Another day of summer - Hazy

I think the sky here in Malaysia isn't getting any better every year, is it?

Today I will be taking a flight to Sarawak. As far as I can tell for 2 days I am here at Kuala Lumpur, nothing much has changed. I do see many construction projects are going on here and there, but I guess that's all.
The foods are awesome as always ^^, thanks to my cousin who treated me.

As for me, I think my health has declined since my arrival. Now I often cough and sneeze. ><. *sigh*...
I wonder how will I be after one month...
Ah, and talking about that,... I think I do have some sort of allergic reaction toward cats -.-.....
I was living so happily and healthily at Edmonton when suddenly a junior came and stayed at my house with his little kitten. Since that day onward, I was sneezing nonstop -.-...
Damn.... why must it be cats??? Family aside, what else is better to hug in this world???? Sob2.

Ah... I can't wait to finish Final Fantasy XIII and Tales of Graces f.

Return to myself.

You know... I often feel that I am much inferior that what I used to be during my childhood.

When I was a kid, I was full of energy, keep pestering others, love to have bicycle race with friends, play with mud, annoys my teacher in school, kick my innocent friend out of nowhere.
But those aside, I always enjoyed hanging with friends, be the one who called for a groupwork doing homework, sell 'rare' printed material I made with 'rare' computer.

But now, look at me. Sitting at my own bedroom looking at the monitor screen reflecting myself. Haha!

If it is possible, I would like to travel to the past and face to face with me from then.
I would like to ask
"Do you like the way I am now?"
"Do you feel like want to punch me in the face?"
"Is the kind of people I'm hanging out with right now looks right to you?"
"Do you like my attire?"
"What do you think about my hair? Nah, I don't think you care, but yah... what do you think?"
"Do you think my dedication towards Islamic teaching is enough?"
"Do you think I spend too much on entertainment?"
"From your point of view, am I keeping good relation with my family? Or do I seems to be too far distanced?"

This is the me who I want to meet.

There is a bunch of stuff that I would like to discuss with him if I have the chance.

*butterfly effect*
And one thing, if there is one advice that I will give him for his new world line... I will say...
"Always love your family. Don't be afraid to depend on your family. They have been very helpful to me in my time of need, and they will also be helpful to you".


Hahah. look at me. ranting about myself. T_T
OK back to the damn endless assignments!

(p/s: The first ever picture of me from pre-secondary school ever posted on internet. Woot! Woot!)

Another day of winter: Looking for the ideal state of myself

Recently, whenever I am up to a certain task, I always wonder how good can I pull it off. No matter, homework, assignments, group tasks, etc. Sometimes I am unsure. Sometimes I feel not motivated enough. Sometimes I feel not being at my best state to do it.
It results in me not giving the best dedication that I should have given for the task.

From my point of view, the world is getting to look like those old pictures in sephia. Dull.
VERY DULL. I begin to question the purpose of everything that I do.

Why am I here. What am I doing. What I should do next. Why I should do it.

And yes, I am living within the community of engineering students, lecturers, and workers. Until now, I still wonder what are their sources of motivation whenever they are working on something. Is it money? Happiness? Why are they doing the thing that they do? Where is the source of their motivation and curiosity?

Every night before I sleep, I usually feel frustrated thinking of my lack of enthusiasm for the day. I don't know. There isn't much feeling of enjoyment in completing my assignments anymore. Not as much as it used to be.
I wonder if this means that I am bored?

Right now, out of 6 subjects that I am taking, there is only 2 that I can relate to my interest. The rest are SHIT that I have to make sure I know so that I am up to par with other people. I am not sure what others are thinking about this, but personally I think this is forced learning, and I do not enjoy it. And this is only the third year of university. God knows what I will deal with in the fourth year, wallahualam. I hope there will be something that I am interested in.

Well, *sigh*. Motivation. Motivation. Come to meeeee!!!

Terrible social network

I don't know about you guys, but I think my facebook page has become another 9gag page. -.-
Full of memes.

In fact, it is worse. Not only it collects memes from 9gag, but also dozens other gag community. I believe the situation has come to a point where I feel disgusted of my facebook page.

