Theme Song Sephia-Samarinda

Theme Song Sephia-Samarinda

The following song is the theme song for the Samarinda drama series that has just recently ended on TV3, titled Sephia. The drama series ended up to be a tragedy of sorts; a whole family was wiped out, due to the evil deeds and ill-doings of one person in that family. In the end, a woman lost the love of her life through an incurable disease, after having lost him earlier due to the circumstances of his family conflict.

A tragic story of life and unfulfilled love.

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(Tip to listen to the song: Click pause at the page default music widget at the right bottom of the side bar before clicking on play on the above widget to avoid the 2 music overlapping. TQ!)

Berhenti Berharap
By Sheila on 7

Aku tak percaya lagi
Dengan apa yang kau beri
Aku terdampar disini
Tersudut menunggu mati

Aku tak percaya lagi
Akan guna matahari
Yang dulu mampu terangi
Sudut gelap hati ini

Aku berhenti berharap
Dan menunggu datang gelap
Sampai nanti suatu saat
Tak ada cinta kudapat

Kenapa ada derita
Bila bahagia tercipta
Kenapa ada sang hitam
Bila putih menyenangkan

Aku pulang..
Tanpa dendam..
Kuterima kekalahanku

Aku pulang..
Tanpa dendam..
Kusalutkan kemenanganmu

Kau ajarkan aku bahagia
Kau ajarkan aku derita
Kau tunjukkan aku bahagia
Kau tunjukkan aku derita
Kau berikan aku bahagia
Kau berikan aku derita

[ rebahkan rambutmu lepaskan perlahan
kau akan mengerti semua.. ]

Aku berhenti berharap
Dan menunggu datang gelap
Sampai nanti suatu saat
Tak ada cinta kudapat

My Brother’s Graduation

My Brother’s Graduation

Today was my younger brother’s graduation ceremony. He is now a graduate of Southampton University. Congratulations Didi!

Interestingly, my own graduation was on the 21st July in the year 2000. That was 4 years and 1 day ago to be exact.

Among the outstanding feature of today’s graduation ceremony, apart from seeing my brother go onstage and collect his scroll from the Vice Chancellor, was to witness the achievement of 2 physically challenged students to graduate along with the other normal physically-able students. One of the special students was blind, and the other, if I am not mistaken, is suffering from the same condition as the brilliant Stephen Hawking. The applause that they received when they went to collect their respective scrolls was deafening and you could feel the inspiration that they exuded to the guests in the graduation hall. It makes you feel amazed at what one can achieve, regardless of one’s physical condition, if one has the grit and determination to succeed.

I certainly can learn from their success.

After the ceremony was the customary post-ceremony reception. The food served was abundant, and if only they were all halal, I would have eaten more than just the egg roll and the chocolate muffin I had. There were all sorts of rolls, pastries and puffs. Well, I guess it’s good that I wasn’t able to eat most of the food served since I am supposed to be on a diet anyway.

My dad had his customary photo in a graduation gown taken, wearing my brother’s gown. My dad did the same thing at my older sister’s graduation and mine too, posing as if he was the graduate himself. Only this time around, my mum and yours truly joined him in his ritual. Hehe.. it brings back the memory of my own graduation all over again.

Once again, congrats Didi!

Of Men and Buses

Of Men and Buses

While waiting for the bus today, I was reminded of a poem that I first came across just before my graduation 4 years ago. I had bought a book of a compilation of the top 500 poems voted as most popular in that year (2000). I bought it because I just felt like reading something different, or maybe because I was driven by the notion that women find men who could recite poetry to them attractive. Do they?

The poem cheekily makes a comparison between men and buses, which I am sure some of the women out there would agree. :-) Funnily, it only serves to remind me how the bus I used to take in my studying days to the university would always come in twos and threes after I'd waited for one for what would seem like eternity.

Enjoy!

Bloody Men

Wendy Cope, 1945 -

Bloody men are like bloody buses
You wait for about a year
And as soon as one approaches your stop
Two or three others appear.

You look at them flashing their indicators,
Offering you a ride.
You're trying to read the destinations,
You haven't much time to decide.

If you make a mistake, there is no turning back.
Jump off, and you'll stand there and gaze
While the cars and the taxis and lorries go by
And the minutes, the hours, the days.

A Shopping Expedition

A Shopping Expedition

Yesterday was another day of shopping and window shopping around the town of Southampton. I have to admit that these are 2 skills that I am not quite good at. When I do shop, I would usually have in mind what I want before hand, go to the particular place where I know I can get what I want, race to the payment counter as quickly as possible for payment, and leave. If I stay around longer and ponder upon the choices on display, I would begin to feel heady, and everything on the shelf would start to look the same to me. That is when I begin to feel sleepy, and thus start to yawn incessantly.

But yesterday, I was accompanying my mother (or rather she was assisting me) with the business of shopping and window shopping. Keeping up with her was quite a challenge. We were looking for a handbag for my fiancée as part of my hantaran to her for the wedding. We must have gone to not less than 10 retail outlets yesterday. My mum was in her mettle, looking through the sea of handbags on display, and assessing the shapes and designs like a pro.

At the beginning of our quest yesterday, I still managed to be helpful and gave her my opinions of the choices she showed me, with my fiancée’s preferred design in mind. But after the 3rd shop, all the handbags began to look the same to me, and in one instance, I even mistook a whole shelf of woman’s knickers for fancy handbags. My mum however managed to keep her composure, and was still making comparisons of the designs of the different handbags from the various shops we’d been to in her head. It amazes me how she could still recall a particular handbag she’d seen 3 shops ago when I could barely remember how the interior of that particular shop looked like by that time.

