A comeback post

I didn't write anything in 2017. Wow, what an achievement. Haha. After more than one year abandoned this blog, I thought I want to let it die in a slow death of abandonment. However, come 2018 and new resolution, I will revive this old blog of mine and start writing again. Writing down thoughts is a good practice, and it provides a venue for reflection and self-awareness. As you know, an effective leader is the one who has self-awareness. 

Since I have skipped 2017, I also missed the mandatory yearly review at the beginning of the year. For this, I have to review two years which are 2016 and 2017.

What happened in 2016? Big changes. Zainal completed his double Master degree from Boston University, and we moved from the northeast to the southwest. Precisely from Boston to Arizona. From frigid cold winter to scorching hot summer. Why the move? To get another Master degree, precisely MBA. We drove all the way across the country in 6 days covering more than 6,000 miles. We arrived on the hottest day of the year which was 120 degrees Fahrenheit or 49 degree Celsius, and it fell on the first day of Ramadhan. Crazy. I finished two quarters in my MBA and what I can tell you is that MBA is wayyyyyy crazier than that Master degree from Duke. I can't remember much the details between August and December because I was literally living at the campus all day and barely have any extra time to live my life.

In 2017, life is better. Or maybe I just adapted to the busy schedule of MBA. I tried to avoid staying in Phoenix during summer, but my rezqi was to be here as I interned at a company here. I felt like 2017 deserved a different post. Okay, I just lazy to remember what happened in 2017 right now and I will continue in a different post.

Dear Future Me

Dear future me at May 2018,

I'm so glad that we took this road and made it! While you are celebrating on your graduation day, I hope you remember the time we almost feel like we are not going to make it.

I'm writing to you now at Quarter 2. We made it in Quarter 1 and aced Accounting! High five. Now at Quarter 2, things are more difficult than I imagined. Finance is a nightmare. At week 2, we are at chapter 11 already and I'm still trying to understand PV and FV. Not really, I understand that concept but why there's a lot of different formula. I have online finance quiz to be taken tonight and I'm still reading the textbook. And writing this post.

Quarter system is brutal, future me. 12 credit hours in 7 weeks is so hardcore. I saw firsthand how Zainal did it in his MBA but I couldn't comprehend the difficulties until I experience it myself. Everything is in light speed and the workload is huge. MBA is truly a different experience and now I know why MBA graduates are given different salary. The company know what we are capable of. 

I remembered my first Master. I thought it was tough as I took 13 credit hours that semester while other Masters student only took 9 credit hours. But now, for the whole semester I'm taking 24 credit hours. And I applied to do double degree. I'm not sure if you are graduating with an MBA only or with double degree. Please don't tell me. I'm going to figure out myself soon.

Ok future me. I really need to focus on this finance book and take the quiz tonight. Please pray for our success!

Get your daily dose of free and cheap books

 

Bookbub.com

 

 I just discovered a great website a few weeks ago. It is called BookBub.com. If you have known it for quite some time, good for you! I wish I have known it earlier.

So what is so great about this website? This website is for a book lover, that too cheap to buy books. What BookBub does is they send daily email on ebooks that are free or on sale right now. During registration, you can choose what kind of genre do you prefer and even your favorite authors. They cover all types of book. Then you can choose what kind of ebook format you prefer such as Kindle, Nook, iBooks etc, and I chose Amazon Kindle.

Every day I received an email with few books that are on sale or free on Amazon. The best part is almost all books that I received (and that I checked) are high rated books. It is not some books that no one read. Nearly all the books have at least 4 stars rating.

However, there is one con about this. My rate of reading can't match the rate of books that I downloaded. I have few books already that I downloaded because of BookBub and now I have to increase my reading speed and spend more time to read all these books. Hehe.

Therefore if you love reading but paying a lot for books, BookBub is the answer! It's like Groupon for book :)

Ps: I was googling BookBub to check the correct URL, and I realized BookBub is a company based in Cambridge, MA. OMG, I didn't know about this when I was in Boston. I know I was a bit overexcited about this but ever since I moved to Phoenix, I became so attached to Boston for some reason. I guess I missed that place more than I ever know.

