Assalamualaikum Hanafiah? How’s life? How is she?
How is ur best friend? Well, it seems like life didn’t turn out the way we wanted eh? It seems dat she’ll always look at u as a friend, even more saddening; a stranger, and dats just sad, really. But life is like love, it’s unpredictable, and the flower of love blooms even under the most unfulfilled condition at uncertain temperatures at an unknown location where u slightest expected it.
Love is hard, yet it’s fragile, and its only normal to love when people are being nice to u, and when they stopped (being nice), life is hard again. And u know what they said about life; dat life goes on. So, sabar la eh ;-)
Change, is hard, yet it can be as easy and quick as a bold, just make sure that it starts from deep within urself. Looking back at myself, I realized that her words are very true indeed. This wake up call, is very hard at first, it’s even harder when the one u trusted to deliver the words said it in a harsh way, and no matter how hard u beg her to reconsider and give dis another chance which she didn’t give makes it harder, and fortunately the well is dried up now, and hei, look, I’m starting to write again.
Yeah, what she said, keeps on repeating in my head, and it never stops, and I never know when it will. And muttering like ‘astaga’ or ‘tolong lah jangan’ everytime u’re awake seems like an idiot, but moving ur hands with mouth mumbling sumthing while driving with ur mum sitting next to is by far the worst la kan, haha.
Well, hanafiah, I can hope u can change better, I know u will. I just know u will, maybe it’ll require sometime, maybe it’ll take forever, or perhaps it could take up as little time one could expect because u just didn’t realize that u had changed, or whatever it is, sooner or later, today or sumday, maybe slowly but surely, u will change, Hanafiah.
U’ve come a long great way to change, to improve urself, and I cudnt see why u shud stop doing so, and perhaps maybe someday u’ll become a great friend to most of us, who is true to himself, without being the slightest hypocrite.
And what’s most important, like someone wud’ve said, jangan berputus asa dengan rahmat tuhan, berusaha, dan bertawakal, semoga setiap apa yg kita lakukan akan diberkatiNya, amin. Well, Hanafiah, I wish u success in life, in whatever u’ll do, and hopefully u can improve ur social skills and fulfill ur ambition to teach like ur parents had, like u always had ;-)
written on: 27 January 2010
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Another Birthday, Another Thought, Another Day without Her
Assalamualaikum Hanafiah? Hei, what a boring person u are eh? To have time to write, to have time to express ur feelings in words, and let people know what’s going thru inside that thick head of urs, well, whatever it is, don’t ever lose faith, never, ever.
So, what’s up? Yeah, I guess recent event surely had been a wakeup call for u my friend. Life is hard, and unpredictable, but what I learnt recently is that, the condition of heart is beyond our control, and u cant make someone like u the same way just by using ur heart, but u must also have the brain, to stimulate the relationship, to adjust the condition where the feeling of love could bloom, but love itself is, like any other feelings are very unpredictable, u cud never expect someone will feel the same way about u tomorrow. U may cuddle hundred times, or said the L word (nope, not DAT L.O.S.E.R. word) like a thousand times a day, but if she didn’t feel dat way, she just didn’t feel that way. Yeah, it hurts, rejection hurts, like hell it did, but still, it’s not the end of the world, rather see this as an opportunity, to improve, to make urself better.
Wow, it sucks a lot eh, she’s gone, and I’m sleeping with the light on, I can feel her slipping out thru my fingers, running deep between my veins, and it’s hurting me, and it really is. I need a run, I need a cool breeze washing up my face, make my eyes open wider, but I’ve completed her course twice, so I wonder if such things would occur again if I completed for the third time? Well, I cant afford it, not right now, I just don’t have time for the pain.
Today is ur birthday eh Hanafiah? It seems u’re getting older, and may u’ve become more matured in whatever things u’ll venture, and whatever it is u’re going thru, never, ever lose faith, and with God’s grace my friend, u’ll achieve whatever u wanted, but in case u didn’t get what u wished for, lets remember this, God knows better, and be receptive with what He had given you. Happy 23rd birthday my friend, May God bless you, like you had always wished ;-)
written on 21st January 2010
So, what’s up? Yeah, I guess recent event surely had been a wakeup call for u my friend. Life is hard, and unpredictable, but what I learnt recently is that, the condition of heart is beyond our control, and u cant make someone like u the same way just by using ur heart, but u must also have the brain, to stimulate the relationship, to adjust the condition where the feeling of love could bloom, but love itself is, like any other feelings are very unpredictable, u cud never expect someone will feel the same way about u tomorrow. U may cuddle hundred times, or said the L word (nope, not DAT L.O.S.E.R. word) like a thousand times a day, but if she didn’t feel dat way, she just didn’t feel that way. Yeah, it hurts, rejection hurts, like hell it did, but still, it’s not the end of the world, rather see this as an opportunity, to improve, to make urself better.
Wow, it sucks a lot eh, she’s gone, and I’m sleeping with the light on, I can feel her slipping out thru my fingers, running deep between my veins, and it’s hurting me, and it really is. I need a run, I need a cool breeze washing up my face, make my eyes open wider, but I’ve completed her course twice, so I wonder if such things would occur again if I completed for the third time? Well, I cant afford it, not right now, I just don’t have time for the pain.
Today is ur birthday eh Hanafiah? It seems u’re getting older, and may u’ve become more matured in whatever things u’ll venture, and whatever it is u’re going thru, never, ever lose faith, and with God’s grace my friend, u’ll achieve whatever u wanted, but in case u didn’t get what u wished for, lets remember this, God knows better, and be receptive with what He had given you. Happy 23rd birthday my friend, May God bless you, like you had always wished ;-)
written on 21st January 2010
Friends ;-)
Friends
The few things we should know,
About needing a friend,
It’s not just about sharing the dough,
But being together until the end
Friends,
When the tide is high,
And hopes are smashed to smithereens,
Rest assured I won’t die,
We’ll always be together whatever it means
Friends,
Do you feel this deep sensation?
When we share each other’s pain and laughter?
A wonderful feeling beyond imaginary’s creation,
That only occurs when we’re together
Friends,
If there were romance,
Store it in the cart,
Measure the distance,
And push it to far apart
Friends,
If you can’t convey,
If you can’t make it,
Don’t scared to say,
And never fake it
Friends,
If love exists,
Face it without guilt,
For your presence is missed,
If the feelings were built
Friends,
In case of separation,
Believe this without a doubt,
In the fight to diminish segregation,
Victory only achieved after the final bout
Friends,
If you are in love,
Cherish it to your heart’s content,
Because love that evolves from friendship is like a curve,
The trajectory is unknown yet potent
Friends,
When love snows,
Let other knows,
If it shows,
Your feeling grows
Friends,
Such feeling was unexpected,
Never had I thought it occurred,
What made this happen I wondered?
For now only you that mattered
Friends,
As we put on our coat,
We tend to deceive others,
Yet we still on the same boat,
In the end we’re just brothers and sisters
Well, gudluck to us all, like we always had wanted ;-)
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Back Again
Recently, the tide is diminshing, if life is full of phases, and now is like the phase after the storm had ended. It's time to pick up back the things we lost, try creating even better ones, try to accomplish even more, and dats the phase I'm going thru now.
Suddenly, the sun is back up, and birds started flocking in the sky, and everything seems normal again. Still, the damages couldnt be undone, we can only hope that all these things will be patched up, and everything went back to nomal again, hopefully.
I wish things will be better from now onwards, and I guess I can start planning my future now, haha, like I had always wanted :-)
Suddenly, the sun is back up, and birds started flocking in the sky, and everything seems normal again. Still, the damages couldnt be undone, we can only hope that all these things will be patched up, and everything went back to nomal again, hopefully.
I wish things will be better from now onwards, and I guess I can start planning my future now, haha, like I had always wanted :-)
Monday, November 9, 2009
Then, It's Hard eh?
It's kinda hard eh mengharapkan seseorang mencintai kita seperti mana kita mencintainya, I could only pray like I always had ;-)
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Mizuno Wave Run 2009 : The Birth of a Runner
Assalamualaikum Hanafiah? How’s life? Haha, okay eh? Whu wud’ve thought u’d actually run in the Mizuno Wave Run, well, dis is good, dis is good, keep it up. Okay, lets write dis as a reminder for the upcoming days, shall we? Let this event be stored forever as one of our memorabilia.
So, 24th October, it was the day before the big day, before the run, and I was still sleeping when I heard a call, 4 miscalls actually, from Fatin. Yeah, I promised to meet her today, it’s been quite some time since I last saw her, gotta do some, no, actually lots of catching up I guess. It’s time to hear her long-awaited case presentation which turns out to be very shocking and motivational one :-)
I was a lil bit late, but fortunately Sufian was half-awaked, he helped me to go to Wangsa Maju, but before that we swing around Maybank to cash in some required money. When I reach Mid Valley, it was around noon. Tho I had eaten a lil bit earlier, I still went for lunch with her. We swap stories for almost more than an hour; we didn’t watch the movie because there wasn’t any suitable time, and I had one thing to do, that is taking the running vest for my first run tomorrow.
