Hello, can you be more inconsiderate than this?

My first day of a real break from work cant get any better. I am now at the Royal Skies lounge with my mrs waiting for a flight to Bangkok. I am taking time off with her.  She has never been there and I promise her  we will do a bit of shopping therapy especially down at their famous flea and night markets.

we are simply lazying on the nice sofas reading the papers quietly only to listen to the occasional flight announcements. But somehow the soothing sound of water cascading the water fountain is now spoilt by this inconsiderate man who talks loudly on the phone.  He continues opening his big mouth ignoring other passengers around him. How inconsiderate can you get than this? I saw many passengers just shook their heads in disbelief. Yo mister! are you telling everyone that you are so important kah? you are a very selfish, inconsiderate and total moron!!

Sick as a cat

I have been feeling very sick for the last few days (you would say "sick as a dog" but as Muslim I dont like using this idiom. No offence intended against the purity of the english idiom but to be likened to a dog is to me not appropriate) Anyway, I had a very bad case of food poisoning.   I had to go to the A&E two days in a row where they had to put me on water drips as I was losing a lot of body fluid. I also had a huge dosage of antibiotics directly injected through the water tube as well as a good amount of anti-gastric medication as usually antibiotics would give me a very bad acid reflux. Although I am feeling much better now, the stomach cramps are still stubbornly there every odd hour or so. This is probably the longest case of food poisoning I have had.  One was in Bali and the other one was in London.  In Bali it was a bad big mac and London a bad indian chicken tikka. The doctor gave me 2 days medical leave. I took that opportunity to stay in bed doing my reading. I have these few books that I bought during my previous traveling as a globetrotting international lawyer that I havent quite finished reading yet, A short history of nearly everything by Bill Bryson, the clash of civilization by samuel huntington and a non-fiction The Afghan by Frederick forsyth just to name a few. The clash of civilisation is actually an old thesis written in 1993 by a Harvard professor but however after 9/11 it somehow generated a lot more debate. It is a scary thought that conflicts between civilizations would dominate the future of world politics and world order.  Are we returning to period of the crusades? I certainly hope not but some of the prognosis of this Harvard professor has already some tell tale signs.  Islamiphobia in Europe and the USA suddenly on the increase.  Islam suddenly became seen as a third world religion. Although I do not wish to defend the actions of the muslims who kill in the name of religion but I do raise my hope that the world order should also be on the dictate of inter-faith understandings. 

Kosovo is a state, no?

The other day at my Raya open house I had one interesting visitor.  She came from Kosovo.  I told her, I was honoured to receive her as this was my first time meeting a kosovar (I am not sure if that is a correct term). I wanted to learn about her “country” as I have heard so much about the conflicts in the former states that made up the federation of Yugoslavia.  Now Kosovo is struggling to gain recognition of her self-declared independence.  She asked me on my personal thoughts about it.  I told her personally I fully support the declaration as the world has recognised Montenegro as an independent state and after all the former states that formed Yugoslavia had been independent since the war of 1991. so now why Kosovo is singled out as having no right to the very principle of self determination? I asked.  I told her that there were 3 basic criteria of statehood, a defined territory, an effective Government and a determined population.  She then questioned me why then the OIC countries were not supportive of Kosovo independence. I could sense her frustration with the muslim countries as strangely Kosovo being mostly muslims different from the Serbs did not somehow get enough support from the OIC countries in their struggle to gain international recognition of statehood.  I somehow thought she had a point. Most EU countries now recognise its statehood and so as the USA. It is I thought different from Taiwan.  To my recollection, Taiwan had never made an official attempt to self-declare its independence  and the Taiwanese and the Mainland chinese are in effect chinese. So Kosovo is a different proposition altogether. Since 1999 it had been under the UN backed administration. So why is it that the OIC is not supportive of this struggle?