 

 

He is my mojo

Alhamdulillah... With Allah's grace, I am able to meet Ramadhan again this year. Two weeks plus of Ramadhan in Tempe, AZ, two days flying in between America, Europe and Asia, and the rest in Malaysia. Everything is good except this is my second time as a wife I will not be with my husband during Raya. 

I remembered during the discussion when should I be back to Malaysia to change my visa and I said to him that then we will not celebrate Raya together. In his sternness and seriousness he exclaimed that if we want to move forward and be successful, we need to get less emotional about this. It's just one time and we can always celebrate again. Deng..

Over time again and again, my husband knocked into my sleepy head when I get too comfortable, emotional and carried away. Before I got married, I looked for someone with a vision, and Allah granted my prayer and I married one. Now it is haunting me, in a good way InsyaAllah. The next chapter of my life is going to be interesting and the reason it happened at the first place is because the knock from my husband.

Knock knock.

First Toastmaster win!

Early this year, I joined Toastmaster International. It's a club where you can practice public speaking in a safe and control environment. I always wanted to join one but didn't have the time or chance previously. So when I found out there's one just a block from Zainal's school, I checked it out to feel how the club was doing. After being a guest for 3 times, I decided to join. Coincidentally I started my membership on 1st January 2016.

Funnily, at the same as I joined, there were many new members joining the club at the same time. So now the battle to find a slot for speech has reached to 2 months waiting period. Last year when I was just a guest, it took 2-3 weeks of waiting period. So in Toastmaster, you need to complete 10 speeches for you to become Competent Communicator. Each speech will focus on a certain aspect of a public speaking, and you are being evaluated by an evaluator. For example, how to structure for speech, vocal variety, body language/movement and speech to inspire/inform/storytelling.

Besides prepared speeches, the second part of club meeting is table topics speech. Table topic speech is when you are asked to give a 1-2 minutes speech on a topic/questions that being asked at that moment. The idea is to train you to be able to think on your feet. You need to think fast and give the answer on the spot.

It so happened, last week the club held International Speech Competition. The winner will represent the club to next stage of the competition. However, only members with 6 speeches and above are qualified to join. Since I only did 3 speeches, I was not qualified. But I can join the Table Topic Contest as it doesn't have per-requisite. I didn't do any preparation as I had an interview in the morning and was preparing for that interview instead. Nevertheless, I watched a Youtube video on how to win Table Topic Contest by past winners. Yes, I am very competitive. I need to do the best even I just joined for fun.

Guess what? I won first place in the Table Topic Contest! Alhamdulillah. I was super duper happy and shock at the same time. Coz I thought I was all over the place while trying to remember what the video told me to do. But the judges were telling me that I did a good job. The question for that contest was: What fictional character you want to meet in real life and why?

Due to that, now I'm going to represent my club at the area level contest early next month. Oh wait, that is next week! Oh no... this time around I will practice and make sure I will make my club proud.

Boston Public Library

If you live in Boston or surrounding areas, and never got Boston Public Library (BPL) free membership, you better apply for one now. It's so easy to apply. All you need is proof that you are living in Massachusetts now by bringing an ID or a bill with your name and address. Within 5 minutes and you have one of the best library membership in the world (source: me).

Even if you don't like to read, you can borrow thousands of DVD from the library. The library also has a program where they give you free tickets to Boston attractions. All you need is to book which day you want to go and pick up a pass at a library near you. I have redeemed free tickets to New England Aquarium, USS Constitution Museum and Museum of Science. For each pass, you can redeem 4 tickets so that you and your friends can enjoy it together. Cool right.

But the best part of this library is the collection that they have. They have the second largest collection of books and records in the United States. Imagine how many books you can read. Whenever I saw a book someone suggest, I immediately search BPL and always find a few copies. Besides hard copy book, they also have the e-book and audio book. I love their e-book. I can just download it into my Kindle within few minutes I search for it (providing the book is available). Sometimes some books are not available in e-book format, or the e-book format is already borrowed by someone else. I can hold the hard copy book and ask them to send to the nearest library near me. At one time, I held up to 4 books and asked them to send to the Brighton library which is few minutes from my house. Within 2 days, they send an email informing that my books are available, and I can pick it up.