I rushed back home, when it was almost 3.30 p.m. The cab ride back home was about seven bucks, which is totally expensive for a trip which used to be around RM4 or 5, tho I was mumbling about the high pay, the driver could only use the typical excuses, oil price increase and there was never a raise for taxi pays since the last 30 years. Lantak la, I tot, I didn’t give it much tot for I was in a hurry. I went to the toilet and took my Zohor, grabbed the kaki (‘car key’ actually, dis is just lame joke dat I always had with mak since I was small) and Alex Yoong all the way to UPM, haha.
When I reached there, it was around 4.40 p.m., almost 5 o’clock. Damn, I shud’ve checked the net to find the collection location. I was clueless where to find the place I’m supposed to go to take my registration number and running vest. I called the Pacesetter’s Athletics Malaysia twice but nobody picked up, and I called the Mizuno shop where I registered, or another branch I guess and they gave me another number, but by the time I have it, it was already too late, I’ve found the place, the stadium, UPM’s stadium, which is located next to Kajang Silk’s highway.
When I entered UPM from the front, I went to the guard post at the Engineering Faculty, and they told me to take left from the roundabout, turn right when reaching the traffic light and go straight. I followed the instruction but stuck at the ‘go straight’ part. Fortunately I found the cursor, which shows the running route for tomorrow’s event. But somehow I was misled into a dead end, twice. First is because I didn’t notice the cursor to go to left and second I was following into the closed, shut-off gate. I had to reverse and ask the students nearby. Again I had to reverse in front some of the kolej kediaman (I don’t remember what number is it) and dis time I went straight, not following the cursed cursor, haha. I went up the hill and there it is the small stadium, equivalent to Salak Tinggi’s. There was a decoration, banner raised and some setups for finishing line dat’s made from wood. I don’t know what it’s called, but I just wanna run thru dat tomorrow, with awesome, lightning speed, heh, yeah, in my dreams eh? But than again, if I can dream, I can see, I can achieve it!
I parked near the field, there were few others too, who is like me searching for the same thing. We were told that the booth for collecting the running vest was behind the spectators’ building, at the back of the stadium. We went there, and collect our yellowish green running vest, with the registration number that followed by the receipts’ number. Mine was A0242. After that I went back home, preparing, worrying about what will happen tomorrow.
That night, I did some buying, I bought eggs, pack of Yakult, Ginseng Tongkat Ali Power Root Drink, Mentos, and Jojo for my nephew, each had its respective usage for tomorrow. I went to cyber café, then to kedai mamak, after that went straight back home, and go to sleep.
The following day, that is Sunday, 25th October, one of the much anticipated day of my life, at least ever since I started registering, my first attempt running in an event ever since I started running, which is like since after SPM, during Khidmat Negara. Thinking how little distance I go back then surely amused me, compared with now; I’m ready to take up this 11.09 km, or at least I thought I’m ready. Thinking otherwise could only disrupt my mentality, or at least that’s what I thought again.
Before that, last night, after packing all the required things, the number, set aside the vest and the shorts to wear, I reminded Sufian to call me if he went back from lepak around 4 a.m. which he did, and I was awake due to his phone call, but then I continued sleeping, haha. Fatin offered to give me a call to wake me up, but I turned down her generous offer, why? I just didn’t feel like troubling her, that’s all.
So when I woke up that morning, it was 6.30 a.m.! ‘Wei, what the heck?’ I thought. Running will start in less than an hour; but I’m supposed to be there like right now. ‘Semayang pun tak lagi’ I murmured, and go the bathroom, took the ablution, and my Subuh. I didn’t have the chance to pray longer that time, but I prayed that I could finish the run without having to stop, or walk at all.
I grabbed my things, went downstairs, go to the kitchen, saw the egg I bought last night and crack it open into a cup and drank it. Buekk, the taste was less awful than other eggs I had before, but still, its taste sucks. ‘I just need the energy’ that’s what was in my head when I drank that raw egg, yuck.
I went inside the car, and notice my Tongkat Ali drink wasn’t in the bag, I went back to the room, but I couldn’t find it. I decided to just go without it. Like any other typical Malaysian, I also believe that Tongkat Ali as one of the good aphrodisiac to be used, tho in this context, I used it for running, not related with anything sexual. It’s just that I had tried this earlier, and it had shown few effects in my running, I tend to be more focused and more energetic, but the down part is I tend to be more excited and tend to run faster, increase my pace a lot more, but in the end I couldn’t go further due to exhaustion. So, I think I’ll be fine, what matters more if I could get there on time.
I sped up the car, due to rain last night I was more cautions and careful when pressing the accelerator, but still I tried to maintain about 100 km/h or more. Luckily, it was early Sunday, and there aren’t many cars on the Middle Ring Road 2 (MRR2). But at that time, one more factor really disrupted my focus on getting to the destination, which is the fuel capacity. It’s almost empty when I reached Sg. Besi, and I was in dilemma whether to fuel the car first or get to the stadium; and I chose the stadium, haha.
As I reach Kajang Silk, there was a car tried to reverse on the highway, it seems that he wanted to park on the left side of the road, but somehow mistakenly passed through. I didn’t notice the car and when I realized it, I tried to move to the right side because braking didn’t seem to be the best idea, and what’s worst, I didn’t notice the car that’s coming from the back, on the right side of the road. Whoa, it was a close call I’d say, and since I was in a rush, I didn’t had the time to be annoyed. I make a u-turn by the Uniten’s roundabout and park faaaarrr from the stadium. I had to walk quite far, and my car was like the third from the last. I decided to put my backpack, that contains the windbreaker, camera and extra shirt in the car, only took out my mp3 player, and Mentos that I bought last night.
I started walking towards the stadium. Along the way, I saw lotsa people who just like I am, wearing the same running vest. And as I walk, I tried to put on the number on my shirt using safety pins provided. I’m glad I reached there on time, and I took the red band as a sign of registration. Fortunately there wasn’t any much thing to do except waiting for the run to begin. I ran one lap around the stadium in slowly manner, stretch a little bit, look at all the runners who like me, share the same burning passion for running and tried not to be too anxious.
I was very excited looking at all the participants, their shirts, crowd of yellowish vest runners, their running shoes; all this kept me captivated, wow, I was really excited. They all look ready, and determined to finish the run. So I continued stretching, until like few minutes before the run begins. After that, they made an announcement and every participant gathered up front. I started to steer myself in the yet-to-be-sweating crowd, and then the run started.
I ran slowly, reeeaaaallly slow due to large number of participants, haha. We start off from the stadium, and the stadium’s entrance is too small to let out almost 4000 participants, haha, so just imagine how congested it was. As I get out of the school entrance, the route was hilly, but it was short.
The congestion keeps on almost 2-3 km into the running route, after that, there’re some spaces for runners to increase their pace, but still they had to avoid the other runners. A day before, when I was stuck in finding the UPM’s stadium, I had the chance to actually follow the running route, so I kinda get a little idea what it looks like, or how further I have to run. I kept on running, or jogging, at I started saw people taking some rest, some even stopped for nature’s call, or waiting for their friends, or to tie up their laces. These entire scenes only made me wanted to not even stop and push myself further, haha.
So, I continued, and its kinda hard when I came across another long, incline route, but again started to do things, keep myself busy. I started to turn on the music, tho I didn’t actually care what song I was listening to, at that time, I wasn bothered, but other participant’s progress made me.
As I continued, I remembered my days back in Khidmat Negara, I remembered what it feels like to do the exercise EARLY in the chilly, windy morning, haha. And I remembered what we chanted, or something similar, and I make up one and chanted it myself, in my heart, in my mind, like it had always been.
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Kasi kuat ibu kaki
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Apa dalam diri?
Kekuatan yang hakiki
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Sejauh mana kita lari?
Terletak jati diri
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Laju atau perlahan,
Itu tanda kekuatan
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Mari-mari kita lari,
Tinggalkan kesedihan ini
And I continued running.
I felt enjoyed looking at all the runners, yeah, the way they struggle and push themselves, just the same I’m pushing myself, only we had different capabilities, different traits, different motivations and reasons to strive. I often look back as I was running, I know what it felt to be left behind, and I know what it feels like to be in the front, all these are very valuable lesson for me, call it another learning session in life, haha.
So I came to about half way of the run, and there was this water station that gave free drinks to every runner. Haha, I was hesitated whether I should drink it, since I don’t drink cold water. So, I tot its best to let things as it is, and let me proceed the way I am, haha. I continued running with feeling slightly worried that if I didn’t drink, I would be dehydrated, but ‘naah, I I have my mentos’ I thought. ‘This will maintain my glucose level’ but then again, what’s the relation between dehydration and glucose level? Haha, whatever it is, im enjoying this run and try to savor every part I can. It only 11km, I won’t be dehydrated right? Tkpa, lets put that aside, at least for now.
