Al-Fatihah for Allahyarham Adly Effendy Bin Haji Azizon, my Brother In-Law

Borned 0n May 25,1974 at his age of 34 years old, Allahyarham Adly Effendy Hj Azizon, my dear brother in-law who's married to my first younger sister, passed away at 12:45 PM, Monday, October 26, 2009 while sufferring over four weeks of coma due to high fever at the Intensive Care Unit of Hospital Kuala Lumpur.

I and all members of the family missed him so dearly already and yet, we accepted what Allah has determined for him. Inyaallah, Allah would forgive his soul and all of us and put him in the place of all the Shuhada and those Allah has granted his blessing and Rahmah. We also pray to Allah to lift all the difficulties and replace them with blessing and guidance to let his wife, and his three little children, Hakimi (8 yrs), Azreen (4 yrs) and Haikal (2 yrs) live with abundance of love for each other and the family and allow them to grow up as "anak-anak yang Soleh", Insyaallah. Amin.


My picture taken with Allahyarham Adly at his request on Hari Raya Aidilfitri, October 2005. I never thought that I have to search for this picture to capture the moment with him.


Adly and his wife, Miza at the graduation of my second younger sister, Ani at the University Malaya in 2003.

Hari Raya Aidilfitri 2009

Like every year, we normally celebrate the Eids with Kash's family in Kuala Lumpur first in the morning and in the afternoon, we would be in Bukit Bading, 200 Kms to the East of KL on the East Coast, with my side of the family. To those who visit my blog, Selamat Hari Raya and Maaf Zahir Batin.


Time really flies, I could notice how grown up my children are as Kash and I are getting older.


Sarah (9) and Abby (13), they grew up together although Sarah is 5 years younger.

This year, my family and I were very happy to have Azman as our special family guest from the night of Raya and the morning of Raya. We went for Takbir Raya from house to house at Bukit Damansara from 9pm to 12pm, finishing more than five houses. Of corse, we filled up our stomach with more than five courses of meals with one meal per house.... never give-up, never surrender!!!! Ha ha ha..


Azman (center), Afif and I in front of the Saidina Omar Al-Khattab Mosque, Bukit Damansara after the Eids Prayer.


My Dad's house in Bukit Bading was covered under the morning fog on the second day of the Eids. I have not personally seen this foggy phenomenon for years since my schooling age.


The view of the road from my Dad's house to the end of the street witnessing how I used to run, learn to ride my bike (and secretly learnt to ride my Dad's motorcycle) and many many more uncountable historic memories of my own growing pains in this beutiful village.

Old Memories

To my surprise last two weeks, I met the daughter of my elementary school teacher who happened to be among my most admired teachers I ever had. I do not have much pictures of me when I was a kid but seeing the pictures of my school teachers was one of the opportunities I never expected. Today, I could recall a few names from the back of my head, thinking that I may need bizillion gegabytes of memory space to run old software to make them to surface!



This sunset view at Ara Damansara will stick to my head if there is memorable event very dear to my heart happened that that moment. For all my teachers, may Allah be the One who would give rewards for all your good teachings to me and all your other students.


This is a picture of me at the time I was among the students of the teachers shown below.


All my teachers, Cikgu Mat Yusof - Geography teacher, Cikgu Jamaludin - English teacher, Cikgu Yusof - my BM teacher in Std 6, Cikgu Ngah - English teacher, Cikgu Khalid - my Std 2 to 5 Bahasa Malaysia teacher and her daughter Zuraya who showed me these pictures, and arwah Cikgu Ngah - Bahasa Malaysia teacher when I was 7 years old. To the left of the picture, I think the student was Kapten Wan Hasbullah, an ex-airforce pilot who is today piloting a helicopter to transport workers to and from the offshore oil platform back to Kerteh Helibase.

Full staff teachers of SK LKTP Bukit Bading in 1979, led by arwah cikgu Hamzah as the principal. Next to him is Cikgu Yusof - my Std 6 BM teacher and arwah Cikgu Ngah - also my Std 1 BM teacher. Also I can recall a few other teachers - Cikgu Salleh - English teacher, Cikgu Aziz - my most admired Science teacher, arwah Ustaz Endut - Islamic class teacher, arwah Cikgu Yaakob - my brother's teacher in std 1 and 2 and the rest included Pakcik Ghani - school gardener. I wish, I coul dmeet them and say thank you from the bottom of my heart. Thank you teachers, may Allah bless you and us all, insyaallah.

Flying Solo....

After so long, I thought of doing this solo ride along NKV Expressway. Here we go, but the day was a bit hazy.