Talking about the nearest library, BPL has 24 branches in Boston besides the famous and beautiful central library at Copley Square. They want to make sure that everyone has access to the library at their neighborhood. By having these branches, you can return books at any branches and ask them to send the book to your neighborhood library. So there is no reason for you not to read!

Yup, I can study here all day. Boston Public Library is the second largest public library in US with 23 million materials 😮 #boston #publiclibrary #bpl

A photo posted by Mun M (@chokiinheaven) on Mar 14, 2015 at 8:30pm PDT

The famous study room in Boston Public Library in Copley Square

However, if you found out that the book you want in not at BPL, you can always suggest them to buy. Last winter, I went visiting Pixar exhibition at Museum of Science (the free tickets remember), and I saw this one book that I interested in reading which is about digital painting. When I went home, I searched the library online and found it wasn't in their collection. I looked up at Amazon, and the price of that book is high, even the used version. Remembered that BPL has this option to suggest any books, I submitted that book information on the BPL website. I imagined that they received thousands of requests, and I don't think I will hear from them. Surprise, surprise, few weeks after that, I received an email saying that the book that I submit for the suggestion is available, and I can come to pick it up. I was so impressed! Wow.. I can forget about buying any books right now.

I'm so happy with BPL, and I glad that I'm able to use their service. I think they do an excellent job ensuring that the Boston communities can continuously learn by providing free materials and spaces. They also have classes at their library. I never join one, but I might try one day.

So those who haven't applied for BPL membership, you should use this wonderful service.

Favorite food

My husband always boasts that he knew everything about me, even what I think if he said something. Few nights ago I asked him what my favorite food is. He thought hard and realized he didn't know. He wasn't happy why he didn't know that and started asking me. He started guessing few food which he thought I like most.
 

The truth is, I don't know too. I have food that I like, but there is no food that I love that become my favorite food. I love food all the same. Haha

 I guess even at 8 years of marriage, you still can find something new about your partner.

How it feel living in -22 degree Celsius?

Coming from a tropical country where we only have sunshine and rain throughout the year with average temperature of 28-32° Celsius, I always wonder how it feel to be in frigid temperature. I have experience with -1 to -3 °Celsius but more than -10 °C? That will be something extreme.

What a better place to experience it than in Boston, right. Temperature in Boston changes everyday or even every hour drastically like a fickle-minded person choosing an ice cream flavor. Last year the coldest day we had experience was -17 °C with windchill temperature -35°C. But I managed to avoid going out and didn't really experience it. This year was during this weekend. Instead of 1 day, we got 2 days of extreme cold. The temperature was -22 °C with windchill temperature of -33°C.

You see, during winter, you don't believe what the temperature tell you about your current temperature. You need to focus on the RealFeel. The weather can be 2°C but the RealFeel is -5°C. RealFeel is the actual temperature that you will feel outside as it takes the account of wind, humidity, cloud cover, sun intensity, and others. That is how to plan what to where before you go out. Therefore, when I said the temperature for this weekend was -22°C, the RealFeel was -33°C.

Let me share the experience. Last night, we went out to see Trevor Noah show in Downtown Boston. We parked the car just 5 minutes walking from Wilbur Theater. The moment I stepped out from the car, the wind attacked my bare skin aka my face. My nose hurt so much that I need to cup it using my gloved hand. While at average winter temperature, I just can't feel my nose, but this time, it's like my nose was being crushed and prick with thousand needles at the same time. At the front door, the security forcing people to come in quickly so that no one will stand outside. The wind was so cold even my feet was freezing though I was wearing wool socks with my wool lined boots. Double wool and still freezing.

Wow, now I know what it feel to be in this extreme temperature. Tonight I going to try throwing boil water and see if it turn to ice immediately.

