Being Azury

My parents in-law

Today I feel like introducing my parents in-law to everybody in the world. I don’t know why, probably because I just met them yesterday and it reminded me of how lucky I am to have them in my life… but seriously, they’re just amazing. It’s a privilege knowing them. 

My father in-law a.k.a Ayah is an army retiree, now working as a driving school instructor. He’s the most loving man I ever known… he’s so caring, charming, humble, down to earth and soft spoken. Kind of reminded me of my own father. Dan ayah juga sangat2 ringan tulang. Tengahari dia balik rumah, tak hilang penat lagi sebab baru lepas ajar org drive lori tengah panas, terus masuk dapur tolong mak; kupas bawang, potong ayam, tolong masak; doing whatever he can to help. Padahal mak full time housewife, boleh je ayah nak lepak relax. Mak, you should know by now that you are one lucky woman! One more thing about ayah, when he’s around… hati ni rasa tenang je. Entah ilmu ape ayah amal. Nafis yang tengah nakal melasak2, bila ayah panggil terus dia pegi duduk atas riba ayah, diam, senyap! Never seen anybody else done that. I guess this is what they call… magic?

 

Mak pulak to me is like a true domestic goddess (Nigella, cry your heart out!). She cooks heaven, hubby balik kampung mesti makan bertambah2. But what can I say; she’s just an amazing cook, and she also sews and baby sits too. In my six years being her daughter in-law, I think the best thing was I never once feel like she’s judging me, despite all my flaws and never ending weaknesses, you know what I mean? I don’t have to pretend whenever she’s around because she just let me be myself. That means a lot, lagi2 masa mula2 kahwin dulu... segan siut dengan mak mertua! Mak is also a good listener, jadi tempatku mengadu… especially kalau bergaduh dengan hubby. But that’s in the first few years of marriage la, sekarang dah steady jarang dah call mak nangis2 ;p 

So, that’s about it. I know they will never be reading this but I hope they know how much I love them. I owe them for bringing my wonderful husband to this world, and also for becoming the parents I would be proud to call my own. Terima kasih mak, ayah :)

Nak Mommy!!

Haha! I got a funny story to tell. Last nite while watching TV, Nafis came to me and threw his body on my lap. He was kicking his legs in the air like a baby; merengek2 and I immediately knew that he was in the mood nak bermanja. I love when he’s behaving like that, hubby menyampah but I think it’s cute. Later he stood up, pulled my hands and said “Nafis nak mommy, Nafis nak mommy”. My heart melted, I really wanted  to hear more so I didn’t stand up and let him goes “Nafis nak mommy, Nafis nak mommy” over and over again. I even asked him “Taknak daddy ke?” and he said “Taknak, nak mommy!”. Hehe, I like that. When I sensed that he started crying, I stood up and followed him to the kitchen. I made him a bottle of milk but he refused to take it. “Nafis bukan nak susu. Nafis nak tu” while pointing on top of the fridge. I looked up and I saw… a few packets of Mamee. My son wanted Mamee, not Mommy!! What a fool I am! My sis in law even said “Patut la Lin tengok Kak Zury biar je Nafis mintak Mamee!”. And I foolishly thought that he wanted me!

Silly Mamee!! Found a matching picture some more!

Another obituary

April is now officially declared the month of grieve for the Kamaruddin’s family. Another tortoise passed away and this time, it was April. Ironic huh? Our in-house CSI, Miss Budar allegedly found April lifeless body lying upside down in her tank. She identified the cause of death as drowned. Poor April!
 
In another unrelated case, we dropped by at mom’s crib last nite. Went to visit the remaining tortoise but shocked to discover Forrest missing! Launched a massive search operation (exaggerated of course :p), only to find him hiding nearby next to mom’s food basket. Apparently he escaped by climbing on Jelly. What a smart little creature! Run Forrest... ruuuun!! :)

Cerita Orang Gaji

We hired Rahma, our Indonesian maid when she was just 18 yrs old. That was 2 years ago and she’s still with us today. I must say Rahma is a good helper; she basically carry out all the chores assigned, she’s patient, obedient, rarely create problems, and my children love her. 

Now, some people might say a maid is just a maid, but to me.. Rahma is already like a sister. Because this is the person who takes care of my children, does my laundry, cleans my house and sometimes does the cooking… basically looking after my whole family. So what’s the better way to compensate her other than money? Answer: We treat her the best that we can, like our own family. 

But unfortunately, nobody’s perfect in this world… and so does Rahma. Apparently she’s just a young woman. So really, what do I expect? 

