Inna lillaah...

It's hard to keep blogging when time becomes a certain constraint. This blog has started waaayyyyyy back on 13th of August 2004. It was when I'm alone sitting in my room doing nothing but blend with the cyber world. It was so glum and I hate autumn. It's neither cold nor warm. This blog almost dead on end of that year. Several times did I try to reincarnate it. But it never as fun as during the times when I started to blog. I've encountered many bloggers during this 4 years.

I have to admit that I find no interest in blogging anymore let alone to write things up, upload pictures etc etc. I dont know what to write anymore. Most importantly, I dont have time to blog blog. Whenever I switch on the laptop, sit in front of it and trying to let my fingers dance on the keypad...my lil' Sofea will come over and asking me to teach her one or two tricks of Internet. Yeah yeah, she literally disturbing me. I wont end up locking myself in the room in the middle of the night while everybody is sleeping just to post my blog's entry. Neither I want to do it while I'm at my office.

So, with such heavy heart, I have to say this blog is dead but will not be buried. It will remain in the coffin so that from time to time, people can come and visit the dead. I have too many social networking site. Blogspot, Friendster (almost dead as well), Facebook, Flickr... forums. *sigh* Ok lah.. bye bye.

Alahai Mami Jarum

A day after Ying Zee's wedding, we went to Penang Island. Ini le acara yg ditunggu2. Mmg dari awal lagi dah pasang niat nak gi Penang Island. Tapi satu hari je mana cukup. Another problem is, I totally buta about Penang. Mmg tak tau langsung jalan kat bandar Penang tu. Buatnye sesat kang, mampos. Nasib baik pulau je. Kalau sesat pun, takde la sampai ke Myanmar.

So, after breakfast kat Bukit Mertajam (alaa... breakfast pun kedai mamak biasa je), off we go. First, we went to meet Azil - Father of Rock. Dia janji nak bagi map sbb dia tak dpt nak tolong jadi tourist guide. Jumpa dia kat jeti ferry.



Father of Rock sedang menunjukkan cara2 baca map Penang

Wahh.. excited giler nak naik ferry. I have to admit that I was jakun to the max! Sofea pun ala2 terkebil2 naik ferry. Seronot tul...





Turun je dari ferry, masing2 dah menggelabah. Nak gi arah mana?? Kiri ke kanan ke? Yang penting, perut ada lapar. Nak lunch. Ibu Sofea pun tunjuk skill jadi co-pilot world rally championship. Bukak map, gi terus, masuk kiri, pusing kanan, etc etc and finally we sampai kat tempat lunch.







(Tak bleh tunjuk gmbr food. Nanti ada org terliuq!)

While having our lunch, we called tourist guide lagi sorang, Anin. Ok la, set appointment, Anin sih tunggu dia kat Gurney Drive. Nasib baik ada Ibu Sofea baca map. Sampai la jgk kat Gurney Drive tengah2 panas tu. Orang kata tmpt ni best. Tapi aku rasa biasa je...



Sofea bosan tunggu Anin lama sgt~!

Anin ckp dia nak bwk kitorg pusing pulau. Mula2 teman dia mkn kat Tanjung Bungah. Aisey, perut dah kenyang tp bau food kat situ tempting plak. Then, kita gi Batu Feringgi (betul ke eja camni?)









Sofea & Anin dan jugak phat to dia...

Our next stop is Butterfly Park. Best tmpt ni tp taktau naper panas sgt. Padahal time tu mendung je. Dalam park ni pun redup. Tapi hangat berpeluh2~!! Kalau ada macro lens, fuh... mmg masyuk amik gmbr kat sini. I tried few shots using my 55-200 tapi tak syok. Tak best. Mmg racun nak beli macro ni...











Sekali ada kaki yg shoot macro, siap tripod bagai... tengok la lens dia. Terasa kecik diri ini.

Lepas tu gi Balik Pulau makan laksa janggus. Time ni Sofea dah tido kepenatan. Anin ckp laksa sini best. Ramai org mkn kat sini. Ada rojak buah, ABC, laksa, gorpis... Lepas mkn, kitorg pun gerak balik la...







p/s - gorpis tu ialah goreng pisang.