I am thinking, how can I unsubscribe from these pages, while still get up to date on latest trends?
How? How?

Building my first modern rig.

1)      I have been planning to assemble myself a powerful desktop. Only recently, I found the chance to do so. So, 2 weeks ago, I went online and investigate a desktop setup that can be considered a beast, yet affordable.
After 3 days of sleepless nights identifying the best combination of hardwares, I finally made my purchase at newegg.

2)      ...ジャジャン！！ A week later, these came to my door. =D 5 boxes in total. 1 contains a monitor and 1 contains the tower casing. But I don't really care about those two.

It is the other 3 that I have been waiting for.
Upon unboxing, I get these: MORE BOXES!! but definitely more colourful.

Highlights: *drumrollllll*

CPU: Intel i5 2500K
(CPU type: LGA 1155)

GPU: XFX HD Radeon 6870 CrossFireX ready.

SSD: Crucial M4 64GB (SATAIII)

and the rest,
Motherboard: ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 (for LGA1155)
Heatsink: Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus (supports LGA 1155)
Hard disk: Hitachi Desktar 1TB (SATAIII)
RAM: G.Skill 4GBx2 DDR3 1600
PSU: PC Power and Cooling Silencer MK III 500W
Optic Drive: Asus DVD Burner (SATA)
Keyboard/Mouse: Logitech MK120 Bundle

As for the OS, we installed 64bit Windows 7 Professional with free key provided by the University service (thanks to Ammar for the heads up, I wonder why I didn't get any email about that).

3)      Assembling the desktop takes about 8 hours of menpower from me and my housemates (thanks to Ammar again, Hafiz, Cimi, and the occasional words of encouragement from the others XD).
The final result is....
SATISFYING =D.

4)     A few things that catch my attention:
-My new desktop can boot up in under 30 seconds. Woot2! Well, without any antivirus though. I wonder how well will it do if I install one.
-In the Windows 7 Windows Experience Index, the slowest component is the CPU and RAM with rating of 7.5. I was expecting the hard disk to be the slowest, but the opposite happened, the hard disk maxed to 7.9. o.O..... is this the power of SSD?
-The desktop is surprisingly quiet, even with 2 chassis fan, 1 CPU fan, 2 GPU fan, and 1 PSU fan. Two friends of mine who went to my room after the assembly thought that I connect the big monitor to my laptop instead, and didn't realize a big desktop house is there.

5)     The verdict. This purchase is satisfying. I believe the specs could last for at least another 3 years before the rig become less-supported. The only thing that I have to think now is... how to ship it to Malaysia later. -.-" I can only think of contenna courrier for now. Well, I'll save that thought for later =D.

My newly renovated workstation. Really, I plan to work with it, no kidding.

p/s: I actually made a mistake in choosing the PSU because 500W is not enough to do multi-GPU (aka AMD CrossFireX or nVidia SLi). Heh, typical kind of mistake if you only have yourself to consult with. As the result of this, I will have to buy a new PSU if I want to do CrossFireX in the future.

In the meantime however, a run through Skyrim and Assassins Creed Brotherhood in High Setting 1080p prove that I may not even need it. They are able to maintain steady rate of frame per second between 50 to 60 with not very common drop to 40 fps. Meh, I guess I can live with that.

Another day of winter: First day of class

Now it is 6.25am in the morning.
I suppose to wake up at 7am, but somehow I slept too early yesterday, and end up waking up a couple of hours ago -.-".

I will have the first class of the term at 8am, Math 300. Math in the morning, isn't that great? Fwa ha ha ha ha.
I hope that this term will be even better than the last.

Okay, I want to take a 30 minutes nap.

zZZZ

Another day of winter: New Year 2012

^^. Happy New Year 2012 everyone.

     For most part of the world, the day is already in 2012. This day marks the next revolution of earth orbiting the sun. Some say that it is insignificant, while some say that it is important. I say that today is a rare enough event for everyone to notice.

