Happy New Year 2013

I am happy to finally have a morning for myself. Life have been hectic but I am not complaining because that's is life. Anyway, as human, we usually take things for granted and only appreciate those luxuries when they are gone.

          Quiet morning with birds singing and green trees lookout over the glass window are the little things that I am enjoying at the moment.

          I thank God for the passed lovely 2012 and looking forward for 2013. Wishing everyone Happy New Year and may all the wishes come true. \(^_^)/

Loss and found

Many things took place for the past few months of my absent in this world of net. The body and soul were going places and so some of my things.

Early Ramadan, my house was broken into. Unfortunately, they took all the things that I cherish from Japan and fortunately, I was not at home.

As fates have it, my mom was there the whole ten days with me to lend her shoulders. Then, at the end of Ramadan I received good news; the national science grant was granted.

Life is like that, simply compelling.

I believe that we human will be tested and tried by Him till the end of the day. 

A mysterious crying affair

As time fly by, we will leave behind many things in our quest for the future. That is life. Same with me, but the brain will never let it go that easy. Those things known as memory still very much instilled in the prefrontal cortex of the brain. Once a while, I will walk down those memory lanes and many incidences will come rushing back. Those memories have made me who I am today. It is like having a dash of a smell of a used-to-love shampoo and it triggers a feeling and images of all the memories that are unknowingly embedded in that particular brain.

I used to live in a flat of Kajang Utama for about 6 years. Those days were the days of struggling where we; my housemates of three and I, spent most of our times studying to finish our tertiary education, it was for the first 3 years. Iza and I had added another three years for master degree while Kak Wan and As, they’ve opted for work, but we stayed put in the same house until Iza got married and one by one left the house.

Money was a big matter during those days. On a small stipend provided we managed carefully to accommodate all the needs. However, it never deterred us from being happy. During free time, we tried to get to know our neighbors and mingling away. But sometimes, our duty as students and workers took away the liberty to spend time with them all. Anyhow, we had been close to a few of them.

As the basis of any relationship, love bridged us with one another. Apart from the adults, there were children, many of them. Children were always behaving like one, but they were only children. At times, they did test our patience but humor us at other times. It was like one big family. We helped each other to the best that we could. Nevertheless not all the families there were the perfect family or at least the decent ones. Some of them were living lives which look like had been lifted straight from the TV’s dramas with either divorced parents, second wife, step child, insufficient money and drinking problems. In other words, we were surrounded with low level middle class family that found comfort in each other company.

Anyway, it was normal life still until one weekend. Early morning of that day, I was wakened up to a sound of a child crying. My room was at the end of the block, at the third floor of four stories building, near the stairs, so I used to hear many things; even of a couple discussing their private life. But then, that morning it was a crying sound and that too, the time was around 3 am. Therefore, only one object was lingering in my mind. Oh God! Not that.

You see, I am easily feared of ghost and since, I didn’t take much attention of it but tried as best to go back to sleep. After quite some time, the crying ended with a loud thud sound. There were questions popped-up of that but I was sleepy and feared; a combination that made my mind blurred. The best choice was to ignore and thus, I went back to sleep.

Since I had to go to the lab that morning, I left early, rushing down the stairs and not thinking much about the crying sound anymore. What’s more, all the others were still sleeping. There was really no one around given that it was Sunday. People usually prefer to sleep it off during Sunday morning.

The mind was fixed at work in hand until I reached home that evening; my roommate told me the worst. A child, the one who’s hyperactive, had fallen off the balcony and was found in the drain below the apartment. They said he was found by someone who walked his motorbike out from the parking place, it was around mid morning and the ants had started to swarm his body.

I knew the boy. The family just moved into the flat. He was maybe around two years old, staying with his father after the parents divorced or said so. The father had since remarried. Another version which was told was his birth mother had left the country to go back to her home country leaving both of them behind. Anyway, at that time they family just had a new addition of a family member when his step-mother delivered a baby boy few months back.

It was also all known that he was always beaten for being too naughty. Probably he was beaten that night and run away from home. Trying to sit on the fence of the balcony and fall off, thus explained the thud sound that I heard. Or worst, probably there was someone who was very disturbed with his behavior and took it to the dangerous level. Trying to quiet him off, the person might have shoved him hard and accidentally, lose grip and he fall off.

Oh my God! There goes my Hercule Poirot deduction. 

Anyway, the boy was too small to get on the top of the fence but he was small enough to get through the in-between vertical bar of the fence.

Gosh! I was not able to stop thinking about the incidence. He was there crying while I slept through the night. He was there lay dead when I walked to the lab that morning.

This incidence will be there whenever Kajang Utama is mention. Hopefully, he is living happily on the other side though I will never know what is really happen that morning.

The young system

In the field of science, I am still young. Yes, at this age, still young. What's more, I believe the day I think I am fully equip with the knowledge; if that day arrive, it is the day I am supposed to die or I am no longer needed in this world. Why? We are here in this world for something, for a reason. People who fail to see the reason of living will have no reason to live. And as long as we’re here living, we then shall find the reason. 

On a lighter note, I am really young….always…at heart. 

Besides me, the science in Malaysia itself is young. 

Today, there is an article in a newspaper stated that the number of Science steam students in Malaysia is decreasing. The statement is not shocking news to me. I will not start the blaming game but I will say that we do not have an optimum system to support the cause of our education system for the future generation. This means that the system that we have now just let it get by without realizing it soon enough whether the trending is going south or north or the benefit of going for it. 