Story 1: Today we brought her along to Sogo. Since she wanted to buy a pair of shoe, I suggested we go separate ways. A few hours later tengah jalan2 I saw her inside the karaoke ‘jamban’ (it’s a very tiny room equipped with a tv and karaoke set). At that time she was singing alone, obviously not aware of us standing behind. I thought we better not disturb, so we left. 

About 20 minutes later when we were about to leave, I went to get her but surprisingly this time I found her in the karaoke room next door… squeezing inside with two Indonesian men and a woman. The woman was sitting on one of the men’s lap, so I assumed that left Rahma pairing up with the other guy. I immediately asked her to leave. Later when I inquire who those guys were, she said they invited her to join them when her karaoke machine broke down. Sounded so innocent, but still…
 
Story 2: Last month, while I was at work, she rang me up to tell that her relative is coming over to meet her. Adik sedara she said. Later, I heard from a neighbour that her maid told her “Lelaki tu muka tua, adik apa. Macam boyfriend ada la”.  Malas nak percaya, but still… 

Story 3 : Around last year she went to Klang.. untuk berubat katanya. Biasa la org Indon ni percaya benda2 halus. When she came back, she told me her agent kat klang tu bawak dia jumpa tok bomoh untuk berurut. Tanya dia tok bomoh tu lelaki ke perempuan. Dia kata lelaki. Gulp!

Banyak lagi cerita tapi malas nak ingat.

You see… I always ask myself the same question; why do I get paranoid over this matter? I’m sure I don’t mind if she got boyfriends because to me, everybody has the right to make friends, or perhaps find love… and you can’t just deny that. But it just pisses me off whenever I find out that she’s hanging out with them. Why? Is it because I’m afraid she might get pregnant? Or is it because I’m afraid she might run away? Or bring them home? Or bergayut over the phone tak habis2? Gosh.. she's doing her job well but here I am, complaining to the world. All I want is for her to be happy working for me, but I don't think me being a control freak does any good at all. Sigh….

In loving memory of Nexus

I'm sad to announce the demise of our beloved pet tortoise, Nexus who passed away peacefully (I hope) two days ago. May his gentle soul rest in peace.

My condolences goes to his owner, Miss Aisya. Next time please don't ask again for anything alive as a birthday present. It's not cute anymore when this time around you shriek "My birthday present is dead". Alamak, nak tergelak pulak! Sorry, i know it's not funny.

Now… I just recalled the shop owner mentioning something about money back guarantee…

That’s Nexus on the right. Rest in peace dude.

Tortoisemania

(This post was written last nite)

Ok, I have a confession to make. It’s silly, it’s ridiculous and embarrassing… especially for a woman who’s turning 28 yrs old (yes that’s me!) but I desperately need to clear my head before I go to bed… so here goes. Remember the tortoises we bought for Aisya a couple of days ago? Well, previously I always thought that tortoise was the most boring animal in the world. They’re slow, they’re shy, they all look the same... so what’s really exciting about having them as a pet? In my mind I thought probably Aisya was trying to be cute, asking for tortoise as her birthday present so that she can shriek “I got tortoises for my birthday!!” to everybody she meets.
 
I was wrong. 

On the nite of Aisya’s birthday, I was introduced to each tortoise. I picked up April, put her on the floor and she just stayed there like a rock, her head and legs neatly tucked in her shell. Boring! So I picked another female tortoise, which at that time wasn’t named yet. As soon as I touched her she started getting restless, her head and legs are sticking out and when I placed her on the floor, I swear I never seen a tortoise walked that fast! She quickly got under my legs and climbed up my pants. Afraid that I might crush that little fella, I put her back in her aquarium and the moment her legs touched the water, she swam forward, climbed over a pile of rock, crossed the bridge and got back to the position where I first picked her up. Wasn’t that amazing? This is a tortoise we’re talking about! And I also realized that she always stays in the same spot, right between the aquarium wall and the plastic grass (That's her in the picture). So does Forrest, whom favourite hang out is under the bridge. 

The other male was named Nexus, after Nafis’s hero Ultraman Nexus. He’s the smallest one, he got the palest green and he’s also limped. Nexus only uses 3 legs because the left one in the front was stiffed and seem swollen compared to the other. At first I thought maybe we should return him back to the shop and get a new one. But all of us felt that it’s totally ‘inhuman’ and the right thing to do was to just accept him the way he was. Nexus truly breaks my heart… 

From left: Nexus, April & Forrest

That nite I was given the honour to name the nameless female tortoise. I came up with ‘Jellyfish-zip-zip-a-a-a’ (it’s our favourite tagline at the moment, long story!). So everybody agreed to call her Shelly.. or Jelly. Cute! 