Halim's Wedding - May 31, 2009

The topic is misleading, but what it means is Halim's family wedding! Nadia and Azlan were married at Desa Coalfield, Sungai Buloh on May 31, 2009. Witnessing the ceremony, all family, friends and relatives! Tahniah Aji!

The 'Pengantin'.




Wedding reception at Halim's house on May 31.


With Halim's son, Hisyam at majlis akad nikah.

Ho Chi Minh City Visit in May 2009


On May 18, 2009, I was asked to visit Ho Chi Minh office. Here are some of the sceneries I captured for view. Last time I visited the city was back in 2002.




My dinner for the two nights, bought at the Saigon Halal Restaurant infront of the mosque. A chocolate came as a complementary from the hotel... nice.



This is the scene I once saw in Delhi, India. Hope that it does not come from the same engineers!

Standard Chartered KL Marathon June 28, 2009

Again, the famous KL Marathon Halim and I participated with success. After the last 15 km run, we felt very easy with this 10km run! There were 13,000 runners this year. Here are the pictures.

New Balance 15 KM Run - May 18, 2009

For the first time in my life, I took part in this "brutal" 15 km hilly challenge around Bukit Tunku area and back at the Lake Garden. At 5:30 AM, when I woke up, I thought of quiting but when Halim said he was ready to get up and meet up at Tugu Negara, I was zapped with energy and curiosity of my willpower. Halim had to detour to Talisman office to collect his running shoes which he forgot to take home on Friday before we both met at Tugu Negara parking area around 6:45AM. Many people already rushed to the starting line while Halim and I took our time to get geared up.


When we were at the starting line, all men category already took off. We sneaked in between the ladies and ran crossing the official starting clock line for time registration. Halim and I were joined by one more runner to begin our 15 km run out of the lake garden area. We were lucky as our marathon's favorite photographer, Mr Tey captured three of us running behind all men categories, essentially the last in line, while we were ahead 10 minutes infront of the women cetegory. Barely 20 minutes we were running on steady pace, the first lady passed by us like a rocket as it seemed. Then, more and more ladies overtook us...of course, I kept ensuring myself that I would not be the last...

After 1 hour 5 minutes, Halim and I reached our 8 km distance (half way) and it was my greatest achievement so far. Given if it were a 10 km run, another 20 minutes I would have reached the finish line and perhaps clocked myself at 1 hour 25 minutes... It would have been my new 10 km record run so far!!! But, life isn't always as what we wanted. The next 7 kms were hell...very short distance flat or downhill but most were exhaustingly hilly.... Halim gave up to run with me and he paced up leaving me 2 kms behind... Little that I knew during the run, Halim was cursing his decision all the way to take up this 15 km run... and leaving me behind was his way to show "...what the heck, you wanted to try 15 kms, just take this.." kind of lesson to me.

My experience beyond 10 km run was totally new. My feet were swelling and I could feel that both legs becoming elephant legs, sort of speaking. The soft Nike running shoes felt as if I was wearing Flinstone's rock solid slippers while my fingers were all swelling and numbness started all over the critical body parts. Deep down in my heart, I realised now why Hj Zailan from Planning Department quit running after completing his 42 km Singapore night marathon last year. I made the right decision to as for now to just get acclimatized with 15km run first before I can upgrade to half marathon.


I finished ahead of a dozen few and clocked myself at 2 hrs 40 minutes while both Azad and Halim perhaps clocked at 2 hrs 20 minutes. I made it, dude!!!! and it feels great!! Of course, getting back to the car park was another "painful" experience, the feeling of every part of our body being shaked up was overwhelming for the whole day!!!

Swine Flue Outbreak

I have not been updating my blog for a while now. A few things just surfaced recently and I have not been very well during the world's swine flue ourbreak in the past week. Not that I was infected by H1N1, but I was struck by high fever just 12 hours prior to my business trip to Jakarta on April 28-30, 2009. Oh boy, talk about worries, I was really worried for not being able to enter Jakarta as well as to depart from Jakarta. The news spread very fast about alert level change from level 4 to level 5 and while entering KL, I swallowed a few tablets to keep my body temperature down and so not to get cought by the thermal scan. Luckily, there was no thermal scan for inbound flight from Jakarta!

Perhaps, the trip to Jakarta this time was the worst one I have ever taken. I was totally sick, unable to sleep and forget about eating and dining. I did nothing apart from going to the office and get my lunch at the hotel and back into the hotel after work for a sleep. For many years, I must be thankful enough that I had never had major sickness such as this one. But having had one now and recovering, alhamdulillah, I feel a lot better. I am trying to catch up with the running but so far, I could only do over 1.5 km run only and the coughs trouble me so far. Azad said that the next run will be on May 17 for 11 km run at Dataran Merdeka! Halim seems very strong at it....but I loss over 2 kg's since the fever, that's a good news..

