Omran going to Mekah

My nephew, Omran Zakaria and his wife Faridah Hanim Saibon are going to Mekah for this session 0f the Hajj from 1-30 Nov 2010. There will be a Doa Selamat at his house in Bandar Seri Damansara this Sunday 24 Oct from 11:00 hrs followed by lunch. Fatimah (Adik) and husband Halim will also be going. Selamat pergi dan selamat balik; semoga dilorongkan Allah untuk mendapat Haji Mabrur.

Ein Passed Away

My brother-in-Law, Rahim Hamid 70, Ham's brother passed away at 11:30 pm on Tuesday 14 Sep, 2010. He is survived by his wife Nor and 7 children. Ein had a stroke on 12 Sep while on a Raya visit to his sister-in-law's house at Teluk Intan. He fell into a coma on the chair he was sitting on while enjoying hidangan raya. He was taken to Teluk Intan Hospital and was treated at Intensive Care for 2 days but did not come out of the coma. So on 14 Sep evening the doctor advised that there was not much hope and he could be taken back to his home at Tanjung Rambutan. He was buried at the Muslim cemetery at Tambun near his father's grave. Alfatihah.

Open House

It rained quite heavily the night before but stopped around 7:00 am in the morning. The weather was thus quite balmy and cool. After Eid prayers it was better and was just fine throughout the day. So it was a wonderful Raya and our annual "Open House" went off very well. The usual relatives and friends turned up including some long lost ones. Pity half of my brood were not around. Sabrina, Zaki's wife was not there either; she was in Montreal attending the World Energy Exhibition 2010. However, my Rotary friends turned up in good numbers and an old family friend from Singapore also turned up driving all way up and back. The books that I wrote about my overland travels were of great interest to everybody and I was ever so pleased. It became a talking point; but to me it was a truly satisfying effort for a retired guy who needed to keep his brain working.

Best Part of Raya

For me, the best part of Raya is the family breakfast after the Eidil Fitri prayers. Every year since I retired, I made it point to have both my wives and our children over to my Taman Perwira house for the breakfast of lemang, rendang, ketupat, laksa and other raya goodies. It's nice to see the children kissing our hands minta ampun dan maaf to the three of us in anticipation of the duit raya. We reciprocated them with tender kisses on the cheeks and the duit raya of course. Now they are grown up and some have gone to study or work and live overseas. But we never forget them; rather we missed them more than ever. It is sad that of late we have not been able to really have a family reunion at Hari Raya. In fact I wonder when it'll be just us...

Selamat Hari Raya

It's raya tomorrow. I miss my children who are not with us: Ida in London, Nani in Dubai and Faritz in Melbourne. Anyway, that's something every senior citizen has to accept, I suppose. The girls have left the nest and are on their own. But Faritz will come back soon after he graduates this year, I think.
Anyway to my relatives and friends who happened to view this blog, Selamat Hari Raya, Maaf Zahir Batin to you all.

I have written 5 books

Yes, now that I am fully retired, I have to fill my time with something useful. Besides reading I have also decided to write. What better way than to document my travels in a hard copy coffee-table version that most people enjoy browsing, and reading if they have the time. The books I have written are about my overland travels in a convoy of 4x4 vehicles: the first one being the "KL-London Rallyton" in 2005. Then in 2007 I did the Istanbul-Tehran trip as part of the 50th Anniversary Merdeka drive from London to KL; and in 2008 I did two trips -- one to Africa (Cape Town - Mombassa through 5 game parks and 7 countries) in January and another one to South America (Cuzco-Lima-Caracas-Cartegena through 4 countries) in December. I've also written a special "Mothers' Day with Love" dedicated to Mama & Bonda, my two loving wives. Some good stuff in it for the children to be aware of.

One more book is in the works documenting my experience in canal-living on the canals of Nottingham. I am also writing my Memoir, an autobiography that will document my life and times. A draft print has been done, but I need to revise it to a 200 page version (at least) because I have left out in the draft quite a lot of juicy stuff to keep the coffee-table book at 100 pages. This 200-page version will have more words.

I am 71 today

22 July 2010, my 71st birthday. No big deal, no dinners or birthday bash. My Rotary club did send me a card and sang "Happy Birthday" when I came for the weekly meeting on Monday 19 July. And today "My Memoir" also came from the Printers; 2 copies only, one for Ham and one for Mek. Letchme, my former PA from MABANUD days 1980 to MPAT days 1994 and my retirement days until now never failed to remember my birthday. This morning I received her SMS on it. All my sons wished me "Happy Birthday". Likewise Nani text me from Dubai. Only Ida is yet to call or text me. As we age we get quite sentimental. Small things like this mean a lot.

Normah got a cucu

On 17/12/2009, my niece Normah Ibrahim got a cucu. The baby girl was born in Kulim and weighed 3.65kg at birth. Her name is Raaesya Zahra, first daughter to Ku Marsilla and Raa Khimi (the father). It looks like that all my nieces and nephews from both sides, have cucus already. I am glad and envious. I am now going on 71, have six children, but not a single cucu. Both my girls are living and working overseas but not married. My four boys are still young for marriage, except Zaki who married last August 2009. Sometimes I feel embarrassed when attending my colleagues' childrens' wedding and the normal question asked, is "how many cucu do you have?" Hopefully, Zaki won't let me down.

I am from Segamat

My father, Ayob bin Abd Rahman was from Kg Gemereh, Segamat. But his father and ancestors were from Serkam, Melaka; as refugees from Aceh, being chased out by the Dutch then. They must have been some kind of freedom fighters, I think. But my father, after his travels to Pattani to seek religious education, came back to Segamat and settled in Kg Bumbun in the early 1900s and worked on the jungle land alienated to him by the Govt then. He was also the local Imam. He married my mother on 28 May 1918, and had his first daughter, Ramlah in July 1923. Then my sister Zainab came in 1927, followed by brother Ismail in 1928. I was born on 22 July 1939.
My father died on 24 Mar 1975 and was buried in Kg Lubuk Batu, in the same cemetery as Bendahara Tepok, the "founder" of Segamat way back in 1511. The site of Bendahara Tepok's landing is by the river now known as Sungai Segamat. There is a mosque there now and the cemetery is opposite the mosque. The cemetery is well kept, probably because of its historical significance.

King Ghaz

I was in the MAAU as Chairman of Disciplinary Committee when King Ghaz (Tan Sri Ghazali Shafie) was the president. I liked working for him. He acknowledged my recommendations to ban a couple of athletes for six months for disobeying their trainer's instruction not to go out of the Training Camp, because they were preparing for the SEA Games in 1972. But he used his prerogative and gave them a suspended sentence instead, so that they could still participate in the SEA Games. King Ghaz died recently on 24 Jan 2010 at the age of 88. Alfatihah.

Faritz had an accident

Faritz had an accident yesterday (Sun 21 Feb 2010 about 6:00 pm). It happened at the T-junction of Jalan 14 and Jalan 1 Taman TAR. It was drizzling after a heavy downpour earlier. He was turning right when a Korean lady in a Honda CRV came from the right and slammed into his driver door and hit his right front wheel area, causing his car to twist left and almost hit a tree. The Honda then careened into the big drain on the right of the footpath. Both were unhurt. Thank God. Police report made today morning at the Ampang Traffic Police station.