Okay, then, as I came to the last part of the run, that is for me around 1.5 km before the finish line back at the stadium, I felt exhausted, my body started to feel every tiredness, and my stomach felt tight, my hands tried to pump harder, it’s getting hard I thought. But I didn’t give in, I saw people, I saw competitors, and its fun, reeaaaallyy fun to see people pushing their limits, I felt Im pushing too, but I felt like I still had the upper hand, my breathing is still stable, only my stomach felt uneasy, but such feeling is not worth to stop the run, so I continued. Then I can see where the route continues because the runners came thru the same route earlier, so this is the part after running in circles, which is backtracking to the stadium. It was a hill, but it wasn’t that high, but it took toll on my pace, I started to run slowly, and the tiredness felt at my feet; but stil I don’t wanna give in, I tried maintaining the pace, tried to lose as smallest as possible the tempo of my running, which it helped me outpace lots of runners, lots of people who started to jog more slowly, some of them even started to walk, feeling exhausted. I continued, as I reach up the hill, I saw the final hill, the last part of the event. Wow, this is one hell of a hill I thought. It was long, and steep, yeah, I can imagine what it feels like to run up through it for I had came down from that route earlier. Seeing the hill from afar is very de-motivating, I felt ‘alamak, adoi, tk guna betul’ all that kind or similar feelings came across. But then again, it was very inspiring, I continued running, jogging, my tempo was as slow as tortoise, I barely gave in, I barely wanted to walk, but I just cant, its not that far left I thought, it wouldn’t hurt just to continue running, that was what came through my mind.
Finally I was able to climb that hill, in a very, verrryyy slow manner, but what the heck, I thought I could run and outpace other runners since this is like the almost last part of the run, and I was suppose not to be tired because running downhill, but then I felt no energy, my legs didn’t listen to me for some time, fatigue at its limit, its yield point and I’m just glad I didn’t have to climb other hill again. But, for other runners, this is it, this is the time to give it your all out for the finishing line is near, but I cant, I can hopelessly saw other people outrun me, I can only smile at their enthusiasm, smiling thinking that they didn’t run up the hill like I did, but walk over it, and took this downhill side to overtook me, but then life is all about taking opportunities, not any opportunities are suitable to one’s capability. And dis time, I’m incapable for such rewarding, final opportunity.
Few metres before the stadium entrance I started to search some upbeat tempo music. My playlist was so mixed up, so I could only finally make do with Ungu’s Dari Satu Hati. I finally came to the stadium entrance. I saw other people walking out of it, other early finisher runners, each of them holding he orange plastic goody bag. ‘Will I have mine too? What will my number be? Wow, I’m jus glad I finished this, I cant wait to tell mak, Fatin, Sufian, budak2 lain’ is what that came thru my mind.
The upbeat tempo run through my ears, my body, my mind, my feelings, more importantly, it boost up my adrenaline push, and I was pushing myself even further, harder, and faster. So I ran, like hell, and as soon I came to the stadium’s running track, I sped up, and accelerates even further, I was Forest Gump, I was Rock Lee, I don’t know what I was, but then my mind, my body cant deny the fatigue, but the song keep pushing me, and as soon I outrun other participants, one after another, the fatigue decline, my body refused to give up, push, and push, and push. All the incidents, all the bad things dat happened recently came through my mind in that few moments, maybe I need some distractions, maybe I need to put the thoughts of exhaustion my body is feeling at dat time aside. And there it is, the finishing line, the white banner they built, and the finishing line is there, as I came near I realize I’m no longer a loser, I can run further now, I can move on now , I can go further, and now, the sky’s the limit, and there, it ends. The attendees looked at my registration number, A0242, and gave me a white card, A312; that’s my number, I got the 312th place in group A which is category for men above 15years old until 51, out of 4000 applications. In aviation, the number A312 could be derived as the extension modified model no for Airbus A310, mine was A312, haha. I couldn’t helped but smile, wahh, but with this pain and exhaustion all over my body, smiling could be very tiresome job, but I don’t give a damn, I wanna smile, I’ve done it, I’ve did it, I had finish the 11.09 km run to be exact, and I’m very glad, I never had such achievement before, and I wanna keep on smiling, haha, yeah!
I saw other participants, all with the white card in their hands, lining up to take their goody bag, but none of them smiled, or laughed, all of them were exhausted, but then again what u’d expect? We’re amateurs, we’re not Olympians, we’re no Usain Bolt, we are just some people who had deep passion for running, only in my case, my passion was overwhelming that it shows on my face, haha. I line up, and took the bag, it was a long line, but I didn’t mind, I took that time to recover, and as soon I get the bag I checked out its content.
In the bag, it contains a can of Revive, a small bottle of mineral water, a consolidation medal, a certificate, and other sponsors’ products samples. I was very glad, looking at the medal, and the certificate, but whats more important are the drinks, I took the mineral water as I tried to find my way a better place to sit, to relax, and observe other people while in the process of rejuvenating myself.
So I sat at the drain nearby, yeah, I’m always attracted to the drain, I don’t know why, maybe its ledge serve a better position for sitting, haha. Wow, it was very tiring, but it was fun, I really wanna do it again, the sense of accomplishment I had was amazing, and I hope next time I could train myself better, I also hope that this event serve as my starting point, my beginning to all the run I’ll enter, or other good things in life.
After that, I went back to the car, took my backpack, my camera, put the goody bag away in the car, and went back to the stadium. With the camera in my sweaty hands, I snapped, and continue doing another passionate hobby that I took up recently. I saw people, I saw sweaty people, running and walking in and out of the stadium, people lining up for free drinks and watermelon, tho I had none, I didn’t quite understand why they gave it, and people sitting like I was just now with overwhelming fatigue. Well, either way, I was very glad, I just was ;-)
The only spoiler dat morning was dat i had a stomachache on my way back to the car, which was very hard for me since I had to walk like 1 km to reach the car. And as soon I'm in it, I rushed to UPM's Petronas, near its entrance. After doing the nature's call, haha, I refueled my car and went straight to Pak Itam's house, took the cake mom asked me to, and sent it to Uncle Ismet's house, only after, around noon that I reach back home, yey!
There are few metaphors when I entered this running event. First, I had always run, but I don’t know how good, or how far can I go, thus this is a good choice to show my capabilities, to show how far I’ve come, to see how good I am. Second, it was to keep my mind occupied, to keep myself busy with all the hardship I’ve gone through, with my best friend’s stuff and other domestic problems, furthermore, when I submit the entry form for this event, my mind was really messed up, and I cant find other way other than tikar sejadah, or religious methods, and my other options was only running. Yeah, running keeps my mind occupied, and ever since that moment, I took up running at night quite regularly. Yeah, it’s a little bit dangerous (sorry la eh Fatin), and dark, but being a nocturnal runner reminds me of one thing, and every time I ran during the moon shines brightly, I felt myself aware of DEATH, astaga. So, running served me lots of purposes, and I wanna keep on running, so that I’ll be reminded, and not forget all the excited feelings I had, so that I can outpace the stigmas or other bad experiences, and outrun my lowly, pathetic self, and I know also by running, that I’m working my ass off to make myself better, and more deserving.
This shoe had always been a great friend of mine, a great friend dat walks the same path dat I had taken, it felt all my sorrow, my burning passion, my sweat and tears, my fears in the night, and everything. It had taken me very far, and for dat Acuna, thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Well, this is life, and if life is a wheel like they had always said, well, then this just something we had to deal, some dirt we had to get stuck with and hope that the dirt will pulled off and again we will feel the breezy, cool air as we go up in life. Hanafiah, I wish u well in life, and for you, my beloved friends, or someone who sumhow manage to get urself into this boring page, I pray and wish you the best in life, and hopefully we all will become a better person, and able to contribute maybe not much, but a little bit of something to the society; how much? Well, it’s only an answer you can determine it yourself. God bless you guys, like I had always wished ;-)
So, 24th October, it was the day before the big day, before the run, and I was still sleeping when I heard a call, 4 miscalls actually, from Fatin. Yeah, I promised to meet her today, it’s been quite some time since I last saw her, gotta do some, no, actually lots of catching up I guess. It’s time to hear her long-awaited case presentation which turns out to be very shocking and motivational one :-)
I was a lil bit late, but fortunately Sufian was half-awaked, he helped me to go to Wangsa Maju, but before that we swing around Maybank to cash in some required money. When I reach Mid Valley, it was around noon. Tho I had eaten a lil bit earlier, I still went for lunch with her. We swap stories for almost more than an hour; we didn’t watch the movie because there wasn’t any suitable time, and I had one thing to do, that is taking the running vest for my first run tomorrow.
I rushed back home, when it was almost 3.30 p.m. The cab ride back home was about seven bucks, which is totally expensive for a trip which used to be around RM4 or 5, tho I was mumbling about the high pay, the driver could only use the typical excuses, oil price increase and there was never a raise for taxi pays since the last 30 years. Lantak la, I tot, I didn’t give it much tot for I was in a hurry. I went to the toilet and took my Zohor, grabbed the kaki (‘car key’ actually, dis is just lame joke dat I always had with mak since I was small) and Alex Yoong all the way to UPM, haha.
