Friend.

I have kept these rants inside for too long.

If a friend asks what appears to be a "stupid" question to you ;

Do : answer them patiently. One person can not know everything, including you.

Don't : smack your forehead and ask them back "Haa? Tak tauu?". That'll make the person asking feel very stupid & ashamed of themselves for not knowing a thing that apparently every single living soul on Earth should know.

If a friend refuses to hang out with you ;

Do : understand their situation. Or know the fact that maybe it's your behaviour that makes them avoid you.

Don't : be pushy.

If a friend has became waaaaaaaaay slimmer than they use to be and you're jealous of her success ;

Do : keep quiet.

Don't : diss them by saying stupid things that makes it obvious that you really wanna be in her shoes and it also makes it apparent that you need to loss weight.

If a friend is having a relationship with someone attractive ;

Do : keep quiet.

Don't : diss them. You're alone for a reason, buddy.

If a friend is in distress and tells you about it ;

Do : have a little sympathy and say something comforting.

Don't : type "Hahaha" and complain about that yammering friend to another friend.

If a friend disagree with you about something ;

Do : be mature and understand that even friends can't agree on EVERYTHING

Don't : judge that person's choice.

Additional rants :

It's better for you not to preach something about Islam if you yourself are a judgemental, jealous and angry person.

Don't make it apparent that you're actually not happy for someone, you'll make no one look bad but yourself.

Choose your words before you spat them out.

Be a little sensitive with what you say to people. I know it's hard to do with your stone cold heart, but please try.

So called "friends".

P/S : It's not about just one person. :)

Hello, London.

Yesterday's flight was neither easy nor enjoyable.

Yes, I like the fact that I'm going to study at London.

Yes, I like the weather here.

Yes, I like to shop here.

But nothing beats me down more than having to say goodbye to my family, especially my Mama.

At first I was OK, despite the crazy hullabaloo when I found out that I have to pay RM2,846.45 for excess of 16kg untuk luggage. Ayah remained calm and collected. We sorted things out by the car and succeeded in getting rid of 13kg. Sorry Min, buat kabut!

Then, we went to McDonalds for breakfast. Wrong place to be at that time. The lines were long and the place was almost full. But we managed to grab a table farthest from the restaurant. I could tell Andi was a little bit stressed because he had to go and queue to buy the food.

It was 9.15 a.m. and Ayah told me that it was better for me to go to prevent any more troubles. So I hugged everybody. First, I hugged Mama. She said something that really touched my heart. "Mama rase macam akak nak pegi kejap je ni.." Wohhh, lepas tu terus air mata keluar la wehhh. Then I hugged Ayah, Andi, Hazim & Min. At this point, I really couldn't contain myself any longer. I couldn't stop crying, because I saw Mama cry. But still, tahan la air mata dari berjurai-jurai.

So, turun escalator, naik aerotrain, bought Sharir's cigarettes, and board the plane.

I cried my eyes out since boarding the plane until we land at Heathrow. Well, I did sleep like for a few hours. Most of the time, I miss my Mama. I think it's because we've grown closer when compared to my last trip to the UK. We talk a lot more nowadays.

It was the most suffocating plane ride I've ever been on. I've never felt so alone in my life. I needed to talk to someone but the two guys sitting beside me looked unfriendly.

What made it worst is that I chose to sit next to the window, which made it extremely difficult for me to get up and go to the lavatory or accessing my bag pack in the overhead compartment becaaaaause one of the guys sitting beside me was...sihat. Note to self, lepas ni duduk aisle seat.

Thank God that's over. Now I'm staying at a friend's cosy little flat. And a few more troubles awaits me. I'm skipping class today because I have so much to settle.

Ya Allah, please help me.

Keep my family safe.

Calm my heart.

Strengthen my soul.

Make me strong and patient.

Ease my burden.

Don't ever let me forget you.

This is a very depressing post.

Hope to see you again, Ramadhan.

22

I turn 22 today! Here's a picture of Jared Leto and a giant cracker

Charming, isn't he?

I'm flying off to the UK in less than a week and trust me, I'm not looking forward to it.

First, I may still be in a Raya mood at that time and having to stress myself over what has to be packed and what has been packed is not a thing one should worry about that time of the year.

Second, I will be going alone. I'm fine with the flying, although I must admit going through customs and immigration might be a bit scary. It's the registration at LSBF that I'm worried about. Before this, I have 5 of my friends with me so it wasn't very frightening. But this time, I'll be completely by myself without anyone to sesat with me! Gahhh, help me God.

Third. This is the hardest part. Saying good bye to loved ones. Guys, I really gonna miss all of you and I really hope you can join me in London soon! :) It'll be fun with all of you around, it's gonna be like a long-term vacation.

Other than those things, I think I'm all set to go. Yeay me. Go me.

Jasmin, before you go to the States to pursue your nannying career, I suggest you bring your ass to the UK and have a Euro trip with me first. Only after that, I will give you my consent. Comprende? Hehehehhe. Berangan pelis.

And as for you, dearly beloved, thank you for all the birthday gifts. Even though you're not the first one to call and wish me a happy birthday, you're still first place in pretty much everything else.

Hope I'll be fine over there. Ya Allah, protect me from harm.

Hallo Ramadhan!