So as we progressed to what must have seem our hundredth shop of the day, myself and my brother (who had to tag along to give directions) went into cruise control, and just tagged along with our go-getting mum with minimal fuss and question. My mum was, still however in full vigour by that time, eyeing any women’s accessories shop or general store that we might have missed out, while my brother and I were close to being like casualties of a failed search expedition.

My mum chided me by saying I should begin to get used to this since I might have to answer more of this call of duty once I’m married. I guess I should. What made the shopping experience yesterday difficult was the fact that I was getting increasingly unsure whether I would be getting the right handbag design in the end. It’s not that I’m getting this for myself you see. And judging from all the handbags on display yesterday, I could not recall them to being in close resemblance to the ones my fiancée and I had surveyed earlier. I have to say the designs here are less conservative (or rather not conservative enough to my liking, given the purpose I’m buying it for), which I find it an irony since the British are known for their conservatism.

In the end, we didn’t manage to find a suitable handbag yesterday. General Zaleha will continue search operation with Corporal Izwan and Chief Navigator Didi at a later mentioned time.

Mum, I take my hat off to you!

Early Morning Musings

Early Morning Musings

It is coming to my 3rd day in the UK today. I am still adjusting to the sleeping time here, feeling sleepy at the wrong time all the time. For instance, I slept right after Asar time yesterday (which was around 5 pm), and woke up just before the end of Maghrib, which in the summer time fortunately ends when Isya’ starts at 11.38pm. It is 5.45 am at the moment, and the sun is already up out there. That’s summer time for you in England, or rather, in countries that experience 4 seasons.

The good thing about not being able to sleep at night and early in the morning is that it gives me more time to ponder and tinker with my blog. And it is a great help that I have my younger brother around to show me a tip or two on computers and things that I can do to enhance the face of my blog. He’s an IT graduate you see, so this IT stuff is his daily language. It’s refreshing just sitting down at the comp with him and see him doing stuffs on the computer. Interestingly, with all his IT knowledge, he’d yet to create his own blog till today. It’s still under construction tho, so I’ll keep the address a secret till it’s ready. Hehe…

Right now, my next project on this blog is to get some others’s blogs I’ve been visiting linked on mine. I’ve registered with BlogRolling, but I still can’t figure how to get the links to appear on my blog. Kena explore lagi nih.. and get my IT consultant to do it for me. These are interesting times for my blog. Hehe…

Back In The UK

Back In The UK
 
I am back in the UK again. Boy it has been four long years since I was last here. It feels good to be back. I am actually here for my brother’s graduation from Southampton University and will be here for 2 weeks. I already have many places in mind that I am planning to revisit here, especially in London, where my alma mater is. I can’t help feeling guilty though for being away from the office for that long. I guess I’ve spent so much of my time at work (even over weekends at times) that being away for this long has a funny effect on my conscience. But I guess the time away from the office should be good to revitalise my jaded body and mind. The only other thing that makes my coming to the UK a bit heavy is the thought of not seeing my fiancée for 2 weeks. Funny how 2 weeks appear like a very long time to be on leave now when 1 month of winter and Easter break seem like a short time in my studying days.
 
I arrived at Heathrow airport on Friday evening on a flight that left KL on the same day in the afternoon. The flight here was ok. The in-flight movie was nothing to stir up any excitement, so I was more content on playing the online video games for most of the journey (boy, time did fly when you’re playing video games). I was seated next to a spoilt kid who kept screaming to her mum for anything, or when her mum was not paying her enough attention. She must be around 7-8 years old. Rasa cam nak lempang je budak camtuh… she was throwing things around in occasional tantrums and yours truly occasionally found some food debris and snack wrappers on his lap and tray as a result. Can’t her mum tell her to behave? And her whole family was talking to each other so loud (there were 6 of them in all) you could be forgiven for thinking the whole family was deaf.
 
Anyway, I then took a bus from the airport to Southampton. The first thing I did before taking the bus was buying a newspaper. Boy, do I miss the papers here. The page 3 of The Sun Newspaper here is WAY much more interesting than The Sun in Malaysia. Those who’ve been to the UK would now… :-). But I settled for The Daily Mail for a light read on the bus. Since Southampton wasn’t exactly the bus’s last stop, I had to make sure that I was conscious when I reached my stop. I was lucky. Woke up from my slumber just as the bus pulled up at the bus station in Southampton. Imagine ending up in Salisbury at 11 at night with no where to go.. 
 
Woke up at 5 am yesterday (had to, since the sun rises at 5.10 am. Kalau tak tak Subuh le jawapnya…). We all went to London yesterday, taking the 6.22 am bus from Southampton. The first thing that struck me about London was how familiar the place was still to me. I could still remember the Underground lines and the buses to take, and when walking along Oxford Street yesterday, I felt like I never left the place at all. The only thing that I forgot was how many people there always were in London, and the dodging you have to do when walking along Oxford Street to avoid walking into almost everyone else. Like my dad aptly said it, ‘macam ulat tahi’. With myself barely recovered from the jet-lag of my long journey and the time difference, it felt almost surreal, more like I was walking in a dream (it was already late at night in Malaysia by that time. So I guess it was only natural that I felt that way). 
 
 

Me at Portobello Road. (Picture courtesy of my very IT literate brother)

 
Didn’t get to go to many other places I wanted to in London yesterday though, as we spent most of our time in Portobello Road and Oxford Street yesterday. Would love to be back in a few days and go to places like Piccadilly Circus, Leicester Square, walking along the River Thames, the LSE (my alma mater), the West End, and the Covent Garden just to name a few places.
 
Oh well, I have another long English summer day ahead of me. Hmm… what am I going to do today? Gi car boot sale? Or just enjoy walking around town in Southampton? Might as well make the best of it while I’m still here…
 
Gonna file a report to my beloved fiancée first.. :p. Cheerio.