L6193 in preparation for the Holy months of Ramadan 7 Syawal

In anything that we do, 80% is planning and the balance is the execution. A week before Ramadan, we spent two days during one weekend carried our general cleaning to our newly bought house at Greenville Garden, Senadin Miri. Except for Afi and M Afiq who are away in KL, all of us lended our hands in one team did our part in making sure the house and its surrounding are fit to our eyes, nose, minds and soul. Thank you to M Asri, M Aiman, Afiqah, Chotey and off course my beloved wife Nana.

Alhamdullilah, at the end of the day, what matter is the blessing from Almighty Allah Rabbul Jalil.

Personal Social Responsibility::@ TwinzBites

The young artist at work. While waiting for their tertiary education, both Afi and M Afiq demonstrated their mural painting skill as a contribution to their Aunties Hjh Rahmah and Hjh Hamiahs' Bakery n Cafe - d Twinzbites at Permy Jaya. The theme of the mural is about the Twinzbites products and its implication to the development of the nation, specifically the Mirians. They spent about one week to complete the whole piece.

my very FIRST day & d We Care We Share

Forty five minutes after I made my very first entrance to the world second larget LNG complex and the second world largest producer of this lucrative molecule called LNG, I was invited to the very first 'We Care We Share' initiative. 'Langkah Kanan' as the malay famous saying says! It was a pot luck breakfast together with all the team members of OPI and PAO...and no business work subject matters is allowed.

my Last IFTAR with elngHRteam

A night before our departure, on the 23rd night of Ramadan, at the new Delight Restaurant Mirage branch, Alexandria, amid the autumn wind, we were spoilt by the Syrian and Egyptian cuisine during the Iftar organised by my Egyptians brothers and sisters. It was our last Iftar or breaking our fast with my young dynamic ELNG HR team. Million of thanks to them :: Ayman : Dina Salama : Dina Imbabay : Ola : Reham : Hesham : Medhat : Shikin :: Rehab and Samar were not able to join us. InsyaAllah, One day and One time we will cross path again.

Mori Sushi Cairo Experience

Alhamdullillah, we had the chance to try the Japanese cuisine at Mori Sushi at Road 9, al Maadi, Cairo during our visit to Cairo early this week, which coincide with M Aiman and Afiqah’s 2 days break. Japanese cuisine – sushi, tempura, sheshimi - is one of my favorites. The only thing that sometime holds us back is the cost, which is sometime ridiculously expensive.
M Aiman and Afiqah tried various items in the menu. I, besides the standard sushi sets, tried Japanese chicken noodle that I thought was similar to the popular Sarawak Kolong Mee aka Mee kolok. In summary, the service and the hospitality of the staff were commendable; the foods and mixed fresh fruit juices were scrumptious and luscious; the ambience was awesome and to top it all, the price was reasonable. Thanks to Mustafa for successfully arranging this family dinner.

IMSAK BBQ @ Family Day 2010

With the theme of “the more the merrier, united we stand”, IMSAK abbreviation of Ikatan Mahasiswa Sarawak (http://imsakmesir.blogspot.com) or Sarawak Uni-Student Association in Egypt had recently organized their 2 days and 1 night Annual Family Day at their Hostel located at El Haiyu El Ashar or District 10, Nasr City, Cairo. The two days auspicious event was filled with various categories of activities. The spiritual enhancement program, i.e. the Fajr (dusk) talk, the Maghrib (dawn) talk, and the Qiyammulail or literally means wake up during the two-third of the night for prayer, etc. Unfortunately, I managed attending the Maghrib talk by one of the third year Al-Azhar student from Terengganu. He was talking about the importance of following the Sunnah or the way of the Prophet Muhammad saw (peace be upon him) and the essentiality to respect his way of life in case we are not able to apply it. Indeed a compelling talk had refreshed and reminded us about our journey as the servant of Allah swt. Another category was the physical program that had provided the members to build their physique through activities such as, futsal, volleyball, the giant leg, the musical chair, the ‘cock’ fighting, table tennis, and the ‘water bomb’. The last part was the mental challenging session - quiz with obstacle and sign-language quiz. All categories of activities were professionally organized by these 1st and 2nd year students and it was awesome.
After the long day physical activities, the brief menu; fried Bi-hun, Egg salad, Curry Puff, Batik cake, and the BBQ chickens (that were marinated overnight) energized all of us. All these were home made.
The members of IMSAK and all Sarawakian family in Egypt were pampered and treated by the decent BBQ party at their hostel – Asrama Kenyalang roof top. During the BBQ, members were encouraged to give a brief speech and there were session called ‘ukhuwah’ or exchange of gift (EOG). The EOG was fun!

During the BBQ, I was invited to give a 5 minutes pep talk. I took the opportunity with honor emphasizing on the importance of investing sincerely our efforts and time to achieve the true success. Irrespective of who we are, what we want to be, and where we come from, we must work together as build our strength to enhance our Iman or faith that will smoothen our journey thereafter. I told them, “’A’ is important, but ‘A’ is the consequent of something. Hence, the ‘something’ is much more important than the ‘A’ itself. The fact is, ‘A’ is Allah swt’s prerogative”. I reminded them that, “there are about 25% Muslim in Sarawak, and thus, it is our responsibility to bring the remaining 75% to the path of Allah swt. Statically, there are merely 34 Sarawakian pursuing their studies mainly in the Medical and Religious discipline. 25% of the Muslim population in Sarawak is expecting from 34 of you to brighten their life later. Quite a tough and challenging responsibility though”. I further shared them my perception about success, “A doctor (who study about human body and its related knowledge) will not live forever and those who study the Islamic religious importance is not guaranteed heaven; the indescribable and unthinkable Jannah – the Heaven of Allah swt is for those who had possessed the true sense of Iman”.