 

500th and 8th

I can't believe it, but this is my 500th post on this blog. But for 10 years old blog, that is not that much. It's around 50 posts per year or 4.2 posts per month or 1 post per week. That's not bad.

Anyway, for this 500th post, I want to write something special which is my 8th wedding anniversary. I always confused the date of our anniversary. For some reason, I always think it's on 18th January and this year I made that blunder again. At 18th January, I blurted to Zainal that we forgot our anniversary. Zainal looked at me annoyingly and told me that tomorrow is our anniversary. With confidence, I insisted it was on 18th. Finally, he took out our kad kahwin and showed me the real date. Ahhh.. It's on 19th. Come on brain, please remember this important event.

This year we were in San Francisco. Not purely vacation but more to Zainal's networking trip. While he was busy meeting companies in the Bay Area, I was busy exploring SF by myself. Since we were at the SF, we took this opportunity to have the anniversary dinner there. I chose Pacific West. The restaurant was full when we got there, and because Zainal was super hungry, we chose to seat outside as no one wants to sit there. We jokingly said that since we are from Boston where winter temperature is at -2 degree Celsius when we left on Saturday, San Francisco 12 degree Celsius is just a spring time for us. Even the waiter told us to take our time as nobody wants our table. Haha.

It was a fun night. The food was awesome, and it was Asian Fusion. Forgot to take any pictures of the food. The good thing about sitting outside that it was quieter and we able to have a proper conversation without having to shout compare to sitting inside which was packed and noisy. I love having dinner date where we able to talk properly.

I have a wonderful eight years with my husband. I pray that Allah unites us in goodness and grant us Jannah where we continue our marriage there. Amiin

The bird and the duck fly away

I told the bird it's ok if you are busy migrating. I know it's winter and even though you might not need to migrate, but it's great if you decided to.

But my heart said why do you need to migrate? Do you want to leave me? Do you find me boring that you need to migrate to other places? Am I so bad that you don't want me be around you?

I told the bird that I understand you are busy. Give me a call when you back here in spring. We can hang up. I like your song and you always have fun stories to share when you fly away.

But I told the duck that the bird is noisy. Always sing the song that I don't like. So it's good that bird is migrating said the duck. I nodded.

But in my heart I actually like the bird's song. Though the bird's songs in not what I usually listen but I can deal with that. I miss hanging with the bird. I didn't know that before but over time I need to hear songs from the bird.

Well, I guess the bird has flied away. So does the duck. I can't blame them. Winter is coming. But I can still have spring in my heart. I just need to grow my own flowers and sing my own song.

Shouldn't be that hard.

Right?

Goodbye 2015

Here we are welcoming the new year and leaving the old year with many memories. 2015 is the worst year for my blog as I only updated 9 times! A single digit posts in one year. What happened to my new year resolution to write as much as I can.

Anyway, as a whole, 2015 wasn't as bad as my blog. Hehe. 2015 marked one full year I left full-time employment and dedicated myself to the family, my company and charity works. I started volunteering at Cradle to Crayons and Gifford Cat Shelter. I also organized the fundraising for Kelantan flood victims. I enjoyed it so much, and I will continue to do it InsyaAllah.

In terms of traveling, we went to Midwest during spring break covering Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, and Wisconsin. It was fun and a good week to escape Boston endless snow storm. We also drove down with few others to Washington DC for Job Fair organized by Education Malaysia during spring and enjoyed Singing Beach at Manchester-by-the-sea, MA.

In summer, we went back to Malaysia coz Zainal got an internship in Microsoft KL. So we got to fast and Raya in Malaysia. Weehooo.. And I managed to have a 1 night trip back to Kelantan with my parents after almost 15 years hasn't gone back to my hometown. I managed to put on 3kgs within than 3 months -_-

Once we were back in Boston, we moved to a different apartment (cheaper but smaller) and got a very good deal second-hand car. Alhamdulillah, now we can move easily and not depending on buses and trains to go everywhere. That also means I'm Zainal's official driver :) Since we have a car, we took this opportunity to explore Massachusetts. We went eating cheap lobster at Rockport and awed the grand Castle Hill mansion at Ipswich. We also went to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. We should go to Vermont and Maine after this.

