Month of Ramadhan

11 August 2010
Today is the Ist day of the month of Ramadhan Al-Mubarak. All Muslims are required to abstain themselves from eating and drinking from dawn till sunset. It is also a time for inner reflection, devotion to God and self control. The month of Ramadhan is an opportunity to gain by giving up, to prosper by giving and to grow stronger by enduring weakness. As a secondary goal, fasting is a way of experiencing hunger and developing sympathy for the less fortunate, and learning to thankfullness and appreciation for all of God's bounties. Fasting is also beneficial to the health and provides a break in the cycle of rigid habits or overindulgence.
Medical doctors would advise his patients to fast for specific reasons. Fasting is another way to detox the body.
Find out more at http://www.submission.org/

Goodbye London!

29 June 2010
Today is a very sad day for me because we are again leaving our son in London. After the mini heatwave hitting London over the weekend, there is rain and the day is cloudy, just as if the day is sympathising with my feelings and emotions for the moment. He has just registered himself as a post graduate student for the Chartered Institute of Marketing(CIM), at Herftferdshire University which he will do on a part time basis while working part time as well. He must be good at juggling these two things in his life right now. The newly announced decision by the new British government to put a cap on immigrant labour from non-EU countries is a big blow for new graduates like him in the UK. However, Great Britain needs new people to enrich the labour market now that the Government is increasing the pension age to a ripe 70 years old.
Nevertheless, deep in my heart, I know he can make it there reasonably well, insyAllah...Semoga Allah murahkan rezeki Ammar di London.

Scottish Highlands

27 June 2010ows
On the 2nd day, we drove up to Glasgow and Edinburgh, seeing more grazing land with sheep, cows and horses in the meadows, lazying themselves in the hot summer sun. Glasgow is not a tourist city, we found out later, even though the tourist brochures say so. There is the Buchanan Street, a pedestrian walk lined with some shopping outlets and the George Square, where we saw the statue of Sir James Watt, the one who discovered the steam engine (pardon me, if  I am wrong). So we moved on to Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland. Here, life is more vibrant, looking at the city centre, the Princes Square and the shopping malls. Of course, everybody is enjoying the sun, on the streets and in the park. At some street corners, you can hear the beautiful melodic sounds of the Scottish bagpipes. Edinburgh is famous for its castles, namely the Edinburgh Castle and the Balmoral Castle(Scottish home to the Royal Family), perched strategically on the hill tops.

PSSS...The Istana Negara is now being built somewhere in Damansara Heights(?). Hopefully, DBKL does a good job of this project in line with the majesticity that the King's Palace will command to tourists visiting Malaysia.

Scottish Highlands

26 and 27 June 2010
We are off to Scotland these 2 days. Travelling on the motorway M6 towards the North along the country side was a wonderful experience for all of us. England is having a hot summer right now, with temperatures rising 20's to 30's centigrade.
Basically, England is an agricultural country, with a vast expanse of productive grazing land. Despite the Indusrial Revolution, agriculture is still the main stay of her economy.
We stayed at a B and B hotel, the Ravenshill House Hotel owned by Sheila, the owner-cum-manager. It is a beautiful country house converted into a B and B hotel facility.We had a sumptious dinner - roasted beef and of course haddock - all agricultural products from the nearby farms!
Actually, we were quite surprised that on the menu, there was this item Malaysian chicken served with savoury rice. We found out later that Sheila met a Malaysian chef on one of her holiday trips on a ship and they exchanged recipes then. As Anthony Bourdain, the celebrity chef, once said in Asian Food Channel over ASTRO, food is an international language. Very true indeed!
Psss. Actually, I have often dreamed of providing a B and B facility for the tourists coming to Shah Alam, the capital city of Selangor. However, I have reservations going into this venture because tourism is not the core industry in the state of Selangor, not for the next 10 years or so....

English Summer

24-25 June 2010

The past two days in London are sunny and bright - summer is already here even though in June. People are donning their colorful summer clothes and the parks are full of children playing in the sun. People are seen sipping their afternoon tea at the sidewalk cafes. Flowers are blooming. Everybody is enjoying the sun. In fact, the weather forecast said that this weekend is going to experience a mini heatwave with temperatures soaring from 20's to 30's. 

24 June 2010
Recycling has been a big issue in Gt Britain. All sorts of advertisements by corporate bodies are all over the place, on buses, in the tubes, all promoting the mission of going green. We were at Pret-a-Manger a few times to take a bite or two and I noticed that even the napkins also carry the green message. "This napkin is made from 100% recycled stock (Pret's environment department is militant, we're makng headway). If Pret staff get all serviette-ish and hand you huge bunches of napkins (which you don't need or want) please give them the evil eye. Waste not want not."
Quality too is their goal - their food labels carry the following message "Made today. Gone today. No 'sell-by' date, no nightlife.
These are little observations I made which can be practised by our local Malaysian food vendors. They should serve with the customers in mind - their serviettes are at the counter top at the cashier and we can get to use them only upon request.
NB: PUSPANITA organised a Recycling Seminar towards the Green Mission on 23 June, with the main objective of developing compost fertilizer from domestic waste. Hopefully it is a successful seminar and the ladies will benefit from this new knowledge of recycling waste within their household environment. http://www.puspanita.org.my/

Psss. Our Malaysian palm oil industry has always been practising this green mission towards Zero Waste. Every part of the palm  and their process is being studied to produce palm-based products and services with R&D and innovation. http://www.mpob.gov.my/

21 June 2010

Harrods sale is on now since 19 June. So we had a peep at the Big Sale. As usual, the branded goods are going for 40-50% discount. However, after the conversion to our Malaysian Ringgit, the prices are still too steep to own a branded bag. A Vaentino bag would cost GBP999, a Louis Vuitton is also in the same range.  The Harrods Department Store has been bought over from Al-Fayed. Hence, with the new management taking over, the Memorial for the late Princess Diana and Dodi might not be there anymore. But the Harrods mascot will definitely remain forever!.
Later in the evening, we went to the Charcoal Kebab House at WoodGreen. To me, they serve the best kebab in London. The food is delicious, the serving is big and the price is reasonable at only GBP4.50 per plate. I am pretty sure they use either oilve oil or sunflowerseed oil as salad oil in their cooking. I wonder when these restaurants will use our palm oil, maybe never at all because Malaysia is not promoting enough usage of palm oil as salad oil.
While there, we met a family friend from Shah Alam who is doing her Masters at Middlesex Uni, where my son graduated last July 2010. A very small world indeed!