Jannah, the niece of Nana's good friend - Uteh is the first year student of the Al-Azhar University. She is very friendly and supportive. Her brother, Azman is also studying in the same university. All the best to both of them.

Our great assets, 'Afi, Muhammad Asri, Muhammad Afiq and Afiqah with their natural pose.

Muhammad Aiman, me and the rest of the IMSAK members (boy) after the 'Exchange of Gift' program. Good job dude. Keep it up!

Nana, Afiqah and the IMSAK (girl) members. By the way, there were around 14 Sarawakian female students here in Egypt. Kudos to all the IMSAK members and strive hard for our future generation.

...Energy Return, Aspiring Others Everywhere

Some noble thingy that I oblige to share.
If you have heard about Grameen Bank, than you must know Professor Dr Muhammad Yunus, a Bangladeshi economist from Chittagong who had received more than 20 awards & Noble prizes. I had shared his brief biography and his noble efforts in early release.
Well, that was just the mere introduction but the gist of this release is about the story of my two friends Ahmad Zaidi and Redza Shamsuddin who spent their weekend doing some noble thing.

I was at this place called Dewan Malaysia Abbasiah or Malaysia Hall Abbasiyah last Friday. I met Yusuf the chief Chef who was busy with his catering things, entertaining his workers and customers. He was asked to cater foods & drinks for activities organized by the students and NGOs on that day. There were many activities going on and, one of it was the English class at the Tutorial Hall of this majestic building.
After we had our lunch, I went down to the Tutorial Hall and met eight eager self-motivated Malaysian el Azhar students who realized the importance of mastering English language to achieve their dreams. Their zealous determination has made me proud. The ‘teachers’ introduced me to all of them.
I greeted them, “Assalammualaikum”. One of the teacher reminded me that you have to converse in English during this class. Sure, it should! Thus, I obliged diligently. One of them read the English Article given by their ‘teacher’. “Do you understand what you had just read? Anything to clarify” asked the ‘teacher’ compassionately. “Excuse me ‘teacher’”, replied the student. “I don’t understand what the meaning of meticulous is?” His question touched my heart. Their passion and sincerity had put off their shyness. Both ‘teachers’ blissfully rationalized the meaning of the words and article to them.

And, let me introduce you again their so called teachers - Ahmad Zaidi Datuk Dr. Hatta and Redza Samsudin. A bit of history of this initiative. It was first mooted by the wife of Shell Egypt’s Chairman. Cik Putri volunteered to take up the initiative and her legacy was passed along to Badely and Afendy. Three of them had left Egypt a year ago. Our friend Ahmad Munir revived this initiative recently and got the assistance of Ahmad Zaidi, Redza and Yusmadi. They take turns facilitating the classes.

When I approached him Ahmad Zaidi informed us that, “Learning goes both ways.. the student learn a bit of public speaking/ English and we as facilitators learn a bit about the lives of these students. He continued, “Probably not many of us knew that during examinations here, the person monitoring the exams make some side business by selling shay and ahwa to the students. Who can imagine that, while taking the exams, we could order a cup of shay? Amazing !”

Well Kudos to A Munir, Yusmadi,, Badley, Afendy, Putri and the wife of Shell Egypt’s Chairman.

The morale of the story is, we have to spend our wealth, efforts and the time (to the path of Allah) with the people ‘on the streets’ to be closer to Allah Rabbul Jalil.
Rasullullah saw encouraged us to look at the ‘lower’ people for us to build our inner strength. The higher we climb, be it the highest mountain, the tallest tree, the tallest building or whatever, the more we rely on the lower people. The fact is that, after the long strenuous climb reaching the peak, you will have to look down at the people who had supported and helped you.
This reminded me about a blind mountaineer – Erik Weihenmeyer – the only blind person who ever had reached the top of the world – the 8840 meters lofty vantage point. When three of them were about to put-off their dream, one guy at the base camp called a weather-man motivated them through their satellite radio, pushing their morale with the weather report, etc.

No mountain is high when there is a will; when there is a will, there is a way.Energy Receive Energy Return, Aspiring Others Everywhere.

Moving Out from Kafr Abdou

Yesterday, my friend ASI started mobilizing their household items to their new rented apartment near San Stefano at Loran, about 6 kilometers away from our apartment at Kafr Abdou. Well, except for the nomadic Bedouins, nobody likes moving house especially when you have many things to be packed and unpacked. It will at least take one month to settle down.
Supervised by Kamarul, ‘Afi, Muhammad Afiq, Muhammad Asri, Hisham and Nasr lend their hands to reduce that unwanted burden and definitely morale support to ASI. Muhammad Aiman and I unfortunately came at the later phase to support. We were invited by M Fikirs’s family to their thanksgiving at Shatby.

Working or leaving in overseas is not always exciting as many of us thought. Challenges and disadvantages always come in many ways and forms. What ever you call yourselves is, be it an Expatriate, Advisor, or Company representatives, you are still foreigner and in many countries, irrespective of its economic and political situations, foreigner is perceived as a second-class citizen, thus less privilege in many aspects. In addition, sometime changes of the company’s policy may make it relatively less good. Nevertheless, as I always mentioned, we cannot grab and have everything in this temporary world. We heard many common phrases like, “there is nothing like home – whatever the shape and colors are”; “nobody is perfect”; “Money is not everything in life” and many more. Generically, we only have two options: to be good or to become bad; to love or to hate; …….. to stay On or to quit and do something else….the choice is yours. Allah swt has given us the information, the knowledge, the wisdom and the answers for each action that you do or the consequences that we must be aware.

I was informed by Kamarul that ASI spent almost a month looking for his suitable apartment and went to more than 40 apartments in many areas around Alexandria! To ASI and family, congratulations.....and may Allah swt give you His Blessing.