Other than that, I experienced the worst winter that Boston ever experiences and for the first time I saw that amount of snow. I do hope that we will not experience that again this year.

Last but not least, I took this opportunity to study and to get ready for another opportunity for 2016, InsyaAllah if there's rezeki. Looking forward to more productive and unpredictable 2016.

First snow of the season

After the worst winter storm that accumulated a record breaking of 7 feet and paralyzed Boston earlier this year, I would never thought I would be so happy to welcome the first snow of this season. I waited until 2am this morning too catch the glimpse of snow falling down. I love the first few hours of snow. So pure, innocent and mesmerizing.

Many people who survived last winter, talking about snow would end with, please no more snow. I don't mind the weather we are having right now (15 degrees Celcius on Christmas day!). Yes, it was that horrible. I don't want it to happen like previous winter. Just 10" for this year would be nice. Enough snow to go sledding and making snowman. Haha

In the meantime, let's enjoy this 2" snow that we received last night.

8 years

Yesterday was 10 Muharram 1437 in Hijrah calendar. It's also known as Ashura Day and also my wedding anniversary in Hijrah date. This year, it fall on Friday. Alhamdulillah, we have reached 8 years milestone in our marriage. Compare to other older couples, we are still young, a lot to learn about each other. There's more coming our ways and so far we have successfully faced it with laughter and sometimes sadness. 

Marriage life is not easy, it required a lot of works from both individual and also the environment. What I learned so far about my married life is, it required trust, patience, tolerance, laughter and most importantly, iman. Sometimes things don't work out like we planned, but it doesn't mean it will end our lives. It means that we are destined for other plans. That is why it is important to have iman and patience. 

Another thing that I think important is being supportive of each other. I realized that sometimes just because we are comfortable with each other, we tend to be each others biggest critics. It's fine to provide constructive criticism but being a plain jerk or negative all the time is no fun to be around. Just provide your support and if you think their plan is not going to work or require a lot of resources, you can discuss about it. Just don't shut the conversation. Because one day, they will find someone who wants to listen.

This 8 years has brought us all over the places around the world. It was an adventure that I never thought I will be part of but I'm glad I am in that adventure with the right partner.

For now, everyday I pray that our marriage is full of blessing from Allah, strengthen by taqwa, surround by happiness and lasting until end of our life and continue in Jannah. Amiin.

Waist-to-hip ratio

In my post 3 years ago here, I was worried about the extra fat in my tummy. At that time I was more worried about my appearance rather than the health issue of the problem. Of course I took some action, and managed to reduce at least 10cm of my waistline. It was quite an achievement for me. Then  moved to Miri and lacked of my favourite food further helped my mission. Last year I moved to Boston and the scarcity of Halal food has helped me to shred 5kg of my excessive fat. However we went back to Malaysia for 2 months which coincidentally fell during Raya which has contributed to my weight gain.

However, these few days I was feeling sluggish and lethargic and wondering what is wrong with me. Don't get me wrong, I only skipped the gym for few days but I have been walking around few days in this week so I was not dormant. While reading articles in the internet (the abundant wealth of knowledge!), there's an article about the how the distribution of fat can be risky even if someone is in normal weight. The risk of cardiovascular disease of people with normal weight but high percentage of visceral fat - the fat accumulate around the internal organ which can be measured by the waistline - is higher than people with normal weight and normal waistline. In fact they have higher mortality risk with those who is obese based on BMI. 

So I took the measuring tape and started measuring the waist-to-hip ratio and looked at the table for the waist-to-hip ratio. Lo and behold, I was at the 'risk' group. MasyaAllah. Now that was the wake up call. 

Ok, I really need to cut down my snacks consumption that full of sugar. Tonight I will start my daily ginger-lemongrass-honey drink to regulate my blood circulation and people say can burn fat too. 

Wish me luck!

