I've got Asthma!

I've not been in the best of health in the last few weeks. At first I thought it must have been the heavier than usual workload both in the office and with my Alumni groups. However, when I started having breathing problems and started feeling tired too easily, I decided to see the doctor.

I first went to see my GP. I've been with him for the past almost 10 years. When I described my problems to him, he referred me to see Prof. Azman, a cardiologist at UH. I kept the referral letter but ultimately did not find my way to UH. Finally, when my health did not improve significantly after about 2 weeks, I decided to see Dato' Dr. George Ananda, a physician at Assunta Hospital. He did a full medical on me sometimes last year so I thought it is best to see him again. He was in fact highly recommended by my boss who is a personal friend of his.

So last Friday, 21 Sep, I took an appointment to see Dato' Dr George. He checked me up and gave me a very good rating on my blood pressure, 120/80. I have been very diligent with taking my medicine, Norvasc. But he told me that I had asthma as I was wheezing. What? At this age? I was told that if you get asthma at a late age, it will be bad. Anyway, I went through the whole full medical tests, except the stress test as I was fasting. I had my ECG, Echo and even MRI on my kidneys and liver. I did not wait for the test results but told the nurse that I'll come again at a later date to see the Dr for my results.

In the meantime, he prescribed some asthma medications for me. I know the medication very well because my dear wife is asthmatic. When I got home, I decided not to take the medication as I was confident I will be okay and I'll wait after seeing the Dr again. However, over the weekend, I was persistently coughing and I knew it was not the "normal" cough. I had no choice but to take the nebulizers. And sure enough, I felt a lot better better after taking them. But I had to take them 3 times a day and one of them contains steroids.

So, here I am having to carry my nebulizers every where I go. Previously I kept nagging my wife for not taking her medication. Now she can do the same to me:-) God is very fair. I hope I will be able to control my asthma so that it will not affect my life too much.

Keep healthy.

Oh Nurin Jazlin

I'm sure all of you must have heard about the sad fate of adik Nurin Jazlin. It has been hogging the news the past few days. However way you look at it, it is indeed tragic. To the parents, to her friends and relatives but most importantly to society as a whole. Which civilised society allows one of its young members to be subjected to that barbaric act? To the perpetrator of that act, you are worse than the lowest of animals. I wanted to say that I'll pray you will rot in hell but I don't think that is necessary. God, is all His Wisdom shall bestow upon you just reward for your act. There is no need for us humans to pray for anything extra. What we could do is pray that Nurin Jazlin is accorded a better place than what has been deprived of her in this world.

Now lets look at us. What has caused us to come to this state of affairs? We are no longer safe in this land of ours. Where have the protection accorded to us gone to? Where are the police? Are they busy shooting "rioters" who are trying to topple the government through illegal means? Or are they busy escorting VIPs through the KL jams so that they do not have to endure the agony of getting stuck in traffic like us mere rakyats? What turned otherwise sane people into sex monsters? Some may say, the fault is with the ladies who wore pakaian yang menjolok mata dan mendedah aurat. Surely Nurin Jazlin did not flaunt her assets to this scum of society. Even if she did, what right has anybody got to attack someone just because she is not decently dressed. I know our religion has stipulated a certain dress code for us to follow. But that stipulation does not mean anyone not adhering to it can be subjected to abuse. Are we so weak mentally and spiritually that we cannot see anyone yang tak menutup aurat without wanting to sexually abuse them. Maybe, just maybe, we have kept this subject too much under wraps and taboo that we do not know how to control our urges. To those who are religiously well endowed please do not assume that everyone is like you. There are many others who are not fortunate enough to be as enlightened as you are. And it is also your responsibility to "take care" of these unenlightened souls. Don't just blame them, guide them for heaven's sake.

Now, I just read somewhere that the police intends to charge the parents of Nurin Jazlin for failing to take care of their children. Why do they want to do this? Because there is a law that have been enacted for this but has not been imposed all this while. Maybe the police hopes by doing this parents who have their children raped or molested will no longer make a report lest they will be charged with negligence themselves. This reminds me of a story that I've wrote before about our hostel warden, Cikgu Tahir. He once caned a student who made a report that he lost money twice while he caned the rest of us only once. Since then nobody dare to make a report about losing money. Why not just make making police reports a crime? Then we can proudly announce to the whole world that Malaysia is the safest country in the world because there is no police report about any crime. Just allow police report for rioters destroying public property or people having illegal gathering trying to listen to opposition parties making speeches against the government.

