! And now, with this purchase, I, a confessed bagaholic, pledge not to splurge on handbags for many, many months to come. Haha! And for now, I’ll be happy painting the town red with whatever I have ;)

Modestly stylish and beautiful

I came across this video on youtube when I was looking for inspiration for blouses designs. I would say that I am pretty much intrigued with this lovely fashion designer, Rabia Z from Dubai.

I read that she took a big risk when she had all her runway models fully covered during the Dubai's Fashion Week. But it all paid off when she bagged the Fashion Week’s “Emerging Talent Winner” award and subsequently became the winner of the British Council’s “Young Entrepreneur of the Gulf” award. In this video, she said, “I want to make modesty look beautiful and also show a more beautiful side of Islam in media…I want my designs to be a bridge between practicing Muslims and non-practicing. You don’t always have to show skin to look beautiful, you can look beautiful and remain covered at the same time.”

Having her designs exported to many countries now, Rabia has definitely merged modern fashion design and tradition. A designer definitely worth keeping an eye out for.