     Just like every other new years, I've been thinking on what shall be my resolution for the next 365 days.
But WAIT. Before that... what happened to 2011's resolutions??
-.-" While I didn't put it into words on this blog, I believe it was something about... getting better grades in my academic terms. Well, thanks Nizam of 2011. I guess you did a good job. One thing that I succeed was I was finally able to have good sleep the night before exams. No more being an all-nighters. ^^

     So, now, it is MY TURN, Nizam of 2012. What kind of paths shall I face for the next 12 months? What choices shall build up dilemmas for the next 12 months? What are the things that I could do the best as a 22 years old teen for the next 12 months? What level of misery that I can expect for the next 12 months? What can I do today that may help me for the next 12 months?

     I think last year, I was a little bit misbehaved. There's a lot of area I could have improved on, particularly in performing daily prayers. Then, while my time management showed some improvement, I still depend a lot on last minute pressure to finish the job. Whereas for daily consumption, I concluded that coffee & coke is bad for exams. MILO is by far the best!

     Therefore, I believe what I need for next year is to practice one-time-FOCUS aka giving dedications. FOCUS when I am studying. FOCUS when doing prayers. FOCUS when playing games. FOCUS when doing team projects. FOCUS when I am cooking. FOCUS in doing assignments. This is my resolution for 2012. I believe everyone would agree that 'focus' is a word with many good connotations.

=D

p/s: I bought a desktop!! ^^

Another day of autumn: It's cold!!!

The temperature is getting crueler. I can feel challenging days ahead of me.

The number of shirts that are comfortable for me to use has been drastically reduced by 50%.

My nose and ears start to feel numb within 1 minute each time I go outside.

Yeap, winter is coming.

I need the HEAT!

Ya Allah, please assist me so that I continue to have the willpower to get through the semester with my best.

Another day of autumn: No skip class... yet ^^

I'm proud to announce that I haven't skipped any class yet for the semester.

(No oversleep etc, a problem since my first year)

This is only a personal achievement. I'm not saying that skipping class is totally disastrous. In fact, most people in my class sometimes HAVE to skip certain class to attend job interviews. Every morning I can see a couple of people smartly wearing coat in class, trying to look professional.

Even the instructor mentioned that every student is responsible to cover the material discussed in class themselves. So, basically, most of the effort is done by the students. Attending class would be just more helpful and it avoids the frustration of tracing back in-class notes from peers.

Yeah, so I hope this routine will be retained for the rest of the semester.
i.e.
EVERYDAY, WAKE UP SOMEWHERE BETWEEN 7-7:30AM, AND REACH CLASS BEFORE 8AM.

My new friend. lol

Another day of autumn: In-between assignment blog post

To be more precise, "blog post in between assignment breaks". haha.

First, it feels good to be home. Fifth home to be exact. -__-"

Secondly, I would like to wish a big appreciation and thank you to my family because they convinced me as always that "there is no place like home". << this home refers to the one we are currently staying in Kuching.
Lol, I doubt any of my family members knows my blog, haha.


Thirdly... I enjoyed my spring/summer break so much. ^^ Thank you guys.

Here's a sneakpeak of me in front PC. Haha.

This is me as I write this. LoL!

Haha. Okay. Back to my assignment!

Another cloudy day: Got an Int. Driving License!

With 3-4 days towards Eid Fitr, everyone seems to be rushing like there's no tomorrow.

Today I supposed to help my parent looking for stuff to decorate my house with, but I took the day off. Anyway, no one's at home when I woke up, so I feel lonely, hence I thought about updating my blog. Haha.

Okay. So What happened recently?

Yesterday,... I went to JPJ to get my international license.

There were not many people at JPJ yesterday.

It didn't took long before it was my turn. I guess people are busy preparing for raya instead huh.

And soon after that, I get my own International Driving License! Yeaaaayyyy!!

The driving license, full with stamps and signatures

The sad part is it costs RM150.
Additionally, since my normal driving license is also expiring, they need to renew it first, adding rm30 to the total.
So, there, RM180 flew.