So.. that’s about it. I’m declaring to the world that I now love tortoise! They amazed me with their intelligence and I’m also surprised to know that each of them got their own feature and characteristic, just like a little baby! I’m really looking forward to meet April, Forrest, Nexus and Shelly again because right now, I’m missing them already! Maybe I should get my own tortoise too… :)

Our picture

I’m soooooooooo in love! This picture was taken by Lieyha on Kak Azu’s engagement day. Lieyha, you’re simply brilliant and Kak Azu, thanks a million. See how Dania was caught red handed biting her nails, and Nafis pulling strands of her sister’s hair. And I can’t believe how much similar my lips are to Nafis!

I’m H A P P Y :)

SMS - Selalu Mesej Saja?

Lately I’ve been wondering why my hubby was not his usual self these past few days. He got home from work looking like a sour grape, moody and cranky all over. PMS ye bang? :p I’m sure something must be messing about with his mind but when asked, he just said dunno. So for a while, I sort of kept a distance from him, gave him some space and prayed hard that he’ll recover from this mystery madness… fast!!
 
So last weekend, I finally discovered the source of the problem when hubby showed me some of the sms he received from his boss and colleagues. For those who don’t know, my hubby is working for a company that maintains the north-south highway. And since they have hundreds of projects scattered along the peninsular, the company had set up a centralized messaging system; you send your message to the centre and everybody registered in the system will get the sms. I guess the purpose of the system was to ease communication between HQ and region, and to make sure everybody is regularly updated on the progress of works at all time.
 
But unfortunately, some people define ‘at all time’ as it is: All the Time! To make things worse, the boss was forcing everybody to reply to each of his sms. Since then, hubby’s phone has been beeping endlessly.. day and nite. Some of the replies to boss’s message are so pathetic because it’s written for the sake of nak jaga hati boss. Message from the boss pun I think a bit disturbing jugak, irrelevant and emotional sometimes. I understand if it's an urgent matter but if it's not, esoknya kan boleh cerita kat ofis? (Oh, btw... most people in the system are from the same office, hari2 jumpa. Duh??). Jadi mana la laki gua tak tension?

So Mr. Boss, if you happen to be reading this, first of all please don’t fire my husband because he has no share in this post. As a matter of fact, I don’t think he ever read this blog. Secondly, incase you don’t know, some people prefer to leave their work behind after office hour and look forward to spend the rest of the day with their family. This sms thing obviously isn’t helping at all. We do have a life you know, so please leave my hubby alone. You can have him back by 8.30am sharp! :p (except on weekends and public holidays of course!)
 
And to hubby, I want you to know that I love you no matter what. I believe you can handle with this problem. Take your time (tapi jgn lama sgt!), relax... take it easy (sing it like mika). And please smile more ok, tak larat i tengok muka moncong tu :p Fuhh.. I feel a lot better now. Chiow peeps.

Congrats Mom!

This morning my mom received her Pingat Kesatria Mangku Negara from the Agong @ Istana Melawati, Putrajaya. How cool is that? She just made me soooo proud. Bravo mommy!!

Beaming Ummi posing by the singgahsana, simply gorgeous in her kebaya :)

 

Pening kepala

This morning I woke up feeling very dizzy, so I sms my officemates telling them I’m gonna be in late. But unfortunately by noon the wooziness still won’t go away.. it literally drove me crazy! I lost myself and became this cranky grumpy headed monster. Nafis kena marah a few times because he hit his sister. In this state of mind, you better behave and don’t cari pasal dengan mama ok! But overall, today was not so bad after all because I got to spend time with my children. These pictures sum it all.

Portrait of Mama by Nurdania (thanks baby!)

 

Nafis trying to be a baby

 

Another baby, hehe :p Won't think the walker will be around by the time the 3rd baby arrives.

Happy Birthday Aisya!

My youngest sister turns 18 today.. not so young anymore. Hard to believe bcos she still looks and behaves like a school girl! For her birthday present, she specifically requested for a pair of tortoise (what??) and she already named them even before we agree buying it for her. The female tortoise was named April, obviously after the month of her birthday, and the male was named Forrest; so that she can cheer ‘Run Forrest run!’ every now and then. One funny girl, slightly undeveloped mentally.. ngehehe ;p 

Aisya dearest, wish you have a happy and smashing birthday! And hopefully April, Forrest and siblings (we bought two pairs just now, wonder what she's gonna name em?) won't be growing into a giant! Love you sis!!