When I reached there, it was around 4.40 p.m., almost 5 o’clock. Damn, I shud’ve checked the net to find the collection location. I was clueless where to find the place I’m supposed to go to take my registration number and running vest. I called the Pacesetter’s Athletics Malaysia twice but nobody picked up, and I called the Mizuno shop where I registered, or another branch I guess and they gave me another number, but by the time I have it, it was already too late, I’ve found the place, the stadium, UPM’s stadium, which is located next to Kajang Silk’s highway.
When I entered UPM from the front, I went to the guard post at the Engineering Faculty, and they told me to take left from the roundabout, turn right when reaching the traffic light and go straight. I followed the instruction but stuck at the ‘go straight’ part. Fortunately I found the cursor, which shows the running route for tomorrow’s event. But somehow I was misled into a dead end, twice. First is because I didn’t notice the cursor to go to left and second I was following into the closed, shut-off gate. I had to reverse and ask the students nearby. Again I had to reverse in front some of the kolej kediaman (I don’t remember what number is it) and dis time I went straight, not following the cursed cursor, haha. I went up the hill and there it is the small stadium, equivalent to Salak Tinggi’s. There was a decoration, banner raised and some setups for finishing line dat’s made from wood. I don’t know what it’s called, but I just wanna run thru dat tomorrow, with awesome, lightning speed, heh, yeah, in my dreams eh? But than again, if I can dream, I can see, I can achieve it!
I parked near the field, there were few others too, who is like me searching for the same thing. We were told that the booth for collecting the running vest was behind the spectators’ building, at the back of the stadium. We went there, and collect our yellowish green running vest, with the registration number that followed by the receipts’ number. Mine was A0242. After that I went back home, preparing, worrying about what will happen tomorrow.
That night, I did some buying, I bought eggs, pack of Yakult, Ginseng Tongkat Ali Power Root Drink, Mentos, and Jojo for my nephew, each had its respective usage for tomorrow. I went to cyber café, then to kedai mamak, after that went straight back home, and go to sleep.
The following day, that is Sunday, 25th October, one of the much anticipated day of my life, at least ever since I started registering, my first attempt running in an event ever since I started running, which is like since after SPM, during Khidmat Negara. Thinking how little distance I go back then surely amused me, compared with now; I’m ready to take up this 11.09 km, or at least I thought I’m ready. Thinking otherwise could only disrupt my mentality, or at least that’s what I thought again.
Before that, last night, after packing all the required things, the number, set aside the vest and the shorts to wear, I reminded Sufian to call me if he went back from lepak around 4 a.m. which he did, and I was awake due to his phone call, but then I continued sleeping, haha. Fatin offered to give me a call to wake me up, but I turned down her generous offer, why? I just didn’t feel like troubling her, that’s all.
So when I woke up that morning, it was 6.30 a.m.! ‘Wei, what the heck?’ I thought. Running will start in less than an hour; but I’m supposed to be there like right now. ‘Semayang pun tak lagi’ I murmured, and go the bathroom, took the ablution, and my Subuh. I didn’t have the chance to pray longer that time, but I prayed that I could finish the run without having to stop, or walk at all.
I grabbed my things, went downstairs, go to the kitchen, saw the egg I bought last night and crack it open into a cup and drank it. Buekk, the taste was less awful than other eggs I had before, but still, its taste sucks. ‘I just need the energy’ that’s what was in my head when I drank that raw egg, yuck.
I went inside the car, and notice my Tongkat Ali drink wasn’t in the bag, I went back to the room, but I couldn’t find it. I decided to just go without it. Like any other typical Malaysian, I also believe that Tongkat Ali as one of the good aphrodisiac to be used, tho in this context, I used it for running, not related with anything sexual. It’s just that I had tried this earlier, and it had shown few effects in my running, I tend to be more focused and more energetic, but the down part is I tend to be more excited and tend to run faster, increase my pace a lot more, but in the end I couldn’t go further due to exhaustion. So, I think I’ll be fine, what matters more if I could get there on time.
I sped up the car, due to rain last night I was more cautions and careful when pressing the accelerator, but still I tried to maintain about 100 km/h or more. Luckily, it was early Sunday, and there aren’t many cars on the Middle Ring Road 2 (MRR2). But at that time, one more factor really disrupted my focus on getting to the destination, which is the fuel capacity. It’s almost empty when I reached Sg. Besi, and I was in dilemma whether to fuel the car first or get to the stadium; and I chose the stadium, haha.
As I reach Kajang Silk, there was a car tried to reverse on the highway, it seems that he wanted to park on the left side of the road, but somehow mistakenly passed through. I didn’t notice the car and when I realized it, I tried to move to the right side because braking didn’t seem to be the best idea, and what’s worst, I didn’t notice the car that’s coming from the back, on the right side of the road. Whoa, it was a close call I’d say, and since I was in a rush, I didn’t had the time to be annoyed. I make a u-turn by the Uniten’s roundabout and park faaaarrr from the stadium. I had to walk quite far, and my car was like the third from the last. I decided to put my backpack, that contains the windbreaker, camera and extra shirt in the car, only took out my mp3 player, and Mentos that I bought last night.
I started walking towards the stadium. Along the way, I saw lotsa people who just like I am, wearing the same running vest. And as I walk, I tried to put on the number on my shirt using safety pins provided. I’m glad I reached there on time, and I took the red band as a sign of registration. Fortunately there wasn’t any much thing to do except waiting for the run to begin. I ran one lap around the stadium in slowly manner, stretch a little bit, look at all the runners who like me, share the same burning passion for running and tried not to be too anxious.
I was very excited looking at all the participants, their shirts, crowd of yellowish vest runners, their running shoes; all this kept me captivated, wow, I was really excited. They all look ready, and determined to finish the run. So I continued stretching, until like few minutes before the run begins. After that, they made an announcement and every participant gathered up front. I started to steer myself in the yet-to-be-sweating crowd, and then the run started.
I ran slowly, reeeaaaallly slow due to large number of participants, haha. We start off from the stadium, and the stadium’s entrance is too small to let out almost 4000 participants, haha, so just imagine how congested it was. As I get out of the school entrance, the route was hilly, but it was short.
The congestion keeps on almost 2-3 km into the running route, after that, there’re some spaces for runners to increase their pace, but still they had to avoid the other runners. A day before, when I was stuck in finding the UPM’s stadium, I had the chance to actually follow the running route, so I kinda get a little idea what it looks like, or how further I have to run. I kept on running, or jogging, at I started saw people taking some rest, some even stopped for nature’s call, or waiting for their friends, or to tie up their laces. These entire scenes only made me wanted to not even stop and push myself further, haha.
So, I continued, and its kinda hard when I came across another long, incline route, but again started to do things, keep myself busy. I started to turn on the music, tho I didn’t actually care what song I was listening to, at that time, I wasn bothered, but other participant’s progress made me.
As I continued, I remembered my days back in Khidmat Negara, I remembered what it feels like to do the exercise EARLY in the chilly, windy morning, haha. And I remembered what we chanted, or something similar, and I make up one and chanted it myself, in my heart, in my mind, like it had always been.
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Kasi kuat ibu kaki
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Apa dalam diri?
Kekuatan yang hakiki
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Sejauh mana kita lari?
Terletak jati diri
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Laju atau perlahan,
Itu tanda kekuatan
Lari-lari,
Kita lari,
Mari-mari kita lari,
Tinggalkan kesedihan ini
And I continued running.
I felt enjoyed looking at all the runners, yeah, the way they struggle and push themselves, just the same I’m pushing myself, only we had different capabilities, different traits, different motivations and reasons to strive. I often look back as I was running, I know what it felt to be left behind, and I know what it feels like to be in the front, all these are very valuable lesson for me, call it another learning session in life, haha.
So I came to about half way of the run, and there was this water station that gave free drinks to every runner. Haha, I was hesitated whether I should drink it, since I don’t drink cold water. So, I tot its best to let things as it is, and let me proceed the way I am, haha. I continued running with feeling slightly worried that if I didn’t drink, I would be dehydrated, but ‘naah, I I have my mentos’ I thought. ‘This will maintain my glucose level’ but then again, what’s the relation between dehydration and glucose level? Haha, whatever it is, im enjoying this run and try to savor every part I can. It only 11km, I won’t be dehydrated right? Tkpa, lets put that aside, at least for now.
