Birthday celebration

The family celebrated Liani's 23rd birthday at Itallianies in One Utama and had Nuqman & Naquib with us.


Kak Nor ordered some cute cupcakes for Mama's and Liani's joint celebration. It is a family friendly restaurant with a lively atmosphere. The little boys entertained themselves with big massive balloons courtesy of the restaurant whilst we enjoyed the lovely food.


So my sis is now steadily approaching the mid 20s mark..getting older lah u! Hahahaha :P

Penang trip

This week, I had promised my sis I'd visit her in Penang.


I enjoyed the scenery whilst enjoying the drive to Penang. There aren't many places in the world where you can see waterfalls whilst driving along the highway. It's one of the things I will miss when I fly back to London.


Whilst waiting for my sis to finish work, I followed Chip to the USM campus which was a nice setting for a campus. I never had the privilege of living in a campus but I think campus life would have been enjoyable living the student community life where everyone knows each other.


A trip to Penang would not be complete without nasi kandar so we had late lunch at the famous Kayu restaurant. My fav dish was the ayam madu..delicious!!


We took a ride round Penang Island visiting Balik Pulau and passing Balik Relau..it was a shame the weather was slightly overcast but I still liked the view. There are also a few durian stalls since it is the durian season...I'm not a durian fan due to a certain durian trip I took with my aunt and uncle when I was younger. Luckily the durian smell didn't get in the car so I didn't get carsick ;)


On the way up to the hill I noticed there were a few people jogging up the steep hill and people can also go cycling up the hill. Full respect goes out to all of them since it is a very steep hill (for me anyways!)


We then headed towards the town...the architecture in the town is heavily influenced by the British Colonial style during the British occupation period. Even the streets have British names like Jalan Downing Street, Jalan Scotland , Jalan Macallister and I even noticed there is even a street of my school Jalan Fettes (yeay! famous jugak my school ni...hehe)


The thing which makes me sad is a lot of the buildings aren't being preserved due to lack of money and investment in restoring these buildings. In my own opinion, I think economic progress has taken priority over preserving the historic buildings and artefacts that remains in our country. I am all for economic progress but we should strike a balance between striving for economic progress and preserving our cultural heritage.
I mean how many shopping complexes do we REALLLY need which probably ALL have similar shops.....??!!!


We visited Padang Kota Lama which faced the seaview...I love walking along the seaside because it relaxes me and for that one moment all life's troubles just seem so far away...............


I met up with my sis after dinner and we all had dinner at Gurney Drive which has a row of hawker stalls. I was still full from lunch but I just had to try one of my fav dishes Assam Laksa and sotong kangkung...I just love kangkung with anything!!!


My sis then took me to her current fav place Batu Feringghi to check out the market....I would've liked to see the Batu Feringghi beach but there's not much a view at night...oh well maybe next time.....


The next day, Chip took me to a surreal place to have roti canai at Jln Transfer ..it was certainly an experience. I've never had breakfast where everyone is sat all in one row (canteen style) but instead of facing each other we're facing the street. That was definitely a first for me! :)


Since everyone was working I ventured out for a wee walk round the area....I visited the massive Burmese Temple adorned with the Buddha statues and gold colour everywhere. I wandered along the streets to look at the building architecture of various buildings around the area and stopped over at Gurney Plaza. I wasn't in the mood for shopping but I ended buying stuff anyway....ooops!


That night my sis brought me to have pasembor, cendol and char kway teaow (again one of my favs!) Anyone who is reading this probably thinks I'm food obsessed! Hahaha you're not far wrong! :p


We took a drive round the town at night...I wanted to go to Penang Hill but it was closed during the evening but we decided to drive up there anyway. Even though Penang Hill was closed there were still people wandering out at night round the area...one of them was a line dancing group who was using one of the halls nearby the hill.. I have to admit their dancing weren't half bad...hehe


All in all it was an enjoyable trip thanks to Chip and Liani for taking me round the area.......

A night of celebration......

Last Friday my uncle a.k.a Ayahyus invited the Nik Clan to celebrate his Company's 15th Anniversary celebration. It was a fun night with a black & red dress theme code. Everyone dressed up following Kak Oleen's tagline "Dressed to Kill" !