Rest in peace Tok

My grandfather passed away last Friday morning at his house in Temerloh, Pahang at the age of 80 years old. Cause of death was described as sakit tua. My grandma said he passed away peacefully in his sleep. Semoga rohnya dicucuri rahmat, Al-Fatihah.

My Dania

Last week I met up Dania’s teacher to ask about Dania’s performance at school. She said overall Dania was doing well. She’s a bright girl and always got good grades. Although a bit shy, Dania mixes well with her friends. But one thing the teacher highlighted that worries me was her lack of focus. For example, I noticed she didn’t complete a few pages in her workbook and her teacher said that’s because Dania was either busy talking to her friends or doing other things. She easily got distracted and her teacher had to repeatedly remind her to complete her works. Well, I’m not surprise really because that’s my Dania I knew. She loves to take her own sweet time… relax wa cakap lu :p

This morning, as usual I have to ask her to speed up brushing her teeth, getting dressed up, get her school bag ready, etc. Bila pakaikan dia seluar, dia masuk kaki sebelah, mata dia tengok tv, kena kata “Dania pakai seluar” dua-tiga kali baru la angkat sebelah lagi kaki. Kalau tak tengok tv pun she’s either busy talking or doing her cute dancing or buat lawak :p Tapi bila dah banyak kali sangat cakap “Dania, cepat sket” over and over again, rase agak tension la jugak. So I decided I had to do something so I said “Dania, kita tak boleh la slow sangat. Kalau slow susah sebab nanti kita jadi orang paling last, paling lambat. Teacher kakak pun kata kakak selalu lambat buat kerja dalam kelas, selalu tak siap”. She replied back “Memang la kakak lambat, sebab haikal tu suka sangat cakap dengan kakak, kawan2 kakak semua suka cakap dengan kakak”. Then I said “Tapi kawan2 kakak semua siap kerja, kakak sorang je tak siap kan?” She slowly nodded her head. “Kalau macam tu bagitau kawan kakak kena siapkan kerja, nak cakap tunggu lepas habis kerja, lepas tu jangan buat kerja lambat2. Mama sayang kakak, mama nak kakak jadi bagus. Kakak nak jadi bagus kan?"

Dania was not giving any respond at first, probably trying to digest what I just told her. After a while she said yes but tears started flowing down her cheeks. Ya Allah sedih gile, rasa macam mak tiri je. Felt guilty hurting my own daughter’s feeling but mommy just had to speak up dear. Hopefully Dania got my message. I don’t expect her to improve immediately but at least she knew now what I expect of her. Rasa macam tak percaya cakap dengan budak 5 tahun but believe me, Dania is far more matured than her age. I know she’s just a little girl but if I can help her improve herself, why not kan?

I love my Dania.

 

 

 

Naik minyak!

I realized that in this few months, my skin gets really oily especially around the t-zone. Rasa kalau kumpul2 boleh buat goreng ikan kot.. hehe yucky! At first I thought maybe it was caused by the facial cleanser, so I tried a new facial soap brand Natasya. Don’t know why I bought this brand, probably because of the ‘nano-technology’ the brand claimed using. Bunyi high tech gitu tapi hampeh, my face got worse and jerawat pasir started berkerumun on my forehead. Switched back to my old cleanser. Next in the line of my experiment was upgrading my facial moisturizer from NV to Dermalogica. Cost quite a fortune but the good news was the pimples started to subside.  However, I was not spared from the bad news because after a week, the oil started piling up again.. huhu.. sungguh buruk. Ok now, since facial cleanser and moisturizer were ruled out of the list, I just have to come out with a new theory. So I’ve done some thinking and i rasa…maybe la  kan... it was caused by me sitting betul2 bawah aircond unit kat ofis ni. After more than a year being directly exposed to the aircond I think it’s possible that my skin becomes dehydrated, kulit jadi sangat kering so sebum works harder to moisturize the skin and got overworked lalu berminyaklah muka. It does make sense doesn’t it? (But for verification purpose; can't u please confirm whether it's true that dry skin makes it more oily? I got this info from the beautician at the salon). So now people, what do u think i should do? Does it mean that I have to moisturize more or should I change my moisturizer again or it is has nothing to do with moisturising? I'm at my wit end. To all beauty gurus out there who are reading this, please.. i need ur advice! But please don’t suggest I move my desk because it’s just impractical … and embarrassing if my colleagues find out the reason behind it :p 

Happy Birthday!