Ah Moi & Ah Pek

Berkurun lamanya kalo nak nunggu kita update blog ni. Heh, bukan apa... mmg tak berapa ada masa la. Kalo kat rumah nak ngadap laptop, jgn harap la. Nanti ada makhluk kenit dtg mengendeng sebok nak main laptop jgk. Takkan la nak nyuruk2 dlm bilik siap kunci semata2 nak update blog?? Lain la update blog politik ka... altantuya ka...

Anyway, on the 22nd November we went to Bukit Mertajam to attend ibu Sofea's best friend's wedding, Ying Zee (the ah moi) and Chean Hong (the ah pek). Excited toksah ckp la sbb ni first time pegi Penang after i dunno how many years. Kalo tak silap, last sekali gi Penang ialah masa tahun 1996 or 1997. Dah lupa dah camne rupa Penang. Lagi, nak g ni wedding chinese. Ho Ho... mesti makan best2. I'm longing to eat the sup sirip ikan yu tu. Being first time to Penang, I google la here n there about the place. Manage to get the map to Ocean Restaurant, Tmn Perwira Bukit Mertajam. So off we go~!! Pukul 3 ptg jalan, pukul 6 ptg sampai. Hmmm... boleh tahan jgk dekat nya ye?.. or aku yg bawak laju?



Ini lah dia tempat kejadian.



Ini pula tempat penginapan. Banglo 3 tingkat beb! Haha~

Hmm... berbalik kpd cerita wedding ni. This is my chance to try do indoor shooting. I was surprised with the condition of the hall. Sangat2 low light. I know i'm gonna screw up my shooting sbb i'm a f**king newbie and i'm not well-equipped!! ...and it's true. All my photo sangat hampehs. But i learned a lot from here. I need to improve my composition and I need an external flash to have sufficient light. Apart from that, I might also need a fast lens to do indoor shooting. Don't talk about wide-angled lens yet or else I might break my bank! But it's a good experience.













...and as for Sofea, she's excited sungguh. Berjalan ke sana sini. Main belon2... tgk performance kanak2, and the best part is yam-seng time. All those chinese tu jerit kuat2 "yaaaaaaaaaaammmmmmmmm-sengggggg!!!". Dia pun ikut "yoooonnnn-teng~!".





Sorry lew gambo kecit. Bleh klik la kalo nak enlarge. Takde masa sgt nak post-production gambar2 taken semua. Ini pun ibu Sofea yang tlg p-p kan.

Feeling Nostalgic

Hmm... kadang2 kalau duk sesaja, mesti kenangan lampau datang mengimbau. Nostalgia lama2 terimbas di ingatan. Kalau nak digambarkan secara grafik, mula2 kita jadi fade-out dgn transition liquid gitu sambil diiringi angelic background sound. Alerr.. mcm time flashback dlm tv tu lah! Pastu semua imej2 yg terlintas di otak ni monochrome.

Ni gua teringat pulak jaman2 tinggal di LS7 dulu. Mcm2 le kenangan indah dan tak indah. Tapi gua igt lg, time tu gua mmg hantu alam maya. Addicted nak mampos. Friendster, MySpace, VirtualFriends, Blogdrive, Blogspot, Hi5, all the social networking sites you name it! Even this blog actually started at that time. Setakat YM dan MSN Messenger tu, mmg 24 hours on. Jarang la off.

Pastu lak kan, housemate semua ada girlfriend. Yg gua ni pulak, hampeh tul takde girlfriend. Manjang je tgk org bergayut2, chat dgn awek, dating ler. Gua ni tak habih2 nak ngayat awek, tp tak dapat2. Hehehe~

Di kalangan circle of friends gua time tu, yg mat jiwang diberi gelaran Father of Flower, Father of Flower II. Yang solo tak layan awek2 ni dipanggil Father of Rock. Gua dpt nama Father of Fry. Haaa.. lu pikir la sendiri kenapa jadi mcm tu. Gua punya landlord nama nya Haji. dia org Bangla. hoh!

Anyway, time tu mmg akan gua kenang sampai bila2. Kalau ada rejeki, gua nak gi tgk la rumah tu in future. Bankside Street, Harehills LS7... kau tunggu sana! Gua akan tiba satu hari nanti!!

*hail to all my sakai friends - Tepet, Chot, Zollu & Paiz.