BHP Orange Run - 11 km Run - April 12, 2009

When I woke up, the clock was already at 6:00 AM. Back from Melaka last night, I overslept in the morning and was late for the run. I guess, I was so exhausted from attending Abby's college annual sport day yesterday in Melaka causing me to doze off well last night!

After solat, quickly I grabbed my phone and I saw Halim's text message saying that he would not be able to join again. In a few minutes, Azman, our new team member for the fisrt time doing his first 10 km's, called me up asking for an earphone set. Although I would like to help, I knew that usually no way I could find everything and attend anything urgent while I was already late for the run. Then, Halim called me up just at the time I was stepping out of the house, informing me that Azad already picked him up! Boy, I was glad that Azad responded to Halim's SOS as I did not realize that he sent me a message late last night. EuGene was supposed to join the run too but he sent a message that he was sick. Poor EuGene!


Four of us, with Azman now joining.

Halim fixing Azman's sticker.

Last year, I quit running after seeing " you have completed half-way of the run" sign board, just right at 4.5 kms. This time, I ought to make it better. As the run started a bit late at around 7:30 AM, with the brick and block jungle of Kota Damansara and Mutiara Damansara new township, I had to put up sun glasses for the run. It's for the look and for the sun shade! Oh well, more for the look then... he he :-).

Our day gets better with the Malay Mail journalist approaching us for a quick interview. Azad took the opportunity to take the team picture with her... we would have been almost instant celebrities if not because of the fact that we realized the guys were already flagged off, leaving the women cetegory behind ... with just us!! May be next time for the newspaper appearances...


As usual, Azman with his, macho gesture, just for the picture! Steady Man!!

The run was fun. Azad, Halim and I were running slowly to encourage Azman to continue running. He decided to walk after 2 kms. I managed to beat my last year's record by continuously running until 6.2 kms. The route was hilly and we were told that the distance was changed to 11 kms compared to only 9 kms last year.

At the start, we were running together-together...


Soon after my legs surrendered, Halim and Azad began to push me to run. I had no idea where both of them got their stamina this morning while I was struggling to keep my feet chasing each other. Towards 2 kms to the finishing line, there were two 70+ older men and women passed by me and I thought that was a real defeat for me! I let them go, perhaps they got so much motivation by being infront of me and all of us would live much longer for the joy of it!!!


We were going for the camera man..

Azad and Halim wanted the three of us to cross the finishing line together. I thought that it was a brilliant strategy to get camera men's attention! I put back my sun glasses and we all ran to the finishing line with style! 1 hr 38 minutes - I claimed that as my time instead of Azad's or Halim's. They both could have had a much better time if they wanted to!! Thanks, guys. Azman did make it at the end and we took many-many pictures including a promotional picture for BHP. Once I get the pictures, I will post them here!


Approaching the finishing line.... he he he...


At last, I have a new Azman taking my last spot in the race... always fun to recruit a new member... EuGene was a new member but his body is as light as feathers, in fact, he beat all of us... Too bad he could not make it this time, later EuGene!


The whole team, with Azad's ex-college mate (white shirt) and Azman's ex-boss who is now with Telekom Malaysia.

Melawati 10 Km Run - March 29, 2009

Low turn up at the Melawati Run.


he he he..!

Much anticipated run for me simply because I have not participated in this Melawati Run before this. Halim had an emergency with his father in-law injured in an unfortunate road accident, leaving Azad and me for the normally competing trio. This time, Azad picked me up from home and we arrived at the location at about 6:30 AM. As expected, not many people participated and the event was just an ordinary event without much publicity, not even with a starting and finishing banners! Others from Talisman were Jamil and Lim Boon Kok. The YB flagged off right on time.

The Talisman's Team - two big ones and two small ones!

I should say that the run was nice, very flat to begin with but pretty tough towards the end, it had both hilly and u-turns which I hated the most. Again, I always dislike the u-turns and we had twice in this run. Of course, if you asked me, I could see Azad running in-front of me while I was heading for a u-turn! The scenery was nice, I have never been to those residence areas right at the top of the hill side with lush of greens and sound of water flowing (not so much to qualify as waterfalls).

Medal at last!

I clocked 1 hr 35 minutes and perhaps about a dozen were still behind me while Azad was at the finishing line about 15 minutes ahead. For this run, we got both medal and certificate! Poor Halim, medal is just what he likes to collect!