To be honest, I have little interest to drive oversea. I just want to be able to drive legally when I am needed to.
Of course, I do want to try driving from the left seat, but that's all it gets. No more than that. Haha.

p/s: Hrmmm...  I think I saw a picture of Canadian friend with a Lamborghini on facebook the other day.. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm. **drool**

Another cloudy day - Mental preparation

It has been 3 months since spring summer holiday started.

At first, I was worried that I will waste the long holiday with useless activities. However, alhamdulillah, at home, I can always find the needs of doing some meaningful stuff. So far, yeap, I am satisfied.  Not to mention that I can unleash my driving powaaa!!

As a side note, automatic trans. > manual trans. I want to enjoy the ride, not the sound of my engine -_-.

It appears that the last month of holiday will coincide with the month of Ramadhan. I am wishing that the month will help me further in preparing me for another 2 years of journey oversea. To be specific, I need to ensure that I am secured physically, and mentally.

Physically as in health obviously, and mentally as in to have the will-power to keep working. Insyaallah.

As for my dilemma of whether I should celebrate Eid Fitr here in Kuching, yes, I think I would. Thanks to those who put weight on that decision.


So... yeah, later.

(p/s: I am currently playing Steins;Gate visual novel for PC. It is in Japanese language, but I manage to find an active translator(ITH, Atlas, TA) to help me translate while reading. Anyone has any info on it, or is interested can drop me a message =D)

Thoughts - Influence

Last few weeks, my sister uttered something like this during our conversation about our viewpoint to everyone around us.
"The only thing I cared for is my own belief on matters"
and I replied something like this,
"Good, that is a strong and important statement that will help you..."

Of course, being not-in-a-tv-or-movie this conversation was, a moments later I regret and wished that I would have said something potentially more beautiful .. like

"It is good that you are able to think like that. Only strong people can say those. However, for now just keep it. Be a good girl and listen to your parents. The time will come in the future where you will be in trouble and at that moment, that hold will help you."

Oh well... I hope they will eventually grow up eventually as fine ladies. Haha. No really I'm serious.

--------------

From my point of view, I am actually glad I manage to be a person that they can feel comfortable to talk with, and they actually are willing to share seriously about their life how they see it (aside from complaining about how bad they hate maths in school -__-").

...and that is like a DREAM COME TRUE for me.


One of the reasons is being able to share.

Like I said to my friends the other days, I think the best satisfaction is when you can deliver your experience and knowledge to other people, esp. the next generation, and see them grow up along with your passed thoughts.

Another cloudy day - mood swing

Today I wake up finding myself alone at home, without tv, food, water , and bright sunshine.

Well, of course I could turn on the tv if I want to, or.. I could go to the kitchen to eat stuffs, or I can just go outside to enjoy the view.

But I think I like it inside the house. It feels soo quiet that I can recognize all sources of sound wave that reached my ears. At least that's what I thought.
Maybe I should've mentioned that I live in a moderately busy town, Matang Jaya.

Combining the 2 factors above, results in a magnificent observation of my surrounding.

I can somehow feel a stressed woman driving a car on nearby road heading to school getting her child.
I can somehow feel a satisfied mechanic downstair who managed to start the engine of his client.
I can somehow feel how birds can chirp all-out with every person nearby ignoring them.
I can somehow feel a truck owner finally reached his destination, then looking for his customer.
And many more.

-------------------------

It is not in my interest to talk about something out of the blue. Here is my reason.
A while back, I talked about how similar life is to RPG, and how everyone other than me is no different than NPCs.
Well, I must admit though, these 'NPCs' are amazing. They accomplish their own work. They work independently or dependently with other 'NPCs'.

Unlike NPCs in RPGs, there is one special attribute in the people around me.
They live their life like me. A dynamic life, full of objectives and emotions.


Hrmm... so I don't know how to end this post.
I just hope that they all do the very best in their life, and for specific case, as a community that lives in Malaysia, will continue to help each other. ^^

Another day of spring: Home sweet home, Sarawak.

Apparently I skipped a month this time. Oh well.

Okay so here is a summary of what happened since my last post.
- Finished final exam.
- Went to Malaysian Student Association dinner.
- Group photos with everyone especially graduated students.

