Looking Back (November 2008)

November was a very busy month for us. Many important family events took place during the weekends. Saturday the 1 Nov. I had my piano lesson as usual except that I had to bring Najla along. Normally Steve would take care of her while Hannah and I attend our lessons. Since Steve was in Kota Kinabalu I had no choice. I don't like taking her because being a kid, Najla is always impatient to go home. She would make noise, ask to go to the toilet, etc. As an adult learner, the theory part seems to be a lot easier as compared to the practice on the key board. I think my fingers are just too stiff already. But I am getting much better now. I might not be able to play like a pro, but good enough to entertain myself when I am feeling down. After my piano lesson ended, I drove home to pick up Danial and Harris so we could all go to Mawaddah's home to get Yasmin. On the way back we stopped at the Permatang Badak housing area where we bought a bangalow lot to build our dream home someday, to meet our future neighbor Badrul. He wanted to inform us about some piping which was accidently being laid under the ground on our side of the fence. Since he's such a good person, we let it slide. OMG, it's 1.30am already! I better get some zzzz, and continue writing tomorrow. I have to practice my piano before I go to class tomorrow. On top of that I haven't done my piano theory assignment!!


Hi, I am back! Hannah and I just came back from our piano lesson. Wow! Today our teacher, Ms Loh let us play on the grand piano! I even took some pictures of Hannah playing. Where were we? Oh yeah, on Sunday morning 2 Nov 2008 I went to my tajwid class as usual, except that I had to bring Najla along. Danial, Yasmin, Harris, and Hannah stayed home.

After tajwid class I went home, picked Danial up, and sent him to the Taman Guru cyber café because he wanted to surf the net with his friends. After I dropped him, Najla and I went to Kolej Profesional MARA, Indera Mahkota to get my convo pictures from Ayu, one of my TESL classmates. She helped collected my pictures from UPM because they were not ready on the day of the convo itself.

Ayu stayed behind because she wanted to celebrate with her friends in KL and picked the photos the next day. After we left KPM, I took Najla to the old Ocean to lookfor a jewelry shop because Najla wanted to have her ears pierced. Unfortunately the shop has been moved to God knows where. So we decided to go to Kuantan Parade instead and had her ears pierced at Poh Kong. She didn’t cry because it was so quick. The ladies pierced both of her ears at once. On top of that I bribed her with a vanilla ice-cream on a cone. She was too busy enjoying the ice-cream, she forgot the pain.
On Thursday 6 Nov, I took an annual leave to go back to the kampong for my niece’s wedding. I drove all the way from Kuantan to my mom’s house with Najla and Hannah. Thank God I have had experience driving long distance when I attended my convo rehearsal. On Friday 7 Nov, my niece had her akad nikah ceremony at the Ulu Bendul mosque. It went smoothly as planned.


There was a simple reception at my sister’s house immediately after. Steve, Danial, Yasmin and Harris arrived in the kampong around magrib so they missed the akad nikah ceremony.

Then the BIG day arrived on Saturday 8 Nov. There were so many people came to the wedding. According to my sister they slaughtered two cows and it was gone, plus more than 25 packets of 5-kg-packet rice!




On 9 Nov another ceremony was held at the groom’s house in Seremban We went back to Kuantan that night, exhausted!! We hope the bride and groom will live happily ever after, ameen. On Thursday 13 Nov, I went to Irshad school to sign my kids’ report cards. Hannah got number 11 out of 32 students and Harris got number 28 out of 28! The good news was, Yasmin got 5 As for her UPSR.

On Saturday 15 Nov Najla had Yaumul Ihtifal for her kindergarden which was held at the hall in Taman Pertanian, Indera Mahkota. The ceremony ended around 12 noon. I missed my piano lesson on that day and on my niece’s wedding. On Sunday 16 Nov my newly wedded niece and her hubby came to visit us in Kuantan. It was a great visit since we don’t get many relatives visiting us in Kuantan that often. When they left after magrib, we sent Danial to Kuantan bus station. He was going to Klang to attend a School Youth Cadet training. He’s now ranked sergeant!
Danial, Yasmin, and Harris stayed over night at their friend’s Hamizan in Sungai Isap. Early Saturday morning (22 Nov) Steve went to Hamizan’s house to get Danial because was going to enter a Quran hafazan competition at the surau in Sungai Isap. Steve took Najla and Hannah also. I joined them later because I participated in the Jubli Perak run at the Kolej. After Zohor we went to our friend Hartini’s wedding at Dewan Belia Indera Mahkota.

I planned to go back to Negeri Sembilan on Saturday because my friend Fadlie whom I met in Mecca was getting married on Sunday but I had to postpone the trip until the next morning because that Saturday night I had to attend the Jubli Perak function at the Kolej. Well, after all we don’t get to celebrate Jubli Perak every year, a little “sacrifice” didn’t hurt me. We went back to NS in the morning of Sunday 23 Nov and attended Fadlie’s wedding.

It was hard to find a parking space because there were many cars parked in a small area. While parking Steve hit a huge stump and put a huge ugly dent in the right front side of our Innova. We had to pay for over a thousand ringgits to replace the bumper! What a huge price we had to pay to attend the wedding but hey, bad things happen every now and then. What is life without challenges? Huhuhu…After the wedding we went back to my mom’s home. While at my mom’s house, Danial called from Kuantan (he stayed over night at Hamizan Saturday night also) and told us he won the competition!

On Saturday 29 Nov, we went to send Yasmin and Harris to Bandar Baru Bangi mosque to attend the Quran holiday camp. The camp lasted until 20 December. Danial didn’t join because he had to attend another School Youth Cadet training in Kuala Pilah on Monday 15 December. Wow! What an activity packed month for us.