Okay, then, as I came to the last part of the run, that is for me around 1.5 km before the finish line back at the stadium, I felt exhausted, my body started to feel every tiredness, and my stomach felt tight, my hands tried to pump harder, it’s getting hard I thought. But I didn’t give in, I saw people, I saw competitors, and its fun, reeaaaallyy fun to see people pushing their limits, I felt Im pushing too, but I felt like I still had the upper hand, my breathing is still stable, only my stomach felt uneasy, but such feeling is not worth to stop the run, so I continued. Then I can see where the route continues because the runners came thru the same route earlier, so this is the part after running in circles, which is backtracking to the stadium. It was a hill, but it wasn’t that high, but it took toll on my pace, I started to run slowly, and the tiredness felt at my feet; but stil I don’t wanna give in, I tried maintaining the pace, tried to lose as smallest as possible the tempo of my running, which it helped me outpace lots of runners, lots of people who started to jog more slowly, some of them even started to walk, feeling exhausted. I continued, as I reach up the hill, I saw the final hill, the last part of the event. Wow, this is one hell of a hill I thought. It was long, and steep, yeah, I can imagine what it feels like to run up through it for I had came down from that route earlier. Seeing the hill from afar is very de-motivating, I felt ‘alamak, adoi, tk guna betul’ all that kind or similar feelings came across. But then again, it was very inspiring, I continued running, jogging, my tempo was as slow as tortoise, I barely gave in, I barely wanted to walk, but I just cant, its not that far left I thought, it wouldn’t hurt just to continue running, that was what came through my mind.
Finally I was able to climb that hill, in a very, verrryyy slow manner, but what the heck, I thought I could run and outpace other runners since this is like the almost last part of the run, and I was suppose not to be tired because running downhill, but then I felt no energy, my legs didn’t listen to me for some time, fatigue at its limit, its yield point and I’m just glad I didn’t have to climb other hill again. But, for other runners, this is it, this is the time to give it your all out for the finishing line is near, but I cant, I can hopelessly saw other people outrun me, I can only smile at their enthusiasm, smiling thinking that they didn’t run up the hill like I did, but walk over it, and took this downhill side to overtook me, but then life is all about taking opportunities, not any opportunities are suitable to one’s capability. And dis time, I’m incapable for such rewarding, final opportunity.
The upbeat tempo run through my ears, my body, my mind, my feelings, more importantly, it boost up my adrenaline push, and I was pushing myself even further, harder, and faster. So I ran, like hell, and as soon I came to the stadium’s running track, I sped up, and accelerates even further, I was Forest Gump, I was Rock Lee, I don’t know what I was, but then my mind, my body cant deny the fatigue, but the song keep pushing me, and as soon I outrun other participants, one after another, the fatigue decline, my body refused to give up, push, and push, and push. All the incidents, all the bad things dat happened recently came through my mind in that few moments, maybe I need some distractions, maybe I need to put the thoughts of exhaustion my body is feeling at dat time aside. And there it is, the finishing line, the white banner they built, and the finishing line is there, as I came near I realize I’m no longer a loser, I can run further now, I can move on now , I can go further, and now, the sky’s the limit, and there, it ends. The attendees looked at my registration number, A0242, and gave me a white card, A312; that’s my number, I got the 312th place in group A which is category for men above 15years old until 51, out of 4000 applications. In aviation, the number A312 could be derived as the extension modified model no for Airbus A310, mine was A312, haha. I couldn’t helped but smile, wahh, but with this pain and exhaustion all over my body, smiling could be very tiresome job, but I don’t give a damn, I wanna smile, I’ve done it, I’ve did it, I had finish the 11.09 km run to be exact, and I’m very glad, I never had such achievement before, and I wanna keep on smiling, haha, yeah!
I saw other participants, all with the white card in their hands, lining up to take their goody bag, but none of them smiled, or laughed, all of them were exhausted, but then again what u’d expect? We’re amateurs, we’re not Olympians, we’re no Usain Bolt, we are just some people who had deep passion for running, only in my case, my passion was overwhelming that it shows on my face, haha. I line up, and took the bag, it was a long line, but I didn’t mind, I took that time to recover, and as soon I get the bag I checked out its content.
In the bag, it contains a can of Revive, a small bottle of mineral water, a consolidation medal, a certificate, and other sponsors’ products samples. I was very glad, looking at the medal, and the certificate, but whats more important are the drinks, I took the mineral water as I tried to find my way a better place to sit, to relax, and observe other people while in the process of rejuvenating myself.
So I sat at the drain nearby, yeah, I’m always attracted to the drain, I don’t know why, maybe its ledge serve a better position for sitting, haha. Wow, it was very tiring, but it was fun, I really wanna do it again, the sense of accomplishment I had was amazing, and I hope next time I could train myself better, I also hope that this event serve as my starting point, my beginning to all the run I’ll enter, or other good things in life.
After that, I went back to the car, took my backpack, my camera, put the goody bag away in the car, and went back to the stadium. With the camera in my sweaty hands, I snapped, and continue doing another passionate hobby that I took up recently. I saw people, I saw sweaty people, running and walking in and out of the stadium, people lining up for free drinks and watermelon, tho I had none, I didn’t quite understand why they gave it, and people sitting like I was just now with overwhelming fatigue. Well, either way, I was very glad, I just was ;-)
The only spoiler dat morning was dat i had a stomachache on my way back to the car, which was very hard for me since I had to walk like 1 km to reach the car. And as soon I'm in it, I rushed to UPM's Petronas, near its entrance. After doing the nature's call, haha, I refueled my car and went straight to Pak Itam's house, took the cake mom asked me to, and sent it to Uncle Ismet's house, only after, around noon that I reach back home, yey!
There are few metaphors when I entered this running event. First, I had always run, but I don’t know how good, or how far can I go, thus this is a good choice to show my capabilities, to show how far I’ve come, to see how good I am. Second, it was to keep my mind occupied, to keep myself busy with all the hardship I’ve gone through, with my best friend’s stuff and other domestic problems, furthermore, when I submit the entry form for this event, my mind was really messed up, and I cant find other way other than tikar sejadah, or religious methods, and my other options was only running. Yeah, running keeps my mind occupied, and ever since that moment, I took up running at night quite regularly. Yeah, it’s a little bit dangerous (sorry la eh Fatin), and dark, but being a nocturnal runner reminds me of one thing, and every time I ran during the moon shines brightly, I felt myself aware of DEATH, astaga. So, running served me lots of purposes, and I wanna keep on running, so that I’ll be reminded, and not forget all the excited feelings I had, so that I can outpace the stigmas or other bad experiences, and outrun my lowly, pathetic self, and I know also by running, that I’m working my ass off to make myself better, and more deserving.
Well, this is life, and if life is a wheel like they had always said, well, then this just something we had to deal, some dirt we had to get stuck with and hope that the dirt will pulled off and again we will feel the breezy, cool air as we go up in life. Hanafiah, I wish u well in life, and for you, my beloved friends, or someone who sumhow manage to get urself into this boring page, I pray and wish you the best in life, and hopefully we all will become a better person, and able to contribute maybe not much, but a little bit of something to the society; how much? Well, it’s only an answer you can determine it yourself. God bless you guys, like I had always wished ;-)
Sunday, October 18, 2009
In Search for Neon with Only Accompanied by a Single White Line
Assalamualaikum Hanafiah, how life been treating u recently? Okay? Feeling much better? How was your rashes? Demam lagi? Hopefully not, hopefully not for any of you guys either, my beloved friends.
haha, I ges I gotta thank En Malek, our FYP coordinator for pushing us, for making us occupied with doing the project which even tho a pain in our ass, but still, it definitely bring us lots of benefits, haha.
Em, today I ran again, during night. It was quite sometime, maybe like 2-3 days I was unable to run due to lots of reasons, open house mostly. Yesterday I went to Saidah's sister's open house, then to Bang Icam's house. I ate a LOT, haha. Those plates of kambing meat had definitely taken its toll on my run just now. I need to get back on shape, need to strengthen my core, for next week is the big day, my first attempt to run in an official race.
I hope dat I could complete the 11km Mizuno Wave Run, i wish I could finish it without having to walk at all during the course.
Yeah, tonight, just now, I ran again, it was short, i didnt manage to go far like I used to, but I was able to run until Shell, which is a good warming up. I hope this will improve later on.
I ran, as I went near the stadium, it was dark, the neon lights were OUT!! Ohhh, c'mon man, i really need the lamp to work, 'c'mon, not when I'm using the street!' I murmured. i really wish dat the lamp post would turn on back as I pass by, but then again my pure wish were turned down. Life is always like dat, u can never expect things to turn your way, what you plan today could turn catastrophic next morning, but like a runner in the middle of rain, we could only pray, we could only wish dat the wind would blew the cold, dark, heavy rain clouds away and sunshine took place, but like I said, we could only pray when things didnt turn our way.
I ran, pushing myself, feeling every bit of pain in my body, my mind was away about tomorrow's FYP presentation, mys slides arent fully ready,what was I thinking running now, but then again, its not like I'll finish it up, so I might as well jog now.
I ran, until that petrol station, i stopped, and grasping for air. Pathetically, from that point onwards, I walked beck home, it wasnt pretty much I wanted. I went back thru the dark route. Wow, dis time it reeeaaaalllly is dark, damn, i thought.