Morning excercise

I'm not a person who is discipline enough for regular exercise. I always think being in gym is so boring unless I join the group exercise. Until last year. Until I realized how regular exercise has improved my well-being (obviously) and the best of all, it actually almost cure my ankle pain that I have been suffering for 2 years and my back pain. Then I realized how weak my body is and how the muscles are not strong enough to help each other.

I have been using Boston University's huge gym at least once a week. They have one of the best gym, in my opinion. I really like that they combine both swimming pool and gym at one building. With this membership I also can use the Walter Brown Ice Skating area for free. How cool is that?

I am not a morning person, so I decided going to gym in the afternoon. I have been doing that since last year but this month I decided to work out in the morning after I send Zainal to class. I remembered once in Kevin Zahri's class when he was giving lecture during our Be Well program, exercise in the morning is good coz your body still sleeping and you are not aware. How true is that statement. I guess my body is still sleeping today coz I'm been doing more exercise than I usually did. As a result, my hands are still sore, and my legs still feel like jelly. Man, that was good exercise isn't it.

This is so random posting but I need to get this writing momentum start.

Congratulations Duke! #foreverduke

5 years ago on the same date and month, I wrote this post. And today, I want to repeat it again:

DUKE UNIVERSITY IS THE CHAMPION OF N.C.A.A. BASKETBALL 2010 2015

It's the fifth winning for Duke. The fact that I'm here again at Uncle Sam's land watching it live, made it so much sweeter. I'm so happy for Duke and Coach K. Well played game and they deserved it. 

(Source of this picture: from instagram) Tyrus Jones and Grayson Allen were awesome and helped Duke to win this game. Quite disappointing with Okafor performance last night but he was a good player in other games.

 Now that the March Madness is over, I can continue watching my favorite TV series. Hehe

Snow snow snow everywhere

Late January 2015, we heard that a winter storm is coming to Northeast. It was predicted so bad that we have travel ban and all public transportation stop working. Well, the storm never left Boston. From 26 January to 20 February, Boston has received 96 inches of snow. Every week we heard a storm is coming, and it actually came and disrupt all our plan.

The first storm was Juno and people actually quite excited about it. We went out, walked around the deserted road, jump into the fluffy snow and went sledding on the second day. Then came second, third and fourth (is there fifth storm? I lost count) snow storm and at this point people just want to stop.

Traveling has become a challenge. Bus stops have no proper place to wait. Trains are not running. Walking needs extra caution, you either walk in the snow or slippery ice. Sometimes you have to brave the wind chill. It is essential that you wear water-proof boots.

 Now the storm has quietly receded since last weekend. We even got above zero degrees Celsius on Sunday. What a happy day! I hope the weather stays this way and slowly melting the snow. What I can say is that I have never seen so much snow in my life until this 1 month and I think I have enough of it.

 Spring, please come faster! 

How I survive Superbowl XLIX

Even though I don't agree that American football is called football, this sport is big in US and since I am here, I have to accept that is the football, and the football I knew is soccer. Fine. Once a year, two teams will compete to bring home the Superbowl trophy. This year, Superbowl XLIX (it's 49 for non-roman people) was on the 1st of February.

My feeling was neutral about Superbowl, neither too excited about the game nor despised having to hear about it all week long prior to the game. It is hard to avoid when your town team is going to the Superbowl and have a controversy about their balls. And it is also hard to ignore considering the quarterback of your town team is good looking with supermodel as a wife. Hehe

Being non-American and wasn't being exposed to this game until 6 years ago, it is hard for me to really enjoy it. But this year, I managed to enjoy it following with this few easy steps:

1) Understand the game

It is hard to enjoy something if you don't understand what is going on. You will lose interest, and before you know it, you are doing something else. For this reason, try to understand this game. Read about the players and maybe same interesting facts. It is quite hard to understand football by just reading. You need live game and someone to explain that to you to make it easier to understand. This brings us to the second point.