Hey guys. Ramadhan's coming in two days and I'm excited because of the fact that there's gonna be tonnes of bazaar Ramadhan. I know that's a pretty messed up reason to anticipate Ramadhan but hey, I know a lot of people out there can't wait to go browsing for food, too!

So, I'm going away in a month time and I'm having mixed feelings on when should I actually fly to the UK. The offer letter states that I'm gonna be starting on 22 August 2011, but the class time table shows that there won't be any classes until the 1st September 2011. So I think the one week (lebih kurang laa) gap is for the orientation programme, which I am willing to attend, you know, to know some new friends, to get familiar with LSBF and etc. Also, I'm kinda excited to celebrate the 1st Raya in Malaysian Hall. I don't know if that's strange but Raya hasn't been a big deal for me since....5 years back?

But Dad said something last night and it made my heart melt.

Me : Ayah OK ke kalau akak nak pegi before raya?

Ayah : Kalau boleh ayah nak la beraya dengan semua anak ayah. Tak seronok la kalau ade yang takde.

Me : OKLAA OKLAAA AKAK PEGI LEPAS RAYA ='(

Howzattt? How can celebrating raya in Malaysian Hall beat that? So I might be going on the 2nd day of raya, which means that my friends won't be able to send me off at the airport, which is quite sad. Hurrhurrr.

Here are some random facts that I want to rant about :

1. What's up with people taking photos of their branded stuff and publish it online/show it off to people?

2. Saying 'thank you' is one thing, but you have to be grateful, too.

3. Biro Tatanegara courses are racist, one-sided, extreme and totally unnecessary!

4. Just get married already.

5. Some guys should stop being perverts. (Providing that us girls stop wearing stripper outfits when we go out hahahha)

All these rants are like reminders to myself (except for number 4) as well as reminders to those who I want to remind. Hah!

Congratulations!

Congratulations to the beautiful lady standing beside me in this picture. She just got married yesterday! I wish her all the happiness in the world and may your new life gets barakah from Allah.

And now congratulations to me for my resignation from work! And now I'm looking forward to pursue my ACCA! The title 'chartered accountant' is what I'm aiming for next, besides from getting married hahaahaaa no I'm just kidding. I'm daydreaming about getting 5 digits salary before getting hitched, so that I can have a full-blasted English themed wedding. That means I have to work hard, play less, study smart & concentrate!

Berangan boleh, kan? Tapi kena usaha la :)

An exaggeration of a bad day

Today was the worst day so far in my working life.

Last week I did what I always do on the 10th of every month. I process the staff claims.

So I did the usual, list all the names, put in their bank account numbers, put in the amounts that they claimed for, upload the list into an online banking site, ask for approval from the directors, and the payments are released.

So it went smoothly and without problem. Or so I thought.

By the end of the week, I keep receiving calls from this former employee whose claim was included in the batch that I just processed.

She kept telling me that the amount that she gets is far less from what she submitted.

This does happen, but not that frequent. Sometimes they mistook their claim figure with another figure in their bank accounts, and sometimes they didn't go check at all.

So I didn't panic and I told her maybe there was a delay from the bank.

On Friday evening, as I was driving back home, another staff called, and informed me of the same issue.

By this time, I was all frantic and I texted my colleague who was still at the office, I thought of asking for her help to check the list that I made.

And to make things worse, she replied my text saying that SHE didn't get her claim AT ALL.

Yeay, happy weekend for me.

So, this morning, I found out that the bank account numbers of 18 people in the list got mixed up!

They ended up getting somebody else's claims instead of their own!

YYYYYYYYIIIIIIIIIIKKKKKKKKKKKKEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!

I panicked, felt like vomiting, crying, wailing, hiding because I was so very ashamed and all those worse feelings that you can ever imagine.

But what puzzled me the most was how can the bank proceed with the payment when it was undoubtedly obvious that the name of the beneficiary and their bank account numbers were not tally??

What the hell, Royal Bank of Scotland!? If you rejected all 18 payments, at least it would be easier because I could've just paid the people the exact amount they claimed for.

But noooooooooo, you just blindly pay them when it was so freakin' obvious that the bank account numbers didn't belong to the right people!

And then I had to spend like an hour figuring out who has been short paid and who received more money than they should!

So I asked my boss what I should do.

She's very kind and she helped me to sort this mess out.

But one thing that's driving me crazy is that when she gives instruction on what to do, the volume of her voice was 100% megaphone-loud.

Hey, I'm embarrassed enough about this even without you yelling instructions at me, or rather announcing to the whole office that I've made a huge mistake.

Thanks boss ;)

And then this technician came up to me and said, "Farah, takde salah masuk claim dalam bank account saye ke?"

What the actual f***?

He didn't even have claim in this batch, how the freakin' hell did he know? Maybe it was the announcement my boss made or maybe someone spread this issue all throughout the office.

Good news spread like wild fire in that office, and by good news I mean people's mistakes and by wildfire I mean in the speed of light.

So the conclusion is, I am ashamed and I've never felt this pathetic before. The end :)

Might I add a little bit here, I want to express my gratitude to the Superman who listened to me when I was crying like an over-sized baby over the phone and came to the rescue during lunch hour. Thank you! You made me feel a whole lot better about myself!