Taylor'swood 2008

Hmm.. this entry is way overdue tapi takpe lah. Nak enter jugak entry nih. Last month, lepas raya, my company was having annual dinner. It was on 17th October. Bertempat di Sunway Pyramid Convention Center and the theme is hollywood. Well, all the staffs are supposed to wear costume that depicted hollywood movies la. For example pakai baju Jedi Knight ke, Superman ke,.. tak kisah la janji character dlm hollywood movies.



I've decided to bring along my wife and of course Sofea. At first, we all takut jgk kot2 halfway through the majlis, Sofea nangis2 ke.. merengek2 ajak balik ke. Tapi, end up dia pulak yang lebih2 excited. Memang laaa dia tak duduk dia kat meja makan tu. Kejap nak pegang garfu, kejap nak pegang sudu, kejap nak ketuk itu ini. Tapi kat belakang hall tu ada mcm big space kan. We just let her main2 kat situ. Dia pun seronok la tgk ada performances, lagu2, joget2, tgk org lalu-lalang berpakaian ntah apa2. Siap kena ngorat dgn anak Mat Saleh lg.



The dinner's banquet hall.



The MC that night was Jules from Pulp Fiction.

Anyway, back to the dinner, it was alright la. Ada performances, ada award presentation, all those normal stuff during company's annual dinner. So, all in all we did enjoy the night. Ingatkan bleh la dapat lucky draw. Hadiah2 yg ditawarkan agak menarik, tapi I'm not lucky :( Main prize is 5 days 3 nights to Gold Coast. Australia mind you, not the Bagan Lalang one... and there's Samsung HTC touch phone, RM10,000 HP laptop. Tapi gua tak dapat apa2~!! Hoh!



There are Julius Caesar, Princess Fiona of Shrek, erm... I don't know this one, and Snow White.



We also have The Phantom, and Princess Leia Organa from the Star Wars trilogy.



Ok, I like this one. You all nak tau tak who are all those Spartan warriors? ...They are actually the top management of the company consists of CEO, COO, Provost, MD, Dato' Loy, ..and also the newly-appointed VC, Prof Dato Dr Hassan. hehe~ sporting habis diorang ni.



This is the winner of Best Costume. Somebody from S.W.A.T. geee.. I dunno where did she (yes, it's a she) manage to get that costume.



*click on pic for bigger view!

..and the best part, I was crowned as The Most Charming Staff of 2008 that night. Ahahahah~~!! Noo laa... that was me and Sofea on the stage when I was trying to answer some stupid trivia question. Dapat laaa keychain bodow seketul. Sofea's not looking at the audience sbb makcik2 penari kat belakang tu duk mengacan dia. Hampeh tul. Oh yea, can you guess which character of Hollywood movies I am?

p/s - sorry for the quality of the pics is not that good. I'll repair it soon. Now got limited time lorr..

Froo Shon Tay

~ welcome to Sofea Frequency Modulation morning breakfast show. On air right now is an epic beatiful number from Coldplay, The Scientist. Enjoy, my fellow listeners ~

Rumah Terbuka

Bertarikh 1 November 2008 hari Isnin, telah diadakan open house kecil2an laa utk sedara-mara dtg ke rumah kitorang. Lagipun, AJK Pekmar nak buat meeting sekali. Kitorang ni malas sket kalau bab2 org dtg rumah nak makan2 ni. Ye la, malas nak buat kerja. Nasib baik mama opah nye ada. Kalau tak, mau lingkup la kitorang. Ibu dah la bendahari persatuan. Tentu nye busy kira duit. Anyway, we managed to do it.

Antara yang datang ialah, AJK2 Pekmar, penasihat2 iaitu Pak Agus & Mak Ebah, Pak Jene, Mak Mah & Cik Lan. Kak Umi sama Nuar pun datang jugak. Bayangkan la... my house ni kecit je. Yang datang ramai... haa dah cramped gila. Lantak le korang. Sofea pun pening tgk org ramai2 menakluk rumah dia. As for me, my A300 tak perform sgt that day. Ruang yg terlalu sempit membuatkan diri rasa ingin menyambar satu very wide-angled punya lense. Hehehe~ tapi tak perlu la... duit nya ngga' ada.