Let me give a few examples of the havoc that we have been dealing so far. 

Not so long ago when I was one of the pupils, out of sudden the headmaster of the school announced that because the ministry wants more science stream student, thus, there will be an element of science in one of the primary school subjects. My batch then was that guinea pig batch. 

Then, when I was a student in a university, suddenly there was a statement that the country didn't have enough engineers. In order to accommodate the need, we shall have them passed after 3 years. After sometimes, there were too many engineers. Down the road, it was lacking again. 

Another time, there was a statement of not enough accountants and thus, more students studying in this area were recruited. The same cycle repeated. 

Then there were rumors of neglecting Art stream students where History or Literature or Acting is part of the subjects. This was followed with months of discussion openly in the newspaper until it was dying off. 

Those situations showed that there was no proper planning of the system. I believe that in Mathematics courses there is one subject where we can project the future trending. If it ever difficult for a graduate in business to evaluate it manually, we have computer science expert for that purposes. 

The latest example of this situation is the nurses who had graduated but without jobs. Prior to this, our country was said to be in shortage of nurses. Many schools start offering the course and at the end, no one is taking them in. 

Just a reminder, no blaming but we shall come out with a solution. 

To study science is not an easy task. As a science stream student, I spent more time in classes compared to my peer who took Art stream. I still vividly remember that while we Science stream students had to attend extra classes in Biology, the Art students were attending extra drama classes for year-end school performances. 

At the end of the day, as a PhD holder, I only make quarter compared to them who some work managing other people’s money. One of my friend who shifted from the Science Stream to do accounting for her degree spent quarter of the year last year visiting other countries with her husband, just for sightseeing. I, in the mean time had to fight with my ex-boss who thought that I didn't deserved the rank because I just a basic science lecturer among the dental/medical lecturers, that to even with a PhD degree. When it comes to the new government scheme, the pay offered (before being review) was much less then the dental/medical lecturers. Theirs come with extra allowance which the basic science lecturers can only dream of. 

If the country wants more students in Science stream, the perk of being one at the end of the day must be very good. I will not suggest that anyone go for science except they want to do medical, dental or engineering. Other than that, you’ll have a long way to go before getting the PhD and be at the best of you. If not, just do it for the sake of loving the science and see where it will take you forward. The system now has a very minimal effect in supporting your interest.

Too costly for a drink!

Thank God! It was over. The water drainage from my body due to food poisoning or should I say, “Ice poisoning” at the end, stop. 

Out of a good intention to make amend with my housemate who I had a disagreement over some silly misunderstanding, we went out for a tea. Well, to a well established cake house, one of Malaysia successful franchising branch in KB. I wanted to have the cake plus the chocolate ice drink with a lot of cream on top of it. The other two were Okay with hot drinks.

Feeling full and sleepy, I slept after Maghreb prayer. But by midnight, the stomach started to show its tantrum. Finally, the whole nights was spent waking-up and throwing-out while visiting the toilets in between and then get back to sleep, the cycle were repeated a few times. I guess the time that I’ve spent in the toilet that night was more than I did in a week.

But it was a good and well maintained restaurant, argued me. Even the mineral water cost so much.

Since I only had breakfast at home, without lunch, there should not be any other way that my stomach gets contaminated other than the ice drink. The other two friends were not affected and yet we had shared all the food. Thank God that they didn’t want to taste my drink with the yummy cream.

I shall make my drink at home next time. It is too dangerous to eat out too often even though for a good reason at a good place. You might get sue for nothing by your own mate if she thinks that you want to poison her after an argument! (^_~)

The day job lover

Last week I went to see a professor who happened to be my father’s friend. An unlikely friend considering that my late father was a farmer. To cut the long story short, they became friends through my second cousin who worked with the professor before he was a professor.

Without digressing any further, let’s jump to the main story.

Since the professor was in KK for his work appointment, we set a time to meet up. He had genuinely shown his interest in the progress of my work since I started my PhD. And as a lecturer, one of the ‘must’ thing that we need to do is to write articles, well, we are supposed to generate knowledge besides the teaching. This one, not many people understand it, even the so called lecturer themselves. Anyway, as expected, the article writing and scientific publications became the main topic of our conversation.

But somehow out of the blue, he deviated from the main topic and asked me a queer question, ‘Are you happy with your work?’

It did stop me for awhile, I mean, I did take a few second to think before shooting him back with the answer, the diplomatically one.

From there onwards, all the other matters that pop out from our discussion didn’t interest me as much since I kept asking myself, ‘Am I happy with my work?’

Surprisingly, I was very much happy with my work and the thought made me asking the simple question again and again, and even seeking the answer from the deep down of my heart.

It's the worry of loving the WORK so much that made me keep repeating the Q unnecessarily. As much as I want, I can’t even answer the ‘why’ question. Why I love my job?

If it is because of the pay, comparing to my colleague who came in as a ‘doctor’ with only their bachelor degree, they are making much more than me. The workload is heavy, though not so much on the lifting all the heavy things or making more coffees, heavy in the sense of doing the thinking part.

Finally, I guess the job come to me naturally because this work allows me to think more than doing. The doing maybe just in the reading and writing, which both fall into the hobby category of mine, besides cooking and fishing. Basically, the things that I do now (that I consider work) are things that I do when I don’t work.

Is this healthy, to love your daily job so much? I don’t know. I think I am supposed to keep the day job just to earn money for living, not to love it. Only artiste have the privilege to play around with their hobby to earn a living. Maybe I am wrong.