- Took a hellish 2 days flight from Edmonton to KL.
- Went out to Low Yatt to update myself.
- Went to Negeri Sembilan
- Visit relative's friend's Kenduri Kahwin.

- Took an hour and half flight from KL to Kuching.
- Claim my delayed baggage.
- Bought some presents for my lil sisters to help them study.
- Redesigned the interior of my house to make it looks neater. LoLx
- Went to Kyan!me event at Kuching and met my fellow batch schoolmate who cosplayed!!!


and now... here I am thinking of what should be done in the next 3 months for the time I have left in Sarawak.

Another day of winter: A week prior to Final Exam.

Good morning!! Wow. Dust is everywhere!

Cough*

There is only one more week before the my first final exam paper, and three weeks before the last.
BIG QUESTION, looping in my mind right now is this; what can I do to make this 'one week before exam' different from the 'one week before exam' that I've had countless times before?

Study harder? I've done that... even though it is speculate-able of how much 'harder' I've been through for the past years.

Study on the very last minute? I've done that too. The worse to date is to start revision 30 minutes before my paper -.-. (Don't try this at home, kids)

Partying in MMORPG the night before exam? I could be proud of this easily.



Of course, another question that leads to the previous question is; why do I want something different now?
Simple, yet meaningful question.

There is only 1 extreme of outcome that people like to have in their exams, that is the highest mark possible.
That's where the problem lies. For the last centuries, (lol) my marks has been.... what you may call... average, expected, foreseen, even before you registered for the course.

There is no problem with that really. Like a buoy at the ocean. Under state of equilibrium, the buoy must be floating on top of the water, and be at the lowest altitude in the atmosphere. That is to be expected.

What I am thinking right now is... analogicaly... if I am able to create some sort of seawave, or wind turbulent, or any anomalies that can disrupt that equilibrium, hence lifting the buoy into the air. Yeah!!

Within this 1 week, what can I do? Hrmm.

[p/s: I sent my camcorder back for manufacturer warranty repair last Wednesday. This is the first time I do such thing. It was exciting to learn how that is done ^^. I hope they correct the problem before I get back to Malaysia. If it does, I'll finish the Boom de Yada project in Malaysia insyaallah. Yea!]
[p/s/s: Winter is closing it's curtain. Can't wait to start posting with 'Another day of Spring' as the title. =)]

Another day of winter: Reading week

This week is holiday for the university. It is called the Reading Week; which I believe intended to allow students to prepare for their oncoming midterm exams.
In my case, I had 2 of my midterms before the reading week. They were so-so. Will the reading week help me in the remaining 3 midterms? I hope it will. In fact, I'm counting on this week to keep up with my studies.

My main target however is only one; Sleep. I must replenish my sleep hours which has depreciate much for the past 5 weeks.
I also want to revise the way I do my assignments, reports etc so that it could be done earlier and I could have a good sleep hours.

I probably have posted about sleep hours many times in this blog. Haha. That is probably one thing that I am still struggling to manage.


I guess that's all. This Wednesday I'm going to join my friends for a trip to Calgary... about 600 km to the south. I hope it will be a comfortable trip. lol.

[p/s: I think starting my post title with series name sounds more manageable. Like 'Another day of' series is for post about life and so on. I'll come up with others as I post about them]

Happy New Year 2011

Today, January 6th is my birthday according to Solar Calendar. It also marks the beginning of 2011.

Last year, I made the resolution of getting A's and finish a diary. The path of getting all A's was harsh to me so I didn't get it, but I did try my best. Diary? Heh, I got a better picture diary. =D. It's cooler.
My Hatachi project is still ongoing with a little bit of additions.
As I grow up, I find keeping resolutions are very useful especially if you got it written somewhere. It probably works just like writing the 'Objective' section in your experiment report. It helps me to keeping track of what I want to do 'in overall'.

Daily life is full with infinite of sub-objectives. It varies from large event of going to supermarket to buy food to very small event of hitting the space bar on the keyboard. Who knows the number of events you have done in one night. They are all relative and depends on what can be considered an obvious events with cause and effect.