So, sila la... jemput makan2 jgn malu~!







Dah kenyang, bermesyuarat pulak. Apa isi kandungan diorg mesyuarat? Entah la... saya kurang ambil tahu pulak. Tapi bleh la gi usha blog Pekmar nu.





Semua orang dah balik, baru lah Sofea boleh bermaharajalela kembali.



*credit: Sofea's pic taken by Paiz using his Kenorn 450D.

Night Out

After so much persuasion from Si Paiz, ok la.. I agreed. Itu pun, sebab Mama and Kak Baby dtg dari kampung this evening with Kak Chik. Diorang tido rumah kita. So, I have no problem of having a night out since Sofea and Ibu ada geng kat rumah. Kalau tak, jgn harap le. Mana bleh tinggal Ibu and Sofea berdua je kat rumah tu. So, sharp pukul 12 tgh mlm, I'm off to Damansara Damai to pick Paiz. I want to try night shoot pulak. (Shoot siang2 hari pun tak pandai lagi, dah gatal nak mlm2 pulak)

Venue pertama, gi Dataran Merdeka. Lepak depan mahkamah tu sambil beraksi poyo mengambil gambar. Syok jgk kat sini sbb ada mat rempit lalu-lalang. Try2 jgk teknik panning, tapi tak jadi. Susah sket sbb A300 ni, kalau burst mode 2.5 fps je kalo tak silap. Lambat plak tu. Dari segi skill tgn nak panning jgn ckp la. Berterabur... amatur la katakan.



The best panning that I had. Itu pun tak best sgt la...

Then we off to Bukit Ampang. Naaa... ni la tempat muda-mudi ber'khembit' sambil melayan pemandangan bandaraya KL. Set up tripod, then aci tekan je la mana2 yg patut. Tapi hasil tak berapa memuaskan. Nampaknya, byk lg yg perlu dipelajari especially pasal night shoot, panoramic shoot, etc etc ni. Lepak kat sini sampai around 4 a.m jgk la. Tak sedar masa berlalu begitu pantas.



Unsatisfactory shot.



Main bokeh2 lagi.

Lepas tu on the way balik, singgah la minum kat kedai mamak kat tepi KLCC tu. Around 7 a.m. I reached home and zzzZZZZ....

p/s - sorry lew, gambar kecit2. Ni sbb blog post punya area dlm blogspot ni max width dia 400pixel je. Tatau camnenak lebor kan lg supaya boleh taruk gmbr besar sket. Ada sesapa tau camna nak lebarkan area posting ni bleh ajarkan tak?

Metropolitan Park, Kepong

Since Sofea pun dah mula dpt kaki, I decided to bring her n ibu to a park. The only park came into my mind is Taman Metropolitan Kepong. Alaa... kalau lalu kat MRR2 from Gombak to Sg Buloh, mesti nampak ramai org tgh main layang2... haaa kat situ ler. Mesti Sofea suka jalan2 sambil tgk layang2. So off we went... On the way, singgah Pizza Hut Kota Damansara for lunch. A very late lunch that is.



Masa sampai tu, Sofea seems very excited and she was really in awe seeing those layang2 yg byk berterbangan di udara. Sambil2 main bola, dia tgk layang2 dgn jakun nya tuh. As for me, I called Si Faiz suruh dia dtg supaya boleh berkongsi2 knowledge in photo shooting.

Mula2, I equipped my A300 with my tele lense. Alaa, tele sikit je... 55-200. Since dulu dah pernah main kit lense 18-70 masa zaman2 pinjam kamera Put dulu, so nak la try lense tele pulak. I have to say that if I want to shoot bokeh2, it's good to have my tele on. Set the focus point manually, and aperture besar sket in order nak dpt kan DOF yg dikehendaki. Pic bawah ni I use f5.6. This the tip I got from my readings yg tak seberapa la. I am no sifu maaa... still a n00b.



After quite some time, tukar kpd nromal kit lense sbb nak amik gmbr pemandangan2 ni, kena la wide-angle sikit. So, snap2 la sana-sini sambil2 testing and godek2 the cam. Maklum le, baru nak belajau guna. Anyway, thanks tu Si Paiz sbb rajin nak outing sama2 sambil share ilmu.



silhouette pic of sofea & ibu