2) Watch it with the right people

It is important to watch it with the right crowd. You don't want to watch with a football fanatic who knew every players' stats, team history, and every single rule in the game. They will hate interruption, will look at you as if you are dumbass not knowing what the sport. You feel intimidate to ask questions and end up still clueless about the game. You also don't want to watch with people who is clueless about the game. Since they can't help you and you can't help them, you'll end up doing something else as both of you don't enjoy the game anymore. What you need is a combination of people who knew at least the basic of the game and some people who as clueless as you. So the people who are not fanatic but knew about the game will explain what happening now without you feeling like a loser since there are other people who don't know. You can ask basic questions and know at least basic rules to enjoy the game. In addition, since the crowd is not fanatic into the game, it is ok to discuss other things during the game. Like Steve Tyler's daughter is Liv Tyler who acted in Armageddon. Or Richard Sherman from Seahawks graduated from Stanford and Tom Brady from UMich and what school one of our friend is going to transfer to.

3) Have some awesome food

This is important. Having awesome food and dessert is important to ensure that we can 1) convince people to come to watch with us 2) avoid unnecessary anger due to empty stomach 3) as a topic when the game started to get boring 4) reason to stay longer until the game end aka endless trip to buffet table. 'Nuff said.

Optional

4) Your town team is playing

It is easy to get excited when you town's team is playing. You see everywhere in the supermarket, train, outside, banners hanging cheering for the team. It is easy to pick a team when watching the Superbowl because it is so obvious who you should cheer for. For me, it is of course New England Patriots. Go Pats!

5) Your team won

Well, it is easy to survive when your team won especially when the ending was so nerve breaking and unexpected.

That is how I survive and surprisingly enjoyed Sunday's game. We thought Patriots was going to lose but that interception by Butler saved the day! It was unbelievable. And to add the cherry on top of that winning, most of Boston universities closed the next day because of snow day. Yeayyy..

New England Patriots vs Seattle Seahawks. Pic from here

The 7th year

7 years ago at this date, my status changed from single to married. I'm no longer under my dad's protection and his responsibility shifted to another man that promised to take care of me forever. Alhamdulillah I never regret that decision.

It has been a wonderful journey for me as a woman adapting myself to this title. We have been moving so many places and created so many adventures. There is no one that I want to share these adventures except with him. We will create more adventures in the future, InsyaAllah and I can't wait to live it.

To the man I married, to the 7th, 17th, 70th and 700th (in the Jannah InsyaAllah) of us.

Another year, another country

It is already 2 weeks since we started the new year, 2015. Suddenly 2014 seemed so far away. Leaving so many sweet and sour (not bad, just sour-ish) memories. Malaysia was having the worst year of all time creating tragic and sensational news around the world. But my year wasn't that bad.

Started my second month on a new team in Kuala Lumpur, and I learned to take KTM Komuter to work. Was not very happy at first but the convenience of not having to face the traffic congestion weight more than the unpredictable of the Komuter. Then in August, I left the company that I have been there for 3+ years of my career life for 2 years sabbatical.

In 2014 too, I left my home, my town and my country, to return to the Uncle Sam's land. This time around, my other half needs to go to class and I cheer him from behind. Hehe. So new place, new surrounding and new people. I wouldn't say it was easy breezy but at least it was not as hard as 2009 at Durham. However, I'm getting hang of it and started to enjoy my time here.

For traveling, finally we made our Japan trip in spring, enjoying the full bloom of cherry blossom and nice weather in Tokyo, Kyoto and Osaka. Then we tried to tone down our travel until we arrived in US. Then did 1 day trip to Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and New York City throughout fall. I still in love with New York. In December, during the winter break, we flew to Texas and made 10 days covering almost 4000 miles (almost 6500km) road trip around Texas and New Mexico.

It seems like I always moving around, from new home in 2012, to Miri in 2013 and now to Boston in 2014, and I guess moving is no longer a major life event for me. The major life event for me in 2014 is the changes from full-time career wife to a housewife. It is not easy at first, but after a while, I adapted to the changes. I'm not going to enjoy the housewife title for granted as I need to find a job soon or maybe need to start planning my plan B.

And oh yes, I registered and started my company, Zeemoon :)