Happy 28th birthday to Siti Buntat and 18th (ke 19th?) to dearest Anna. May all your wishes come true, and God bless!

What a day!

It's 4.27am and I can't sleep. Well, can't get back to sleep actually because Dania woke me up just now requested for milo and when I offered her plain water she got pissed off. So kena la mama bancuhkan air untuk Cik Dania sayang. So since now I'm wide awake, let's talk about my life today. I woke up yesterday morning feeling dizzy, probably because of the nausea I had the nite before (nope, I'm not pregnant people!) Thinking about what to serve for breakfast but found out that it was already served on the table, thanks to my helper Rahma.( Sorry dear, it should be my turn serving breakfast on weekends but I just couldn't help it today). Around 10am mom called from Temerloh asking me to get to her house because some anti termite people is coming for the scheduled treatment. Dania insist to follow and when we were there, she kept trailing me around because she was so afraid of the indian strangers in grandma's house, at one point she screamed like mad when I got out of her sight. Hehe tu la nak ikut sangat sape suruh ;p When the guys left we went to the loo and while Dania's on the bowl she suddenly said "Dania sayang sangat kat mama, mama sayang tak kat Dania?" Aduh, cair hatiku! She then asked how much I love her and my answer was "Hanya tuhan saja yang tahu berapa banyak mama sayang Dania". Don't know whether she understood or not but she just smiled :) My heart still melts now...

Ok sambung cerita. When we arrived home my dizziness got worse, probably caused by the smell of the racun anai2. But since I've promised earlier to my schoolmate to donate some clothes today (he will pass it on to orphanage) kena la jugak bukak kotak2 and almari, sort out old clothes. Petang baru siap, bertimbun2 rupanya! No wonder our drawer was so stuffed sampai nak tutup pun kena hentak2 sket but still I never feel like we have enough to wear ;p Oh, and we also donated some children toys and buai baby (we had three sets, macam nursery!). When everything was done I was left feeling good about myself because I know what I gave away is going to make someone's life better, and also definitely because I finally got rid of the clutters and reclaim back the spaces in my drawer. Bravo azury!! (If only I can pat my own back for the good job done.. ngehehe...)

Ok sambung cerita lagi, walaupun mata dah mula mengantuk. For lunch today, I cooked sup ayam and ikan kembong goreng sambal. Nafis makan banyak sebab banyak sup boleh hirup2. And Dania as usual memang makan byk la, sampai kena pesan makan tak boleh tambah sebab nasi dah bubuh banyak. Macam ibu tiri bunyinye.. isk! Then around 5pm Shah minta tolong marinate his lamb tenderloins in the freezer tapi tak dapat buat sebab dah penat gile masa tu. (Sorry sayang, I promise I'll do it tomorrow). After maghrib we load all the clothes in the car and head off to setiawangsa to meet my friend, only to find that he was not home yet and was trapped in a traffic jam somewhere. Hungry like hell so we decided to try a johor restaurant recommended by my boss. We arrived at Mak Tim Sajian Warisan Johor and were shocked to see people lining up to get seat. Thrilled by the menu, we ordered soto nasi, mee rebus baidali, nasi beriyani gam ayam & tauhu bakar. Unfortunately tauhu bakar habis so ganti otak2. And unfortunately again ayam beriyani habis so ganti ayam masak merah. But despite the series of unfortunate events we left the place smiling because Shah really loved his soto, my mee rebus was super duper excellent and Dania & Nafis loved their nasi beriyani, although we felt like nasi tu tak berapa original johorian beriyani gamnye. Nevertheless, big burp! Alhamdulillah.

My schoolmate came over to the restaurant to collect the donated stuffs. Good to see him after few years, even though I don't remember talking to him at school. But for good cause, I will support anybody for it. So there goes, my life on 5th April. Quite meaningful and exciting.. so can't wait for tomorrow to come. Ok peeps, got to catch some beauty sleep now. Nite! Err.. or morning, whatever :)

And I thought blogging was easy...

Good day mate! If u r one of my fans who frequently browsing my blog for updates (hohoho!), sorry if I disappointed u. Honestly, there were few posts that I've drafted and attempted to upload here but somehow it didn't happen because I thought it wasn't appropriate to be published worldwide. Some of it were quite nasty and might hurt a few souls because I wrote it while I'm mad and emotional.. isk! Trust me, you wouldn't want to read it too. However, I will try my best to keep this blog updated. Who knows, probably one day Dania & Nafis will be reading this too :) and that's a good reason for me to keep on blogging...