I guess if you wished to to know about the history behind Kosovo move, the following is the extract that I got from wikipedia:

When, Slobodan MILOSEVIC became president of the Serbian Republic and his ultranationalist calls for Serbian domination led to the violent breakup of Yugoslavia along ethnic lines. In 1991, Croatia, Slovenia, and Macedonia declared independence, followed by Bosnia in 1992. The remaining republics of Serbia and Montenegro declared a new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) in April 1992 and under MILOSEVIC's leadership, Serbia led various military campaigns to unite ethnic Serbs in neighboring republics into a "Greater Serbia." These actions led to Yugoslavia being ousted from the UN in 1992, but Serbia continued its - ultimately unsuccessful - campaign until signing the Dayton Peace Accords in 1995. MILOSEVIC kept tight control over Serbia and eventually became president of the FRY in 1997. In 1998, an ethnic Albanian insurgency in the formerly autonomous Serbian province of Kosovo provoked a Serbian counterinsurgency campaign that resulted in massacres and massive expulsions of ethnic Albanians living in Kosovo. The MILOSEVIC government's rejection of a proposed international settlement led to NATO's bombing of Serbia in the spring of 1999 and to the eventual withdrawal of Serbian military and police forces from Kosovo in June 1999. UNSC Resolution 1244 in June 1999 authorized the stationing of a NATO-led force (KFOR) in Kosovo to provide a safe and secure environment for the region's ethnic communities, created a UN interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) to foster self-governing institutions, and reserved the issue of Kosovo's final status for an unspecified date in the future. In 2001, UNMIK promulgated a constitutional framework that allowed Kosovo to establish institutions of self-government and led to Kosovo's first parliamentary election. FRY elections in September 2000 led to the ouster of MILOSEVIC and installed Vojislav KOSTUNICA as president. A broad coalition of democratic reformist parties known as DOS (the Democratic Opposition of Serbia) was subsequently elected to parliament in December 2000 and took control of the government. DOS arrested MILOSEVIC in 2001 and allowed for him to be tried in The Hague for crimes against humanity. (MILOSEVIC died in March 2006 before the completion of his trial.) In 2001, the country's suspension from the UN was lifted. In 2003, the FRY became Serbia and Montenegro, a loose federation of the two republics with a federal level parliament. Widespread violence predominantly targeting ethnic Serbs in Kosovo in March 2004 caused the international community to open negotiations on the future status of Kosovo in January 2006. In May 2006, Montenegro invoked its right to secede from the federation and - following a successful referendum - it declared itself an independent nation on 3 June 2006. Two days later, Serbia declared that it was the successor state to the union of Serbia and Montenegro. A new Serbian constitution was approved in October 2006 and adopted the following month. After 15 months of inconclusive negotiations mediated by the UN and four months of further inconclusive negotiations mediated by the US, EU, and Russia, on 17 February 2008, the UNMIK-administered province of Kosovo declared itself independent of Serbia.

1st Day Raya

1st day of raya is  always the day I am always looking forward.  Not only its a day that the whole family gather around at my parents' house for a reunion of sort, I also get the opportunity to get invited to the palace to meet and greet hari raya wishes to our beloved sultan and his family in a rather joyous settings with all the good food and the best chocolates and cakes you can ever imagine.  I always look forward to this because I could sample the fresh lobsters and huge alaskan crabs and many more. yummy..but as I always I couldnt eat that much as I would normally spend more time giving hari raya greetings to everyone. And the one thing I am sure the guests are looking forward to is probably the Raya souvenir. This year, I have to say the Raya souvenir is really pretty. I am told the palace souvenir was designed wholly inhouse. wow! my hats off to them. Inside it, there is a fruit cake laced with sweet white chocolate coating all produced by the Istana kitchen, Hyatt.

Wishing Mum for a speedy recovery

Mum underwent surgery at around 845 am this morning. She only came out of the operation theatre at around 3 pm.  I went there as early as a I could to catch a glimpse of mum before she went for the surgery. tears ran down my cheeks  and said to mum, "if God willing you would be okay". On the other hand, I wasnt ok. that morning I already had stomach cramps. so I went to the A&E and asked for a diagnosis. I had food poisoning. I wasnt exactly sure what I ate the night before. I had a feeling it was the lassi at this Indian Restaurant as it tasted so bad that I told the waiter to take it away. the stomach cramps were so excruciating that I can still feel them even as I am writing this blog which is like more than 8 hours now. the doctor gave me a jab on my butt and my little brother poked fun at me by saying I had been sodomized! I was given two days MC. Anyway, I thought of giving mum a visit but I am not too sure if I can even get off this bed. 