I continue jogging slowly, but I can't see anything, the moon wasnt on my side tonight, nor the stars are shyly fading into the dark sky, and I was alone, like always. Wait, arent we all like dat, alone? We came to this world alone, and we'll die leaving it alone too. Somewhere along the process we definitely will be alone too, so technically, being alone in the dark is part of us human beings, no part of everything in this world. But still, i wish you'll never be able to feel such unwanted feeling again, the hollow, and coldness that covers, and accompanied the sorrow of being alone sucks alot, it sucks alot that sometimes it hurts even more that the sharpness of a blade, or maybe in a modern work nowadays where technology is getting more advance and technical, even more lethal than the grenades or weapon of mass destruction. Haha, okay, dat may be a lil bit overboard, but still, being alone hurts.
It was dark, and pitch black. No one was around, and I was about to wonder aimlessly. But, like every cloud dat has its silver lining, every road has its white lining too, haha. With the white light that I barely saw, I follow it thru, and tried to watch up front few times between, in case there's a vehicle coming from the front. I was glad, with this single line, I follow it along the way. This single line, it reaaallly meant a lot. I was glad.
Tho the night was cold, tho I was alone, i didnt hope for someone to be there with me, I didnt expect you to be with me and sit this thru, I just didnt. I just wish there neither, that no one, not a single person will suffer such feeling again.
Life is full of dark moments, with the unwanted pitch blacks that overwhelms us during our downfall, during recession, or when we failed our exams or just when things didnt turned our way, but lets remember this every time we stumble across such moments, lets remember that every dark road has its white lining to guide us out of the pitch black of miseries, downfall and sorrow. Just follow it, the line dat God had created beautifully for us, the line that had been set up to help us human, His beloved slaves whom pathetically often turn away from Him during our good moments. Follow dis my friend, and you'll find the ray of neon lights soon enough.
Dont you think dat its such a wonderful feeling, to be given directions and able to find your way out even with GPS, or satellite radar, or any break-thru advance technology like the westerners had always proud of? Dont you think dis is wonderful and how great God's love to His slaves? Well, I think it's great.
I may be alone, but I'm not, I am not pious (but I'll try) and i had my running, and hopefully God will watch me running safely back home. I hoped, dat I and any of my friends will never be traumatized by such stigmas again, never had to feel the sharpness of the blade called sorrow dat cuts even the hardest of men into pieces or ever succumb into the darkness of being alone ever again, I pray for the best of you guys, for the best of myself too, like I had always wished ;-)
haha, I ges I gotta thank En Malek, our FYP coordinator for pushing us, for making us occupied with doing the project which even tho a pain in our ass, but still, it definitely bring us lots of benefits, haha.
Em, today I ran again, during night. It was quite sometime, maybe like 2-3 days I was unable to run due to lots of reasons, open house mostly. Yesterday I went to Saidah's sister's open house, then to Bang Icam's house. I ate a LOT, haha. Those plates of kambing meat had definitely taken its toll on my run just now. I need to get back on shape, need to strengthen my core, for next week is the big day, my first attempt to run in an official race.
I hope dat I could complete the 11km Mizuno Wave Run, i wish I could finish it without having to walk at all during the course.
Yeah, tonight, just now, I ran again, it was short, i didnt manage to go far like I used to, but I was able to run until Shell, which is a good warming up. I hope this will improve later on.
I ran, as I went near the stadium, it was dark, the neon lights were OUT!! Ohhh, c'mon man, i really need the lamp to work, 'c'mon, not when I'm using the street!' I murmured. i really wish dat the lamp post would turn on back as I pass by, but then again my pure wish were turned down. Life is always like dat, u can never expect things to turn your way, what you plan today could turn catastrophic next morning, but like a runner in the middle of rain, we could only pray, we could only wish dat the wind would blew the cold, dark, heavy rain clouds away and sunshine took place, but like I said, we could only pray when things didnt turn our way.
I ran, pushing myself, feeling every bit of pain in my body, my mind was away about tomorrow's FYP presentation, mys slides arent fully ready,what was I thinking running now, but then again, its not like I'll finish it up, so I might as well jog now.
I ran, until that petrol station, i stopped, and grasping for air. Pathetically, from that point onwards, I walked beck home, it wasnt pretty much I wanted. I went back thru the dark route. Wow, dis time it reeeaaaalllly is dark, damn, i thought.
I continue jogging slowly, but I can't see anything, the moon wasnt on my side tonight, nor the stars are shyly fading into the dark sky, and I was alone, like always. Wait, arent we all like dat, alone? We came to this world alone, and we'll die leaving it alone too. Somewhere along the process we definitely will be alone too, so technically, being alone in the dark is part of us human beings, no part of everything in this world. But still, i wish you'll never be able to feel such unwanted feeling again, the hollow, and coldness that covers, and accompanied the sorrow of being alone sucks alot, it sucks alot that sometimes it hurts even more that the sharpness of a blade, or maybe in a modern work nowadays where technology is getting more advance and technical, even more lethal than the grenades or weapon of mass destruction. Haha, okay, dat may be a lil bit overboard, but still, being alone hurts.
It was dark, and pitch black. No one was around, and I was about to wonder aimlessly. But, like every cloud dat has its silver lining, every road has its white lining too, haha. With the white light that I barely saw, I follow it thru, and tried to watch up front few times between, in case there's a vehicle coming from the front. I was glad, with this single line, I follow it along the way. This single line, it reaaallly meant a lot. I was glad.
Tho the night was cold, tho I was alone, i didnt hope for someone to be there with me, I didnt expect you to be with me and sit this thru, I just didnt. I just wish there neither, that no one, not a single person will suffer such feeling again.
Life is full of dark moments, with the unwanted pitch blacks that overwhelms us during our downfall, during recession, or when we failed our exams or just when things didnt turned our way, but lets remember this every time we stumble across such moments, lets remember that every dark road has its white lining to guide us out of the pitch black of miseries, downfall and sorrow. Just follow it, the line dat God had created beautifully for us, the line that had been set up to help us human, His beloved slaves whom pathetically often turn away from Him during our good moments. Follow dis my friend, and you'll find the ray of neon lights soon enough.
Dont you think dat its such a wonderful feeling, to be given directions and able to find your way out even with GPS, or satellite radar, or any break-thru advance technology like the westerners had always proud of? Dont you think dis is wonderful and how great God's love to His slaves? Well, I think it's great.
I may be alone, but I'm not, I am not pious (but I'll try) and i had my running, and hopefully God will watch me running safely back home. I hoped, dat I and any of my friends will never be traumatized by such stigmas again, never had to feel the sharpness of the blade called sorrow dat cuts even the hardest of men into pieces or ever succumb into the darkness of being alone ever again, I pray for the best of you guys, for the best of myself too, like I had always wished ;-)
Friday, October 16, 2009
Izinkan Aku Berlari Meninggalkan Mu
Wah Wei Hanafiah, c’mon dow, u can do this, u can this pull this off, c’mon!! Okay, that was a lil bit a heck of an intro eh? Well, I like such intro tho, it helps me to keep up to the reader’s expectation, that is my future self, haha.
Recently, I realize that being busy is some sort of gift too, it helps you to put unwanted things aside, or at least you’ll be too busy to be bothered with it. Oh, the only thing I held on dearly recently is running. I tried every day to jog, to at least sweat a few rounds around the stadium, thanks to her, my best friend I had started take up running during night.
But then again, it didn’t stop there. Now I felt like jogging at each route I see. Whenever I was driving, I saw certain road, I’ll feel like stopping, put on my worn out shoes, and run against the flow of traffic, against the flow of life, against sharp edges of society’s stereotypical negative perspective, accompanied with the loud playback of certain artist whom their music inspires me and its lyrics; like a warcry , pushing, enrage, and increase the burning passion and motivation to keep on going, keep on moving, and hopefully as I went thru dat route, not only I find satisfaction, joy, or any some of salty sweat overflowing from my face, but with God’s grace may I find a better conclusion, a better way to sort things out, a fresh mind to think properly.
I don’t know how many times I’ve wrote abt this thing, abt what I felt when I run, it’s just that, maybe now running is all I can write about. It sucks sometimes, but, hey, I got something kan? This is after all trivial matters, is not like the world crisis or the world war to get my head so worked up. But then again, people had mind, but they had feelings too; the body isn’t only made up of brain, there’s also heart. And triviality of certain problems, the worriness, it vary between people, u can never feel exactly what it feels like on the other side of the shoe if you’re two different person, but opening up and sharing, it helps reducing the burden, so mystical yet simple.
Sesungguhnya sesudah setiap kesukaran, ada kemudahan.
Bear that in mind my friend, and may you’ll find your definition of success, may you’ll overcome any obstacles with great spirit .
Thank you friend, thanks for everything.
Izinkan aku berlari meninggalkan mu. Like I’ve always had wished ;-)
Recently, I realize that being busy is some sort of gift too, it helps you to put unwanted things aside, or at least you’ll be too busy to be bothered with it. Oh, the only thing I held on dearly recently is running. I tried every day to jog, to at least sweat a few rounds around the stadium, thanks to her, my best friend I had started take up running during night.