I can continue writing this but it will just make me sick and for a day in Ramadhan, it is definitely not good.

So lets end it here. Al-Fatihah for Nurin Jazlin. Semoga rohnya ditempatkan bersama roh mereka yang diberi perlindungan oleh Allah swt.

Its Going to be a busy Ramadhan

It is already the 2nd Ramadhan and I had not managed to either berbuka at home or sembahyang tarawikh in my mosque. The first tarawikh was at Masjid Al-Syakirin, KLCC, second one at home on my own, the third at Masjid Ar-Rahman, Taman TAR. Both berbukas were at the office.

I was planning a quiet Ramadhan where I can concentrate on my ibadahs but it looks like it is not going to be. First, there was a major presentation to the Ministry and now we have visitors from Dubai and Japan. Luckily these people are not that fussy. They even agreed to fast (skip lunch) while working so as not to bother our staff. But, it is already 10:20pm and all my staff and our guests are still in the office, working.

Next week we need to prepare for our final presentation to the KSU. When will this stop? I think I should seriously consider my priorities especially about continuously trying to make more money for the shareholders.

I hope the later part of Ramadhan will be more tranquil for me.

Sallam Ramadhan untuk semua. Semoga ibadat kita sekeluarga diterima Allah swt dan mendapat keberkatan yang berkekalan.

Selamat Menyambut Ramadhan Al-Mubarak

Masjid Nurul Yaqin hari ini mengadakan gotong royong mengemas masjid sempena kedatangan bulan Ramadhan. We had a good turnout. Penyelia sekolah KAFA made sure that students came in to help with the cleaning of classrooms and the Muslimat had quite a big team. Biro Pemuda also had a good number of attendees and they helped clean up the Futsal court.

There is actually not much to be cleaned as we have 2 Siaks taking care of the masjid but it was more of an annual social gathering. We did managed to prune the mango trees which had not been fruiting for sometime.

In the evening my family had dinner with my sister in law's family at Kelana Seafood to celebrate the birthday of her eldest daughter. The place was full of people. Everyone must be trying to fill up before the puasa month. We only had our food at around 9:20, about an hour after we arrived.

So in tune with the times, I just want to wish all of you "SELAMAT BERPUASA" semoga kita mendapat hidayah Allah untuk beribadat dalam bulan yang mulia ini.

Remembering Friends

It was an impromptu program by any standards, conceived, planned and executed all in less than 2 weeks. But as far as I'm concerned, it was a runaway success. It could have been better, no doubt, but everything "could have been something else" if we want to nitpick.

Thanks to the efforts of the prime movers Wilmie, Alim and Rosman, the ever helpful Mokhlis and of course the willing hosts Zahari and Nor Ismail, all went well. Of course without the attendance of and support of friends, all the planning would have come to nought. So thank you all.

The event started on Saturday, 1st September in Zahari's place in Bangi. It was a pity I was not able to be there as I had left for Melaka a day earlier. My biggest regret was not able to meet up with Cikgu Tahir. I have not not met him since I left school, more than 30 years ago. Who can forget Cikgu Tahir? Over the 2 years that he was the hostel warden, he must have caned me more than 30 times and I'm supposed to be one of the "good boys". You can imagined how many "the bad boys" would have got. Every time he blows the whistle 3 times all of us must assemble in front of his house. We know someone is going to be caned. Most times, most of us will be caned.

I can still vividly remember one night when the whistle was blown 3 times. We would rushed to wear at least 2 pairs of trousers and then our sarong to soften the expected blow. Cikgu Tahir told us that someone just reported to him that he had lost his money (I think it is 20 ringgit, big money to us then). Cikgu asked all of us to go upstairs and search for the money. If in 10 minutes we cannot find the money all of us would be caned. Sure enough 10 minutes passed and we came back down with no money. So all of us got caned. I think our Captain, the late Nor Zahari, was the first to be caned. One by one all of us got caned. All this while the boy who reported losing the money was standing besides Cikgu. All of us stared at him of course. After all of us had been caned, the boy who lost the money was caned twice for not taking good care of his money. Since that day nobody lost any money in the hostel.