We had Kak Oleen and Alex Choong as our MC for the night. The MC did a good job making everyone participate with the event for the night. The night was filled with an assortment of entertainment ranging from Michael Jackson impersonations, comedy from Leonard Tan (although I didn't find him THAT funny..not my cup of tea I'm afraid...), various theme music quizzes, best dressed competitions won by Azrai. I thought there should have been a category for best dressed boy cuz Naeem was the handsomest boy of the night. Even my mom participated and won a prize for rushing up on stage in guessing the Dallas theme song!


My highlight was seeing Amy from Search perform. I grew up listening to Search and Gersang rock songs mainly influenced by my bro who often had their songs on at home. He was as we say in Malay slang "very sporting" coming down stage to allow people to take photos with him while he was singing those classic Search songs. I would have liked to see him perform more songs but due to late running of the event he performed two songs only.


The other singer of the night was the lovely Misha Omar. A singer with an amazing powerful voice with a friendly attitude which was good to see. Abang Azmi was lucky enough to perform a duet with Misha. He was a bit nervous at the start but he got into it halfway through the song...hehehe...Abang Nizam recorded the song so we will keep it in our family's hall of fame...hahahahahaa..... :)


The night ended with Ayahyus emotional speech. As a family we all hope he will find happiness and contentment in life. It was a a joyous and enjoyable night of celebration...We look forward for the next milestone Ayahyus! :)

Weddings weddings weddings........

Apart from visiting my family, the reason I came back to Malaysia this month is to attend my friends wedding.

My sis and I attended Ezro's wedding at his place in Bangi. A simple affair but enjoyable and thanks to 'lil sis for temaning me :)


Izad's and Wendy's took place last night. When Izad told me he was getting married I was surprised since out of the LSE gang we didn't think he would be the first one to get hitched. Nevertheless we're all happy for him. Selamat Pengantin Baru dude!!! Semoga bahagia ke anak cucu :)

It was a good night being reunited with uni friends and London people who I haven't met in a long time..some even since graduation.... Some have got married and had babies and some haven't changed one bit since we last met.



My other good friend Nija is also getting hitched this week. Nija has been one of my good friends at LSE and we became closer when we lived together as housemates. We had our girls night out at KL Hilton organised by her sis Nina. It was a fun dinner filled with some entertainment for our dear Nija *wink* Hope it was a memorable night for u !
Thanks for letting me be involved in the wedding preparations..hope I don't let u down ! :)

Back at home...

I'm finally back at home. I arrived early on Sunday morning.


I wasn't too jetlagged this time since I didn't really get much sleep the night before with my last minute packing and the last few weeks have been hectic to say the least!


Recent updates, I've had to move out of my flat in Bayswater to Edgware Rd. It wasn't out of choice but I was forced out by the landlord and there were certain mishandling of the whole situation by the estate agent. Anyone who has experience in renting will know that estate agents are the most insistent and persuasive people when you are looking for a flat but once you're a tenant their service are often not satisfactory to say the least! Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that I moved out of the place because the whole situation would've been a whole lot more messy if I found out when I came back from KL end of this month.


In the long term I've had to rethink my career options and long term plans ..the question everyone always asks when I go back "Bila nak balik for good??" . When I was younger I thought I had a plan...after uni , qualify for my CA and then work for a few years post qualification in London and then go back to Malaysia to settle down. But now, I'm done with planning ahead and having high expectations..."que sera sera"... I still want to do well... but maybe my time has not yet come..All i can do now is keep on trying and doing my best..


Well, hopefully this break can revitalise me...
I prefer the afternoon flight from London..arrived KL in the morning so didn't get a chance to sleep.
After having breakfast at home, I met my second nephew Naquib for the first time...a year old already! Time flies man!
This week I've been sorting out my admin things like sorting out my lost driving license and updating my passport which I can now use at the Autogate..yeay! No more queuing at the manual gate.
Renewing the licence was surprisingly straightforward, I had to pay RM20 as a fine for losing my licence and showed my IC with copies of my licence photos and hey presto a new driving licence just like that!


I went for my fitting for my fren's wedding...I hope it looks good...have to control what I eat now cuz can't put any more weight after the fitting took place. :P


I also checked out the Curve this week for the first time, I like the place..good choice of places to eat and near my house too so I think that will be my new hangout place... :)
Shopping has also been good although I have to stop using my credit card and converting in MYR! Definitely not a wise thing to do.....


Apart from that, spending time with the family, catching up on sleep and familiarising myself with the Malaysian traffic again with new roads & highways paying for tolls everywhere!