Praying for Babu

Waking up on Friday morning after learning the shocking news that your mum has cancer is not something that I am looking forward to. The sad news has somehow not sunk in yet. There were just too many questions that remained unanswered. why did this thing happen? am I going to lose her? is this curable? what can I do? why is the full diagnosis not released yet? the feeling of helplessness crept in constantly in my head. when the gastro specialist broke the news, I just broke down in tears inconsolable..I really couldnt accept the news. I was just like this little child begging to the doctor to help my mum get better. “is there a cure?” I asked. The doctor said if the cancer is still at an early stage, yes there is hope by removing the cancerous part of her stomach but if it has already spread to other organs then things could become complicated and that was why they needed a full diagnosis by putting her on a CT scan. I was simply frantically calling everyone that I knew at RIPAS to help babu be put on the CT scan on a priority basis. Some were helpful some were none. So I sought help by pleading my mum’s case. I told them the actual endoscopy was done many weeks earlier and now that the specialist confirmed that she has cancer, the least the hospital could do was to put her on a priority list for a full CT scan. I was thankful that my good friend Hj M and Dato S, who is now a permanent secretary. They had helped me a lot to get to the right people. So thank you to both of you sir. I was really upset with some of the nurses at the hospital where my babu was warded. She was admitted at the ward for her high blood sugar level. But earlier in the weeks, she was already seeing the ENT & gastro specialists as she complained of heart burn. She had an endoscopy done on her and the earlier result showed she had stomach ulcers. When I told them that she was supposed to have a second review at the specialist centre, the nurses told me that we couldnt bring her there as she was now already admitted in the ward and she should be in their care and there would be doctors on duty to attend to her so they told me. They kept telling me that mum only had stomach ulcers and her blood sugar level was high and she had gone to see the specialist that morning. But I told them that that the appointment card stated that she had her review at 2 pm that afternoon and the least they could do was to check with the specialist centre if this was true. Not convinced with their explanation, I went to the specialist centre with my wife and little sister and went to talk the specialist myself. He was very gentle and helpful. True enough, there was an appointment for my mum’s review and true enough it was more than just a mere stomach ulcers. I was devastated. There was a mixed feeling of anger and helplessness. I was angry with the nurses for trivializing the situation. I was feeling helpless as I didnt know exactly what to expect.

(written 8 am 10 October)

The good news, mum had her CT Scan done and another good news was also that the result showed her cancer is still at an early stage. Now we all know this is curable. Alhamdullilah. But there is still the lingering question on what best options available to her. She is diabetic and her blood sugar level is still very high. I sought advice from Dr S who is a cancer expert. Whether she would go for a chemo theraphy and surgery to remove the cancerous part would depend on her health condition. so he told me that mum has to be healthy, so the first priority is to get her blood sugar level down to normal. I pray to Allah the Merciful, give my mum the strength. please give her the will to live. Amin.

Little Haziq and his antics

My youngest 3 year old son lil haziq has this funny habit when he gets upset with me.  Instead of throwing tantrums he would just sit still and start to grimace making funny faces with his eye brows almost joined together.  I would usually just laugh at him and he would get more upset with me as he would know I wasnt taking him seriously.  The other day, he wanted to go to jungle gym, a pay-as-you-enter playground down at Kiulap, in town. I told him that we couldnt go there as often he would like to as its very expensive. So he started to get upset. But what was so hilarious he simply lied flat on the floor with his face down  refusing to budge. He just lied there completely motionless and refused to talk to me.  So I took a few shots of his antics.  My wife and I would usually in our quite moments together share some of these funny antics of all our kids and the littlest one is by far the most hilarious.  I keep reminding my wife that our life would really be empty without them and we should consider ourselves lucky of having 6 wonderful kids with all their different amusing characters.