But then again, it didn’t stop there. Now I felt like jogging at each route I see. Whenever I was driving, I saw certain road, I’ll feel like stopping, put on my worn out shoes, and run against the flow of traffic, against the flow of life, against sharp edges of society’s stereotypical negative perspective, accompanied with the loud playback of certain artist whom their music inspires me and its lyrics; like a warcry , pushing, enrage, and increase the burning passion and motivation to keep on going, keep on moving, and hopefully as I went thru dat route, not only I find satisfaction, joy, or any some of salty sweat overflowing from my face, but with God’s grace may I find a better conclusion, a better way to sort things out, a fresh mind to think properly.
I don’t know how many times I’ve wrote abt this thing, abt what I felt when I run, it’s just that, maybe now running is all I can write about. It sucks sometimes, but, hey, I got something kan? This is after all trivial matters, is not like the world crisis or the world war to get my head so worked up. But then again, people had mind, but they had feelings too; the body isn’t only made up of brain, there’s also heart. And triviality of certain problems, the worriness, it vary between people, u can never feel exactly what it feels like on the other side of the shoe if you’re two different person, but opening up and sharing, it helps reducing the burden, so mystical yet simple.
Sesungguhnya sesudah setiap kesukaran, ada kemudahan.
Bear that in mind my friend, and may you’ll find your definition of success, may you’ll overcome any obstacles with great spirit .
Thank you friend, thanks for everything.
Izinkan aku berlari meninggalkan mu. Like I’ve always had wished ;-)
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
On the Verge of Friendship and Love
Sometimes there will be times when you're on the verge of something important, something so deep, and complicated, hard-to-define, not easy-to-digest matter, for example, to choose between friendship and your love life. Well, not that my love life would’ve won either, it had always not been, hopefully not always will.
So, if somehow u're stuck in this dilemma, and trying to figure your way out, its best to ask yourself, not your heart, but your wonderful, God-given, most complex and unique, identical to urself and urself only, which is your brain, subhanallah.
Sometimes again when you really love...no, let’s use somethin' less tragic than ‘love’, how about ‘like’? Yeah, when you really like someone, there are lotsa indications, and signs that showed, but only fools would deny it, and ironically, this stupidity came from the author himself, maybe he wrote this as some sort of diary or a reminder of his foolish ignorance.
Maybe the reason he had been a fool is because he didn’t realize his true feelings, maybe he had been denying it because he didn’t expect such feelings to occur, or perhaps previous experiences was painful, that made him tried to be more careful and to actually go straight for someone he really like wasn’t seem like the wisest idea. He was a fool because he choose to be clever, to wait-and-see, until one day, with lightning speed someone grabbed the precious gem away, right in front of him, and a smack right on his face; and now regretting seems pointless for if this is a some sort of detention, resistance is futile. But then, to fall in love, to like someone, is not about being wise, it’s not to hide any tricks up your sleeves or putting your best trump card forward, tho the outside nature of love or such feeling tend to be game-like, but the deep, pure core essence of heart is not, it is love, and full of wonderful feelings and excitement; and feelings aren’t meant to be played, aren’t meant to be toyed, aren’t meant to be suppressed or cast aside.
So, when you're stuck between friendship and love, first thing I think anyone should do is to clear their mind, spit their hidden feelings out, let the respective person know about it, for letting them know such matter is not an embarrassing situation, it may be awkward, but not as awkward as trying to get into some serious relationship out of thin air. When the bond of friendship is held tight, there’s always a possibility for a mutual feelings to occur. But still, life is not easy, it never will, so be prepared for the worst. Thus, when you confessed, there's always the friendship to back you up, to support you. And this is what makes it more interesting, secure yet it could be the hardest to forget. Meaning, you may be digging your own grave, and with a slight chance you'll rise and shine again. And believe me my friend, you’ll never again be the same person you are before.
So, if the time has come for you to confess, for your big break, for your mind is already set, only then you could let your co-pilot a.k.a. your heart to take over. Take actions, make effort, and say it, say the words with all your heart, let your bottled up feelings, unknown source of stress, the sudden undiagnosable, uncertain pace of your breathing out, and put your sleepless night to an end, for it is a good thing and accept the answer with all the might your heart can take. With dat my friend, with that, I hope that happiness will always smile on your side ;-)
Again, like most of my previous post, or any of my stupid actions in life, I don’t know why I did it, what made me to instigate such idiocy, yet as dumb as it may be, I didn’t regret it either. Like this piece of my mind I’m writing.
The few things that makes a man that recover from a heartbreak with his best friend much better than other normal crush is…Seriously, I don’t really think I’m qualified enough to write this matter, for I’m still trying my best to recover. But, I’ll try to write some insights of what I felt, theoretically dat is.
Okay, continue. Though this kind of situation is much more complicated and hard to overcome with when you compared to other heartbreak, there are lotsa positive aspects, a motivational and inspiring one, with God’s grace you’ll become a better person.
First, she is your best friend, the person u’d tell all your secrets to, and somehow along the way, you tend to want to know more, know how she felt, what she went thru today, her views on certain problems, your problems mostly, and once you been quite get used to it, stopping seems the hardest thing to do. Me? I’m still rehabilitating. But to know that you are fully okay from this first aspect doesn’t mean that you’ll stop contacting her, it’s enough that you’re able to draw some limit, some distance. And when you achieve that, you’ll know that you’re ready, ready to embark a new ocean of relationship with new crew of attitude, and with a new ship of confidence. Hopefully your guilty thoughts for her will lost like the pearl at the bottom of the ocean, lost in time, untraceable, only a piece of memory as a reminder.
Second, she is your best friend, again. Yeah, dis shows that to like your best friend is a good thing. One of the few taglines I often watch from movies was ‘I’d rather have you as a friend than not having you in my life at all’. You see, the truth is, whenever the bond of friendship had grow on stronger each day, you’ll see how trivial dis matter is, and dats why such feelings cant be suppressed, yeah, rejection hurts, it sucks a lot, but still, like I said, it made you stronger, and if the bond is strong, if the foundation was well built on the ground of pure friendship, love and respect, you will realize that the blade of sadness and hammer of sorrow are not sharp enough even to cut the smallest part, not even producing the slightest damage to you, and your integrity only become better. And, can’t u see that to be able to keep in touch after such awkward, embarrassing situation is already a blessing in disguise? Well, be thankful for she’s still there, maybe not all of it, but she’s still there, to guide and support you, as a friend. Yeah, it may be a huge letdown but this is life, not everything we plan in life will turn out to be the way we wanted, but then again, fate had always a better plan, and just bear dis in mind whenever you came across similar situations; that every cloud do has its silver lining.
And hopefully with dis things in mind, I hope u’ll succeed my friend, yes you, the reader who choose to spend some of your quality time when you could read other better knowledgeable material but instead you choose reading dis piece of crap, this piece of my mind, this huuuge piece of my heart, and for that, I thank you, and I pray that with God’s grace your love life, no, all aspects of your living quality will be a success, a tremendous one, hopefully, like I had always pray :-)
So, if somehow u're stuck in this dilemma, and trying to figure your way out, its best to ask yourself, not your heart, but your wonderful, God-given, most complex and unique, identical to urself and urself only, which is your brain, subhanallah.
Sometimes again when you really love...no, let’s use somethin' less tragic than ‘love’, how about ‘like’? Yeah, when you really like someone, there are lotsa indications, and signs that showed, but only fools would deny it, and ironically, this stupidity came from the author himself, maybe he wrote this as some sort of diary or a reminder of his foolish ignorance.
Maybe the reason he had been a fool is because he didn’t realize his true feelings, maybe he had been denying it because he didn’t expect such feelings to occur, or perhaps previous experiences was painful, that made him tried to be more careful and to actually go straight for someone he really like wasn’t seem like the wisest idea. He was a fool because he choose to be clever, to wait-and-see, until one day, with lightning speed someone grabbed the precious gem away, right in front of him, and a smack right on his face; and now regretting seems pointless for if this is a some sort of detention, resistance is futile. But then, to fall in love, to like someone, is not about being wise, it’s not to hide any tricks up your sleeves or putting your best trump card forward, tho the outside nature of love or such feeling tend to be game-like, but the deep, pure core essence of heart is not, it is love, and full of wonderful feelings and excitement; and feelings aren’t meant to be played, aren’t meant to be toyed, aren’t meant to be suppressed or cast aside.
So, when you're stuck between friendship and love, first thing I think anyone should do is to clear their mind, spit their hidden feelings out, let the respective person know about it, for letting them know such matter is not an embarrassing situation, it may be awkward, but not as awkward as trying to get into some serious relationship out of thin air. When the bond of friendship is held tight, there’s always a possibility for a mutual feelings to occur. But still, life is not easy, it never will, so be prepared for the worst. Thus, when you confessed, there's always the friendship to back you up, to support you. And this is what makes it more interesting, secure yet it could be the hardest to forget. Meaning, you may be digging your own grave, and with a slight chance you'll rise and shine again. And believe me my friend, you’ll never again be the same person you are before.