Sorry but I digress.

On Sunday, a few friends including Wilmie, Alim and Rosman met the family of the late Anuar Johari and visited his grave in Cheras. They handed a small contribution that was collected earlier. Thereafter they drove to Melaka. Mokhlis drove alone from KL to Melaka.

I decided to fetch Cikgu Rejab from his house since I know he is not too well after a heart operation some time back. We were actually quite early and so decided to go to the grave of Tan Sri Rafie. He was the first Malay principal of Melaka High School and later became the Director General of the Education Ministry. Therefater, we went straight to Nor Ismail's place in Tiara Golf Resort.

Nor just moved in to his new abode two weeks ago. According to him, he had spent the last 15 months supervising the construction of his house. Knowing architects, his contractor must have had a nightmare :-). As expected, it was a very nice house. Soon enough everybody started arriving. The wife of the late Yusof Sulaiman and their 3 children were also present. We were busy reminiscing and almost forgot about our initial objective. A few minutes after 1:00pm we started the tahlil. Mokhlis gave a short introduction and mentioned the names of our friends who had left us. There was quite a number and some that I did not know have passed on. Cikgu Rejab led the tahlil and also recited the doa thereafter.

We were then treated to a sumptuous lunch. While we were having lunch "Edward" arrived with his wife. This is one friend whom I have the utmost respect for. He is staying in JB, more than 200kms away from Melaka, but he took the effort to join his friends in Melaka. When I invited him for my brother's wedding earlier in the year, he also made the effort to come. Thanks Edward, you are a gem of a friend. You definitely put others to shame. When some even considers Bangi to be too far away from KL, you are always your jovial self coming all the way from JB. But for all your efforts I still cannot remember your real name, Edward. Please forgive me.

Dato' Dr. Baba was also present. I did not had the opportunity to know him while in school but I surely have heard about him. After all, how many Malaysian doctors got shot while doing voluntary work in a foreign country? Syabas, Dato'. Keep up the good work. I'm proud just to know that you are a High School Alumni.

Later, we had our Zohor prayers, led by Cikgu Rejab. I had long chats with KM Yaakob. Frankly, I can not recall him from my High School days. I'm quite sure he also cannot remember me but we had something in common. Both of us worked for MISC, the national shipping line in the 80's and early 90's. Both of could have spent the whole day talking about shipping. After all, I know quite a bit about the exploits of seamen. Though KM is supposed to be an "old High School friend", I left the gathering thinking that I have just met a new friend. He is also the guy who painted the roof of his house into the Jalur Gemilang to celebrate Merdeka. What a guy.

Before long we had to continue with our program. Mokhlis handed some contribution to the eldest son of the late Yusof Sulaiman before we proceeded to ziarah his grave in Bacang. Before that all of us were handed a new pair of kain sarong. Thanks for the gift. It must be Wilmie, Alim and Rosman.

We spent only a short while at Yusof's grave as it was getting dark. We then drove to Selandar, quite a distance from Melaka, to meet the parents of the late Mazlan Yaasin (John). His mother is such a jovial lady. Even though Selandar is only a few kilometers from my kampong I have never been to this house while John was still alive. What a pity I only managed to be there after he was no longer around. I had to leave early as I promised dinner for my family as it was my daughter's birthday. The others proceeded to ziarah the pusara of John. I had to ask Malik to help send Cikgu Rejab home as I left the group. Thanks Malik for your help.

I was a full day for me. After dinner we headed back to KL and the highway was jammed packed with cars. I left Melaka round 8:45pm and reached Kelana Jaya about 30 minutes before midnight. I was real tired but the whole trip was worth it.

Thanks my friends. I will refrain from naming you all again but EVERYONE is special. Let us hope this is a signal of more to come. This past few months have been an experience for me. First, I was part of the team that organized our university Reunion. We had more time and the program was more elaborate. This time around we hardly had 2 weeks and the program was more sombre as we were remembering friends who were no longer with us. But isn't it ironic, it took friends who are no longer with us to get us to meet. Lets us not wait until someone leaves us before we meet again.

Sallam semua.