In between those events are choices. "What letter should I press next". "Which transport should I use to get home". Etc. These are the one that is affected by the larger objectives you have beforehand, which could be, "Typing my name" or "To get home as fast as I can".


Extend it a little bit more, you can see where the yearly resolution can come into play.Having yearly resolutions is not a must, but a indeed good addition to your life.


---------------------------------


So I made my own cake on my own birthday. Of course, I don't expect anyone to make one for me. So, rather than I have a dull night, might be good to have a homemade cake to eat aye? Haha.
Cheesecake! =D


So, I believe another resolution should take place. Unfortunately, I feel uneasy with the exam I just went through. And I can't define my course of action completely without knowing what will happen in the near future. Therefore, I will postpone the new year resolution till next month that is when everything should be settled. Will update this post again. =D Ganbaru!

p/s: Miss my p/s section T_T.
p/s2: Will probably continue to blog this year. I've collected quite a lot of skillz and it is a waste not to share. Hahax.
p/s3: Should I buy a ps3?

Back!

Hello blogger. It has been a while since my last post.
What happened was I was trying to focus more on my studies. I eliminated a few online activities and ended up including blogging as well.

Fall 2010 term has passed. There are a total of 5 more terms to go. The next one, Winter 2011, will start just next week. I'm not sure if I did well or not. I hope I did. Relatively I have put more work in my studies throughout the term.
Homeworks never fail to be sux, but promising to aid understanding as always.
The best part is surely working with foreign student(or me as foreign student working with local students you could say ;D) in group projects and labs. In Mec E we have been taught to expect different type of people in a group and ways to work with them. I must say, it works! The idea of group as a separate entity than the individuals who make up the group is very interesting. You could have the person you hate the most in the group, but still be an efficient group. Might post up something on that later.

However, I doubt the final exams did me much good. One of the courses, statics should be the subject I'm ace on but the its exam was consecutively held after another exam. It was really tiring, so I don't think I gave my best on that. :(
The reexamination procedure on Academic Calendar doesn't seems to allow my conditions though. I guess I will have to check it out with the people in charge in person.

I believe these are BIG hints that Mara will contact me again soon =_=.
Ya Allah please help me go through this with peace.

Right now I'm thinking the course of action I should take. The nonconsecutive classes is good, however the cons is there as well. Yeap! The 8am is an obvious obstacle especially during Winter months. My inspiration right now: comparing to the people, lecturers, and a few local friends who have to wake up at 5am and commute a longer distance than I do, I am an absolute jerk to complain. Haha.

That's all about school I guess.

Then,.... continued in next post with different title. =D

Preparing for fall 2010.

As sweet and bitter moment of first year slowly fading away, here comes second year which never break it's promise to bring challenge to students. (At least that is what I heard, lol)

Alhamdulillah I was admitted into Mechanical Engineering at my U. With the holiday also coming to an end, I should as well come up with a new resolution for the next Fall/Winter duration. 

That being said, I hereby am going to work harder for next two term and aim for get three point six GPA. Insyaallah.

I do pay some concern to expectation from MARA, my parent and people around me, but I think it is myself that I have to start dealing with. My spring studies proves it. The only choices that I should allow myself are improve, improve, and improve. No maintains are allowed as my maintain=get worse. Well, thank god I do want to improve.

So, right now I am busy arranging my class schedule. What I've learned from the past is... me and consecutive classes definitely do not get along. So, be it, even if my classes start at 8, I don't mind, as long as no class run one after another. I find short breaks are very valuable assets now.

Then, there are about one and a half months left for holiday. My housemates are planning to go for another camping trip it seems. Me on the other hands... , probably going to take my TM700 for a walk around Edmonton. I'm still figuring out the best way to preserve the quality of 1080p60 video it produces.

K, off I go. =)

[p/s: I was surprised to see there is a course dedicated to bust myth. Maybe I'll check it out during the fourth year. The course name indeed looks interesting for an elective course. Hahah.]

[p/s: I suddenly fall in love with this post style after I view it. It looks easy to read. I'll try to adopt it in all post after this.]