So, if the time has come for you to confess, for your big break, for your mind is already set, only then you could let your co-pilot a.k.a. your heart to take over. Take actions, make effort, and say it, say the words with all your heart, let your bottled up feelings, unknown source of stress, the sudden undiagnosable, uncertain pace of your breathing out, and put your sleepless night to an end, for it is a good thing and accept the answer with all the might your heart can take. With dat my friend, with that, I hope that happiness will always smile on your side ;-)
Again, like most of my previous post, or any of my stupid actions in life, I don’t know why I did it, what made me to instigate such idiocy, yet as dumb as it may be, I didn’t regret it either. Like this piece of my mind I’m writing.
The few things that makes a man that recover from a heartbreak with his best friend much better than other normal crush is…Seriously, I don’t really think I’m qualified enough to write this matter, for I’m still trying my best to recover. But, I’ll try to write some insights of what I felt, theoretically dat is.
Okay, continue. Though this kind of situation is much more complicated and hard to overcome with when you compared to other heartbreak, there are lotsa positive aspects, a motivational and inspiring one, with God’s grace you’ll become a better person.
First, she is your best friend, the person u’d tell all your secrets to, and somehow along the way, you tend to want to know more, know how she felt, what she went thru today, her views on certain problems, your problems mostly, and once you been quite get used to it, stopping seems the hardest thing to do. Me? I’m still rehabilitating. But to know that you are fully okay from this first aspect doesn’t mean that you’ll stop contacting her, it’s enough that you’re able to draw some limit, some distance. And when you achieve that, you’ll know that you’re ready, ready to embark a new ocean of relationship with new crew of attitude, and with a new ship of confidence. Hopefully your guilty thoughts for her will lost like the pearl at the bottom of the ocean, lost in time, untraceable, only a piece of memory as a reminder.
Second, she is your best friend, again. Yeah, dis shows that to like your best friend is a good thing. One of the few taglines I often watch from movies was ‘I’d rather have you as a friend than not having you in my life at all’. You see, the truth is, whenever the bond of friendship had grow on stronger each day, you’ll see how trivial dis matter is, and dats why such feelings cant be suppressed, yeah, rejection hurts, it sucks a lot, but still, like I said, it made you stronger, and if the bond is strong, if the foundation was well built on the ground of pure friendship, love and respect, you will realize that the blade of sadness and hammer of sorrow are not sharp enough even to cut the smallest part, not even producing the slightest damage to you, and your integrity only become better. And, can’t u see that to be able to keep in touch after such awkward, embarrassing situation is already a blessing in disguise? Well, be thankful for she’s still there, maybe not all of it, but she’s still there, to guide and support you, as a friend. Yeah, it may be a huge letdown but this is life, not everything we plan in life will turn out to be the way we wanted, but then again, fate had always a better plan, and just bear dis in mind whenever you came across similar situations; that every cloud do has its silver lining.
And hopefully with dis things in mind, I hope u’ll succeed my friend, yes you, the reader who choose to spend some of your quality time when you could read other better knowledgeable material but instead you choose reading dis piece of crap, this piece of my mind, this huuuge piece of my heart, and for that, I thank you, and I pray that with God’s grace your love life, no, all aspects of your living quality will be a success, a tremendous one, hopefully, like I had always pray :-)
The Emptiest Raya I Ever Had
Okay, like usual, few days before raya, I was tossing back and forth on the bed, being restless thinking about whatever I was thinking, about my problem, anyone’s problems, and my brother’s problem. All these stuffs get into my head, unstoppable, uncontrollable like the water flowing in the river. But neither nevertheless, all dis problems aren’t something that I can deal with, nor it’s my problem to deal with, nor that I’ve any way to solve it or perhaps it’s unsolvable only time could tell when.
So, I decided to make myself busy, with all the trivial stuff I can find, and the first thing dat I saw as I went down the stairs, the wall on the right side. This wall is full of high esthetical value graffiti, created by the most artistic graffiti painter anyone could find in the history of graffiti that is Danial Iman and his other dark sidekick, Amirul Iman, who are both my nephews.
I decided to paint the wall, and when I went outside, I saw dat old, rusty, small gate, with broken plastic letter box. I think its time to change, maybe I cant change it completely, but at least I can paint it, at least that will keep it going through during this festive season, or these hard times. I think I can do it, it’s easy I tot. Yeah it was, a little bit. After buying all the required tools, I started painting with the wall first. What made the process harder was not the procedures itself but the hardships that came from the cranky masterpiece creator, my both beloved nieces, maybe this was just some sort of test, a fasting test dat is. Iman was sulking when I scold him to take his bath and the true masterpiece creator, who is just about to rise, Fatihah Iman, the true hidden mastermind of the graffiti creation, also decided to take actions into her own small hands, haha.
The next day, I painted the gate with its original color, the darkest color anyone could find in one’s heart, black. Before painting, I scrape off the dirt or any rusty part that had chipped out and wipe it with a cloth to clean off the dust or any small unwanted particles that could disrupt the painting process. After fully finished painting the following day, I went to buy the new post box, dis time it’s aluminum, not plastic. I hanged it on the gate, tied it with a string, and painted the house number, ‘306’, on the red box.
Then I rushed and prepared myself to balik kampong. I was in a hurry, but its normal to forget sometimes even the most important, crucial things when you’re rushing. As I went thru the Sg Besi toll, few kilometers after dat I remembered I had forgot to bring my baju melayu along. Damn, adoi, astaga, how could I forget? Then I told mom, and we went back to Melawati by following the UPM Serdang exit.
Well, I just hope this is the end of all this misfortunes, like i had always wished ;-)
To Overcome One's Pathetic Love Life; The Curious Case of Hanafiah Al Adiyat
Okay, haha, what the heck eh with the title, lantak la eh kan Hanafiah. I guess the main reason I put up such title was because of my final year project, it sucks....not, alhamdulillah, we're a lil bit late behind schedule, but we'll keep up, insyaAllah.
Introduction
Love is blind, or so they said. Unrequited ones are like a self destructing bomb, waiting to detonate, tho it didnt usually starts an explosion, sometimes it triggers something good, something positive, a beginning of an evolution, a mutation in DNA, way of thinking and the body of the person himself, and in Hanafiah's case it evolved to an unknown species.
Before we could proceed, lets review the subject, that is Hanafiah. He's a person, an unknown one, people around him would describe him as eccentric, weird, and he's usually the target of their aggressive jokes, tho he didnt really mind. He had a pathetic love life and this is how he overcome it.
Literature Review
Since we're all diferent person, we all have different interests. Some people had their own way of dealing with this kind of problem. Certain people they ate, not only for living, or vice versa which we should not, but they also ate to forget these bad memories, some people they cried or shouted their heart out. While shouting is also a method, it usually accompanied with loud tones of music, simply said, karaoke a portmanteau of the Japanese words kara and okesutora which could derive as 'empty orchestra'. Some people prefer to be more useful and extract the energy from the sadness doing exercises and stuff, which is very good, a positive way to deal with stress, like one wouldve said, like I wouldve said. So, in Hanafiah's case, he took up karaoke, running, and his favourite past time, (sfx on : Hanafiah made the tackle, it's not fouled, he tapped the ball, he flicked it, made a one-two, tap it past the defenders, dribble past the keeper and he SCOOOORRRRRREEEEEDDDDD, GOOOOAAAALLLLL!!!!!) football..
Methodology
In this mamat's case, Hanafiah had use THREE+ONE method. Okay, I'm done blabbering, next time I'll continue, if I ever ffel like doing so.
Introduction
Love is blind, or so they said. Unrequited ones are like a self destructing bomb, waiting to detonate, tho it didnt usually starts an explosion, sometimes it triggers something good, something positive, a beginning of an evolution, a mutation in DNA, way of thinking and the body of the person himself, and in Hanafiah's case it evolved to an unknown species.
Before we could proceed, lets review the subject, that is Hanafiah. He's a person, an unknown one, people around him would describe him as eccentric, weird, and he's usually the target of their aggressive jokes, tho he didnt really mind. He had a pathetic love life and this is how he overcome it.
Literature Review
Since we're all diferent person, we all have different interests. Some people had their own way of dealing with this kind of problem. Certain people they ate, not only for living, or vice versa which we should not, but they also ate to forget these bad memories, some people they cried or shouted their heart out. While shouting is also a method, it usually accompanied with loud tones of music, simply said, karaoke a portmanteau of the Japanese words kara and okesutora which could derive as 'empty orchestra'. Some people prefer to be more useful and extract the energy from the sadness doing exercises and stuff, which is very good, a positive way to deal with stress, like one wouldve said, like I wouldve said. So, in Hanafiah's case, he took up karaoke, running, and his favourite past time, (sfx on : Hanafiah made the tackle, it's not fouled, he tapped the ball, he flicked it, made a one-two, tap it past the defenders, dribble past the keeper and he SCOOOORRRRRREEEEEDDDDD, GOOOOAAAALLLLL!!!!!) football..
Methodology
In this mamat's case, Hanafiah had use THREE+ONE method. Okay, I'm done blabbering, next time I'll continue, if I ever ffel like doing so.
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